The Soldier’s March

I’m writing this blog about faith because it has become a huge factor in my life recently. Faith is something that I’ve struggled with a lot since becoming a Christian. Coming from an atheist background, I was completely dependent on myself, and (said at least) I didn’t need any help. Well when I became a Christian, I realized that being self sufficient was failing me and I should place my dependence on God.

Well that didn’t last long and I ended up relying on my own efforts again. God has been working on breaking me down in this area and it has been great, because I know how much my own effort will fail me and trusting in God will show me great results, and actual improvement in my life.

Recently several things have been happening that I know for a fact that the only way to overcome them is to trust in God. The first is the realization that in a couple of weeks I will be entering the University of Akron Battleground. Yes, a battleground. Secondly I’m going to definatley need a new job once school starts. I keep running numbers and coming up with me having to work about thirty to thirty-five hours in order to move out into the ministry house.

In a battleground, there is no room for a soldier to mis-trust his commander. It is the same for God’s battlefield, except the ramifications for not trusting in God could go into eternity. The difference between a worldly Leader and God is obvious, God won’t fail, and he is never wrong.

Damn, straight I changed the name again. I decided since I’m going to be entering a new phase of my life (the college years!) I would have to change the name of my Blog. Just make sure you read the tagline or it will seem like I’m trying to impersonate a military officer, which I’m not.

Well I guess the past month has been a pretty crazy ride for me. For once, though, my title actually is going to be a pretty good description of what I am going to write about.

I guess I will start with the separation. About three weeks ago, Becky and I broke up. The whole thing shook me up pretty bad. It had happened just before our word prayer meeting. I sat there, through the meeting, holding back tears, while we prayed. After it was over, I left without telling anyone what had happened, and went home. I changed my facebook status and started watching some tv. A couple hours later I get a call from B, asking what had happened (because he saw my facebook status had changed). I told him that we broke up and I didn’t want to talk about it over the phone. He invited me to come over to the McCallums to go watch a movie and hang out.

I decided to go, and got there about 7:45ish. When I got there, Keith, Jeff, B, and Kyle were all there hanging out. Keith had asked what had happened, and I started to tell him, tears welling up in my eyes. I had kept so much from all of them (my closest friends), about some stuff that had been going on between Becky and I, leading up to the break-up. They all comforted me, and really helped me out a lot.

Well The next day, I got up and went to work. I worked for my five hour shift, trying not to really think about it, and just get through the day. When I finally got home, I checked my E-mail, and found a message from Keith. He said that he basically wanted to get together with Becky and I to talk about what had happened. I called him, and we got it all set up and went over to his house. Keith brought up some good discernment of basically what had happened between us. Through this I realized, once again, just how many problems I had. What had happened was I was relying on Becky for my emotional outlet (because being a phleg I tend to not be that emotional) and this was causing her to feel smothered. Also, Keith noted that we were spending a large amount of time together, and this was probably increasing the smother feeling. My resistance to open up with my friends about the events preceding the break were due to the fact that I am a notorious judger and I was afraid of being judged, and this hindered my ability to be open. Becky and I walked out of Keith’s house, having all those mishaps worked out, and decided to continue our relationship again. I was so happy
with our reconciliation and I was just praising God to have such a great friend as Keith, to help me out. It was a great experience.

Well that was pretty crazy (and long) but I thought I’d share that life moment with everyone.

Graduation is drawing ever closer. Classes are all done and the ceremony is on June 9th. A lot of people have been asking me if I felt any different, or if I’m excited. The thing is though, I don’t really feel that different at all. I’m not sure if it has something to do with the fact that I already have a year of college under my bely, or never really saw graduating high school as that big of an accomplishment. After all, I’m about to go right back to school for another four or so years to get yet another degree. It seems like very few people don’t go on to college any more, and the four more years of education has become a norm. So then, the question I have is, why does everyone make High School Graduation such a big deal?

Ya, so I’m guessing that you guys are thinking that I am going to write about sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll. Well the title is completely misleading. I just wanted to write a blog about what’s been going on with me lately and couldn’t find a good title.

Well my Dad retired from Chrysler last year, so right now he has a part-time job with Joe’s auto, working nights. It’s really cool because that means his afternoons are free. That’s awesome because my dad and I have been able to go out to lunch. We’ve been able to get to talk and get to know each other, which we were never able to do while he was working at Chrysler for 40+ hours a week.

Getting to know my Dad has been a really cool experience, because I’ve found him to be a very interesting person and very cool to talk to. Some time earlier this year I shared the gospel with him, and have been praying ever since to get more opportunities to share with him some more, so this is an answer to my prayers. Now what I really need to start doing is praying for boldness to share the gospel (of course going back to the whole phleg emotion of fear). I’m really excited that the Lord has given me the opportunity, because my dad really needs the lord, and to win him, would mean great things for the rest of my family.

Well, I am completely done with classes for the semester and I only have one exam on Tuesday. As the end of school comes ever closer, it means the beginning of more work. I’ll have to start putting in forty hours a week, so that i can start a nice savings for when we get a ministry house.

Oh, and for those of you haven’t heard, we decided to wait one semester to move out and get a ministry house. Various obstacles came up, like an unexpected raise in the rent of our house that we wanted, and the fact that we really had no other houses. It seemed as if the lord was telling us it wasn’t time for us yet, otherwise he would have obviously destroyed these obstacles. It kind of sucks, but in the end, it will help adjust those who aren’t used to a college load be prepared for balancing school, work, and most importantly ministry. I was blessed enough to already have this opportunity through post-secondary, so my main use of this extra semester will be to pad my savings a bit more.

I found out that I am going to be interviewed for a scholarship in a couple weeks. It was one which I had mad credentials. I just need to keep praying that the interview doesn’t get completely messed up, and I’ll have some extra college money.

Well, I’ve been contemplating writing a multi-part story as a part of my blog, releasing one entry per week, along with my normal entry. I’m still thinking about a good story line though, so it could take a bit, I have a slow thinking process.

This is J.A.D.

J….A….D…..

It’s hit or miss time with this Ministry House. All of us who are moving out have the money in hand and finally have a nice little house in Kent picked out. Sunday is the day we sign our names to the lease.

At the beginning of this adventure, I was scared shit less. Even though I have been looking forward to this ever since I found out about Ministry Houses after I became a Christian. It just was so different than what I was used to, and a ton more responsibility. It’s interesting because I was reading Katey Downs’s blog about phleg’s and how their dominating emotion is fear. At first I didn’t think that was right, I was all like, “Fear? Me? Ya Right! I’m big, bad Justin!”

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that it was actually fairly accurate. Heh, even now I’m still a bit nervous. A lot of my fear has been killed by me realizing that if I rely on myself for all of this new responsibility, I’ll end up dying of stress by the end of the year, but I should rely on God for all of this, because it is in his will, and he wants to help us. This reminds me of this verse from Luke 12:24-25

“Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap; they have no storeroom nor barn, and yet God feeds them; how much more valuable you are than the birds! And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life’s span? ”

This is a really good verse, especially for fearful, worrying phlegs like me. I especially like how he ends that verse. It’s verses like these that I need to focus on when I’m feeling fearful.

Instead of fear, now I’ve been feeling excitement. I’ve been really excited for this Ministry House, because I know it will not only make it, but flourish with God and his help. I’ve been realizing that I need to quit being so fearful and step out in faith in God.

Well, I’ve decided to come back to my blog, after I found out my user name again. Within the next couple days I’m going to think of a new topic and blog about it. I think this might be a good way to deal with my laziness as well as my inability to focus.

I’ve renamed my blog “The Pong Game That Is My Brain” for an analogy I thought up about a month ago. I’ve been having trouble focusing lately and so I thought up this analogy to describe it. The Idea was that my brain is like a game of Pong that is circular and with many Pong paddles. Each paddle represents a new idea and when the ball bounces on it, it that’s where my brain shifts toward. That’s why sometimes if you talk to me, it seems like I just completely switched to a new topic without a transition.

I want to write on a good topic next time, so I’ll be thinking of some, but suggestions are always helpful if anyone has any. I don’t really know what people usually blog about so I’m gonna be pretty lost. Well, I’ve got major work to do, I’ll post back by Saturday I hope.

Well I decided that I’d post a piece of writing I did last year and won an award for (got a whole $75.00!). The premise of the paper was to write about a law that you live by and the story behind it.

Listen

A law of life is something that people live by. Some laws are good and some laws are bad. These laws are usually based on common sense or past experiences. The strongest laws are ones that combine both. I have a law that is strong like this which I use everyday. The law states that I must swallow my pride and listen to what people are telling me even if I don’t agree.

I made this law based on the two ways life laws are made. I thought this law to have a lot of common sense for multiple reasons. Through various experiences I realized that I might actually be wrong about things I had been previously so sure about. As hard as it was I had to let go of my pride and actually listen for once. Once I let go of my pride and started to listen I came upon some wisdom that I hold close to my heart even until this day.

I started talking to my friend about God. I was positive that there wasn’t such a thing. I wouldn’t listen to my friend about all these facts he was giving me. It was a decision that I was still very unsure about, and frankly didn’t want to talk about. I was always trying to rule out the possibility of a “Creator” or “God” and my pride was getting in the way of me learning the truth about God’s existence. We would talk about it and he would try to convince me yet I would not listen. One day I decided that instead of not listening I would pay attention and take my friend’s points into consideration.

I had gotten to thinking about what I believed to be true, about how this world came into existence. It was so abnormal yet the way I thought was based on pure chance and frankly dumb luck. I had previously believed that existence had just appeared in some primordial soup; however I realized that the odds of that actually happening were astronomical.

The world I had created in my mind suddenly stopped moving. The world of “logic and science only” was turned on its head. I would think to myself, “It just can’t be that simple…” and I was wrong once again. It was that simple.

It was as if God had been telling me all along “Justin you idiot, stop trying to rule me out that’s impossible instead take me into consideration.” I swallowed my pride and that night accepted God’s existence to be true. This was one of the most important decisions I’ve come to and ever since then my life has just continued to get better and better, and all I had to do was swallow my pride.

Good morning Blogging Community,

My name is Justin Alain Duchaine for those of you who don’t know me. For those of you wondering, the answer is yes. I finally decided to get myself a Blog. I don’t know why, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. Well Blogging community this is my greeting to you, so feel free to respond, ask me questions, and give me things to write about. That’s one great way I can keep coming to this and remembering to update it.

Sincerely,

J.A.Duche