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Lady_Katie87
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Name: Katie
Country: United States
State: North Carolina
Metro: Charlotte
Gender: Female
Interests: history, reading, writing, spelling, grammar, linguistics, words, languages, etymology, spanish, Puritan and Reformed theology, apologetics, soccer, frisbee, swimming, sunshine, animals, baking bread, biking, hiking, camping, skating, listening to music, word games, puzzles, scrapbooking, shooting, self-defense, hanging out with friends, laughing, lazer-tag, civil war era dancing, swing dancing, letter-writing, travel, adventures, photography, sign language, antique stores, thrift shops, homemaking
Expertise: Working hard. Over-working. Not sleeping or drinking enough.
Occupation: Lover. :-D Bride-to-be (yay)
Industry: Food Services.
Message: message me
Member Since:
4/28/2006
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| From Samuel Rutherford to Robert Gordon of Knockbreck, 9 February 1637.
. . . I see that now which I never saw well before:
1. I see faith's necessity in a fair day is never known aright; but now I miss nothing so much as faith. Hunger in me runneth to fair and sweet promises; but when I come, I am like a hungry man that wanteth teeth, or a weak stomach having a sharp appetite that is filled with the very sight of meat, or like one stupified with cold under the water, that would fain come to land but cannot grip anything casten to him. I can let Christ grip me, but I cannot grip him. I love to be kissed, and to sit on Christ's knee; but I cannot set my feet to the ground, for afflictions bring the cramp upon my faith. All that I can do is to hold out a lame faith to Christ like a beggar holding out a stump, instead of an arm or a leg, and cry, 'Lord Jesus, work a miracle!' O what would I give to have hands and arms to grip strongly and fold handsomely about Christ's neck, and to have my claim made good with real possession! I think that my love to Christ hath feet in abundance, and runneth swiftly to be at him, but it wanteth hands and fingers to apprehend him. I think that I would give Christ every morning my blessing, to have as much faith as I have love and hunger; at least I miss faith more than love or hunger.
2. I see that mortification, and to be crucified with the world, is not so highly accounted of by us as it should be. O how heavenly a thing it is to be dead and dumb and deaf to this world's sweet music! I confess it hath pleased His Majesty to make me laugh at the children who are wooing this world for their match. I see men lying about the world, as nobles about a king's court, and I wonder what they are all doing there. As I am at this present I would scorn to scourt such a feckless and petty princess, or buy this world's kindness with a bow of my knee. I scarce now either see or hear what it is that this world offereth me: I know that it is little which it can take from me and as little that it can give me. I recommend mortification to you above anything; for, alas! we but chase feathers flying in the air, and tire our own spirits for the froth and over-gilded clay of a dying life. One sight of what my Lord hath let me see within this short time is worth a world of worlds.
3. I thought courage, in the time of trouble for Christ's sake, a thing that I might take up at my foot. I thought that the very remembrance of the honesty of the cause would be enough. But I was a fool in so thinking, I have much ado now to win to one smile. But I see that joy groweth up in heaven, and it is above our short arm. Christ will be steward and dispenser himself, and none else but he. Therefore now, I count much of one dramweight of spiritual joy. One smile of Christ's face is now to me as a kingdom; and He is no niggard to me of comforts. Truly I have no cause to say that I am pinched with penury or that the consolations of Christ are dried up; for he hath poured down rivers upon a dry wilderness the like of me, to my admiration; and in my very swoonings he holdeth up my head and stayeth me with flagons of wine, and comforteth me with apples. My house and bed are strewed with kisses of love. . .
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| Katie is struggling with a sinus and chest cold and searching for a new place of employment and wrestling with fears and impatience and wishing she was in Scotland N*O*W* instead of having to wait another 11 days and catching up on several loads of laundry and looking forward to not sharing a bedroom with her little sister anymore and trying to decide what to make for dinner and missing David excruciatingly and wondering whether her bridal registry is sufficient and wishing she had a pair of nice cozy slippers and getting totally insanely excited about the fact that she is having her first bridal shower this week (squee!!!) and thinking is this really happening to me? and trying to trust God throughout every day and not studying as much as she should be and thinking every once in a while about the paper she's supposed to be writing and realizing all the things she could be doing and panicking because she doesn't know where to start and wondering if she can afford to splurge on a Riverdance performance next week and getting weary of feeling so desperately lonely sometimes.
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| TWO. MONTHS. LATER.
Wow, the last time I blogged was really two months ago?? Hmm, that would seem to imply that there has been a priority shift in my life!  The reality is that there indeed has been.
1) I am now engaged to the most incredible, amazing, wonderful man on the face of the earth! We officially got engaged on November 22nd, the day before my 21st birthday.  The Lord is so good, so gracious, so generous, so kind. . . Because my man lives on the opposite side of the Atlantic Ocean, our relationship has been pursued by way of phone calls and emails -- and then we got to spend nearly three weeks together over Thanksgiving, when he came to visit my family and to ask me to marry him. 
2) I am now deeply immersed in wedding planning. David and I will be getting married in July and planning a trans-Atlantic wedding takes a fair bit of effort! It has been encouraging and overwhelming to watch the Lord provide. . . He has already immensely blessed our search for a church, a minister, a reception facility, and a photographer, and so many of the other details seem to be coming together in an amazing fashion!
3) I'm still planning to continue taking classes full-time at the local community college and working part-time until just before our wedding. So far my studies have been going quite well -- although it was difficult trying to study for finals during the last few days of David's visit!
The Lord is good, and life is good, and love is good. And life is still requiring patience. . . that elusive virtue called patience. Learning to wait on the Lord's timing. . . not just "waiting" which can sometimes be fretful or anxious, but waiting that is full of contentment and active service for the Lord. Using His time for His glory. Resting in the knowledge that He -- still, always, continually -- knows what is best. Apparently the Atlantic Ocean is where it is for His glory and my good . . . though there are days that I am sorely tempted to build a bridge across it, or drain it, or simply buy a plane ticket tonight and take myself away to where I long to be.
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| I posted this a year or two ago, but it's worth re-posting.
O merciful God, be Thou unto me
A strong Tower of defence,
I humbly entreat Thee.
Give me grace to await Thy leisure,
And patiently to bear
What Thou doest unto me;
Nothing doubting or mistrusting
Thy goodness towards me;
For Thou knowest what is good for me
Better than I do.
Therefore do with me in all things
What Thou wilt;
Only arm me, I beseech Thee,
With Thine armor,
That I may stand fast;
Above all things taking to me
The shield of faith;
Praying always that I may
Refer myself wholly to Thy will,
Abiding Thy pleasure, and comforting myself
In those troubles which it shall please Thee
To send me, seeing such troubles are
Profitable for me; and I am
Assuredly persuaded that all Thou doest
Cannot be but well; and unto Thee
Be all honor and glory. Amen. ~ The prayer of seventeen-year-old Lady Jane Grey, in her prison cell before she was beheaded in 1554 I
love this poem so much that I re-read it often to remind myself of its
truth and beauty. It comforts me to think that this prayer is as
applicable and full of God's providence to me, in the relatively small
trials of my life, as it was to Lady Jane Grey as she contemplated her
premature death at the hands of an evil monarch. What faith and trust
she had in God's will! | | |
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