The Journey That Has Brought Me Here...

I am just beginning my journey.

I realize, as I sit here a month away from 27, that I’m no spring chicken. I look young, but I have an old soul. There have been times when I felt much older than my age and times when age was as foreign a concept as time itself.

I have been called out on saying that age is just a number by people who just don’t get it—but for me, it really is. I have found, the older I have gotten, the more I can relate to just about anyone. The women I hung out with a year ago when I was working as a first grade teacher were all older women: I enjoyed their wisdom, but most of all I loved their spunky, hilarious personalities and the ways we could laugh through anything. Currently, most of my closest friends are my age—but it’s only because they’re the ones I went to college with. In this last season all my friends were younger than me, sometimes by eight years. Two of my best friends from that time, more like sisters, were eighteen when we started. I could have cared less how old they were—I loved being with them! We had fun!

It doesn’t matter. It’s never mattered!

I find that experience—what we’ve been through—and the heart—how we let our experiences shape, change and develop us and what we choose to care for—are all much more important indicators of who a person is. I know—beyond a doubt—that God gave me more years before I started stepping into this crazy life called missions because I had a lot to work through: things that would have been ugly on the mission field. He kept me back—even though I longed to and even fought to move forward. He was faithful to block me, even when it caused me pain, from those things that were not right at the present time, in order to give me something grand at the right time. It was right in me to have that desire, but without the timing…you have nothing. He’s taught me that, over and over, in so many areas of my life.

It’s this thing called ‘holiness’ isn’t it? I have become quite obsessed—no, it’s just come more and more to the forefront for me, just how important this little word is, with all its implications. Holiness invites you to believe in the other, to see the world through another’s lens and believe that what He says is true and good for you. Holiness holds within itself an element of timing: of doing things fittingly, in the right time and place. In trusting the timing of another, holiness invites you beyond yourself into the unknown, the other, to trust what you cannot see so that you can move forward fully. To believe and walk in holiness means to abdicate all other gods who would take the throne of your heart so that you may see clearly and move forward when the Father calls you.

It’s easy to let go of holiness. I was so close to doing it this last season, only seconds and words barely unspoken away from pushing into what was not mine yet. I had to abdicate—and the loss felt just like that, such a loss—but I can see clearly now.

I see where I am headed and the work that the Lord has done to get me here—to this Promised Land. All of my broken, trying years created this refining and hope in me that go beyond human expectation. They created in me resilience, an ability to look beyond present pain into what is coming, the gift of the future. I know how to endure loss, criticism and judgment from others in a way that honors those around me and keeps me moving forward. In the middle of the arena, with the fight going on all around, I have learned to stand still and hear my Father’s voice—to live and move from that perspective and not what my natural ears and eyes perceive.  I have learned, especially in this last season, that love is made to be audible, shared, and that the love of the Father makes all worthy. I have learned to let love grow in me, so that others may be known and seen and comforted. I have learned to speak when it may be unpopular and that my voice is worth being known and heard.

And in all this, I am very much still learning and in process—but He sees gold in me. He put it there. This last season was the last of digging out the choking weeds and dust of death so that life, true life from the Father of life, could be found in me. I am becoming—always in process—a piece of heaven on earth, where the dwelling place of God has been made with man.

Heaven on earth…

It’s strange, to live in the yet and the not yet: we spent a whole year while I was in college talking through this concept in my school’s chapel. Our campus pastor, Travis Osborne, took apart the Kingdom of God, its implications and all that Jesus and the rest of the Bible said about it—and in the end, we were left with “it’s-here-but-not-yet”. Tension…

Tension…

We all live in the tension, in many ways. So much of it is earthly, full of unfulfilled longing: “I want healing…, I want a child…, I want a new Mercedes…, I want that perfect job…,” You can be centered on your earthly tensions for the rest of your life and find that nothing else matters, because you can’t even think of anything else anymore: you’re so consumed with what you don’t have. It’s a fruitless pursuit: letting earthly tension take you over.

The Kingdom of God is not like that. It’s the place of tension, but it’s the best kind, the kind that brings life. When your life is centered around this Kingdom, all the rest comes to you as a matter of course, just part of the ride as you gaze at Him. Kingdom living—which is others centered—accidentally on purpose propels you forward into all you ever dreamed of because you have chosen to live for the King and He has chosen—and is now able to, because of your relinquishment—to take care of all that concerns you. You live with such a different hope and focus from this place: you know that the Lord is coming and your life is about building into His kingdom, even if you can’t see it yet. It’s a tension that gives life!

Here’s how it works: as you become more and more obsessed with this Kingdom, giving up more and more of what you thought was your real life to be a part of it (and this could look different in every life, as each of us has different struggles and dreams that we must relinquish control of) as you make this choice, it changes you. The further in you get, the more it will cost you: but, if you let it, the refining will bring you further into all He created you to be. Sure, you lost your car and you’re still single, but wowie! do you know how to love on and connect with people who you thought were so different from you! As He asks for more of who you are and who you thought you would be—often a very painful process--you are able to walk forward fully into all He has for you. In all your choices to trust His holiness and timing, you have created a place where you are able to behold Him truly and in that place, you see yourself truly and recognize that nothing holds you back from fully walking out the life He promised you. As you encountered the tension—and let it change you—all of a sudden it created in you what He had wanted there all along—and isn’t it beautiful? Isn’t it wonderful? Isn’t it great to be one of His own?

Tension is a part of life. We will never escape it: but when we choose to embrace the Kingdom of God as our own, the tension allows beauty to be found in us. A musical instrument will not function without tension. Any good story must have its share of tension to be worth being told. All the good love stories, dramas, thrillers—all accept and are able to move forward because of and in tension. You can run from it—or embrace it, allowing it to do the work in you.

I love the tension of knowing that my King is coming and yet not being able to see Him yet. I love—although I also feel the pain of—the various places in my life that are living in tension: marriage, ministry to Haiti, going back to Ireland. It is in the tension that life is created and holiness is felt: because at the right time, with the right amount of disappointment and hope, beauty and pain, suffering and glory, our lives on earth are being built. And yet, we are more: we are part of a Kingdom that goes on eternally. This life—the one you’re living—matters more than you have ever given it credit for. And you, who you are right now, the choices you are making, affect generations to come. So though you may have tension—hurts and worries that won’t leave you alone, struggles that seem to go on and on—know that these are part of a beautiful story that, if you chose to let your Creator in to co-create with you, will show Him and His glory off in the end.

1 Peter 1:6-9 says it best: “In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love. Though you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith—the salvation of your souls.”

No matter what state your life is in, I guarantee He wants it—to show off Himself. And I guarantee that when you are fully given over to Him, He will make beauty out of your pain and allow your story of redemption and hope—Jesus in His Kingdom at work—to shatter the lies of the enemy in other people. He loves to take what the enemy meant for evil and fill it to overflowing with good—and He’s powerful enough to do it, every time. You are not beyond redeeming, beyond Hope because we all know: Resurrection is here. It’s not a concept to be grasped, but a life to be lived, fully out of Him, in whatever broken places you have to offer.

The Kingdom has come—and is coming. Enjoy that tension with Him. It’s a beautiful story.

As for me, my journey, just beginning, is leading me to Northern Ireland for the next few years. A grace to my parents (sending out your single daughter isn't easy) and a delight to me: I will be working with students just like me as well as locals, bringing all forward into deeper encounters with the Lord and His radiant Kingdom. The people who were missionaries all over the world now need missionaries of their own: and I am delighted to be part of their journey! Pray for me!

Stripped Away

What do you do when it all gets torn away from you? When you lose the one thing which you thought would bring you happiness...when you have to move away from all you've known...when life can't seem to give you anything but hard knocks?

I ask it because I'm living it. There's a place deep in my soul that's unsettled and striving, that keeps crying out for more when less is all I see around me.

I've read a lot of books on "desire" and "choosing to know your own heart"--books that remind us that the single most painful thing we can do is acknowledge the mess our lives are in--how far we are from where we intentionally tried to be--and to go from that place and keep hoping. Every book...they say that this is the hardest thing you will ever do, but you will only get your heart and your life back if you do choose to keep hoping, keep trusting and keep pursuing God even when all seems lost.

Because all will be lost--especially if we are in a pursuit with Him.

There are easier ways--we can slip in the back door, take the smooth road and end up where we always wanted to be by our own merit--but there's no pride or glory to God in that methodology. If you are in a pursuit of all (ALL!) that God has for you--prepare for the worst.

Prepare to leave all that is familiar behind--you're paving a new trail...

Prepare to be misunderstood--your circumstances will make sense to no one, usually not even to you...

Prepare to lose it all--He needs to have His hands on your life, so you must relinquish control...

Prepare to die to what you want--the vision goes way beyond what you can see...

Prepare to leave silly arguments about calling behind--it all becomes worthless in the light of knowing Him...

Prepare to dance and sing and praise Him even in the middle of your deserts--these are the sweetest moments, the sacrifice of praise...

Prepare to meet Him in a new, life giving way--and prepare for Him to fill you with Himself on a level you could never have imagined when you first started out...

I have lost it all--love, independence, career, hopes for my "future"...it wasn't His best and so He stole me away to a new life--comfort, hope, joy found only in Him. I read in a letter yesterday (the first letter to my husband--haven't meet him yet :)) that I have been praying that I would truly know deep love--we never know what we're praying for, do we? Never realize how deep and wide and crazy those prayers can be and the journeys they will take us on. I prayed that prayer unaware of the pain that would come out of knowing deep love. My Lord asked me to sacrifice all--took things I depended on away, one by one--so that I might truly love and hope in Him. He's a wild God--but so good in the end. I wouldn't trade sun filled days for the dark nights where I have known Him.

And now the journey continues--chooisng to live out of my heart, though I can see less than far and have much to ask...still I will choose to dream. When I moved home I put this Post-It note up on the wall to remind me to keep pressing forward:

Give yourself room to DREAM! 

It may seem crazy and messy, but it's the only way to hope...

I choose hope today, will you...? In the middle of all you can't see, in the middle of desperate pain and broken relationships, will you choose to believe and trust that there is a good God who knows you and wants to show love to you? Give yourself room to dream, remember the words He has spoken to you and move forward in hope...

Even on a rainy day, there's still light and color behind the clouds.

Inspired by Psalm 137   

By the waters of Babylon,
    there we sat down and wept,
    when we remembered Zion.
² On the willows there
    we hung up our lyres.
³ For there our captors
    required of us songs,
and our tormentors, mirth, saying,
    “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

⁴ How shall we sing the Lord's song
    in a foreign land?
⁵ If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
    let my right hand forget its skill!
⁶ Let my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth,
    if I do not remember you,
if I do not set Jerusalem
    above my highest joy!

⁷ Remember, O Lord, against the Edomites
    the day of Jerusalem,
how they said, “Lay it bare, lay it bare,
    down to its foundations!”
⁸ O daughter of Babylon, doomed to be destroyed,
    blessed shall he be who repays you
    with what you have done to us!
⁹ Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones
    and dashes them against the rock!

Our Long Walk

Hope stirs...

It's been a long winter break...they usually are, but this one is especially. My feet were chilled continuously last night, I kept waking up to frozen toes.

Then morning comes (and I sleep in) while the sun rises and beauty abounds (Question: is it still beautiful somewhere even if no one ever sees it? hehe) I woke up and decided to climb a mountain, one I'd been on before a little earlier this break...but I never got to the end of the trail. Today I was going to walk on that path until it ended.

I read "The Long Walk" by Stephen King last night. 100 boys had to march at a certain pace until they all "bought their ticket" (i.e. violated the rules in some way--being too slow, falling down from exhaustion--and were sot by the soldiers traveling alongside them). The only boy sparred was the winner...and by the end, it didn't matter that he'd won. Apparently, this walk was the national pastime of the country and people had bets on who would be the winner. The winner also got whatever he wanted for the rest of his life...that's mainly what drew the boys in...
Brutal book.

Anyway, reading this and reading about "the Crowd"...this crazed entity that was watching these boys march to their death and loving it...I was aware of the stark contrast between the reality of the boys on that long walk and how the way Christians live. See, we're all on a walk in our lives, we're all dying as we go along (as one boy said to the main character "we've been dying all along") it's just that the walk in the book was much more simplified and put into a smaller frame of time...but we are all on this walk, dying as we go. Some die quickly, maybe before life has even started for them and it seems unfair...others are still in the race, but they've been so mowed down by all the difficulties that have come their way that they are no longer truly living or responsive to life around them, they're just still moving forward, who knows why?...others have a long walk, filled with all that life should be filled with, but then it all ends badly...

These boys had terror as the reality of their walk...friends shot down mercilessly...I think many people live this reality. Life just keeps getting worse, until you just have to go numb to all the pain and stop feeling disappointed or you'll explode (several of the boys in the book explode in this way--attacking the soldiers who escorted them, or, in some cases, pleading with the soldiers for mercy). We've resigned ourselves in order to survive. We believe the world is a dark and terrible place where senseless things happen and...what more is there to say?

When this worldview is contrasted with the Christian worldview...we Christians simply look naive!! It seems as though Christians wander through life with their head in the clouds, smiles plastered on our faces as we offer shallow bandages ("it'll be alright, sweetie, God's in control" and "it may look terrible, but God has a purpose for this too!") to those who are experiencing the ravages of war (life can be war, right?) We seem clueless...

...and maybe some of us are...maybe we're stupid and we don't realize what's going on in the world, the enormity of children dying all around because they are unable to have food in their bellies...curse us, if you will. Many of us are clueless. I was.

But then there are nights like tonight when you see beauty in the sky (hence the picture in this blog) and you realize that despite death and destruction all around, life has its moments of joy.

But back to the Christians...

I went on my own long walk today, up the mountain. I kept thinking on that book...I tried to walk fast, like they had to, without stopping...up mountains and along roads where people were driving by like every day...and I finished what I started. I found the end of that trail and even made it home.

You know why we Christians see it differently--it's because our walk is different. The "Crowd" surrounding us is not malicious...it's a crowd of those who have already made it through this race and are now cheering us on. "Fight the good fight!" "Keep going, you can make it!" Christians know that this life is not easy, but we know many have already made it and we can make it too. We have someone fighting on our behalf, someone who knows us more intimately than any other ever could and who has already gone before us. He knows how our lives can be used in the best way possible and we follow Him, even though the path may lead through despair and heartbreak and us having to give more of ourselves than we ever thought possible. We remember that He asked us to pick up our cross and follow Him and so we do it gladly...because He did it first for us.

Maybe that's why we can keep going and even have a smile on our face as we go. We even have songs of praise on our lips, because we know how very much our God loves us (His Son proved this on the cross) and we are thankful.

So we look stupid and some make fun of us...but we are still walking and praising our God as we go. He is in control of what goes on in our lives...we have placed our trust in Him and He is good.
He will lead us home in the end.

O, Christians are a strange lot. Live through us, Jesus!

the beginning

Hmm...a place for thoughts...that's what I wanted...and not just to keep them for myself, but to share. That's how I want to live life--not trying to hoard it all as close as possible like I see so many people doing--but living free. Lending things to those who need it, being a true friend and giving all I can to see that others are safe and able to follow their dreams...

I guess most would call me an idealist, but I've also been knocked down more than I now...not physically, but seeing people dear to me in situations and not knowing how to move...what can I do? They are so far from me and yet I ache for them at times. No one should starve...but some do. It is the reality of our world, but I can't stand it.

And you know, some days, you just want to stop feeling, stop caring...it would be easier. It is a pain--heart pain--to care deeply and it can take a lot out of you.

Maybe that's where this blog comes from...I know--so many people blog--so maybe I don't do this to be read, but rather to help myself see through this time to a future. I am a Christian, one who has read much of the Bible. I know and love Jesus--usually much less than I should--and I know what He promised. So that's where I am--here in the waiting...waiting to see His promises coem through, because soemtimes, that's all there is. Hope. I need hope...faith...and love. May they be evident in my life...and in this blog.

Jesus, live through me. Please.