what was and what is

I didn't drink until I was almost twenty-four years old.  For me it was a religious thing.

And then things changed, and I began drinking.  I had somewhat of a life epiphany, and realized just how much I had been judging something that I didn't really understand.  Alcohol, in and of itself, was not bad.  It was a cultural thing, a social thing, and I liked it.

I drank for about a year and a half.  Not a whole lot, just a drink here and there, sometimes several a week sometimes several a month; it all depended.

And then, about three months ago, I stopped drinking.  At first it was mostly just a "I'm-not-going-to-buy-alcohol-anymore" thing.  And then I realized I was done.  No more drinking for me.  I am not going to go so far as to say I'll never drink again, because I don't operate on those terms.  But at this point, it serves no positive purpose.  Among my friends here, it serves only as a stumbling block.  In Bellingham it was different, but culture is a funny thing and I must be willing to change with the culture.  When I drink here I promote alcohol as a solution to life's problems.  I promote, perhaps without meaning to, alcohol as the primary means of entertainment in a slow town with nothing else to do.  I promote drunkenness without having more than one or two drinks myself.

Do I regret the year and a half or so that I drank?  Not at all.

I refuse to see life in black and white terms.

~~~

As you're probably all-too-well aware, I attended graduate school a few years ago and obtained a master's degree in history, which came right on the heels of three and a half years of undergraduate work in the same subject area.  At this point I have little desire to return to the world of academia, at least not to obtain any more degrees.  I'm ready to earn my keep in this world.

And I'm changing, too.  Being out of the gates of the university means that I'm surrounded by different types of people than I was as a student.  My influences are more Christian (both religiously and culturally speaking) in nature due to my geographical location.  I'm becoming less concerned with things that plagued me a year ago.

Above all, God is moving in my heart.  He's changing me and making me more like Him.  He's taking my heart of stone and making it a heart of flesh.  He is the one transforming me, He is the one guiding me.

But today someone said something to me that cut much more deeply than they probably know or intended.  The specifics of what was said is not important, but she implied that my time in graduate school taught me to think in the wrong sorts of ways and that with time I'll relearn how to be a good Christian.

I refuse to see life in black and white terms.

God gave me my mind, and He gave it to me to use it.  When I have a gut level instinct about gender roles in the Church, the struggle is mental and spiritual and emotional all at the same time.  I cannot divorce my mind from my will, my soul from my heart, my thoughts from my emotions.  It's all interconnected.  God did not leave me during my time in graduate school, and He was no less with me then than he is now.  I may be more aware of Him now, but I treasure the things God taught me about life and Him during my time there.

I want to be transformed more every day into the likeness of God's Son, and I'm trying to not be afraid of the questions.  I'm trying to learn to ask them with gentleness and humility, with meekness and with boldness, knowing that the questions I ask are not the most important thing, but neither are they unimportant.

I'm wrong about most things, I know.

But that will not stop me from asking the questions.