Giving it a try...

So, I've never been one for blogs or journals, but I figured I'd give this a try (thanks Beth). Journaling for me of one of those things I wish I would do, but never seem to be able to carry through with it. I'm going to use this to get random things out there, most probably for my own personal benefit.
So, it's 1:30 in the morning and I'm waiting on my laundry to be finished. I'm slightly proud of myself because I did not want to do it all, but the need for clean underwear overpowered that. There's so much going through my head right now, everything from clean underwear, to the problems with my back, to my relationship with God, to my relationship with Tara. Not much to be said about clean underwear except that we all appreciate it when we have it. The other three things however, have a lot that need to be said. This might turn into a really long post.
So, my back and my chest have been hurting a lot in this past week. It tends to flare up when I'm playing trombone, not good considering I'm a trombone major. I went to the doctor on Friday and he said I had a rib out of alignment and popped it back. He told me to call him Saturday morning and let him know how it felt. Well, it started hurting again Friday night at the wind ensemble concert so I called him Saturday morning and went back and saw him. He popped my back again and found the source of the pain in my right shoulder blade, a really bad muscle spasm he said. He gave me a shot for it and told me he wanted x-rays to make sure we aren't over-looking anything. This brings up a dilemma, when in the world does a music education major have time to go get x-rays? Hopefully Dr. West will let me skip/be late to wind ensemble on Monday. This is all very irritating because I have this undying suspicion that it's going to turn out to be nothing like always. I always think I have something really bad and it always turns about to be completely harmless. Oh well, I guess I'll find out soon enough. Pray for me.
Next on the list: my relationship with God. Wow what a topic! I don't even know where to start except by saying that God is amazing! I walked outside the other morning and was in awe at the beauty of the sky and the mountains. To think that the One who created all of that is present and active in my life is astonishing. Recently I've "revamped" my quiet time. For quite sometime, my alone time with God was something that was routine, basic, and not very good for me spiritually. I realized this and decided to take a new approach. Now, instead of just reading a chapter a day and maybe praying a little bit, I'm taking passages of the Bible and pulling as much as I can out of them. I'm going through the sermon on the mount right now and it is great! The whole thing basically tells you exactly how to be a Christian. I think I'll be in this passage for a while, maybe I should change up the books I reference it from just to keep it interesting, haha. Tonight (Saturday) was incredible! I went to Coulter, the music building, to practice trombone. Well, I decided to not practice but just play for God instead, so I took my iPod and headed out. I went to the chorus room and turned the lights off and just started playing. In my mind it was like I was playing my testimony. After that I turned my iPod to "All Creatures" by David Crowder. I must have repeated that song five times and just played along with it. It was a great worship experience and I finally understood what it meant to use my gifts for God's glory. It's not about playing all these scales and exercises and solos, it's about giving back the gift God has given me and doing it with everything I have. After attempting to play a couple more songs, I just laid on the floor and listened to some music then turned it off, got on my knees and prayed. it was a fantastic night! Praise God!!
So I guess the last thing I mentioned was my relationship with Tara. Wow, what a blessing from God this woman is! It is great to be with someone who not only shares a relationship with God in common, but also almost every view when it comes to the purpose of dating, boundaries, accountability, future house plans, and much much more. Tara pushes me to be closer to Christ, sometimes without even meaning to or knowing it; and for that I am so thankful! In a true Christian relationship, it's not just the man and the woman, Jesus Christ has to be the central figure. A woman needs to have her heart so buried in the heart of God that the man has to seek Him in order to find her; and vice versa. I'm so glad that Tara understands this concept and that she helps me stick to it. I praise God that I'm with her! My prayer is that our relationship would continue to grow in a godly manner, that He would be the center of our relationship, and that we would glorify Him with the way we act towards each other in private and in public. God is so good!
So umm, that was really long and I definitely did not expect it to be. I really hope that I can keep this blog going, it feels nice to get stuff out there. I can pretty much guarantee you all that they will not all be this serious though; ya'll know me better than that.