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Draw2much
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Name: Nicole
Metro:
Birthday: 8/9/1983
Gender: Female
Interests: I love Japanese food. Yakisoba, ramen, beef bowls, sushi, and all! I play computer games like City of Heroes and Guildwars. I enjoy fantasies and sci fi books and movies. Smallville and Scrubs are my current TV show favs. I enjoy reading manga, as much as I can afford. "From Far Away" is my ALL TIME favorite! I like cartoons, good ones. Asian, European, or American. As long as they got a good story and good art. I also love pillows. :)
Expertise: Computers, Linux, StarWars
Occupation: Artist
Industry: Other
Message: message meEmail: email me
Website: visit my website
AIM:  Nikkipicklechan
MSN: draw2much89@hotmail.com
Yahoo:  draw2much83
Member Since:
9/23/2004
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| I've been thinking about my "salvation experience" lately. The reason being because, how can you talk to someone about Christ if you do not know him yourself? So it got me thinking about my story. Ah, which is always a bit depressing.
You see, most people have these strong recollections about their salvation experience. They remember going up to an altar, sitting in their bed, a conversation... something. I have nothing of the sort.
I have always had a horrible memory, and this extends to every aspect of my life. I have almost no memories of my life before 12 years old. What memories I do have are very vague, so vague that sometimes I'm not even sure if they happened or I imagined them. Because I was saved, or at least Baptized, at 8 years old I don't remember it. (Though I got some vague memory of my Baptism... though perhaps I only have that because I was nervous/excited about getting "dunked" under water. I can't say for sure.)
Well, this puts me in a bit of a bind. Lots of people like to share their conversion story to others as a way to show "Hey, this Jesus is real and I can prove it with my life!" But I can't do that because I have no "before and after". And of course there's the Pastors up their preaching about that "old man" who use to do all these awful sinful things and I'm thinking "I can't even remember my old man!"
That frustration often turns to doubt because no one else seems to understand where I'm coming from. Almost everyone gets saved in their teens or adult years. My husband, who got saved at 5 yrs old, says he remembers it! How could I have forgotten? Didn't I think it was important?
But I know I must have thought it was important. Because I *do* remember at around 10-12ish (see what I mean?) asking myself "Do I believe in Christ just because my parents do? Is this my faith or theirs?" I struggled with this question for days, because I didn't want to go on pretending to believe in something just to make my parents happy or to "fit in".
I finally concluded that I accepted Christ for myself, not to make my parents or someone else happy. I decided to follow Christ for His sake, not for anyone else's. And, at least I hope, that's what I've been doing ever since.
And I don't think I'm not saved. There are too many indicators in my life that say I've got God's Holy Spirit in me. The easiest ones to spot (and frankly the most boring ones) are a desire to go to church consistently, to read my Bible, to study theology and Biblical history, and pray no matter how awful or good I'm feeling. Could a person without the Holy Spirit be like that for years on end? I don't think so.
But this still leaves me without a "before and after" to tell people. How can I explain the wonderful life-changing sacrifice of Christ to someone without any "before" to give them? This is what I've been asking myself lately.
The closest answer I come up with, it doesn't seem to satisfy really. It seems so... so.. wishy-washy and lacking somehow. But I shall give it now, and we will see over time if it's worth anything:
"There is a God, and He has been with me my whole life. I have laughed and loved, and He shared in my joy. I have stumbled over my words and embarrassed myself, my family, my friends, but He was not embarrassed of me. I have cried so hard I couldn't move and feared so deeply I couldn't breath, yet He was there. He gave me the strength to go on, to move forward. And when I was over-whelmed by life, He was their to comfort me, to re-assure me that He is faithful and will never leave me to fend for myself.
If you are to say "What physical proof do you have that there is a God?" I couldn't tell you. I have never seen God, or touched Him, or heard an audible voice. But there's something inside me, something so strong that even when I am at my most doubtful, my most hard-hearted, I can't ignore it. Even when I want to just give up and pretend like I never knew Him, I can't. I can't deny it, I can't deny His presence. It's an impossibility for me.
And how did I get to know this God? This being who created this universe and all in it? I know Him because of Christ. He who lived, died, and rose again for all the wrong doings all of humanity has ever committed. I simply believed in what he did. By simply believing in the truth of Jesus' action, I went from an enemy of God to His adopted Daughter.
So that is how I know God. I'm His daughter."
See? My testimony is so... boring. It doesn't have the same punch that testimonies from former Abusers, Druggies, Alcoholics, Cutters, Thieves, etc. They can be all like "See the difference in me? I don't do [insert badness] now! This is the difference that Christ makes!" The only "difference" I can talk about is all the things I haven't done, and frankly that's not worth talking about.
I don't mean to sound ungrateful for what I have, by no means. I really love having God in my life. I wouldn't trade that for the most fantastic unbelievable but-it-really-happened conversion story. (Lemme tell ya, 17 years with God is better than any awe-inspiring conversion story.)
But still... I just don't know if my conversion story brings "anything to the table" so to speak. Would it cause people to stop and really consider the sacrifice of Christ? The forgiveness and new life He offers? Or would it be just some more weird/ignorant Religious person rambling added to the cacophony of other religious ramblers? I don't know, I don't know.
Not that I'm worried about it so much as a little frustrated.
That's all I've got to say. Take it or leave or throw a Fuzzy Bug at it. :P | | |
| So where are we going? Sheppard AFB, Wichita Falls Texas!
Huzzah! *throws confetti*
Yeah so.. it's out in the middle of no where. Haha.
But it's still more in the middle of some where than Misawa. If you can believe it. (I know it's hard to believe but it's true!)
Dunno when we'll be moving yet. Hopefully September. Trying to move in August with cats would be a butt. | | |
| Does anyone I watch or who watches me use Twitter? If so, why not send me a friend invite? My twitter name is Draw2much. If you want to add me, please let me know (by commenting if you like). I get a lot of junk friend invites on twitter so I don't always say "yes" to the first person who sends me a friend invite.
And if you're into Twitter, you might want to try out TweetDeck. It's possibly one of the best Twitter programs out there!
Speaking of TweetDeck, for the longest time I could not update to the newest TD version. I kept getting an error message. I tried manually installing, instead of going through the updater, and had the same problem.
I tried googling for an answer, but got no help there. I'm hoping this entry will find it's way into the google search engine so others won't spend two months having to click "Update Later" every time TweetDeck opens. Tehe.
I use Vista Home Premium 64bit and I guess it doesn't play very nice with the TweetDeck installer. (Well, it IS a Beta program. :) )When you go to install (by downloading the newest version, not through the updater) it will try to dump the new program in C:\Program Files (x86). This won't work and you'll get an error. So instead direct it to; C:\Program Files (x86)\TweetDeck . This SHOULD work.
In other news, sickness strikes again! Our dear friends have been harboring those nasty Misawa Germs and gave them to us. It pretty well knocked Mike off his feet Sat and Sun and has given me a bad case of the sniffles and sneezes all week.I'm hoping to get over it by the end of next week since that's when I'm going to Tokyo.
It's snowing again. The last time it snowed we had snow up to my knees. MY KNEES PEOPLE!! I hate Misawa during Feb and March. HATE IT. :(
Mike reenlisted into the Air force last week. I don't know if you can understand how hard that was for him. He's not a military man by ANY stretch of the imagination and signing that dotted line was like signing away his soul away again for another 4 years.
But he had a good reason to sign his soul away again. He finally got a job he won't absolutely loath and despise. I'm not saying where we're going... yet. I promised myself I'd tell my family first before anyone online. ;)
Mike's computer is being a butt.... I'm not sure if it's Windows Vista or nVidia drivers... maybe both. But the one game he loves to play--City of Heroes--keeps crashing on him. It says it's an OpenGL Error 14... and from what I reading on the COH forums it's pretty common problem with the newer cards. The closest solution anyone has found was by downloading a patch from Microsoft's website (it's part of the SP2 that's currently in beta) so that's what I did. I don't know if it worked or not, but I'm hoping so.
Because, seriously, what's the point of getting him this nifty new computer if it won't run the one, and only, PC game he plays? 9_9
Well, at least it'll work well with Maya. Hurmph.
That's all from me. | | |
| Still no word about whether Mike got the UK assignment. Probably didn't get it, otherwise I'm guessing we would have heard from them by now. *sighs* He'll probably reapply for the Instructor Position in Texas.
Missy (Dog) is making our house smell like...well... dog. I lit a scented candle and am hoping that'll help. Hehe. Now our house smells like cupcakes. (I love food smells! :D)
I moved the kitty litter box back to it's former location. Next is their food dishes. Having them in our room all the time is driving Mike crazy. (They get hyper at around 430-5am and run all over us.)
I'm still exercising! This is my schedule thus far:
Mondays Gym with Tia and Mel @5pm
Tuesdays Gym with Katty @9am and Mel @5pm
Wednesdays No Gym
Thursdays Gym with Katty @9am and Mel @5pm
Friday Gym with Mel @5pm
Weekends are off
I'm really optimistic this time about keeping my gym schedule! I've been doing really well so far and it's been enjoyable since it gets me out of the house and around friends.
My IUD experience has been going pretty well so far. Had a bit of a scare one day because I thought I might have expelled. I don't think so though. I still have my string, and I couldn't feel anything poking. Of course, I'm not entirely sure I found my cervix either. (It's like trying to find a needle in a haystack sometimes! Ugh..)
I might have started my period today too. It's hard to tell. Going off hormonal birth control and then having the IUD inserted has made my bleedy-ness not very stable. I've spotted a few times and been crampy a few times but it turned out to be nothing. So I'm not sure if I'm doing that or if I'm actually getting my monthly Aunt Flo visit.
My friend Liz has gotten all in a tizzy about the email I sent her concerning the CPSIA. She'd heard of it before I did, but hadn't realize congress actually passed it and turned it into a Law. She was absolutely horrified. And rightfully so, considering she plans on homeschooling her children and this law might end up seriously affecting that.
My left knee has been giving me problems for a while now. I think it was caused by a combination of extra weight and twisting my knee the wrong way. I can't recall exactly. But whatever I did caused my knee to mildly hurt, off and on, for about two years. It's never been really severe pain, since I never did anything that impacted my knee heavily.
But a week ago I was walking Missy and she pulled on the leash really hard (she's not leashed trained >_<), which caused me to bend my knee in a way it didn't like. It hurt worse than usual but not "go to the doctor" bad.
Then I tried to do a Zumba class. BAD IDEA. It killed my knee! For a few days after I had a horrible time using stairs or walking the dog. The pain was bad enough that I really wish I'd had a cane or something to lean on. That's when I knew I'd put off the doctor visit for too long.
My knee doesn't hurt much now, but I can't risk that type of pain again. (What if it happens when I'm carrying something heavy?!) So I'll be going into the Hospital tomorrow. I'm hoping I just have weak knee muscles, which could very well be the case. Nothing that requires surgery.
In other news, Ichigo is looking particularly adorable today. Never met a cat that managed to keep his kitten face after a year. | | |
| Mike took two weeks off around the holidays. He'd accumulated over 70 days of leave so he needed to start using it.
I'm enjoying having him around. He's helped clean up the house and bring in the groceries. It's nice. I don't normally have him around for the day-to-day stuff.
I guess Liz's friend Heather is gonna be at church tonight. Interested to meet her, as I've only heard about her so far.
December heralds the 9 month mark. That is to say, in 9 months we'll likely be leaving Japan. I'm looking forward to it, as I've been feeling very.... claustrophobic here lately.
Where are we going, you ask? Haven't the foggiest idea. Still no word back on whether Mike got that Instructor position. We probably won't know till we hit the 6 month mark.
Not looking forward to moving 'cross the world again. Hope I can take my cats with me this time at least. >_>
Christmas is coming, but it doesn't feel much like it this year. I dunno, the holiday spirits just aren't with me. Wish I could visit family but it's much too expensive...
Well, that's about all for now. :)
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