Hey fellow bloggers and bloggees!
It has been such a long time, and so much has been going on! I apologise for my lack of blogs.
Lately the book of Revelation and the End Times have been on my mind and heart.
It all began about two months ago while I was flicking through the bible as I do and my eyes saw this scripture:
Isaiah 24:18-20
"The floodgates of the heavens are opened,
the foundations of the earth shake.
The earth is broken up,
the earth is split asunder,
the earth is violently shaken.
The earth reels like a drunkard,
it sways like a hut in the wind;
so heavy upon it is the guilt of its rebellion
that it falls—never to rise again."
Now as most of you will know, we had a quite sizeable 7.1 magnitude earthquake in September 2010. This was frightnening for everyone!
Not long after this earthquake I would flick through my small pink bible at random and often come across passages that would bring up the topic of earthquakes.
However it was this scripture from Isaiah that had me the most captivated and I told many people about it.
On that monday night some months ago, I was at a connect group which is called Getting Real with God. I spoke of this passage I had sighted and that led to an indepth conversation about end times and the rapture and so on.
It is safe to say that since that converation I had a fear envelope that I simply could not shake! I would constantly think about the end times, and the likelihood of more quakes and so on. Natural disasters and a fear of the rapture would not leave my mind!
So....22/2/2011
This is a day I will not forget in a hurry, or ever in fact.
12:51, I was sitting at a desk on the 3rd floor of the Avonmore builiding out near latimer square on a lunch break. I hadn't eaten except for a flavoured latte because I had no food. The building started to shake, not too badly at first and then increased in violence. I thought nothing of it at first, and looking back it all seems like a big blur. But then the class realised it wasn't stopping and windows were smashing as well as pieces of the building fall off before our eyes.
It was then that I remember what our hospitality tutor Amber had said
"If there is another big earthquake it'd be more likely that the outside of the building will be damaged, not the inside. It's a safe building."
This provided a small comfort for a second but that soon faded as my classmates screamed and had expressions of utter terror on their face as the room swayed dramtically back and forth. I cowered under a desk along with everybody else and then ninja'd my desk closer to my classmates so I wasn't alone.
It was at this moment that I thought I actally might face death because I was certain the building was about to collapse under us. So I started praying for protection in between my screams of terror.
We went into the classroom next to us and our other tutor, Sean, shouted at us: "GET OUT! GET OUT!"
So we all mished down the stairs as quickly as possible.
The scene outside was like an apocolypse. Buildings on fire, buildings on the ground, people with blood pouring down them and all the while there was an eerie smog/smoke in the air.
We assembled in Latimer Square, at first I was trying to be cool and calm, and giving people hugs and reassuring them, but then I just lost it, I started sobbing. I felt like I would never feel happy ever again. I was certain that it must have been at least a magnitude 8 or higher, and when I got a tweet from geonet saying 6.3 I was very surprised. Then the aftershock came. It felt massive, and the ground lurched about a metre in one direction. I was certain that the end had come. I was bracing myself for a huge earthquake that would finish us all.
I know that sounds very melodramatic, but it is exactly how I felt at the time.
So about this fear, it was chasing me down ever since I'm not sure when, well ages anyway. It came to a head when I was at a prayer meeting a couple of weeks ago and I got a text from my bro saying: "Watch channel 3."
I then heard about the horrific events that had occurred moments ago in Japan, the huge 8.9 quake that was beyond comprehension, and the devastating 10 metre tsunami that had swept over Japan. There was talk of tsunamis in N.Z, and I felt very afraid.
As you can probably tell from the way my mind works thus far, I usually come to the worst conclusion first. It doesn't matter how small or big it is. So when I heard rumours of a tsunami for N.Z I was wracked with images of a humungous wave sweeping our house away and everything around it.
So what did I do? I did the only thing I could do, I prayed to God.
Life went on as normal (as normal as could be under the circumstances) and at a prayer meeting a week or so later I learnt that I could/should repent of my fear that was suffocating me, i.e, ruining my life. So I did that! Needless to say it helped a lot. It took some time to completely erradicate the fear but I just kept on giving it to God.
And about end times? Well I don't feel so fearful about them now, which is a huge relief, I even kind of look forward to them, maybe?! (Just a teeny bit perhaps :) )
I know that they're inevetible, and that there's not a lot I can do except live for God the best I can and talk with Him every single day.
Lately I'm been considering what to do next year. Even though I'm currently studying hospitality, I keep thinking of MTC, and might just do that. Time will tell. I would definitely love to be employed this year though. :)
Love you all! God Bless!
Kia Kaha Christchurch!
