Ok, so this might come as a surprise to many but I am not going to Germany. Do not worry, nothing happened or changed, I just finally listened.
If you read the blog entry a couple entries down from this one [ http://ryancallihan.blogspot.com/2009/05/trepidation.html ] you would see that I have been struggling with the idea of being in Germany at this point. What I didn't add there was my struggle with my motives for wanting to go. When it came down to it the reason I wanted to go was that I really wanted to go. That in itself is not a bad reason to go. But there were reasons for wanting to go that were not good. They were at the back of my mind and I did not want to admit that they were there. I will get onto that later on.
So, about 4 weeks G-d was really speaking to me about giving up everything for Him and putting everything I am/have/want on the alter. I had to look within and see if I would be willing to give up everything if my Father called me to. Some things are a little easier to give up for me. Things like relationships, shame, jobs, and such. But some things would not be so easy. Would I give up my ideas and ideals, getting married someday, my comfort, my security if G-d called me to. Would I even be willing to give up my calling to Israel if that was the will of the Father?
Now, this does not mean that I am called to give up those things, but I just need to be able to to. The concept kept on coming up in my reading, in my conversations, in my talks with G-d, and in my mind.
Now, on the fourth of July, I had a long conversation with an old friend about some struggles in my life, sin, repentance, and my relationship with G-d. That conversation left me confused and discouraged, but I do not feel like getting into the detail about that right now. We also talked about my upcoming trip to Germany. From what I described to him he said that going to Germany would be detrimental to my walk with G-d.
For the next half a week I was wrestling with G-d about whether or not I could let go of going to Germany. I decided to talk to Festus about it. As we walked around the entire perimeter of camp I talked to him about the conversation I had. He cleared up a lot of things for me about repentance and grace. [I am being quite vague, I know, but I really don't want to go into the details of all that here. That is a different struggle that would take another blog to explain. If you want to know, just ask me]. When we got to the topic of my year abroad he told me that this entire struggle that I was having could be the Holy Spirit telling me not to go.
After that I went off by myself and talked aloud to G-d. I released my year abroad and put in on the alter. As I did, I felt enormous peace and have been feeling that peace since than.
In retrospect, I can see clearly what my hidden motives for wanting to go to Germany at this point in my life are. I wanted to run away. I wanted to run away from people who would keep me accountable to G-d, I wanted to run away from living a life that was above reproach, I wanted to run away from the pain of last semester. In my last blog entry [ http://ryancallihan.blogspot.com/2009/06/concluding-thoughts.html ] I talked about how painful last semester was for me. I can see clearly now that satan had a firm grasp on my heart during that time. There was a spiritual battle going on around me that I was losing. The reason I had such a bad semester was because I was not listening to the Holy Spirit, I gave into things I shouldn't have, I started to believe things that I shouldn't have.
After I put my year abroad onto the alter, all this became so clear to me. It is only now that the damage from last semester has been healed. Like I said, I have felt immense peace. My months of running from G-d are over.
So, what now?
Well, I am going to be moving back into ΑΓΩ. More specifically, I will be moving into ΑΓΩ's BRAND NEW HOUSE! Super exciting [Our Father is good]. And what's more, I am going to be sharing a room with my beloved pledge bro Crusoe. Also, I talked to Danny about serving at Thrive and he needs a small group leader for the sophomore boys since Kyle Harrell is getting married. I am super excited about that. Futhermore, I set up my schedule for next semester and I will only be having class on Tuesdays and Thursdays which leaves Mondays open for ΑΓΩ meetings and Wednesdays open for Thrive small group. Once again, G-d provides. So from here I just need to get a job, buy a car [I sold my Squareback to go to Germany haha], and make sure that I fill out all the resignation paperwork. Finally, I discovered that by not going to Germany I will be graduating at the end of spring 2010 instead of spring or fall 2011. So I will be saving about a year and a half of school and an obnoxious amount of money.
With all this said and done, my desire to live in Europe for awhile are not gone. I still very much want to go. Just today I got a welcome letter from the Universität Heidelberg with a map of the city. My flesh was a bit pained to see that, but I know that I have made the right decision.
So, that's that. This next semester is going to be amazing. And here's a picture of the house we are moving into....
