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Thanks for visiting my diary. I've been journaling since 1984 and have chosen to share some of my entries online. They are not all positive thoughts, but I hope that reading them might be a blessing to someone who needs encouragement.
If you are just coming to my diary for the first time, please read my introductory entry, where I share some background that is important if you plan to follow this diary regularly.
Please also visit my music page, where you can hear samples from my debut CD, I Believe, which features songs written based on experiences shared in this journal.
More things have been happening, and again I have not had time to write. I loved East Side Church of God. That is where I went with Melissa. The college Sunday school class is wonderful! Two of the teachers are Bill and Gloria Gaither. I did not want to think about the fact that they are very well-known people when I went to church. I wanted to see Bill and Gloria in the same way that I wanted people to see me: as a person with emotions and the ability to love.
Last Sunday night, the class went to Bill and Gloria's house for a cook-out. I really wanted to talk to Gloria, just because. I was standing around when she came up and hugged me. ?How are you doing?? she asked. That night I began to see Gloria as a friend, and that was not just because she was with only fifty people instead of five thousand. She was looking at each of us as individuals, not as statistical, unnamed college students in a crowd. We were people, and we were searching for something to gratify some inner emptiness. I was, anyway. I needed to know that someone cared about me, whether it was Gloria Gaither, Julie, or whoever was around. At that moment, it was Gloria Gaither. She saw my need and responded to it.
That leads me to another subject. I can remember a girl coming up one day when Kevin, a guy at school, was talking to me and saying, "Leave her alone." I thought, he was just talking. "I wanted to go to a different church," he said when he showed up at church, "but then I saw you in here."
Now I see that he was searching for some acceptance that he did not find at home or at school. Unfortunately, he did not find it at church, either. I am embarrassed to think that I, who should know so well how strong the wall is that isolation can build that I can write a song about seeing people's needs beneath their laughter, did not see the need that was right before me. If I had seen his need, would he be anywhere else now? As I have grown up, I have felt that the church has become a social club. We do not open our arms to the people who really need us: the ones who are seeking forgiveness.
Julie had told me that she would go with me to try out for Chapel. On Sunday, Melissa said that if I wanted to, we could all sing in a trio. I thought that was great because they are seniors and music majors, and I am just a freshman. We sang "My Jesus, I love Thee." I had always thought that was a pretty song, but I realized the meaning of it last Wednesday, another one of my bad days. I was lying in bed feeling really sad, and that song was going through my mind. Then I understood that if I am ever to love the Lord, the time is now, when there is no one else to love. I was thankful that I knew what the song meant during the tryouts Thursday night, because it helped me to sing better.
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