Mark 9

I've really been struggling a bit lately - under the weather spiritually and emotionally. I was feeling like the adventure has been sucked right out of my life.

After Leaderquest, where everyday was an adventure, where I was always in ministry, forcing myself to recognize God, getting into the Bible and really thinking about what it means and making its message a part of who I am and what I do; having an amazing family of believers who challenged me and mentored me and cared for me...
Sundre, Alberta. My family, who doesn't see who I am or what I do as anything special - I'm just the same old Camille, strange in my own way. This is what they might tell you about what is wrong with me...

For a job, my career aspirations include working with other nurses from students with stars in their eyes to people who see it as ministry to people who are bitter and burnt out; wiping dirty butts and having twenty-minute conversations at 2 am trying to communicate that "Yes, your hearing aid is working" when a confused resident swares that "No, it isn't. I can only hear you say, 'your hearing aid is working'." My passions are also strange - prolife education, youth in the church, becoming more and more Catholic and learning the old prayers and traditions.
I end up spending time with old friends that I really feel connected to, but who have lost contact with me or even stopped talking to me over the last five years; sometimes it ends in me feeling heartbroken and disconnected, but I try anyway.
And have you seen the car I drive? Why on earth don't I just forget doing overly responsible things like paying for student loans and starting an RRSP and go to the dealership tomorrow?
And scandal of all scandals - I'm not in a serious relationship yet? My sister, who constantly tells me that my worst mistake was not pursuing more guys and getting in a relationship, also told me the other night that I shouldn't even think about pursuing anyone 'from around here', after all they aren't 'your style'. When I asked her what my style was, she said, "Well, you go off and do these things like go to Nova Scotia and Mexico, and you want to go off on adventures to the North or to nurse as a missionary. No guys around here could take that. Besides, they're all looking for a more perfect 'girl' than you are."

HERE'S THE THING -- she's friggin right, they are all right in saying these things!!! I think sometimes that I really am missing out, that not having the prerequisites to be a full-fledged member of whatever group I don't really fit in - the couples, the girls with kids and families, the people who look and breathe 'cool' or 'hot' - that these things make me less of a person, that God dealt me a shitty hand of cards. Seems like my whole life I have been falling in love with people, finally believing that I can belong someplace, and God tells me to go to the next place or to try something completely different.

But I was reading in Mark 9 today, the passage about Jesus casting the demon out of the little boy. Great story, but it wasn't the miracle that caught my attention, it was what came afterward. Jesus could have done many more miracles, pumped up his reputation, brought huge massive event-glory to God; but instead he tried to get away that day. He tried to get away from the adventure and the image for something different, because he 'wanted to teach his disciples'. He was way more concerned with what was going on in the hearts and the minds of these misfit people that he had chosen to be his friends and his students and learners and legacy than he ever was in flexing his miracle muscles. Even though the disciples were usually confused and whiny or foolish, and probably wanted to keep going with the big flashy stuff (hmmm... like me) they were his first priority and the focus of his heart, and he wanted them to learn other stuff, like about his death and his rising.

I am so grateful to God that he can take my spoiled princess "Daddy I want a pony" attitude, and take me out of the adventure in these days because he wants to teach me as his disciple. Sure I don't fit into many a mold, but God cares about me there and is using my quirks. I love you, Jesus - that is so COOL. And Holy Spirit, you rock for filling me with joy in these days.