To be lost with You
In utter abandon
Arms spread wide
Head thrown back
The passion of silence
or a ragged breath
or to shout with all my strength
I can feel You moving
My heart is fuller than full
I am caught in the storm with You
The storm that may just very well be You
The storms that tears down and rebuilds
That drops me to my knees
To my hands
To my face
Until I have abandoned myself
and taken on You
Fill my heart, fill my soul, fill my mind
While I am here
With You
Lost in utter abandon

I'm a person of ideas. I've got a lot of thoughts that never go terrible far. Some burn out, and just become a memory. Other burn down and just become a way I live or a part of who I am. Then there are those that stay burning. There are those things that you hear, or learn, that just stay with you. Burning up your mind. For me, the biggest ones are poverty, injustice, and oppression. I can not hear the combined wealth of 500 richest people is more than the combined wealth of the 3.3 billion poorest and just move on. I can not watch the leader of a nation tell her army not to worry about human rights violations, but to just kill and oppress and ravage a minority, and just not say anything. Lately I can't stand that I can walk into a mall and most of the clothes in the building were made by slaves, many of whom were children, or working in unsafe conditions. I hate, and I mean hate, that you don't even really have the choice to buy things that were made or harvested by a person who was paid a fair wage for their work and worked in a safe environment. I hate that kids don't have food or clean water. I hate that millions are dying and millions more are being ravaged by a horrible disease. I hate these things, but like I said, I'm a person of ideas. So I don't know what to do, or how to make it happen. So why am I saying anything? I don't have a plan. I'm not really asking anyone to do anything, I just believe there is power in speaking out against injustice. I believe that perhaps some will hear or read this and tell someone else, who in turn will tell another. Then, maybe, just maybe, there will be enough people who will stand against this, who will stand and say "no, this can not happen" that we can't be ignored. And maybe, just maybe this message will even make it's way to someone who takes ideas and turn them into action and will say "yes, I know what we can do." Maybe...

There was once a potter and a lump of clay. The lump of clay sat on the wheel, waiting for the potter to put his hands to it and begin to form it into a beautiful piece of pottery. As the potter prepared to throw the clay, the clay began to think about what was going to happen. The clay thought about how the potter had chosen this piece of clay over the other pieces, how he had come and pulled it from the pit and chosen it to become a beautiful piece of art. As the clay thought of this is was overwhelmed with joy, and despair. Joy because it had been chosen, but despair because it was unworthy. This potter made beautiful things, saw beautiful things all day long. It was just an ugly lump of clay, it was nothing compared to the beautiful pots and jars it saw in the potter's shop. As the potter began to throw the clay, molding it and shaping it into what he wanted it to be the pot called out. "Wait, stop, I'm not worthy of you right now. Potter let me go away, let me go and become worthy of you. Let me become the pottery you want me to be. I can be beautiful, I promise I'll be perfect. Then I'll come back and you'll see, you'll be so proud and you'll love me then. I won't be this ugly unfinished lump of clay anymore."

The potter looked at the little lump of clay. He thought of the plans he had for this little piece of clay. The beautiful pot it was going to be. He thought of how he loved this piece of clay, it was perfect for the role he had chosen it for. It was just the right density, had just the right weight to be the pot he wanted it to be. He thought about how he loved the molding and shaping of the clay. He loved making the pots as much as he loved the finished product. He loved getting his hands in there, being involved with this little pot, watching it grow and change before his eyes. Watching it become what he had dreamed for it be. He looked at that little pot, so sure it could go away and come back and then be deserving of his love and he laughed. "Little pot, do you think I'm surprised you're not finished? Of course I'm not, I'm the one who's going to finish you. Do you think I will love you more when you are done? I won't, it's not possible for me to love you more, that's how much I care for you. Do you think that if you go, and become this perfect pot without me that you will bear my stamp? I want to create you little pot. I chose you because you are perfect for what I want you to be. Will you take away the pleasure I get from making a pot? I'm not a potter because I have lots of finished pottery. I'm a potter because I create, I shape, I mold, I make pottery. That is why I am a potter, little pot, stay here, let me mold you, know that every step of the way you are becoming what I want you to be. Know that every step of the way I love you for what you are and what you will become, I am invested in you. That is what makes you so precious little pot. 

Life for Jessie is good. This is just a big mass useless update. Useless because my life is basically the same. I go to school and I go to work or I hang out at my house. lol. YA isn't as terrible as it could be, surprisingly enough. I mean, yes I deal with some of the stupidest people in America and I have to assume that most of them are illiterate otherwise how could they not read what's right in front of them...and I have to apologise for their mistakes constantly. But hey, at least it's call in and not call out. Now most of the people who yell at me usually end up saying "and I know, it's not your fault, I'm just venting right now." after a twenty minute rant. So ya, that's Jessie's life.

"I used to want to be a doctor, then I wanted to be an artist, now I've realised that there is nothing called hope in my future."

-Born into Brothels

You know what I love about God? It's that, even when everything is crappy, and He feels like He's a million miles away and like He could care less about your life, He still demands that we worship Him as wholeheartedly as we can. I may sound sarcastic, but I'm one hundred percent serious. Just days ago I was railing against this God. The God who comes in and out of my life like a whirlwind, demanding change and responsibity. The God who makes me fall in love one week and then disappears the next. The God who demands my worship no matter how I feel about it because He is worthy of worship no matter where I'm standing. Just days ago I was standing in a room full of people praising this God, being close to this God and I was angry. I was angry because my words felt empty and I remembered, oh I remembered the God who was so close to me. The God who was there when I woke up, the God who walked with me into every difficult situation. The God who came into my life like a whirlwind, encouraging change, holding my hand and leading me to my best. The God who made me fall in love over and over again, deeper and deeper. I was angry because I saw this God connecting with others and when I strained to hear his voice and feel his presence I got nothing. I was angry because it felt like He was always coming in and out of my life, there one day, gone the next but always saying worship me. Praise me. Pray to me. Just one day ago I felt His presence pour into my life like the wind, or the rain, or hot chocolate and a warm blanket and a loved one or like sunshine in the winter, all so cliche and none adequate to describe the presence of God but as true as we can get. So why do I love that God demands we worship Him even when we don't want to? Because when we worship Him, no matter how unwilling, we are reminded just how worthy of worship He is. Because it opens our hearts to Him, to let Him squeeze back in where He belongs. Because even if we don't really mean the words, He'll still hold us to them. Because it reminds us that He never left us, we just stopped listening and turned around. Even when He is silent He is there, watching, waiting, holding, and above all loving.
"I'm so bored of little Gods while standing on the edge of something large, so close to You." David Crowder.
What a Glorious day and what a wonderful God. Blessed be his name, though there's pain in the offering blessed be His name...

wow. been awhile. I don't really have anything important to say. i'm glad school has started again. I know, what the hell is wrong with me. Honestly, I don't even really like any of my classes. I just like having somewhere to go in the day and that feeling of working towards a goal I actually care about. Not that taking General Arts and Science is really a meaningful goal...but it's getting me where I want to go, well, sort of.
AND
"exciting" (and I use that term very loosely) news. I got a job at YA Canada. wheee. another call centre job. thankfully it's call in not call out, so i'll have people calling ME, i'm hoping there will be less anger directed towards my person and more anger directed towards some faceless corporation whom i can also hate. yay!

So, it's official. Nick and I are getting married on September 14th, 2007. huzzah!

 

AND...

 

I never really got in to New Years. I grew up in a small church and the New Years event was hanging out at the church playing Scategories and eating pumpernickel bread. Which is great if you're thirty and married with small children or are one of those small children. I remember one year we had an N64 and it was like...the new cool thing at the church. Needless to say, as I got older, New Years got suckier. So this year I look forward to my first real New Years event. Seriously...my first. I know, I'm a loser. Almost twenty and and going to my first real New Years event this year. But hey, whatever...it's actually going to be cool. Plunge is putting on what sounds like a cool event so I figure, why not make the first a biggie. Whheeeeee! And now for shameless advertising. come. yay!

 

Jessie out.

 

P.S. so excited about getting married! yay!

I met with God today. On a bus in fact. On a wet, dirty, ugly bus I met with the Creator of the world. Crazy I know. Unbelievable too. But no less true. Today, my heart was full of worship as I sat on that dirty, ugly bus. I watched birds take flight and felt the wind in my soul. Not that scary, forceful wind. The wind that pushes you to do right, and to be right, and to live your potential. The wind that not many of us like. No, that other wind, the gentle wind. The fresh, light wind before it rains. As the skies get dark and the clouds roll in, that wind picks up. The wind that precipitates that cleansing, refreshing rain. The kind of wind that brushes your hair off your face as you close your eyes and spread your arms. The wind that makes you run to the end of a dock- any dock- and throw your arms out and just...stand. Just stand and feel that wind on your face and in your heart.  The wind that says it's not going to be ok, but you can make it. The wind that says I am here. In the darkness I am here, in the light I am here, I just am. And as you stand on that dock, with your arms spread out; as the clouds roll in and the skies get dark; as you sit on that dirty, ugly bus, and the air begins to crackle with the sound of distant thunder rumbling may you feel this wind. May you meet with the Creator of the world. It's crazy, it's unbeliavable, but it's so true, like the wind in your heart, it precipitates the cleansing rain and the greatest meeting of our lives.

I hate grammer, hate it, why? do you ask. Because, it's grammer. frick. I have a test tomorrow morning on grammer. Yup, 60 multiple choice questions on grammer. Actually can I change my subject...I hate grammer TESTS. the tricky, sneaky...who really cares kind of tests. the ones where it's like...no, in this case the comma should be here and see this colon, that's a semi-colon, ya and your period, two spaces too far away. stupid grammer. hey, at least it's open book!