God's done some awesome things for me this Youth Quake. I've accepted the now two year old occasion of being separated from someone I once called "Sister". She was my best friend, and when I finally accepted that she wasn't my friend or my sister anymore, it was like an amputation that I'd spent nearly two years angsting about. This was something I wrote about it shortly after I was coherent enough to get my words down.
I thought about her that way. It didn't make me happy, even though that used to be a synonymous term for happy. Yeah. I thought I'd be completely alone from a packed house, when Bro. H said for anyone struggling with that to come forward. Luckily, somewhere around 8-10-20 came forward.
Guilt and shame? Do you know what mine and my best friends relationship was and is based on? Mine and Sis. P's? Mine and J's? Mine and K's and.... L's? The power of the special interest is the love that I've poured into KNOWING each of you.
The power of the special interest after I've finished really, really, getting to know all but the last ones, is the desire to be a fighter for those people. For L, I hadn't finished figuring her out before the determination to protect came.
It was enough to keep me fixated on her, have all of my attention wasted (poured out completely, not the other use) on trying to get her back to emotional safety and *I STILL HAVEN'T FIGURED HER OUT YET* was also a somewhat major underlying concern..
The separation is MURDERING us!!!! *howl*
Now, we hop in our time machine, and fast forward to last night, after I've accepted Pastor F's decision to separate us.
I put all of my energy into loving and wanting to know those people. It wasn't enough. GOD is the only one that can satisfy my love-thirstiness.
I desired .... something I never should have. I lost one of my dearest friends, the rest of my first innocence, and my view of myself. I became incapable of helping, protecting solidly.... I became twisted. Because I didn't put God first.
I didn't put God first. If I had been listening to the Audio Bible, and writing something good and Godly, I wouldn't have read that fic. I read a yuri lemon, allowed it to tempt me, and I was forever changed. It was training. Through the darkness, God showed me light. By running and fighting against the darkness, I learned to love the best things... God Himself, more.
When I was young, I decided that I would give less to God so that I'd be able to give God more later.
This was as wrong as it could have gotten. God always deserves my all. I put my friends before God.... Now look where it's gotten me.
The Devil's tempted me with a divergent lifestyle, and because of that, I lost my other god. My mind.
My mind was highly efficient and capable once. I lost some of my capabilities due to the way I responded to myself once I started looking at certain ones the wrong way. I hated myself, and the mind that thought those things. I used to be a head banger, and not the kind that does it against air. What part of my brain is at the forefront? The maturity centre! I used to have a lot of impulse control. It was flushed down the toilet, basically.
Then, I started losing closeness to L because of my issues. Eventually, I'd go to my Pastor, tell him about the temptation, and this would change my life again. He said, "Stay away from her." We have spoken to each other no more than seven times since then.
I finally badgered my Pastor into letting me speak to her again. I never even got to ask her if she would be my friend again. "Yes, he did," she said. "The answer is no."
She went on a missions trip and came back. I was still hurting, natch. I was also sleepy. I murmured to myself, "Nee-chan janai desu," which is to say, "She's not my sister," in Japanese. I disowned her. My, that hurt, but it was a necessary amputation. Better to make it to Heaven with a Sasori (puppet) body than to go to Hell with my family intact. That was the main issue of what Bro. H preached tonight.
Throw Jezebel down, and kill Joram while you're at it too. Joram is your worst issue, metaphorically speaking. Jezebel is beyond the worst. Joram would've been the temptation. Jezebel is the not-putting-Jesus-first thing.
I'll be putting Jesus first! I'll learn to get help.... and I'll throw down Jezebel! Well, I'll have help, but she will be overthrown.
On this night, a visiting minister who knows us very well told us not to call our Pastor "Bro. D." anymore, like we always have. "From now on, this is Pastor F." he said, or something incredibly similar. I felt a strong remorse-like feeling for all the times in my past I'd been frustrated and resentful towards him from a distance in my past. I am very sorry for disliking him so badly. He was watching for my soul. I had no right to be so frustrated and maybe even angsty about it. I'm sad so much time was wasted, but so thankful the hurting, angsty part's all over.
God really does work everything out to the good of those who love him, and are called according to His Word! Do you think you'd have as many issues accepting God's will and your Pastor's decision if he made a decision to split you from someone you consider your family?
Autistics and autism are NOT bad. They are part of humanity, of the human condition. It's an alternate way of seeing the world and communicating with what all you come across. Neurotypicals do not empathise with it, and if they did, the logic of calling it Autism would disappear. If Autism comes from a word that means 'alone' and Autistics were empathised with, they would not match the original meaning, for they would not be alone. The accuracy of calling it Autism, of even calling it more disabling than normal would disappear. Because if Autistics were all empathised with, they could be taught better. That would change everything.
Maybe you're not seeing something about your previous autism. It's not that wretched from my angle. But, nobody knows everything, and it's even really hard to know everything about a given region of thought or knowledge. But, seriously, look outside the box. It's really no one's fault, and Autism (or Neurotypicality and all the other brain differences) isn't really all that bad.
Humanity has it's flaws, weaknesses, and short comings, like all other blemishes in this imperfect world. But there is Hope, in the realm of Autism, and all humanity, with belief. And that is truth.