If you missed my first two posts, you can find them here:
Freshman Year: http://remyeaton.blogspot.com/2012/12/what-i-learned-in-college-freshman-year.html
Sophomore Year: http://remyeaton.blogspot.com/2012/12/sophomore-year.html



What I learned in College: Junior Year

Between sophomore and junior year, I went from feeling young and inexperienced to mature and confident. I still had the desire to be childlike and humble, but all the lessons and experiences from the past two years allowed me to be rooted in Christ. It was a turning point from underclassman to upperclassman, from naïve child to mature adult.

Jealousy and Envy
Coming off my sophomore year, I was still single and loving it. But that didn’t prevent me from yearning for the beauty of women and the comfort of friendships. This introduced me to a little destructive duo known as jealousy and envy. They are twins and they both like to steal joy. While single, I still looked at the friendships and relationships that others had with a green eye. I had crushes and I had friend crushes. I resented the fact that I wasn’t as cool, as handsome, as wealthy, as spiritual, as popular, as whatever as someone else. From my experiences, I can tell you that envy will take every blessing you have and hide it in the shadows, making you feel cold and barren. Growing up, no ever really focused on preventing jealousy and envy. I didn’t even know I what envy was until one of my housemates told me he was struggling with it. When you look at what everyone else has, you can’t enjoy what you’ve got. If the grass looks green on the other side, you need to water your own lawn. Don’t let envy and jealousy rob you of your joy. It’s a cancer of the heart. God hates ingratitude. Become friends with humility, thankfulness, and joy.

Miracles
Over the summer, I started looking into miracles. Do they happen? When? Where? Why? Did miracles just happen in the days of robes and dirty sandals? Or is God still doing miracles through the Holy Spirit today? I read accounts of miracles like Like a Mighty Wind by Mel Tari (read it) and Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire (read this one too). I asked the big questions and struggled with why God didn’t do miracles around me. I began pursuing God’s power, not just His love. I spent the summer discussing the topic of miracles with my closest friends until we went to the Jesus Culture Awakening Conference in Chicago. All I had researched happened there. People were healed on the spot. The lame walked. The sick became well. There was even a guy who had a bullet in his shoulder disappear completely. It freaked me out. One thing I learned was that doubt will always exist. Even after seeing it with my own two eyes, I still didn’t quite want to believe it. It doesn’t matter how much you investigate it and it doesn’t matter how many miracles happen right before your eyes, your flesh will still doubt. Oh,, your broken bone was healed? Show me the x-ray. Oh, it’s right here? It must be faked. Oh, your doctor validated it? How did you trick him to believe it to? Faith isn’t faith without the rejection of doubt. If you tell a child that your arm was broken and now it’s healed, they will believe you. Instead, we have to feel the holes in Jesus’ hands just like Thomas. That’s where we have to come to as Christians. In the Kingdom of God, seeing isn’t believing; believing is seeing. There are no experts in the Kingdom, only children. God doesn’t move through highly qualified spiritual juggernauts; He uses ordinary people to do His extraordinary work. I saw the Spirit move, and frankly, it scared me. It took me out of my comfort zone. No longer was God an idea. No longer was the Spirit a feeling. Everything was now tangible. I couldn’t live a comfortless and placid lifestyle knowing that God will do the supernatural if we will just ask. If you doubt that God does miracles at the word of His children, believe me: God does miracles. I’m not trying to trick you. I have nothing to gain. I am simply reporting the truth. And these aren’t just the we miraculously found the right kind of medicine to heal you in 5 years miracles, but the you just got healed on the spot miracles. They happen. We just don’t ask for them. And when we do, we do it without faith. We must pursue God’s presence with faith if we want to see His power.

I wrote about that conference and miracles briefly here: http://remyeaton.blogspot.com/2011/08/do-you-believe-in-miracles.html

Be content with those around you
You know when you are in a room with a bunch of people and they are all bundled up into a bunch of little circles? Isn’t that strange? Or how about when you go to a restaurant with a bunch of your friends and you do your best set sit in the best spot for social interaction? We are social creatures and that can create some interesting habits. One habit I noticed in myself all through sophomore year and the beginning of junior year was that I would always work to put myself in the circle with the best conversation. When in a circle of friends, I would subconsciously survey the room to make sure there wasn’t another circle that was more entertaining or filled with more laughter than mine. It goes back to that envy and jealousy thing. I wanted attention. I wanted to be “in”. Junior year, I finally got sick of trying to talk in the funniest circle, sit next to the best people, or be associated with the most respected crowd. I dropped my social ambitions and just said “God, I am going to sit myself down and let you put the people around me that You want to.” So I did, and let me tell you friends, what a relief it was! No longer was I concerned about being in the best social position. Rather, I lowered myself and became a wallflower such that God could make it evident who He wanted me to talk to rather than who I wanted to get in a conversation with. My self-worth was no longer who I was with, but who I was for. Learn to be content with the people around you. Every person is a unique image of God found no where else in existence. Don’t yearn to be around others when you have precious children of God right around you. Seek to serve your neighbors; don’t seek new neighbors.

I write about this idea here: http://remyeaton.blogspot.com/2011/09/self-worth-whats-it-worth.html

Rachel
I started dating Rachel. I can’t really keep the lessons learned from this shorter than 5000 words, so I am just going post my blog post on dating. Most of what I learned is reflected there. What I can say is this: I remained single until it was absolutely clear that dating Rachel would glorify Him more than me being single. I pursued her as Christ pursued me. Now, I have a passion for how to date in a Godly manner. The following blog post shows all the wisdom I learned about dating junior year:
http://remyeaton.blogspot.com/2012/10/how-to-date-well.html

God Speaks
Until my junior year, I only heard God’s voice through sermons, music, events, and so on. I never imagined that He would speak to me in my mind about myself and others. The truth is: the closer to God you get, the more you can recognize and listen to his voice. My junior year, I began to seek God’s presence through prayer. When praying for myself and others, I simply asked Him to give me words. I made myself believe that whatever thought ran through my head was His voice. I asked Him to prevent other spirits from speaking to me during prayer. If I was wrong or got embarrassed, it was okay because I knew He was in control. So I began texting people prayers. I simply asked God to tell me what to write. I wrote what I heard and sent it to people. At first, the responses were the typical “Thank you for praying for me” messages. But the closer and closer I got to God and the more time I spent seeking His will, the more descriptive the prayers became and the more unexplainable the responses were. People began to text back saying that every word I said was spot on to their life and that they couldn’t understand how I knew that about them. I simply laughed because I had no clue what I was doing. But once I got over the worry of being wrong or embarrassed, God used me to bring His voice into other's lives. I can’t say I hit the nail every time, but I can say that as I pursued God, He empowered me to pursue other people for Him. To put it simply: God rewards His children when they act boldly in His Name and He speaks to those who are willing to listen and obey. However, a fair warning is due: Don’t try to fill the silence with God’s voice. If you focus on trying to create the supernatural, it may work and it may not. But if you focus on loving people, you will never fail.

Blogging Bonanza
Junior year is when I started to blog. Again, I was never one to enjoy writing in high school. But the Spirit changed my heart and my desires and started giving me a passion for reading and writing. I don’t know why God made me seek to write down my reflections and post a bajillion Facebook statuses and tweets, but now I can’t stop. Very often, He will give me a word or a lesson that burns deep down, and if I don’t get it out, it drives me crazy. Regardless, I began blogging and now I can look back at over 70 blog posts, each one averaging thousands of words. In fact, because of my new found passion for blogging, I already wrote a blog on what I learned my junior year. I tried to keep this post short (Keyword: Tried) because I already have a post on my junior year.

Here is my blog post on lessons from junior year: http://remyeaton.blogspot.com/2012/05/jeremys-junior-year-lessons.html

That’s it for junior year! One more post to go!