When Jonah and the Whale Isn't a Story About A Big Fish Anymore

I think that I am Jonah right now. 

Now get this. God. The CREATOR of the ENTIRE UNIVERSE only wanted Jonah to go to this town called Nineveh, but Jonah went in a different direction entirely. God legit told Jonah to do something that was SO simple, and Jonah was like "Nah". And you know what? That decision had consequences. Jonah got onto a boat with some men, and God sent a storm into the seas. What does Jonah do? He goes to sleep (ignoring God once again). Then, the men all started to freak out, naturally. And then they asked if there was anything that they could do to stop this, and nonchalantly Jonah is like "oh yeah, just throw me off the boat. This is really my fault anyway." So, the men plead with God and ask him not to get angry that they're throwing this man off of the boat, and into the waters, Jonah goes. 

Do you know what I find baffling? God STILL provides for Jonah. He provided a large fish to swallow him up for three days and three nights, and then the fish spit him out on dry land after that. So eventually Jonah goes to Nineveh and warns them that the city is going to be destroyed, right? But when the message gets to the king, he repents and the town turns away from their wickedness. Then, God decides to not destroy the town. You know what Jonah does? He gets angry with God and decides that he'd rather be dead than alive. God calls him out on it and says "Is it right for you to be angry?" 

Jonah then goes and throws himself a pity party at the edge of the town to pout some more after that and then God STILL PROVIDES a leafy plant to grow over Jonah as he slept. Then, because Jonah did not tend to it or nurture it, the plant dies in the morning. And what does Jonah do? He gets UPSET. AGAIN. God then again calls him out on it and makes Jonah realize that he was more concerned about a little plant than he was about the lives of hundreds of people. 

Do you notice a pattern here? God provides, Jonah gets upset, God provides again, Jonah gets upset... AGAIN. 

How many times do we do that in our own lives? Honestly, God's only been wanting us to follow his commandments. (Seem's simple, right?) And you know what? I fail at that EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.  And sometimes my choices have bigger consequences than others. I chose this summer to run away from God when he was there the entire time saying "go this direction" and I went the entire opposite. I got on the boat and pretended to not know why it was storming all around me. My storm included losing a friend who I had so much respect and adoration for because I chose to make bad choices and ignore everything that he had to say to me. My storm included losing myself a little bit because I wanted to satisfy myself with earthly things instead of Godly ones. And you know what? I'm hoping that moving back to college is like getting thrown off of that boat and into a large fish. I need my savior who ALWAYS provides, even when I don't realize it. I'm so grateful for God's overwhelming grace and his overwhelming love for us because most of the time I don't act like he's there at all.  

We serve a God of mercies. That renew every single morning. 

I'm blessed with the people in my life now, and I'm working so hard to be the girl who is on fire for Jesus, instead of the girl who is running away and fleeing to a different town. 


Thanks for reading & staying on this wild journey with me.

-Emma Jane

False Expectations

As women, we are really good at compartmentalizing sections in our lives, and multitasking all of them. This applies to men as well. As a single woman, I've noticed that I have certain guys in my life to perform specific tasks. I have one that I can call when my car breaks down, another who will come and pick me up if I need something or someone to talk to, and the one that I want to help fix my heart. I assign these roles pretty subconsciously, to where the guy may not even know he's fulfilling that role in my mind. And that, my friends, is where it gets dangerous.

With roles come expectations. And if the other party is not aware of these expectations, usually I am the one who gets hurt. My brain goes "but you're my ______ person so you have to do ______". This mentality is how I believe that I get stuck in emotionally compromising situations, romantically and with friendships. Romantically, I see a guy that I want, so I share some of my heart with him, and he generally listens. Then, without defining any sort of relationship, the guy answers back with pieces of his heart. This moment is when the expectations are set. That person becomes my: "share your feelings with him" person.  With friendships, it pretty much works the same way. I get disappointed if someone doesn't fulfill their role in my life that I've set for them, even if they don't know what that role is. Therefore, it's not fair to them for me to be angry or upset. However, I still do. I tell myself that they were my person for emotional support, physical comfort, car help, etc. or sometimes it's all of the above.

This little thing that (probably most) women do is one of our superpowers but also one of our destroyers. It's a superpower because women are wired to connect with other humans. We are so plugged into other people and we're honestly pretty good at making conversations flow and helping people feel at home in any situation. We crave deep conversations and that vulnerability from the men in our lives. However, doing this destroys us because we set up unrealistic expectations, and we end up craving attention that doesn't even belong to us. As connectors, we crave that praise as well. I would love for someone to come up to me and tell me that they felt at home when they're around me, you know? Women crave those words of affirmation that they're doing their natural abilities correctly.

However, at the end of the day, it's nobody's job to tell me that I'm doing a good job. And our validation as women comes from the Lord who formed us in His image. He created us in our mother's womb, and no set of false expectations could take that away. We have a God who never lets us down and always does what he says he's going to do. I'm blessed to know where I stand with God. It's simple. He sent his son to die on a cross to pay for all of my sins. And even though I screw up on the daily, He loves me anyway.

If you need encouragement tonight, rest in the truth that your God loves you, even when you mess up. And he is a God with no false expectations. We as women cannot screw that relationship up, no matter how hard we try.

Thanks for staying on this wild journey with me Y'all.

Emma Jane

p.s. I know I said I was reading Single. Dating. Engaged. Married.... and I STILL AM!! (It's just taking a while.)

Craving Love Like A Closed Door

I have come to realize that I crave to be loved, but I have no desire to be vulnerable with anyone. I have absolutely no desire to show parts of myself to people and re-tell my life story. I will tell anyone surface level things, but my mouth stays shut when it comes to the things that actually matter. And I'm learning that this desire to be loved is normal, but cannot be achieved without the vulnerability. So right now, it's not in the cards for me to be loved, or accept love from other people. Because truthfully, I don't know how. And I don't want to. This probably isn't healthy, but I've been living in a self-protective mode for the last two years and I don't know if I'll ever get out of it.

 I know that Christ knows our souls. He knows all of our demons, the things that we hate about ourselves, and our lowest moments. The amazing thing is that He loves us anyway! I had one person who knew the inner depths of my soul, and things didn't go as planned. Now that they've been gone for a while, is it all really worth it? Part of me wants to shut everyone out completely because that's what I do. When I get too close to someone, I usually react by pushing them away. This self-destructive behavior doesn't lead to a path where I'm able to be loved. And maybe I just crave the physical components of love- not the emotional ones. Which I think is normal for people my age. Nobody needs the emotional toll of a relationship when they're simply trying to figure themselves out, right? But then what do you do? I'm not a fan of this whole "friends with benefits" notion or the idea of having a person who acts like a significant other but doesn't put a label on it, because those options are not fair for anyone involved. But at the same time, I totally get why people do it. It's so tempting.

Way back before I got hurt, I used to be an open book. I would tell everyone who would listen what my story was because I thought it might help people or something. Or that they might love me more if they knew the scars on my heart. It turns out that it's just easier to betray someone when you know everything about them.  Quite frankly, I'm in a place where I feel like I'll be loved less if people know my past and who I was. So how do you balance being terrified to let people in and the desire to be loved? You don't. I'm learning that I have to figure out how to let someone in without feeling the need to abandon them right after they know something about me. I'm learning that being yourself and letting people in is part of being loved, and they'll probably love me more if they do know my past struggles and current demons.

At the end of the day, I need to stop lying to myself and fight my "flight" instinct. The people who stay in your life after knowing your soul are probably the best ones. I cannot let one person who hurt me dictate the rest of my life and my desire to be loved again. It's a process, and I'm learning new things every day through it.

Also, if you still read these, thanks a ton for sticking by me. I'm a mess, but at least I'm getting somewhere sometimes.

Emma Jane

A Month Without Jesus

Phil 3:18-21 

"For, as I have often told you before and now tell you again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body." 

I was looking in the journal that I used to bring to church every Sunday and to Breakaway every Tuesday, and there hadn't been anything written down in there for an entire month. For me, as a journaler, that's a pretty long time. The journal stayed in my backpack for that duration, and never once was pulled out. Because of work, I haven't been able to make it to church on a Sunday morning, and I haven't felt like I had time for Jesus. 

In college station, I feel like that's where Jesus lives. And at home, it's almost as if he's not there in my life. He's not presently shining through my life like he was in college. Because a month ago, I was on fire for Jesus. I was so hungry for teaching and so eager to learn everything that I could about him. I was so devoted, so involved, and so energetic for the love that He has for me. However, I've recently been the opposite. I've pushed Him aside to fulfill my own desires, and to give into the earthly pleasures of this world. About a year ago, I struggled with something and thought I was done struggling with it. Yesterday, I learned that I will still do anything to gain approval from the people surrounding me and that I still will have temptations that I give into to earn that approval, whether it's giving up a part of my sexuality, drinking, or becoming someone who blends in with a group of people that I know are bad for me. 

It was so easy in College Station to stay sober, feel loved, and go to church every Sunday. Recently, I've sacrificed a big part of myself in order to become someone I'm not. I'm not a girl who forgets who her Savior is. I'm usually not a girl who uses cuss words, but I've been dropping them like they're a part of my normal vocabulary lately. 

This girl who drinks, cusses, and does stupid things in order to gain the approval of others is not who I want to be. However, I've lost the girl who is racing towards the love of God. I've lost the girl who is selfless, happy, and easy going. I used to be so relaxed and so confident in Christ, but now I feel like I'm stuck in the middle of a corn maze without a map or a direction to go. Part of me feels this overwhelming desire to lock my phone up in a box, go outdoors, and stay there for a very long time. My head is so fuzzy with all of the wrong things, and I'm not sure what I prioritize anymore. I wrote an Odyssey article about how I'm my biggest priority, but shouldn't God be that? 

Maybe I've forgotten how to prioritize Him. And maybe I've pushed Him away to fulfill my own desires and give into everything that the world wants from me. 

Hopefully, that will change because I miss the girl from College Station who knew that her citizenship is in Heaven. 

Red Light Vulnerability

Tonight, it was preached that one of the best ways to fight our enemy (Satan) is to bring to light what he's trying to make you believe. So, therefore, many brave women yelled out into the crowd what that was. However, I wasn't able to. I told myself that in order to process the night, I needed to write about it- so here I am. This is my shouting. But I realized that I couldn't shout out anything and that was the thing that I needed to shout. I'm absolutely terrified to be vulnerable with people. And this is why the enemy can work his way into my life, where he tells me to stop talking about the things that are eating away at my soul, and the things that have beaten me down before. If you go far enough down into this blog, you can see the brokenness and the light that has come from it, but I'm at the point in my life where I'd rather have people read my blog to figure out my struggles than have an actual conversation with them. Essentially, it's easier to hide behind a screen than to see someone's face after you tell them what has been going on in your heart. So maybe, I'm still searching for that approval from others, even if it's the approval that they understand my problems, and still love me for all of them. 

I'd like to think of my vulnerability as a road. At the beginning of the road, I'll tell someone about my favorite things, my hopes and dreams, and my family (the surface level things). And then, you get to a red light. And depending on how well I know you and how much I want to let you in, you might be stopped there forever. And your road is over. But if we're closer than that, I'll tell you about the boys who hurt me in high school maybe, and you'll get to know about the failed friendships that I've had in the past. But then you hit another stoplight. And that's where most people get stop my road. I'm so comfortable talking about my dreams or the people who have heart me, but talking about my inner soul... there's no way that you can keep driving down the road and getting to the end. At the end of the day, I'm scared that people won't wanna love that girl. At the end of the road are the baggage and the stuff that people wouldn't know about me by just looking, or knowing about my surface level relationships in high school. 

I'm learning that after I open up to someone, my initial reaction is to shut them out. It doesn't make sense, but it is terrifying to be around someone who has actually seen your soul, because if they reject you- they reject the parts of you that you were scared to show them anyways. I have been hurt and abandoned by multiple people who had gone all the way down my road and known the inner depths of my heart, and there's no greater pain than losing someone who knows everything about you. It's almost like starting over with someone else might not be worth it, because my heart is overly guarded. At camp, I'm always told to guard my heart, which is smart. However, I think I've built a brick wall around that thing, and if I let myself take a few bricks down, I immediately put them back up even higher. 

Is this a self-destructive defense mechanism? Totally. Do I know that doing brave and bold things set you free? Yes. Do I also know that freedom from this fear will cost something? For sure. 

Stay posted to see if that actually happens. 

Emma Jane 

Catchy Christian Phrases

I've always liked the catchy Christian Phrases. These include "turn your mess into a message" and "make your test your testimony". You know what I'm talking about now? I think I like them because they hold so much truth. I firmly believe that there's a point in our lives where we are really tested, and we get tricked into thinking that we're the only ones struggling. And that it's impossible for someone else to be struggling with things like depression, anxiety, loneliness, losing someone, a bad breakup, low self-esteem, jealousy, giving into lust, and everything in between. I also firmly believe that as believers or nonbelievers, we need to talk about these things, whether it's confiding in one close person, writing in a private journal, or publishing them on a blog site. If we're honest, this blog started because of my pain and has blossomed to talking about healing from it.

If I have learned anything, it is that healing from your struggle is not a linear process. There are days where you feel on top of the mountain, and then there are days where you are so far down in the valley that you cannot possibly see a way out. However, I also have learned that sometimes the only solution for something that seems impossible to solve in your life is to pray about it. I know that it's hard to pray about something that seems impossible to fix, but our God is the God of miracles. And he's also really really good at knowing our hearts which means that he also knows when our hearts have stopped trusting him. Mark 9:14-29 is about a father and son where the son is possessed by an evil spirit. Jesus comes up to a crowd and the man brings his son up to Jesus, explaining that this evil spirit has been inside of him for his whole life. In verse 22 it says "It (the evil spirit) has often thrown him (the son) into fire or water to kill him. But if you (Jesus) can do anything, take pity on us and help us." Do you notice anything strange about that verse? It sounds like a father begging Jesus for help. However, Jesus picks up on something very specific. In verse 23 he sasses back and says "If you can'?" said Jesus. "Everything is possible for one who believes." Basically, Jesus calls the man out for doubting him. Therefore, the man replies in verse 24 "I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!" 

Every time I read this passage, I get something new out of it. At first, we read it and laugh at the father. Because in our minds, we say "Jesus is literally standing right there. Why does he even question it?" But, how many times have we question God's ability to provide for us and heal us in our situations? How many times are we the boy living our entire lives needing Christ to heal us, but have something in the way (such as an earthly desire, reluctance to let go, or jealous heart) from humbling ourselves to receive that healing?

 Most of the time I feel like I am the father, who looks Jesus dead in the eyes and doesn't believe that he can do amazing work in my life. Other times, I believe I am the son and have something like an unbelieving father standing in my way. At the end of the day, don't they stand in each other's way? The son is the reason that the father is having a hard time believing, and the doubting father is the reason that the son cannot be healed yet. So at the same time, our struggles are the things that we have a hard time talking to God about and that cause us to doubt his ability to take care of us. And we need to believe that our problems are able to be solved by Christ, instead of questioning his ability to do so. Sometimes, the hardest part is wondering the how. Which truly is out of our control, no matter how much we try to take that control.

The overwhelmingly amazing news is that we really don't have to worry about how Christ is going to do His thing. In the story, Jesus brought out the evil spirit of the boy right in front of the father on his own will- not because the father told him to (aside from the begging). However, sometimes the answer from God isn't immediate. And so we think that there's no answer and no help at all, or we demand one that is immediate. But I'm begging you, please don't lose hope. God will take care of you in HIS timing, just like he took care of our sins by sending his son to die on the cross for us in HIS timing. 

Anyways, my twitter, facebook, and instagram DM's are always open for anyone who wants to hear how amazing Jesus is!! He's really out here working you guys, so maybe sometimes we're just too blinded by focusing on our issues to see it clearly. If you don't know what to pray this week, "Help me overcome my unbelief" is always a great place to start. So turn your test into a testimony because I'd love to hear all about it.

Until I'm inspired again,

Emma Jane

p.s. I know I said I was reading "single. dating. engaged. married" and that I would finish it, but I haven't had the time. But I promise one day I will finish and I will definitely write about it.

February News

I know it's been a while since I've posted on here, but trust me when I say that I've had a lot going on. First of all, I started to write for the Odyssey, and I have an article due every week. Writing for the Odyssey has really pushed me to do so many things, made me develop my skills as a writer, and TAUGHT ME HOW TO USE GIFS. I really love it though. However, sometimes I feel like I simply write for other people, and I've stopped writing for me. Today, right now, I'm writing for me. And using gifs.

However, I've learned a lot about myself this week though (probably more than I wanted to dig out). This is because this week was extremely difficult for me, and it all could have been avoided. This past week, I joined Tinder so I could write an Odyssey article about it. Basically, messing with my own life for the sake of a good read. I'm not sure if I did the article justice, but it's out there and can be found here!

Going into it, I was already terrified. I mean, like I had to talk myself into it for hours, and then I still wasn't sure about it when the app was downloaded. I had been against the entire app's concept ever since I had seen a friend of mine use it. However, I told myself to get out of my comfort zone, and I definitely got more than I bargained for. 

Through that process, I kept it a secret from most of my friends, and when they found out what I had done, they all freaked out. I mean, they completely flipped. Which makes sense. I think anyone who reads this blog cares about my well-being enough to know who I am as a person. We've all seen the effects of what someone who hurt me can do. Just scroll down on my homepage.

Each one of my friends shows that they care about me in different ways. Sometimes, it's the sweet approach, and other times it's getting angry that I'm doing something stupid in their eyes. Or both. This week, I got some of both (more of the anger). And you know what? It absolutely sucked. This whole thing was so hard for me, and the idea of actually dating someone is quite terrifying. My roommate, a very wise person, told me I'm not ready to actually date someone. And she's absolutely right.

Realizing that this week really did suck too. Because you don't realize how terrifying it is to possibly be vulnerable with someone until you realize that you might have to be. Or you might not. But dating requires vulnerability, and there's a brick wall around my heart at this point. Tinder did no steps to bring that down. In fact, I think it added a few bricks. There's no way in the world that I want to be hurt again. I know that, my friends know that, and strangers probably look at me and know that. It might as well be written on my forehead.

My friends got upset because they figured I'd get hurt again, and they don't want that for me. I don't want that for me either. At the end of the day, no matter how upset at them I was for all the angry comments and confrontation, I love them to death. It's so hard to accept that someone cares about you, but I'm learning that every single day I'm going to have to convince myself that they do until I believe it wholeheartedly. For now, I think I'm going to remain single until I'm not afraid of pain, and stick close to the people who care about me. Until anything changes,

Emma Jane