ME! (just kidding)

So, camp.
Camp has been crazy.

Last week was the most physically exhausting camp I've ever been a part of. Which is impressive, because I was saying that two weeks ago as well. Not that this is at all bad, but exhausting is well... tiring. I loved getting like seven soccer games over the five days of camp last week, and a couple football games, and a couple of awesome recreation games - but now my legs hurt. And it's Wednesday of the next week.

Luckily, this week has been really relaxing. We have to be up and ready to go at 9, and we work until noon. And after that, we are free until the evening rally at 7. So over the last two afternoons, I sat in Paul and Katrina's apartment and talked with Becca Clark and then watched Gilmore Girls, and played in a waterfall. The first was really relaxing in every way, but climbing up waterfalls and swimming upstream a creek wasn't really restful at all :-)

But that's just the physical state of my body (minus the story about the broken toes and the new scars sprouting up on my body). Spiritually and emotionally it's been a fun ride with these five other people that I'm spending my summer with.

I'm full of all kinds of talk that isn't true at all. Like how I talk about how I'm so laid back about the details and I just want other people to take car of them and then let me know what they are so I can be there at the right times.
Well, I thought that until I realized this summer that I actually need to be asked what my opinion is (though I still usually give none) for that to be true. The first few weeks I was really angry at the rest of the group because they would make all the decisions together and then tell me what I was going to do. That didn't really sit well with me at all, and amazingly enough I had a terrible attitude about it.
I also realized that those details need ot make sense to me for it to be true. For instance, on our way to Chamber's camp a couple weeks ago, we had some stuff we needed to get at Wal-Mart, K-Mart, whatever. So we stopped at 5:30 p.m. and we got it. As we stopped I asked if this was dinner or not and was told that no, of course it wasn't (you know, in that tone that makes it seem like you just asked whether or not the sun was out on a 115 degree day). So we stopped two exits later and got dinner. "Brilliant!" I thought to myself.
So I'm realizing that while I may have some patience when it comes to waiting for things, I have very little patience for people.

Granted, this problem is nothing compared to the other huge problem I'm having this summer.

PRIDE!

YAY!!

It's been a good time. And really, all that patience for other people stuff that I just talked about it just a product of this one. I have had the hardest time with certain people this summer for a number of reasons. They are loud and obnoxious at times when they shouldn't be. They are very confused about who they are and what kind of image they want to give off to other people. They are always hanging out with the other college students instead of with the campers/students. They are always complaining about how tired they are. They are usually brining this on themself by being online or on the phone or doing laundry until 3 a.m. when they could just as easily do it the next day.They are always complaining about how the camp should have been run differently. They are always complaining about their campers. They are always complaining.

So for those of you who know me, you should realize that most of these apply to me. Which makes it maddening to me when I truly stop to think about it how much I'm annoyed by them. You can chalk some of it up, I suppose, to me being tired (did I really just admit that?). But really, I just have this idea in my head of how they are supposed to be or act in a situation and they just don't live up to that. Funny, they don't live up to my standards. Heck, I don't, why should they?

So this morning as one of them for the second time in the last 16 hours proceeded to do something to drive me crazy, I just about lost it and flipped out bigtime on them. since it was the middle of the morning rally with the teens, I wisely decided that it wasn't really the time or the place to do that.
And since this person and I have had a couple "run-ins" this summer already where I have wanted to flip out and have had to restrain myself, I decided to drop it altoegether.
Although, I'm writing about it, so did I really?

After the rally I went across the hall to the prayer room to try to journal and write some stuff out and collect my thoughts. A lot of what's above is what came out on paper.

And I just got so frustrated - as I have been all summer - that I know that what I should be doing is dropping my own bad attitude about things and my own standards of what I think should happen and go and apologize for being such a jerk. But of course, given my pride and how of course what I want is right, and I shouldn't have to give up my own rights and my own ideals, etc, I shouldn't really have to do that, right?

I've been mentally grappling a lot for the last few months about "losing myself" in Christ and what it means to "find my identity in Christ". And I was just writing all these thoughts and these frustrations out and wondering how if I am never doing anything htat I want to do and I am always doing what Christ wants me to do, how does that leave me with any sense of my own identity? How can I be anything other than a robot? How, if we are all finding our identity in Christ, is that not pantheism?
I was reminded, as I was writing so much about myself (after someone else tipped me over the edge and I went to write to collect my thoughts about them) of Don Miller and his chapter on Community. He talks about how the way that he was living was as if he was constantly tuned in to this radio station that was all Don Miller all the time. He was insensitive to other's needs and desires, and all he cared about was himself. sure, he could put on this big show of "loving" other people and caring about them, but really it was all for selfish reasons. And nothing was more precious to him than his own wants and his own ego.
And I was like "Aww frick, that's me..."

Not a great feeling.

But all these things were building up in me and I just couldn't figure out how to reconcile them all to each other. I don't want to be so self-centered and egocentric and such and arrogant bastard - but I still want to badly to have a sense of my own identity and something retained that is inherently me.

And I was writing this all out in the prayer room across from the meeting room where one of my other five team members had just driven me up the wall, again, I had this verse (I had to look the reference up just now) just hit me smack in the face that turned everything around for me mentally.

"You are not your own; you were bought with a price." That price is the blood of Christ. He died on the cross for me. If he hadn't, I would be my own and I could gratify all my desires in any way I wanted and I could have my own identity and everything would be just great for me (haha).
But that's not the case.
He died for me. The Son of God came down in a human form and died for me. Out of love I should follow him with everything I have and I should be glad to do what he wants me to do. But I don't - I struggle with myself and my sin nature and I still want my own identity!
The shift came when I thought of the fact that I was BOUGHT with a price. I am not my own. Christ owns me, and He will do with me what He will, regardless of what I want. I don't have any opinion. Sure, I can rebel, but how many dogs do you know that like the pain that goes with obedience school? Because if I rebel and try to do things on my own, that's what I'll get. so why not drop my own thinking about how I have things that I deserve and I have things that I want and just get over the fact that I don't have crap because I belong to Jesus Christ.

I'm not perfect. It won't be easy to make that truth a reality in the way I live. And it won't be fun. And Who knows that I'll always know what Christ wants me to do? That's a big enough struggle as it is. But hopefully now that I am learning just how much I need to let go of myself (for I don't own myself!) it will start to get easier.
That at the very least is my prayer :-)