Respect

Sometimes people tell me what to do. Its a part of life, it'll always happen. And I don't mind, like if it's my boss, mentor, older, wiser person, somone I've sumbitted myself to, somebody I trust. People like that. But sometimes people don't just tell me what to do, they try to force me into things. I hate that. I know I'm still a teenager, and most people will say to deal with it, thats what happens when you're a "kid". And thats true. Sometimes.... I'm not a normal girl, I've had to learn to take care of myself and do things on my own. Ever since my dad died when I was 10 I've basically parented myself. Yeah, my mom did some but when he was gone, my life ceased any pretenses of "normal" that I thought my life was or had. I was strange even before Dad died, all my siblings were. We were taught to be very self-suficient and were very mature for our ages. And all that escalated when I was just barely 10. And now, I'm finding myself having parents. It's so weird!! I'm not used to them! Somedays I feel 40, other days I feel 8. Its crazy sometimes having to trust other people to meet my needs. I don't know how I'm dealing with it, it's still shocking to have them. I love them so much, but it's a little difficult absorbing the fact that my life isn't the way it used to be. I don't mind obeying them and respecting them, I'd do it for the rest of my life if I thought it would somehow repay them. This isn't about them at all. It's about not being respected, and being pushed around. It's about people assuming I'll "adapt'. Well here's some news. I won't. I'm willing to compromise and meet in the middle, to a certain point. But when people try to decide my life for me, without even trying to find a compromise. They just assume they are right. Because I've decided for myself for so long having someone TELL me I'm going to do something that I've made clear I despise makes me very angry. I need respect, and I don't get that too much. My opinions aren't respected, they're heard then rejected. In fact, sometimes I wonder that they are heard at all. So my point is, respect is a key part in any relationship. And I think so many times people forget that. I forget that! I'll tell that person right back what I will and will not do. What we really need to do is actually sit down and find a solution that will work for both of us without trying to boss each other around. I hope we figure that out, and soon. Because otherwise our relationship with suffer big time. Because without respect, life is a heck of a lot harder. So I guess this means I have to be the mature one and try to give respect. And maybe, just maybe I'll get some back. We can pray anyway....

We've aquired it, now can we make it stay?

The fire has been aquired by  thousands of teenagers in Houston and the surrounding area. Not only here, but all over the country. Will it stay ignited? That is the question right now. As having experienced the hype and "Jesus high" that comes from attending a ATF and the drop off of it in a couple weeks I know first hand how easily swayed and pumped up teenagers and people in general can get, only to burn out when they have nothing of lasting substance to keep their fire and relationship with Christ going. The only thing that can really work is to pursue God, in the Word and in talking to Him, and not just trying to maintain a relationship through your pastor on Sunday and Wednesday. Church doesn't cut it I'm afraid. It take effort and time to have a good relationship with God, like it does with any other relationship in life. So my challange for myself and the rest of us who've been inspired by "Normal is not enough" is to actually pursue God and live like we promised we would. I will not slip back into mundane life, I can't afford it. Normal is not good enough for me.

Money, money, everyone needs it, everyone wants it....

I wish I was rich. You know, born into a fabulously wealthy family with not a worry in my pretty little rich kid head. But I wasn't so, I have to do things like get a job, and fund raise. Oh joy, who doesn't love asking people for money. But I was thinking, and I thought of something that surprised me. As most of y'all should know I'm going to New York in the spring with my choir. I'm not gonna lie, it's pricey, like 1500 or something around there. And yeah, I've been doing all the fundraisers, but to be honest, it's not helping much. But I thought, how many friends do I have on facebook? 612 to be precise. And if everyone gave me a dollar or two that'd help so much! But I doubt everyone will. Or anyone actually. But I think aside from feeling like a beggar and asking for money I learned something pretty amazing. If everyone gets behind something and gives just a tiny bit it adds up a lot!! If you gave up one coffee drink a month and gave the money to say, Heifer International, or another nonprofit like that, and a lot of people did it think of how many people would be reach. So many. So why don't we, not just as the Body of Christ, but we as people in general, just reach out and give a little something to help each other out? The power of giving a little should never be under estimated folks, because pennies add up :) So whether or not anyone helps me get to New York I hope I made you think. A little goes a long way. Like me! I'm short and small but I go a long way. It's hard to ignore me. (probably because I'm loud and obnoxious, at least my brothers and sisters have told me...hah!)  anyway, there was your random comment from your lovable Hannah for the day. Have an awesome day, month, year, and life. I love you!

Capitol Punishment, cruel or just?

      Of the 1099 executions carried out in the whole of the USA from 1977 to the end of 2007, Texas accounts for 406 or 37%. Texas carries out far more executions than any other American state; between 1982 and 2007 it executed 404 men and 2 women. America is one of the few countries that still have a death penalty, but it still has one of the higher murder rates in the world, when most of Europe has outlawed capitol punishment and has some of the lowest. However, Singapore has a very brutal punishment system and they have crime rates that most countries dream about having. It’s a very mixed message. It also has to do with cultural differences as well as the punishment method. Capitol punishment has many problems though, one of the biggest being the thought that it is inhumane. Is it? Reports claim that more then half of all prison and jail inmates have mental health problems. Another line of thought is that anyone capable of doing heinous crimes worthy of the death penalty can only be committed by someone who is acting under the influence of something else, be it drugs, pressure from another source, or mental sickness. I believe that capitol punishment is inhuman and needlessly cruel, and that while retribution is very much needed, killing a human being is not the answer to stopping crime. 

     Throughout the centuries, murder has always been a crime to repay with the death of the one who committed the act. Yet the notion seems skewed to me. We teach others not to kill by killing people who kill other people. It doesn’t make sense in my mind. Not only is it horribly cruel to the recipient, but think of the hell that the family and loved ones go through. Losing someone is never easy, but the guilt and painfulness of losing someone to capitol punishment would be horrific. Now, the person should have to face the consequences, but I firmly believe in rehabilitation. If the money spent on the inmates on death row and their appeals and such was spent on keeping children off the streets and out of trouble, and on rehabilitating criminals, not only would lives be saved, but society would function better.

      Some think that people who do these acts are purely evil and need to be wiped from the earth and removed from society permanently. But where do we draw the line between the victim and the oppressor? The child molested grows up to be a molester, the young man seeing violence his whole life turns to the only thing he’s ever seen, and the girl raised to flaunt her body and use it sells herself to earn a living. Minds warped from birth and suddenly the broken child is a heinous criminal in the eyes of the world. Is there no compassion? Does no one care? Given up on, rejected, hurting hearts are crying out to be saved and all anyone cares about is getting them out of the way. God’s heart hurts at the pain of His children. What right do we have to kill each other? God does not choose sins as better or worse. Liars will go down with rapists, petty thieves with mass murderers.

      Death is an interesting concept. Life is so fragile, so easily snatched away by a careless move. When I was 10 my father died and the foundation of my life fell away, leaving me in freefall, dazed and disoriented. Then I hit the ground a few years later when I fully realized he was gone and the pain was like being ripped into by whip of barbed wire, over and over again. A ruthless master is pain, and anger stemmed and overflowed out of my life as the scars of my past refused to completely heal and the pain was a river, constantly flowing and mingling with my hatred as I was thrown about like a ragdoll. When I think of anyone else going through a time as dark as that my heart breaks.  No one should ever have to face that; no child should be forced to grow up to soon. And killing someone on purpose? Deliberately ending a precious life? That is an evil thought to me.

       To die without forgiveness is a thought that haunts me. To have no hope of redemption, no belief in a better thing beyond this whirlpool of trouble and pain we call life, would be a horrific state of mind. The cruelty of putting another human through that kind of mental horror and agony is obscene. And if one goes with the thought that only a mentally injured person is capable of doing a crime worthy of death as I do then not only is capitol punishment cruel and inhumane, but also a horrible act of immense proportions.

Rehabilitation is the answer, if only people will start caring enough to do that for those accused and convicted.

I'm waiting....

I moved. It was hard, and painful.
I'm homesick. It sucks and it's even more painful.
I have some amazing people in my life, who keep me grounded in God and do more for me than I'll probably ever know. I miss the ones I left, but I got some new ones here.
I miss home. I dream about it, I think about it, I talk about it constantly.
But I'm starting to realize some things.
I found something out that I never knew before. God loves me! Why? Who knows, I sure don't. But He does! And He has the most amazing plan for my life. I'm learning that, and I'm learning to trust that He has my life under control. I've been so stressed and upset about my future lately, and its been killing me. But I'm starting to hear what God is telling me. "Wait on the Lord, and follow His way." Psalm 37:34a
While I've been stressing and trying to pull my life together, I've lost site of God and His Word. Last night I was drained. Emotionally, physically, spiritually. I couldn't sleep and I had folded all my laundry, which is saying something, haha. I was at Christfest at College Station early in the night, and there was a concert and one of the artist's had said something that struck a note. He said something about being in a time of waiting and listening to God and just relying on Him. I opened my bible and was reading in Psalms, and desperately praying for a word from God. And then I saw it, in orange highlighter. "Wait on the Lord, and follow His way." I was waiting on God, that's for sure, but I hadn't really been very close to Him, in fact it seemed like I'd never been so far from Him. And when I needed Him the most all I was doing was forgetting Him and trying to do my own thing, yet still expecting Him to get my life where I wanted it to be. I just soaked in that little snippet of wisdom and realized that while I am waiting on God I need to be seeking Him and pursuing His heart. So that's what I'm doing. And I'm trying to open my heart up to receive His love and wisdom. And the funny thing is, I'm starting to feel content with this time of waiting. Why? Because I know God has it under control. Whatever happens is going to be so much better than any of my plans. Maybe here I'll be able to touch someone's life that otherwise would have been lost otherwise. I don't know, I just know this. His plans will not harm me. Jeremiah 29:11 says "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future."
Do I still want my own plans to happen? Of course! But am I content with my life right now? Yes, because I know I'm where God wants me. 

Thoughts of a Girl

I used to think that the world was pretty good. Sure, there were bad guys, but almost everyone was good, and did the right thing. And what bad guys did exist were behind bars. Safely in prison and out of my life. That was my world, and it was a nice place to live in. I saw the good in everyone, and forgave and forgot the faults of people without a thought. I defend the mistakes that those I loved made. I thought people could change in a moment, with just a prayer, a sorry thought, an apology. I had the naivety to believe that people would change from their habits. That once you said you'd stop, you'd change, that you would. I believed that people didn't do bad things on their own. They had to be coerced, forced, they weren't thinking straight, something was making them that was out of their control. I pushed down feelings of hatred and hurt and a life of pain and buried it so deep I didn't know it was there. I was a healthy girl, at peace with the world, my world. I could stop the conflicts, taking the blame, apologizing to end a fight, even if I knew I was in the right. To stop others from hurting, I would take the hurt and make excuses for their mistakes. And things still bubbled over, as much as I tried to stop it. I desperately tried to keep my eggshell thin world from cracking. I was holding it together, barely, and I convinced myself it was all alright.
But then came the breaking point, it was inevitable, it had to come some time.
I realized I hated my persecutor, the one I always protected, forgave, and tried to excuse.
All the things I had pushed down were surfacing, coming out where I least expected them. I did not realize the depth of pain inflicted on me until it came out. I was an angry spirit, I didn't care about ending the conflict, I was escalating it, after years of packing it down and burying it under smiles and laughs. My world was now filled with violence and pain. Bad guys roamed the streets aimlessly, committing horrors without thought. I know longer filtered unknowingly the faults of others, I saw them crystal clear. I could see that everyone, makes mistakes, is cruel, says rude things, curses, has a touch of evil. It was as if I saw the world through a fuzzy glass window, and then it was removed. But I went to the extreme, I couldn't see what was good in people, I lost site of the beauty of life. But time past, and so did my bitterness....kinda. God is working in me and He's not finished yet. But I'm seeing people as things in the works. They aren't finished yet, and he's till working on them. But I also am not blindly forgiving their faults, that day has passed. And I pray that one day my heart will be fully healed and I can truly forgive those who made my life so painful. But it's not today.
And it  probably won't be tomorrow.
But maybe the day after that...?