{"id":32,"date":"2012-06-14T01:58:00","date_gmt":"2012-06-14T01:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/2012\/06\/thief\/"},"modified":"2018-04-21T17:22:22","modified_gmt":"2018-04-21T17:22:22","slug":"thief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/2012\/06\/thief\/","title":{"rendered":"The Thief."},"content":{"rendered":"

I started a new book \u2013 \u201cWalking with God\u201d by John Eldredge.  It\u2019s all about learning to hear God\u2019s voice in your life.  A very wise woman in my life recommended it to me, after a long discussion we had about the subject of fear.  Something that I\u2019m sure we all struggle with and yet no one talks about.  John 10:7-10 says: 7 Therefore Jesus said again, \u201cVery truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them. 9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.<\/strong><\/em> I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.<\/strong><\/em> I don\u2019t know why this verse in particular resonated with me on this particular week \u2013 maybe I was just so over feeling paralyzed by all I cannot control.  Letting those voices of doubt stop me from doing what I long in my heart to do because I am afraid.  Afraid of what people will think, afraid I will regret my decisions, afraid of judgment\u2026  It dawns on me, that life is just so fleeting, so short \u2013 a blink of an eye and 2012 is half over.  Driving through my college town this past weekend, realizing it was 12 years ago that I left there, so full of promise and cockiness and sheer willpower to succeed.  12 years \u2013 gone like the mist coming off a lake in the early morning hours.  All of these moments we try to stretch out, hoping for a do-over, another chance to do it right.  When in reality, we never get that time back<\/em>.  It\u2019s gone.  Then I start thinking about the next 12 years. How do I want to spend my days, my time?  God said, \u201cI have come that [you] may have life, and have it to the full<\/em>.\u201d  The word Full is defined as \u201ccontaining or holding as much or as many as possible; having no empty space\u201d. Having no empty space<\/em> for the enemy to hide, to destroy, to devour all of the good that God has built into my life. I realize that I am not living my life to the full.  How can I when I spend so much time fretting over other people\u2019s expectations of me? Spurred on by this newfound clarity, I made a decision.  I went from this: \"iPhone<\/a> \u2026to this: \"579600_10150951701137722_1674835123_n\"<\/a> You may think, what does changing the color of my hair have to do with fear?  Ever since Reese Witherspoon colored her blonde locks for \u201cWalk the Line\u201d, I have wanted to do the same.  For 7 years.  And every single time I think I\u2019m going to pull the trigger, I start to talk myself out of it: What if I hate it?  What if my family hates it?  What if my husband hates it?  What if it looks nothing like what I picture in my mind?  What if I can\u2019t change it back and I\u2019m doomed for the rest of my life with a hair color that doesn\u2019t \u201cfit\u201d me?  I have only ever been a blonde.  My whole life.  Ask me what my \u201cnatural color\u201d is and I\u2019m not sure I can tell you.  That\u2019s how long I\u2019ve been a blonde. The day of my hair appointment my stomach was completely tied up in knots. But then, I was reminded of God\u2019s Words in John 10 and knew that if I was going to live my life to the full, I would have to take risks and not let fear stifle me anymore. This might seem silly to some of you\u2026but it really is a small picture of what God wants to teach us about fear.  God intends for our lives to be extravagantly and lavishly filled with Him.<\/u>  To have no empty space, no vacuum for the enemy to fill. The end of the story is a good one \u2013 I love my hair.  Like, love, love, love a million times LOVE.  And I\u2019m SO glad I didn\u2019t let fear steal my joy.  What are you letting fear steal today? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I started a new book \u2013 \u201cWalking with God\u201d by John Eldredge.  It\u2019s all about learning to hear God\u2019s voice in your life.  A very wise woman in my life recommended it to me, after a long discussion we had about the subject of fear.  Something that I\u2019m sure we all struggle with and yet […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1151,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/almostjuliet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/iPhone-pics-3-26-2012-121_thumb1.jpg?fit=486%2C484&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1150,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32\/revisions\/1150"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}