Love the new look. Would like to solve all Neuro's problems. Unfortunately am mere human. *shrugs*, suggest smoking???

Don't worry, I'm moving to Your Town. When I get there, the point of your existence will become clear. You were born to entertain me!

Tg

Sounds like you are in a great place spiritually right now. I can predict this ->
Next comes some sort of crisis, unless you somehow manage to work up enough of a sense of real need of God, beyond simply missing His presence (I never can, unless through extreme amounts of praying and maybe even some fasting, and I don't even think the effects of that method last very long compared to a crisis) ->
And then comes the warm fuzzy bit were you recognise more than ever before how you look before God and how your circumstances don't matter because the only ones that count are what God defines as good, so you might as well just focus on God, and it all makes sense, and you hold on to this as long as you can before too many aspects of life start to seem too important ->
And hopefully this doesn't happen, but you for some reason lose that joy in God because you forget that prison, were everything is attractively neat and tidy, is a horrible horrible place, and you start subtly thinking God isn't as important as what is going on in your life, and since life doesn't bring you joy, you wonder why you don't feel as good about life, or about God anymore. ->
A crisis happens, you learn all over (instead of just in your head) that you can't depend on your circumstances or your mental stability or etc, and you depend on the only dependable, God. ->
etc.

Happens all the time, don't worry about it. But each time it happens I think that we learn a bit more.

PS. Thanks so much for this blog. I am beginning to go back into the state that hopefully you will soon come out of, but you showing it to me helps, and me talking about it helps, and I'm going to go home and pray and hopefully stave it off for another while. Teaching was pretty nasty and it is only a month since I was there.

I don't want to have to go through something similar again too soon. It is possible to go through a crisis without changing, but not when you are surrounded by amazing Christians who can encourage you. You yourself are an amazing Christian, helping me and maybe others by this blog. No matter how far you feel you are away from God, I can tell you He is definitely very close right now, not just from His promises, but because He has just used you to help me. He doesn't base your status on anything you or I base it on, except on Jesus (think dove coming down from heaven to alight on you, and a voice).

Baffled Heathen, I am sitting now with my first packet of cigs and a lighter before me (it is a novelty lighter that looks like a syringe). What have I got to lose? Plus I can explain the honey in the rock stuff if you like but you are so smart as to have guessed the jist of all of it anyway I'm sure.

Teragram, I will gladly dance a jig your way any time.

jimlad, I am really moved by your serious response to my flippant address of serious problems and am encouraged too that it looks to you like I am in a good spiritual place.

I know it is healthy to struggle in faith, to keep vitality in oneself, but sometimes I grow tired of the struggle when I see so little growth in myself? I mean, what the fuck is my problem really? Sin - and other shit? I am quite honestly astounded that this pile of rubbish blog I publish less and less frequently could be a source of help to anybody! You're one of those people who builds others up instead of ripping them down. So thanks jimlad. It's good to share the same family. :)

I think C.S. Lewis says something about closeness to God, that when we are caught up in His Presence, our need of Him doesn't seem so important, and that when we are caught up in our sin, our perceived need for him is greater, so (I'm not sure what he says about this) in which instance are we actually closer to God?

When I met you first, one might consider that I was at my weakest point in my walk with God. It is only recently that I have been able to say that yes, my faith is actually much greater now than it was when I was a child. When I first met you it seemed that my security in God was much lower, because I was emphasising how I fit in with mankind, showing that I feared man more than God.

This is where you a small handful of others helped me, because you are God fearing men and women. But think, when I was growing up any miracles that happened related directly to my own growth rather than impacting others directly. So the fact is, my faith had not been tested in how I interacted with the world. When my faith was tested this way, I gradually fell backwards for maybe four years. After I met you, I began to gradually defeat this sin.

But think again, did my new self diminish at any point in this struggle? No, the worse my sin got, the harder the new self fought, and the bigger my old self appeared to be, until when the old self was most apparent, my new self made the decision to make an effort at identifying myself with other Christians.

Recently I repented of looking for self-worth in any area of my life, including my job. In order to fully appreciate our acceptance by God we need to throw away the burden of looking for life in other things. It is a great burden, and the sense of joy that comes from throwing it off is proportionally great. Teaching, or helping kids with H.I.V. does not bestow any more worth on a person than fixing bugs in software. God bestows the worth. Did I suddenly increase in faith when this struggle came to a head? No! It looked like my faith was weakening for years, and yet I was growing all the time!

But when I am close to God, I am distracted by concerns again, sometimes the same concerns as those I have repented of. This is why your honesty helps me, because it awakens an honesty in myself about where I am placing my value again too.

I have a tendency to assume I am worthless, rather than the opposite sin, but how much am I worth if the one who defines me (and someone who has no higher power to look to has no valid place to find their definition, ergo self-worth) in the first place is willing to die for me? And how much I want to follow a God like that. And the more I struggle with not following him and seeing how unhappy I get in not following him, the more I want to help others to get to know him. Maybe it is your honesty about this struggle that makes you so good at sharing your salvation, Neuro? Apart from your braininess of course.

One other thing that comes to my mind at the moment, since I have a better job and everything, and since you have a better situation all of a sudden, is to find out what it means to take pride in one's low position when one is doing better in life. We are used to trying to take pride in our high position, so maybe we've forgotten to change our attitude in the transition of circumstances?

I hope it was all right to write for so long on your blog. If it helps you it should be worth it. I could have expanded this out on my own blog but you are too intelligent for there to be any point in explaining what I am saying.

Oh flip, that was a lot longer than I thought it was. Feel free to delete it, but save it and email it to me and I will fill it out and put it on my blog.

I don't mind if youleave it here, but I also wouldn't mind if you expanded on it in your blog. Go on ahead and do that like a good Jimlad.