I'm captivated!

"Take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ." 2 Corinthians 10:5

Every thought... man I have a lot of those. I'll start thinking about one thing and about 10 seconds later wonder how I got to what I'm thinking now. This taking captive my thoughts thing is really hard for me! I have a tendency to let Satan feed me his lies and once he's got a foothold he really goes for it. You know, somebody looks at me funny and soon I'm having a pity party because the world hates me. Ha, that's a slight exaggeration but its along those lines. Or If I feel someones wronged me and I start resenting them or thinking badly of them, I've taken the bait. And if we have these thoughts and we dwell on them, we are likely to act on them in a way that will not be so pretty (James 1:14-15). Today's thoughts are tomorrow's actions! What if I made the conscious effort as soon as a thought that is not Christ-like enters my mind that I'm going to stifle it? Satan's good. He knows my weaknesses, he knows my insecurities, he knows just the place to stick the knife in. But lucky for you and me we've got someone so much greater on our side. And the enemy is scared of His name. I like this version of the verse too: "We capture every thought and make it give up and obey Christ." How cool is that? Phil 4:8 gives us a pretty clear picture of what our thoughts are suppose to be. So solution! With every thought that comes to mind I need to say, "Ok liz, is what I'm thinking true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, and praiseworthy?" HA yeah right. People would either think I had Parkinson's from how slow it would take me to speak or they'd think I was nutso as every few seconds I appeared deep in thought, mouthing the words of that verse. But this, and the entire rest of God's word helps give us an idea of what we should be thinking. So once we know God's thoughts, we can better separate them from Satan's (or ours, which may be one in the same a lot of the time). Sanctification! So when I start getting impatient in traffic, or I get annoyed with the person that made a rude comment, or I'm fearful of saying something about Jesus because I don't want to offend someone, etc... that's when I have to take responsibility of my thoughts. And say be gone!! Cast it out! Have a bible verse to recite at that time or maybe just start praying! God can purge us and cleanse our hearts of the messy things, but we've got to be willing for Him to do it. He can restore and heal us. I have to remember I'm not a victim of my thoughts. And also its good to know that these things I struggle with, the sins that seem so prevalent in my life, they are NOT me. It's a lie of the devil that I am an insecure person. The insecurity is a sin that's being lived out through my body. It's not like I want to be insecure! (Romans 7) And now that I have recognized this sin in my life, whenever I have a thought that is putting my security in something of this world and not in God (and that's a whole other story... I've got lots of those things) I can so "no siree girlfriend, your security is in Christ!" So no one and nothing is gonna take that away from me! And in time, it will get easier. If God and I start fighting this together, we're gonna beat it. It's not instant gratification, but this is the first step- taking our thoughts CAPTIVE and making them give up and obey!! How awesome that we have that power in Christ?

Patience- my nemesis

so i was just reading this psalm...

"how priceless is your unfailing love!

both high and low among men

find refuge in the shadow of your wings.

they feast on the abundance of your house;

you give them drink from your river of delights.

for with you is the fountain of life;

in your light we see light."

Its all quite lovely, but i got stuck on the verse "feast on the abundance of your house". someone once gave me the illustration that god has this magnificent feast for us but were on our hands and knees on the ground looking for crumbs that may have fallen underneath the table. Sounds pretty dumb right? But that's what we do! We sell god short, or we don't realize what he has to offer, or we think we're content with just the crumbs, or that it's all we deserve... for whatever reason we're missing out BIG TIME. Over Christmas break I talked to some Christian mentors about how I knew I was not walking with the lord anymore and that there were things I had not been willing to give up that I knew were just hedges in my walk. They said we hold onto things so tight sometimes and it's so hard to let go that God has to come in and pry our fingers open and just take whatever it is because we weren't willing to give it up on our own. But it's for our good and for his glory. He's shaping us and making us into the person he wants us to be, and I want to be just that. So some changes have come easier, others God had to do some prying. Serious prying. It hasn't been easy, but it's so incredibly clear that it was for my good. I've been able to fully focus on him with fewer distractions and it's been just awesome. I love my quiet time, before if I did it it was kind of out of habit or to check it off my list? I've prayed so much for god to remove certain sins from my life and he really has! Things I've been struggling with for who knows how long. All around fabulousness.

And now I'm having to pray for something I don't want at all-patience, which if you know me you know I'm terrible at! Waiting at a doctors office, traffic, people who talk slow, people who are slow in general, toaster ovens, commercials, etc. Well now I want to fix a certain situation and I want it fixed now! I guess it's just human nature to want to take care of everything on our own. But certain things in my life right now I can't do a thing about. Not that I havent tried and failed, probably even my efforts have made things worse. I just have to trust in gods timing with it, always keeping in mind that he works for the good of those that love him. So I can have this pretty picture in my head of how I want something to be, and it may look great, but it's not the picture god has in store. I'm still trying to hunt for the crumbs instead of loving Jesus with all my heart, focusing on him, not being strayed by the things of this world and enjoying the feast he has for me.

I don't know about you, but I love food. So this is a good illustration for me. Yum.

bad parents

2 most excellent songs

Chris Rice- Untitled Hymn (Come to Jesus)

Casting Crowns- Voice of Truth

Oh,what I would do to have
the kind of faith it takes
To climb out of this boat I'm in
Onto the crashing waves
To step out of my comfort zone
Into the realm of the unknown
Where Jesus is,
And he's holding out his hand

But the waves are calling out my name
and they laugh at me
Reminding me of all the times
I've tried before and failed
The waves they keep on telling me
time and time again
"Boy, you'll never win,
You you'll never win

But the Voice of truth tells me a different story
the Voice of truth says "do not be afraid!"
and the Voice of truth says "this is for My glory"
Out of all the voices calling out to me
I will choose to listen and believe the Voice of truth

Oh, what I would do
to have the kind of strength it takes
To stand before a giant
with just a sling and a stone
Surrounded by the sound
of a thousand warriors
shaking in their armor
Wishing they'd have had the strength to stand

But the giant's calling out
my name and he laughs at me
Reminding me of all the times
I've tried before and failed
The giant keeps on telling me
time and time again
"Boy you'll never win,
you'll never win."

But the stone was just the right size
to put the giant on the ground
and the waves they don't seem so high
from on top of them looking down
I will soar with the wings of eagles
when I stop and listen to the sound of Jesus
singing over me

well...

So it's been awhile. I'm about to finish my pediatrics rotations which I'm super bummed about but I'm going knowing I'll be back again soon... I have absolutely loved it and am 100% sold on peds. The residents are great, the attendings are great, I've learned a ton, and let's face it, kids are just WAY cooler than adults. I've become attached to one patient in particular, a 4 year old with ALL, acute lymphoblastic leukemia. She got diagnosed last summer and is in the hospital now with a fever. The other night she got transferred to the PICU which meant she wasn't on our service anymore (and the patient I got to take her place was a 17yo incarcerated female who was hallucinating... but that's a different story), so I went to see her and when I left she said, "bye elizabeth! I love you!" ahhhhh. she has my heart. So first, the kids are obviously ballin. Also, the residents are great. A lot of them (ok, basically all) are foreign so it's been cool to get to know people from different countries. Today was the birthday of the resident I am on call with. So since it was his birthday, he bought us all dinner. What? That's apparently the way they celebrate in Nepal haha. Another one of the residents brought britni and I cake for our birthday! And then everyone sang us happy birthday!! All of them are so nice and helpful, and so thankful for us helping them. I usually feel as a student that I'm more of a nuisance than anything, but they've made me feel like I'm an intricate part of the team. And the attendings... Some not so good, but most are awesome. Yesterday I got to do a bone marrow aspiration with my fav, which was amazing... I totally rocked it. I'm holding out for the chance to do a lumbar puncture too! So yeah, to sum it up, peds is the best. The kids make me smile. I don't wanna leave them, but I guess I gotta help out the crazies, the neurologically impaired, and the ones that need cutting on.

I'm such a dedicated blogger.  Quick update on life...

1- made it through my month of no meat.  I might have cheated unknowingly a couple times.  Chicken broth style, but no real meat.  One night, rationality slightly impaired, I came in and heated up a turkey sausage Jimmy Delight to eat (yeah, they are delish).  Luckily, I fell asleep in the 1.5 minutes it was in the microwave so I dodged a bullet there.  

2-I've had 4 quizzes in the past 2.5 weeks.  2 100s, 1 i missed 1 question, and then it gets embarrassing.  FOD- Fundamentals of Doctoring- a class most people do not take seriously.  Well I really wasn't taking it seriously.  I did not read the chapter that we had a quiz or, nor do I have common sense apparently.  Here's an example of a question...

Drugs are bad. True or False.

I choose False.  Then we see the results of the question and 74 people said TRUE and 1 person said FALSE.  That was me.  On 4 of the questions, I was like the only one that got it wrong.  Or maybe there were 3-4 other people.  I made a 40 on the quiz, and afterwards SMITTY was laughing at someone for missing 1.  I'm an idiot.  

3- I have a pet named Spot. He is a sweet potato.  I discovered him in my pantry after he sat there for about a month and he has done some serious sprouting.  Like 2 feet tall probably.  I'm taking suggestions on what to do with him.  One, use him as a centerpiece.  Two, leave him be and wait for him to take over my apartment.  Three, plant him.  

4- My current food obsession (edit: NEW food obsession.  I have many) is Jello Pudding.  The sugar free mix of course.  I go through a box every 2 days, pistachio is my favorite discovery so far.  

5- just realized all the updates I came up with except 1 have to do with food.  I have a problem.  

Week 1 of my semi-vegetarian diet went well.  There was one incident... that involved lentil soup made with chicken broth, but it was an accident and it won't happen again. I've eaten good-tons of seafood and tofu and veggies and fruit... ah I love food.  And to continue with that, I leave for Kansas City today to attend a family medicine conference.  Thanks to the family med department at USA, everything is paid for.  Flight, hotel, transportation to the hotel, the actual conference, and best of all, food.  Apparently the conference provides vouchers for breakfast and lunch, and we are getting $55 from our family med department for food.  Which means allison, kacie, and I will be dining at only the best and most expensive restaurants in kansas city for dinner every night.  There's an opening social where I plan on winning either a Wii or a $30o gift certificate to apple.  During the day, I hopefully will learn things about medicine.  But now I've got to go pack and find some 80s outfit to wear to that social... good times.