Daybreak

Behaviors, Attitudes and Character

I read about the difference between these three today. 

To sum it up, there’s a viral problem with today’s culture- we’re all trying the change out “attitude.” We’re all trying to change our actions, or “behaviors.”

Literature from the early 1800’s shows a type of writing that shows a foundational character of fundamentally extraordinary men, like Benjamin Franklin- one of the modern author’s this is seen in is C.S. Lewis.

You see, we as a culture want out attitude to change about certain things. And therefore, we want our behaviors resulting from those attitudes to be different. 

But how can you build a house with walls and no floor? How can you build a car with no frame?

The author of the book I was reading is basically saying this; when we begin to heart-achingly and tiringly work character traits such as integrity, compassion, work ethics, etc…we will then see our attitudes change- and in turn our behaviors.

With no change of heart, we’re basically putting a band-aid on a severed limb.

Stiffled Words

There’s a motivation behind everything. 
Some men are driven by diligence to serve whatever it is they serve- themselves, idols, their lust and need for carnal satisfaction. Some men are driven by the need to be accepted socially. Some men are driven by internal forces yet to be determined. Some, the love of their family and the need to support them. 

I urge you-no, implore you, to look beyond your paradigm. I urge you to reconsider someone’s motives before you cast the stone just “in your head.”

I had someone tell me recently that they wouldn’t dare judge someone to their face, or even to other people. What I gathered from this was that this person wouldn’t gossip or slander, but are gossip and judgement not two different things?

Our culture has become one that says it’s okay to judge as long as we don’t create the “compound sin” of judgement and slander. So I once again urge you to assess the motives and foundations of your heart. Train your mind to search for value in tarnished gold, not to simply disregard it. 

Because, to be honest, if that’s how God thought…well, we’d all be pretty screwed.

Pray

Some day our well of words will run dry

Then what will we do?

Haven

It was a cool, misty fall day. The leaves whispered to the ground as they gently and moistly plopped into it’s lap. It was a time for change, which they’d derived from the weakening of their stems and faded colors masking their veins. They could feel the soft, malleable soil upon the stems as they wriggled in deeply to the ground with each passing wind. 
They sought to depart from the skies for fear of being taken to a faraway land by the gusts, never to rustle at home with their families again. Soon they had decided to move on and join the earth, knowing they wouldn’t have much longer to dance in the wind after their departure.
Need not worry, spring will bring us home again.
Once they tangled in for the fall they decided to stay there for a season, thinking, “it will only be a short while before we join the earth, deep I it’s skin and become a part of the new soil- a part of spring’s rebirth and beauty.
So they slept, then they rested
Then they decayed.
The snow-laden months were unforgiving and sent them spiraling quickly into the frostbite, the frost crawling along their veins…creeping into their souls…gnawing at their bones.
They hadn’t realized they wouldn’t be able to hear the songs of their rustling anymore when the warmth departed. They were stifled by the unyielding frost…muffled by the slowly built structures resting on their fragile frames.
Need not worry, spring will bring us home again.
They aged with the drop of temperature, cracking and convulsing- trying to escape their icy tombs and rest with the sun among the horizon once again…but to no avail. 
The trails of weeks and seconds led them to their collapse, and they sighed with relief as they no longer suspended the muffling snow on their shoulders. Moisture rose to meet the sun once more, calling out with the sound of a small whisper as if singing “raise us to the haven, once more.” 
The elderly leaves had long departed into the crevices of the earth, finding rest again.
They never realized that by joining the earth they were strangling the grass of spring and all it’s beauty. Sucking up it’s life and covering is as a smokescreen enclosed in it’s lungs.
They had the most pure intents, to live in harmony and join the earth to watch it become a flower. The wind had told them nothing of the gloom that would befall the spring, even as it’s traveling had revealed it to them many a time.
The leaves simply wondered about the haven the snow had departed to.
Need not worry, spring will bring us home again.

The hard part about trying to argue an important topic over the internet; it takes far more time to convey your true heart on the topic and it’s far harder to receive.

Brutally Honest

I’ve found myself weaker than I’ve ever been and stronger than I’ve ever been in different ways, being in my first real relationship. All I want to say is this; to be brutally honest, it’s hard being a 17 year old and being committed. Being committed in every way- in the way I look at other women, the way I use my words, and the way I turn my gaze or don’t turn my gaze.

I’m very public about how I had struggled with pornography for a long time. I find myself in a place where I have this constant fight between my flesh and my foundations, knowing the right way and seeing down the alleys where wrong is faded into the brick walls right along with the right.

Guys/girls, commitment is hard. It requires sacrifice. It requires putting yourself aside- and whether we want to say it or not, that’s hard- even for the ones we care deeply for. It means not only committing to omission from sinful acts (because you should conquer those before you enter into a relationship anyway in the case of pornography and/or accountability,) but being committed to the others purity. If you can’t submit to someone’s purity and boundaries, you have no business being in that relationship.

With that thought, keep this in mind. I’m not perfect, I’ve made mistakes, and I have no intention of hiding that and being a hypocrite. 

All I want to say is that person deserves all of you- and all of themselves until there’s a ring on that finger.