Prologue

On Friday, July 16th I had a conversation with my good friend Jen about figuring out the path God has planned for us and finding where we're supposed to be. She had been in a transition period, reading the book of Daniel and was inspired by Daniel's 70 weeks of prayer so she decided to change that into days- 70 days of pressing into God in hopes of getting a better sense of where she was supposed to be, who she was supposed to be. Our mutual friend was jumping in on this as well. "It's not like a deadline," she said, "more of a way to keep track of things, just see what God does in my life in the next 70 days."

This visit with Jen was on one of my few trips home, was in the middle of my reading "The Great Divorce" and having a philosophical revelation on my relationship with God and how it had grown or decreased in proportion to my relationship with others. Going home always makes me think a lot, revisit where I've been, and re-evaluate where I'm going. When Jen mentioned the idea I did not decide right away to do the 70 days myself but while driving up to my alma mater one summer day I passed some familiar landmarks that reminded me of landmarks on my spiritual journey- 2 years ago I had begun to re-vamp and, in a lot of ways, really establish (in a way, for the first time, truly) my relationship with God. I saw where I was then and what God had done for me, where He had pulled me out of a relationship from which I could not have extricated myself, made me myself again, gave me true joy again, and primarily led me to understand what true joy was- what truth was, to know who Jesus was and so many things that can't be put into words.
I also realized how much more work I had to do.  While reading "The Great Divorce" I realized I was like the woman who would not give up her son, who used God only as a route to reach him- I used God only to get what I want. I never loved God the way I always said I wanted to love another person: "love him for him"-I never loved God more than friends, family, students- and that that was a terrible, sad, and detrimental thing. I had known this before, had known I needed to put God first but never quite got there. Maybe I just thought it would come, maybe I was just putting it off and thought the love I had for Him was good enough. But that weekend I was home, I knew it wasn't and knew I couldn't do anything right until I loved God right. Thus, began my 70 days of pressing into God but with a specific purpose- to press into Him in order to know Him, to love Him for Him. Like Jen said, it wasn't a deadline. Who can love God correctly in 70 days? Who can love God correctly and wholly in this lifetime? I'll continue working on it until I see His face, but I needed to make a lot more progress, to get a whole lot closer to loving him wholly than I was. Thus began the 70 days, ending September 23, 2010

And, while Jen was in a transition period, I realized I found myself in a kind of three year transition period- a period of working and growing, transitioning between college and a place where God eventually wants me to be. While I had already begun the journey of being a teacher, I was signed up to spend at least 3 years in a place to grow as a teacher, as a person, as a child of God- to become who God needs me to be to embark on the more pivotal part of the journey He has planned. The problem was (and is) that I did not (and do not) know where the pivotal part of my journey lies, what it is, and what I need to do to get there. This was a very serious question, one that could take a lot of prayer. 70 days was great for the first part of this process, loving God, but after I get that more under control, I should go further. 70 WEEKS seems daunting, but for someone about halfway through her 3 year transition period, it's perfect. It put me at November 18th, 2011- about 1/3 of the way through the last year of my graduate program. I decided I would pray, press into God, get to know God, love God for 70 weeks and that by that time, I had to have an idea of where the next part of the journey was and where I was going to start the pivotal part of it, more importantly, where GOD wanted me to go to begin the pivotal part of it.

Thus begins  this blog, although I'm a little late in posting it as I'm already 14 weeks in. Although, I'm only 4 and a half weeks past my 70 days at this point. I did some writing during that period so I'll post that although it's not the current status of my 70 weeks. Eventually I'll catch up and what you read will be where I am.
So, here begins the chronicle of my 70 weeks of prayer, the content of which should be a meaningful conversation with the Almighty, the end of which should be the beginning of an important life decision.

Here goes nothing...