Leaving high school, I felt like I had religion and morality pretty well figured out. Looking back to high school days, I cringe at how I behaved and the things that I said. I must have been very difficult to talk to because I felt like it was my duty to make sure people knew when I disagreed with them so that I could point out where their faults were. (*shakes her head*) I remember some of my friends decided to try getting drunk, and they couldn't discuss it with me without fear of condemnation. Perhaps even more painfully, I felt like there was a spiritual obligation to insert God into a conversation whenever at all possible. I feel like I didn't accept people as they were. I don't think people would say I was generally unkind, but I certainly didn't embrace people.
It took a couple years, but during college, I think that this started changing. I'm not sure about what all the factors were. I'm sure that some of my classes helped, and moving to a school with almost all new people to me (compared to Newport...) certainly helped a lot. However, perhaps it was really just God helping me to interact with people. I'm sure He was aware that I was in need of some help! What a blessing to me though! (And debatably a blessing to those around me!) How much more full and good life is when I can laugh and enjoy people... ALL people. Not just the people who agree with me.
In a sense, I'd like this to read as an apology to some people that I knew in high school and perhaps early in college. I'm sorry that I didn't love you fully like I should have.
However, mostly I'd like to celebrate the fact that I can look back at the past six years and see that God used my college years to do more than to improve my mathematical logic skills. :)
I'm still working on loving people (as a few of you who have read all of my posts know!) However, whoever happens to read this, I hope that you know I do love you. And that, my friends, is the blessing of change.
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