I am a 2 year old

This last weekend I went to Palm Springs and visited my grandparents. Along with myself, my mom, my aunt, my cousin, and my cousins daughter all came. My cousins daughter, Evelyn, is 2 and half years old. And there is definitely a reason they call that time the "terrible twos." She is a crazy, bratty toddler but we all love her! She wanted to always play and run around and pretend she was a dog (it obviously runs in the family). With all of this she also chose who she liked and who she didn't like and she was pretty blunt about it. One of the people she didn't like was my grandfather. No one knew why she just did not like him. Now this story kind of goes back to the genome thing but it also has another point I promise.

My grandfather is very soft spoken and has a hard facade. He doesn't share much about himself, and pretty much just keeps to himself. However, when Evelyn expressed her dislike of him, you could tell he was really hurt. Although we all knew it was just because she was 2, he still took it super personally. At one point in the weekend I was talking to my dad on the phone in the spare bedroom and Evelyn ran into the room and sat on the bed across from me and just stared at me. My grandfather then walked in and tried to talk to Evelyn, and she through a hissy fit. At this point I was just trying to hear what my dad was saying but then I got distracted by what happened next. My grandfather looked Evelyn straight in the eye and said "You are such a little stinker, but you have no idea how much I love you." I almost started tearing up.

This man who rarely said he loved his own daughters as they grew up was so vocal about it now. Just seeing this transformation was so awesome. He told my mom that he loved her every chance  he could and expressed the same to me all weekend long. But this exchange with Evelyn just reminded me of our relationship with God. And honestly I kind of needed it... I have totally been acting like a 2 year old. We are these bratty two year olds that decide when we want to be with God and when we don't want to be with him, when we want to listen to his will, and when we don't want to listen. We innately just want to run around and play, we don't just want to sit and be with him. But he does the same thing that my grandfather did, he looks us straight in the eye and tells us how much he loves us.

Reading through chapter 9 I was just hit with the fact that God meets us where we are at. I am going to be completely honest here and tell you guys that the last few weeks have been hard. I have been struggling with  my health again and have been so ridiculously frustrated with God. I feel so angry that I almost don't even want to spend time with him. "Sometimes, we rebel during confusing in-between periods rather than embrace the waiting period in which we find ourselves. The temptation to flee from God, to quit, or to fall into despair is great when it appears God is absent. The good news is that even the, god will fin us and meet us." pg 173-174 This is real life!! I started calling all the shasta  barns again this week and when I ask them what God has been teaching them recently all of them have been talking about how God is just teaching them to be patient, or to just sit in God's his presence. To just be. What the heck!? God is using these people that I am supposedly leading to teach me and meet me where I am at. This is going to be an interesting summer. It has seriously been so beyond encouraging that god is using phone calls (which I was super worried about and procrastinating on) to meet where I am at. I am still definitely frustrated because I have absolutely no control over my stomach aches, or head aches and they always come at the worst times. Instead of fleeing from this frustration and anger I am trying to express it, and lift it up to God but it is definitely easier to flee.

This Psalm has helped me this week and is such a good reminder that God loves us so much even when we are bratty 2 year olds. He will set us high upon a rock and keep us safe in his dwelling.
"One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple. For in the day of trouble he will keep me safe in his dwelling; he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent and set me high upon a rock." Psalm 27: 4-5