A Legacy Left Behind by the Class of '99

Some of you are probably tired of me talking about it, but this weekend is my graduating class from Florence High School's 10 Year Reunion!!! We've been planning it since March, but I've been thinking about it for 9 years. So what, I'm a girl! I wish I had written down somewhere what I thought it would be like so I could LOL! It's been fun getting to reconnect with old classmates through the planning. Now we are (or at least should be) a lot more mature and at different stages in life. I'm looking forward to catching up with some classmates with whom I finally have some things in common!

One thing I'm really looking forward to most is finally letting my classmatess get to know the real ME. Back then who knew who they really were? I sure didn't.  I knew who and what I wanted to be, but was far from it. I was as fake as could be. People thought I was a Christian, but I really wasn't. I desperately wanted to be though. My junior year I thought I was a Believer, then my senior year, I thought I could believe myself into being a Christian, but that only left emptiness and hopelessness and worst of all...fear. I saw true Believers exuding joy that I knew only came from the Holy Spirit and I wanted that. I was a hypocrite. My pride was sending me to hell. Life at home was awful and I was in a pointless relationship that was all about infatuation, but I didn't want people to see that. It would be embarrassing. I had a youth minister and a youth worker who saw through the charade, and they looked after me. I don't think anyone was more happy than them, when I finally did do business with God in my heart and stopped doing it with my head.

It was a hard journey after that, in the wilderness being humbled, tested, humbled and shaped, but I emerged to find that I didn't care any longer what people thought of what I looked like or whether or not I was a dork. I have learned to be me, the one God has made, from the inside out. His opinion is the only one that counts. "But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart." 1 Samuel 16:7

My hopes for this reunion aren't only for me, there are other classmates who have changed, and grown, who have renewed their relationships with Christ and are growing by leaps and bounds in the Spirit. I want people to see that. To get to know them now. I want people to see the joy we exude and to desire a true relationship with the REAL JOY GIVER!