Why We Can't Quit

"For you are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's."   ... 1 Corinthians 6:20

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Of course, sometimes I'm tempted to pack up this blog. 

You know, to return to pre-Internet days when this happy homemaker lived for her family and herself and spent myriad quiet afternoons alone, at home, vacuuming, washing dishes, sitting on her front porch and writing in diaries no one ever saw.

Oh, I'd write letters to old friends. I taught adult and children's classes at church on Sundays and contributed to the oh-so-occasional weekend seminar and went out to coffee shops sometimes with a friend or two.

There was that, of course.

Yet mostly? My daily life belonged to me (me, me, me) to arrange and do with however I (I, I, I) wanted. It was a quiet, organized, tidy type of life more "Debra-controlled" than God-controlled.

But then, the summer of 2004 came, along with the conviction to begin blogging which meant sharing my life with people across our world who I've never met in-person, nor will ever meet this side of Heaven. Most of them, anyway (having, in this Real World, met a few of you). 

Daily writing here (well, nearly so). Thousands of posts, meaning almost always there's something to write about floating around inside my head, even when I'd rather it would just get quiet up there.

And you know? Blogging (and even being at Facebook) has stretched me, changed me, broadened my proverbial horizons and shown me that yes! Since I belong to God, my life really does no longer belong to me. A God-bought person was never meant to stay hidden away inside a house, a yard or only expressed upon secret diary pages kept inside a drawer.

A true Christian life was never meant to stay that safe, that tidy, that, well, selfish.  

No, we're each given gifts (there are so many!) meant to be shared and a love so full-bodied, golden and overwhelming that it cannot remain so if kept to itself. Love like that must be released in order to keep the love flow, well, flowing, so that the hope remains that lives will change along its course. 

And that is why, nearly nine years later, I'm still here.

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"For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone."   ... Romans 14:7

 Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me."   ... Luke 9:23

Sometimes we're not happy only because we're keeping what we were meant to give away...

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Oh! Have you seen this yet? It's Not About The Nail. It's not only quite true within marriage, but when anyone tries to help us, only to discover we're not ready to actually be set free from our pain, but instead, just wish to complain about it awhile longer.