As every minute goes by...

I get so excited when groups arrive...it brings life back into this place. That arrival time is so awesome, each person that walks through the door has forgotten about what just happened the week before and they are ready to meet with God. Experience something new something fresh...even if its just a change in scenery.

I've been thinking a lot about Beulah Beach. I love what this place represents, I love that lives are changed and that I can be apart of that. But there's something inside of me that I feel is missing. I don't know what it is. Maybe that excitement. Whenever I was a camper or when I was on summer staff I was so excited about coming to Beulah Beach it was like, "Awesome, new experiences new people...this is going to be great." Now...it's like..."Shoot I've got a lot to get done." A retreat goes by that I've worked really hard at getting set up, like the Youth Prayer Retreat, I've put countless hours in entering names of campers and making sure schedules don't conflict, and answering questions...and it's coming next weekend but I'm already focused on the next retreat. I don't want to miss out on that experience. I want to be able to focus on what God has for me this week, this day...but I'm so caught up with tomorrow. This goes even outside of my work life...into my personal life. I keep thinking...okay what's next. On my next day off I've got to get this done...on this weekend I have a birthday party...I haven't taken a second to breathe. I need to breathe.

I want to be able to take time and breathe but it's almost like I'm to afraid to find out what might happen in that moment...that moment when I say...okay *sigh*. What will flood my mind. I'm longing for a connection, a connection that can only be met by one person...Jesus. I just finished the Shack (great book by the way) and in it Mac took time to meet "Papa" but I long for something like that where I can go away for a weekend and just be with God...where it's just me and Jesus...no concerns about what needs to be done at home or in the office. I want that retreat that everyone comes to Beulah Beach for, those people that I host and greet and serve while they are here. I desire that for myself. And I need it. I know I do. This summer is going to be so difficult if I don't take that time to...breathe...Oh but I look at the calendar and see so many groups so many people that are going to be walking on the grounds and there isn't time to take that breath. There is not a change for sacred time...that time with God. meeting him in the "shack".

"[This is] because you don't believe. You don't know that we love you. The person who lives by their fears will not find freedom in my love. I am not talking about rational fears regarding legitimate dangers, but imagined fears, and especially the projection of those into the future. To the degree that those fears have a place in your life, you neither believe I am good nor know deep in your heart that I love you. You sing about it; you talk about it, but you don't know it." - Jesus, in The Shack

"You can't [change that], not alone. But together we will watch that change take place. For now I just want you to be with me and discover that our relationship is not about performance or you having to please me. I'm not a bully, not some self-centered demanding little deity insisting on my own way. I am good, and I desire only what is best for you. You cannot find that through guilt or condemnation or coercion, only through a relationship of love. And I do love you." - Papa, in The Shack

These two quotes from the Shack seem to fit where I am...I know the truth, I know that God does not want to harm me when I meet him in that place...but that fear still consumes me...because I can't trust. All of these doubts go through my mind and I get angry for God allowing this to happen, or that to happen, or that person to be out of my life forever. I have so many questions that I would love to have answered. I live with this persona of perfection (thanks Nate) I don't even want to write those words, because I'm admitting this truth. Giving the idea that everything is perfect and wonderful and nothing is going on in my life that would make me sad. That's a lie. My reasoning behind some of that is that why should people know what's going on...would it make a difference? I want to guard myself from outside heartbreak while inside I'm dying... I can't seem to say enough how much I need that time...how much I crave for an opportunity to take the gloves off and just go at it with God. To get angry, to repent, to heal...to heal. Oh that healing is so needed. I need to stop writing and actually act upon my desire and this pressure in my heart.