Be my escape.

The first verse of psalm 10 says: "Why, O Lord, do you stand far off? why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?" if you continue reading, you find out that God is not far off. "The Lord is King for ever and ever; the nations will perish from his land. You hear, O Lord, the desire of the afflicted; you encourage them, and you listen to their cry, defending the fatherless and the oppressed, in order that man, who is of the earth, may terrify no more." (1:16-18)

So, the sight passage that i had to read for my exam was about this guy living in a nightmare and how we are all "bonded by nightmares". Everyone has a story. Everyone has a past. And everyone has their own nightmare, whether it be war, starvation, loneliness...you get the picture. When we're faced with our nightmare, our instinct would tell us to run. And often we do. We run because we don't want to face it (like i've mentioned in my previous blogs). However, we can't run forever, can we?

So this week my dilemma was music class. I know for a fact that i am not a musician. I cannot understand the music the way that i should, and i am almost sure that i am tone deaf. So this year we're playing these incredibly cool songs, but I cant play it. I really.. just couldn't do it. It's not a matter of practice, because i have tried. So then i think i just kinda told myself to stop caring so much about it. I have other things to worry about. Things that would actually aid me in my future. So in a way, it came down to prioritizing, and music came to the last spot. While i was contemplating my situation, all these angry thoughts came to me. "I should've dropped music a long time ago. The teacher is ridiculous, and i really cant take it anymore." etc. On monday, I had a talk with my teacher. (We're going on this trip, and I had to tell him that i dont want to go and i have no money to waste.) Before i talked to him, I came up with all these things that I could say. "Kick me out of the band, I can't do what you expect of me. You can't force me to go on a trip which i don't want to. I need you to stop expecting perfection from me because I'm sick of disappointing you over and over again." Like, I had no fear to say those things to him. I really didn't. I was actually going to say them. But I ended up just... crying. I simply told him that I can't afford to miss school and use money that i dont have. (It's not that expensive, but still, I need to save up for uni.) I felt like I couldn't lie to him at all because I knew that he cared for me. Then my teacher started saying these things that really made me feel like a jerk for ever thinking such angry thoughts in attempt to hurt him. I felt like i couldn't hide from him because his love/care was genuine and I can't run away from that.

Then it suddenly hit me. If I can't even run away from a mere teacher, how can I run away from God? And what can I do to make God so angry that He'll turn His face from me? Everything just seemed so unrealistic. How is it that God is able to take all these crap from me, and yet love me for who I am? There is no logic in that. But God is God. Nothing makes him happier other than me knowing how much He loves me and how much He wants me to "live life to its fullest". Like I said before, we have no idea how much God is capable of doing and how much bigger and stronger and more authoritative than anything of this world. God used my relationship with my teacher to teach me how much more He loves me and my vulnerability. Humans are limited, but God is not. God also taught me that I can't run from Him. I can try to hide all that I've done wrong, but don't be fooled, He already knows. There's no use in keeping secrets from Him, it only makes us feel more guilty by attempting to hide.

Whatever you're running from, you know that God is your escape. God is there, 24/7, waiting with open arms to listen and to embrace you for who you are. :)
Listen to "Be my escape" by Relient K if you want. I stole the title from them. hahaha.

--a.