Yesturday, Today, And Tomorrow

Sorry in advance, this is going to be a bit of a rant.

So I know I haven't posted in forever. This is Sorry # 2. And I never really let whoever reads this know how the whole Haiti trip ended up going. And I will say that it ended about a month short and all in all it was hard at times, fun at times, but most of all I learned a freaking ton about a lot of different things.

I just updated my profile on here so if you want to know or you don't know where I am at now please read my profile first because the rest of this post probably won't make sense otherwise.

Anyways,

So I can't really nail down one reason that motivated me to write this post but I will say it was probably a series of events that have happened over the last month or so .

Recently it has been extremely hard to figure out why I feel like crap all the time.
I have this problem with feeling like I am not good enough or like I am too young and inexperienced to do the things that I am doing successfully. Every day I run into situations where I can not figure out the best possible solution to the problem. In the past more often than not I was pretty good at coming up with the best thing to say or do. That doesn't mean that I always did say or do these things but at least I sort of knew in the back of my mind what the best possible way through any particular situation was. Nowadays I run into problems all the time that I don't have a clue how to handle. I get all my emotions mixed up in things, and when that happens I decide to say or do something that later I regret. In the past, there have been very few things that I regret doing. In the past month, I think I've probably doubled the number of regrets that I've had over the time that I've been alive. For instance, buying a truck that now I've invested in more than double what it's worth. AND ITS STILL NOT WORKING PROPERLY...or some of the things that I have done for some of the residents in my apartment building where I work that has gotten me into crappy financial situations and/or awkward conversations with my boss; both of which I walk away feeling like a complete idiot. Or the fact that I haven't communicated with some people that have played a big part in my past and that I no longer live in close proximity to when I fully know that I probably should reach out to them but I don't due to some fear of feeling guilty or saddened or regret or simply because I don't allow myself any time to focus on anything but what I am doing right now. These things just scratch the surface of my regret. There are a lot more that I'd rather not put on here due to the fact that I don't have a clue who reads this.

So the more and more I feel regret the more and more I realize that humans aren't designed for regret. I really don't think that any man/women/child is designed to have to deal with the emotion called regret. Some of you might think that I'm crazy so I guess I'll have to explain myself.

So if you haven't read any of my other posts or looked at my profile let me first say that I love my God and I consider myself to be a Christian. As of right now I am not really part of any church denomination or anything like that simply because I don't think God intended for there to be any denominations in the first place.

The idea of Christianity is a simple one, but It's extremely (let me say it again) EXTREMELY hard to actually live out.

I am not talking about doing everything right or wrong, or partying or going to church, or becoming a hypocrite, or having to abide by all these rules and regulations that some might read the Bible to be.

I am actually talking about somewhat of the opposite. You see, the hard thing about being a Christian in my mind is not buying into the Ideas that the devil has out into this world. These worldly ideas that if you are a Christian that you automatically have to act better and be better than someone who is not a christian. Some people that go to church and such buy into that idea, which leads them to attempt to be perfect, which then leads them to the inner-idea that I can't do this, so whats the point? and the outer-idea that I am better than everyone else because I am a christian.

I see around me so many different interpretations of what the Bible says. I also see around me so many different actions based on what the Bible says.

But deep inside of me I get this feeling inside my gut that is screaming at me. It says "THIS IS ALL WRONG". For the longest time I wasn't sure where this feeling came from therefore I ignored it. Now, I am quite sure that this message is from my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

You see, Jesus said a bunch of things when he was here on earth, and when you go through and read all these things you see that Jesus came to this earth to totally reverse the ideas created through human logic. For instance, the idea that if you do a bunch of good things in your life you'll go to heaven. Or like the idea that the more money I have the more happy or successful I will be. Or like the idea that if I go to church and spend a few hours thinking about God once a week than my relationship with God is where it needs to be. Or the idea that I am not good enough to be around God or talk to God and therefore I have to fix myself before I go to God So I can then say "hey look, I fixed myself...aren't you proud." You see there was this plethora of mentalities that people had in their minds when Jesus came to this earth, and people still have these ideas in their minds today. I must admit that I have bought into these ideas produced by my own logic time and time again. I am as guilty as everyone else in this matter.

Here comes the cool part.

So Jesus came to this earth teaching things that have never been taught before. For Instance, the first thing Jesus starts out saying when he preached the "Sermon on the Mount" was that the people that are spiritually poor are the ones who are going to receive the Kingdom of God. WOW...That alone doesn't make any sense if you are thinking through human logic. You would actually end up saying the people who are spiritually rich are the ones who are going to get the Kingdom of God.

So the point I am trying to make is this:

1. God is merciful enough and loves us enough to allow us to be with him even though the list of all of our good deeds and our bad deeds will never ever ever compare to Himself.

2. When you become a Christian you will still continue to screw up. Actually, you will never stop screwing up.

3. The difference is that when you are a christian you don't have to worry about screwing up or not screwing up or doing the right thing or the wrong thing or going above and beyond or ending up on the streets, or regretting the decisions you've made or worrying about messing up again, or worrying about how you are going to fix the problem that you are in.

( I know that sounds crazy )

4. There is one verse in the Bible that explains this point of mine.

Matthew 6:33-34
"But seek first His kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own."

Ok that was 2 versus, sorry.

But what does this actually mean. Well how do we seek His kingdom and His righteousness? This is the hard part I was talking about.

So let me sum it up like this.

We, as Christians, tend to make our lives a whole more difficult than it should be because we misinterpret the verse that says seek His Kingdom and Righteousness. We often think that this means we have to make sure that we are righteous and that we are perfect and that we aren't screwing up all the time or as much as we used to.

Well I think this is wrong. This is simply my opinion. I think that God never intended for us to worry about all this crap that we always worry about.

I dont think God wants us to worry about what everybody is thinking when they talk to us or what person you are going to date next or what person you are going to marry or if your kid is going to be a boy or girl or what you are going to have to do when you have a kid or how much its gonna cost to get your vehicle working again.

I think that God loves us a ton, a whole more than we can comprehend, and I also think God is a powerful God, a whole lot more powerful than we give Him credit for.

So if you can get to a point where you can absolutely believe that God made you, that God loves you, that God wants the best for you, and that God has the power to do all these things, why on earth would you be so freaking worried about all this small worldly crap that we face on a day to day basis.

Please know that I am saying this to myself more than anyone else...this is something I am trying to figure out...I suck at this life, and God knows it...Just like a baby sucks at walking...and when that baby falls down his/her parents aren't gonna get pissed off cause the baby fell down, they were stoked in the first place when the baby took the first step...

So the question shouldn't be "Why can't I stop falling down". The question should be "How can I look up at God after I fell down and say please help me back up"

That, in my opinion, is one of the hardest mentality shifts there is. And if I were to be totally honest, I don't think I'm completely there yet...And I really don't know if Ill ever get to a place where I can seek God in all aspects of my life all the time...

Anyways, I think that I've illustrated my point of view. I hope you enjoyed this rant, and if you didn't, please know that you were warned at the beginning that this was going to be a rant.

God Bless you all and as always, I am going to try to post more in the near future but obviously I am not very good at that. So again I will TRY and we will see what happens.

- Daniel