The Race: I Just Got Invited Back in Again

I just got invited back in again.

When I was preparing to come out here to Ireland the first time, I spent a few days and months not working, just preparing. I had to move apartments and use money that I didn’t necessarily have: but the Lord was providing. On one of those days, I went by a park where I used to run as a kid and there it was: the cross country races in full swing.

Of course, I was caught up in the nostalgia. I used to be a runner myself: I remembered the agony and grit required, how quickly it all went by, the feeling of waiting to just start out (awful!). I wrote a grand little paper later that day on running the race together that I asked all of my soon-to-be-teammates to read (they thought I was a bit nuts, poor things. Mores the pity for them.) But God was doing something, reminding me that there is a race to be run and inviting me in, at my old stomping grounds.

Races are hard, ardous, deadly-feeling things. It’s all over really quick, but the blood, sweat and tears in the middle can leave you feeling as though you haven’t a hope in the world: best give up now. You can especially feel that way when you’re the girl who is so slow that your friend can go to the bathroom in the middle of the race and still find herself with a better time than you (that was a humbling day). I remember one race where we had been practicing in really wet, soggy conditions and then race day was dry dust and I lost heart…but we’ll finish that story in a bit.

Races…races are about the endurance, the anticipation of what’s around the next corner without letting that become your whole focus. They’re about running well right now, being fully present, with an ear and an eye to the future, knowing what is to come and that the energy you’re exerting now is worth the gain to come in the future.

I was never any good at races. I was never good at endurance. I hadn’t the head for it: I couldn’t—or maybe I never learned—to take what was in front of me and crush it so that I could reach my ultimate goal. I have had countless conversations with my mother where I tell her about what is in front of me (in a panic) and she calmly explains to me that the mountain I think is in front of me is actually a molehill.

It’s a crazy thing to race, to actually believe in oneself and move forward despite the jeers and catcalls and overwhelming doubt you can feel in the crowd. If you tune in, it can capsize you. My first race in college, I was competing against schools in the Title I division. In other words, they were the best in the nation as it came to cross country. Stanford was there, for gosh sakes! I was cart girl in that race: dead last, with the man on a cart following to make sure we all knew where the field of players was divided: just in case a winner happened to pass me, we’d still be sure to know who I was.

But you know what: I was in the race.

I take myself out of the race so often. I lose heart, get discouraged, stop making available what I have been gifted with when I perceive that it’s not being appreciated…gosh, I act a baby sometimes! And the body of Christ around me suffers for it, suffers for my selfishness, my selfish ambition, my unwillingness to reach out in love. 

I’m in a new season currently, reevaluating. What do I want out of life, what do I need? It’s a time of introspection, looking at deep wounds (far too often self-inflicted) and choosing—as I see myself clearly—to move forward with confidence: fully aware of myself, my faults and all that I perhaps can’t change and also aware of who I want to be, dreaming about how to get there and offering myself again to the world around me.

I want to be back in the race.

I am currently in Dublin. I have a few days here, seeing off my last students as they take off back to their respective homes. The lot of them has gone off to explore with one of their families and there wasn’t room enough for me in the car. I had (well, at first I was miffed by it and then I chose it) to stay behind at the hotel. There’s a glorious pond with swans and a wonderful park nearby. In search of a place to write, I took off into the park. The girls who entered before me had duffel bags hanging on their shoulders and I presumed that they were football (American soccer) players, that being the sport of choice in these parts. As we (I following these girls) made our way toward the center of the park, I saw more and more students around their age and then: a race marked out clearly, and all of them either walking or jogging it. As I walked past a microphone (nearly blasted my ear off) a female voice cheered, “Welcome to the Irish National Championships!” I had stumbled upon a race, and one with a prize to win no less. I felt the invitation again: what would you do?

What could you do? What can you do, when invited into this race with Him. I tell you what you’ll do:

You’ll run in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.

For me that means putting aside the straight up laziness that often keeps me form accomplishing anything. It means gathering people around me who will encourage me and help me to keep training, no matter what the ‘weather’ conditions may be. It means choosing to take on each new day as a new day and then going forward establishing and living out as a pattern in my life to choose forgiveness. It means discarding all the sin that tries so hard to entangle and throwing off every weight that tries to hinder: I want to run free! It means being a living sacrifice, making these choices every day for as long as it is called a ‘day’.

            I’ll end with this, for those who are fainthearted. The story I began earlier, the dry, dusty championship race, didn’t end well. I hardly placed, didn’t help my team much and just fell into feeling an utter failure. Fear was winning and I got so overwhelmed, I almost started walking. There just wasn’t any point to this anymore.

It was then I heard an inner voice say, “I’ll never give up on you, even when you give up on yourself.”

That moment changed: and is still changing, a lot of things in me. To know that the God of the Universe is still rooting for me, will never give up on me, even when I am besieged on all sides and so unsure of how to move forward. His love never changes and in the small schemata that is my life, He has grand designs. I can’t see them yet and can hardly believed He’d deign to glance my way but its true: it’ll always be true and never stop being true that He is obsessed with me and all the details of my life. He has directed so well so far: how could I ever just wander into Irish National Cross Country Championships? And only He would know how significant that would be for me. I take away today what I overheard one coach say: “Don’t think over the whole race, it’s too much. Concentrate on doing the section you’re in really well.”

Yes Coach.

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!

The Radical Shift

I live so American.

That's so weird to write, but its so true. I have always dreamed of being overseas, I was just that weird kid who from the time she was a teenager looked around and was like, 'what?' I just did not understand the selfishness (though I recognize it in me), the disregard for others, the rebellion that all make up an average American teenager--who has now grown up into an average American young adult. I get it. We have issues. I wanted to leave them behind (cue "Get me out of here!" theme music)

Then I lived here. Really lived here instead of being aloof as I was in high school. I got into life (finally) with other Americans (and a few MK's) in my college story and was a little more okay with being American. Believe me, I still wanted to leave (country of choice, today and always: Haiti) but there was something in me that wasn't so afraid of us and the direction we were going. God moved here too, definitely.

Then I became an American career woman and man, did I take it to the hilt! Beyond nine-to-five with an hour and half commute added in: I was living that dream. And I was beyond lonely. And I went to Starbucks several times a week. And I lived vicariously through Facebook and watched way too many movies and just generally felt...the...ache.

We Americans are so alone.

We fight alone.

We cry alone.

We laugh alone.

We drink alone.

We sing alone.

And we live alone.

I get it. I get it now, the raw ache you feel after a long day when you have no one to connect with and no energy and you just find some way to entertain yourself. I get why you give yourself away so cheaply. I get why you look so tired and jaded and hopeless--we have made a tough world out there, with deadlines and papers and evaluations (can anyone say, "no grace!") and we fight it out and don't even know if it's completely worth it.

I am so sorry for judging you.

But now I am being brought out of that place: fending for yourself and providing for yourself and just being with yourself. I found out today that I wasn't receiving some money that I thought I would get--and it's fine, I don't really NEED it but it just made me realize how radical this season really is: I have to depend on other people now.

And that's really scary.

And I don't do that well: I really am comfortable (too comfortable) being on my own and taking care of myself. I was literally brought up that way and did just fine (I thought). Needing other people and asking for their help is literally completely against my wiring and very intimidating. I had a lot of trouble this year because I did just that: never asked for help. My principal literally leaned toward me during my summative (whole year) evaluation and said, "I'll tell you the secret of what you really need to work on wherever you go next." (Huh? What's that?) "You need to ask for help."

She pinned me. That was it to a tee: it's not even in me to ask...I would always much rather figure it out myself.

It's so destructive! But it's how Americans live! And I do it...really well...and it DESTROYS me.

But God is putting me in a place where I can't operate that way anymore. I am being thrust deep into community (I had a taste this week through going to a workshop called 'Single Life': and this workshop is actually the opposite of single life because you learn there how to operate in community and let people in...the way its named is literally ironic), having to rely on others for what I need and going beyond myself and all that I am comfortable with! And I'm not going to say I'm going to rock it or that it'll be the best thing ever (this is gonna be tough!) but I am EXCITED!

So, if you're still reading, please support me. It may be through prayer or even sending a check but, I am willing to admit: I need help.

SO UnAmerican :) heehee!

This is Really Long--Don't Read It Unless You Want to Believe in the Change Jesus Brings! :P

"As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God. When we were controlled by our old nature, sinful desires were at work within us, and the law aroused these evil desires that produced a harvest of sinful deeds, resulting in death. But now we have been released from the law, for we died to it and and are no longer captive to its power. Now we can serve God, not in the old way by obeying the letter of the law, but in the new way of living by the Spirit." 
(Romans 7:4b-6)

 Excuse me for a moment whilst I process my year...

Twenty-four--that was not a year I missed saying farewell too...it seemed to all go on forever with no hope in sight. I think I learned, as Abraham had to, to trust in God's promises even when there seemed no end in sight...no land to journey to, no son to see grow up, no dream blossoming...

Endurance produces...what was that again? Hope? Ha. How I learned the truth of that extraordinary statement. I think I'm realizing evermore that so much of our lives must be lived out supernaturally, supremely apart from what we realize/think we are able to do. This new life of the Spirit--a completely new way of living--is really the way we must go if we want to have anything to do with Jesus and His kingdom. Because its all--backwards and not upside down, but illogical: gaining hope from being in a place of despair; forgiving when there is no earthly reason to; believing in resurrection for ourselves, these old bodies--it's all ludicrous in the best possible sense of the word. Love especially--love, especially, is a most insane, unimaginable concept. No, not romantic love that everyone is obsessed with--but that ability to continue to hope in and long for someone who completely shuns you again and again. Reaching out to that person over and over even while they reject you...that's love.

Isn't that insane?

But that's what Jesus is, that's what He offers. To every person that could possibly ever choose to follow Him (and that's all of us) He extends His love, His forgiveness, His very life--and He asks us to do the same.

It is insane--because if you try to do this--really love someone despite how they treat you--you will end up in abusive, co-dependent, broken relationships...and no one wants that! So no one loves that way--or do they?

See the trick is--the catch, the gist of it all, the way I have learned from my own Father--this centerpiece of all that encompasses a life giving away to Christ--is that we don't do the loving.

Hear it again--it's not your job to do the loving.

Well, God is love and if we know God then we know love and if you don't have love then you don't have love, so I have to muster up the love for this other person, right?

Wrong.

We love because He first loved us.

This is love, not that we loved God but that He first loved us and sent His Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and His love is perfected in us. 

Can we just live here for a moment? Catch that last verse from 1 John--as we love one another, God dwells, abides, lives it out through us and that love (which came from Him in the first place!) gets perfected in us.

I've needed to hear this every day of my life and live here and I will die here--waiting for God to come and fill up my life so that I quit scrounging and trying to show enough love...finally believing in the fullest sense that Jesus came not to perfect me, but to love through me and the change of me becoming more and more like His Son suddenly gets wrought as I go about the ordinary task of loving Him alone by loving all those around me as He lives through me. 

I'm sure I'm off theologically at some point in the middle of this vast understanding that I am trying to pinpoint into a few words. Beloved, forgive me for it and move on.  Just realize for a moment with me the grace that this Pharisee-ical little girl has learned and be in awe of the God who would take the time to wrought that change. I am not the same--all my perfecting and needing others around me to perform has slowly died away in the flame of being broken enough to just know Him. He loved me in the middle of my mess, when I had absolutely nothing to offer--and I will spend my whole life learning how to live out a life filled with a love like that--a life leaning into my Father's arms and feeding others out of the abundance of that embrace. 

It's amazing the little places you'll go to--and the things that the Lord will teach you there. The endurance, hope, love--they don't get learned on the big stage when you're feeling really important. The hope of your life, the truth of it and who the Lord is creating you to be--they come out of small moments, lived in the presence of family and friends, completely mundane and totally treasured. Don't be ashamed or deride the big stage and shiny lights--but live your life not around those edges but in a way which proclaims that even if those things were never available to you, you know that your life is good, worth living, full of Him. 

That's what I learned this year--the hope when everything is failing comes because of the strength I find in Him, the joy in the midst of pain is present because He abides with me, I can keep climbing up this mountain, painful as it may be, because He's offering His hand to me. I don't have a lot at this point in my life, but all I have finds its origin in Him and that makes it exceedingly worth more than all the riches I could recieve. And given the choice, He knows what I'd choose.

A friend made the comment when I was talking over a bit of my year, "You're in missionary training." I laughed a little, but only because its true. I don't think even I will understand the gifts He's placed in me by teaching me how to live out through this year.

Because I wanted to run and cry and quit--so many times. I couldn't. I had no options--I had to face the reality of my life as it came and be honest about it and keep moving forward even when everything in me wanted to leave. To be honest, I screwed up a lot. Hurt people. Would have left had I had any options. But He stayed me, rescued me time and time again, practiced forgiveness through me, taught me to be an intercessor, changed me, ransomed me from the dead and restored me. Who I am now is stronger, more hopeful than who I was when I began twenty-four.

I wouldn't live those years again if you paid me (or did anything for me! ha!) but I would never trade the character, endurance, presence... 
 
"Now you have every spiritual gift you need as you eagerly wait for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ." 
(1 Corinthians 1:7)

It's weird--I've never read this verse before, to my knowledge. But running across it this morning, the truth of it stuck in me--I have everything I could ever possibly need for every day ahead because of the access I have to Jesus and the truth of what He--the ever faithful one--is doing in me. I've only had a taste of the glory which is to come--and it only makes me thirst that much more.  

like this song by Brooke Fraser says:

if i find in myself desires nothing in this world can satisfy,
i can only conclude that I was not made for here...

"He will keep you strong to the end so that you will be free from all blame on that day when our Lord Jesus Christ returns." 
(I Corinthians 1:8)

There's something about the steadfast grace of God that keeps me running forward, with such hope! It makes me think of a vision I had once of me and my future husband (wherever you are!!!). We were running forward with all the strength we had, each of us with a hand in Jesus'...there was such joy in the exchange--I never even saw who it was on the other side of Jesus (I really didn't want to, yet) but I knew that our lives were about staying close to each other through our life in Jesus and He was the One propelling us forward. That no matter what came, He would link us together, enable us to keep running forward, joy and hope in our faces no matter the circumstances. Himself--so present with us...even in the middle of this terrible season, I somehow knew, deep in me past what anyone could say/convince me of, no matter how they spoke despair, no matter how stagnant it got--I just knew He was faithful--and it enabled me to keep going.

The dark night...all I had at times was a heart still burning for Him--and it was enough.

"Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit." 
(Romans 8:5)

I think for some reason this verse became alive in a different way through this year--somehow or other I had always missed--or maybe hadn't had to live on close proximity with--people who were so willing to live in darkness, be dominated by what was controlling them and not see the harm it was doing. I learned compassion and forgiveness in a big way by seeing people through this--just being so aware that the reason they acted the way they did was almost not a conscious thing on their part--they didn't mean to damage you so bluntly, knife thrusts of words--they just didn't know any other way. So you had to learn not to be dead toward them, but to keep peeling back your pain and disappointment and see them anew each day. It's still a struggle for me--loving in spite of the pain they cause--but as I said earlier, Jesus' love has been shown to me so new...and I mean, just recently.  There's a newness in me, a profound declaration wrought by the pain that the Lord is completely pleased with me as I do my best, working out of His supernatural love, to extend love to the broken. It becomes such a beautiful thing--and they often have no idea how to respond--but its not about them and me anymore--its about what Jesus wants to show off through His kids--and that's His love! He wants Himself, His beautiful character of seeing beauty in the pain and calling forth hope out of brokenness to become a part of all we do. I for one am jumping on board.

"God will do this, for He is faithful to do what He says, and He has invited you into partnership with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord." 
(I Corinthians 1:9) 

 I mean, partnership with Jesus (perfect words for what it is) who wouldn't want that? Who wouldn't want the nearness, the darling blessedness of being one of His own and operating in His love? No more striving on my part to become all I was made to be, crying out of fear, "Use me, God!" lest He forget about me and all I did turned out to not be enough for Him. No, I have learned a new way, a reliance on His tender care and a darling hope into all of His promises--because a promise, unlike a contract, cannot be broken (read Romans 4 in the Message--it'll change your life!). I live in the risky faith embrace of trusting in the Son of Man, who loved me and gave Himself--for me. I don't count His grace as something which is to be taken lightly--its what saved me, sustains me and will bring me into my forevermore. He's faithful for that!

"So, my dear brothers and sisters, this is the point: you died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the one who was raised from the dead." 
(Romans 7:4a)

A re-uniting...no, no, just a uniting--what you never had before because of sin becomes fully yours, fully possible because of what Jesus did for us. This year I proclaim His faithfulness, His power to release us from the grave, His utter ability to show up in whatever you called "dead" in your life and bring full life, better life than you could ever have proclaimed over it, to come springing up like a well-tended vine. It's all Him in you, no mustering up or being enough--but relaxing into what He is doing in the world and simply choosing to meet with Him there. Its such a more graceful way of life, its truly life--its what He has for you! Just seek...

"The message of the Cross is foolishness to those who are headed for destruction! But we who are being saved know it is the very power of God." 
(I Corinthians 1:18)

There was a moment, on the eve of my 25th birthday, when I lost it all. I mourned what had been, all the destruction, despair and hopelessness that had filled the year that was now behind me. I wailed, crying like I don't think I've ever cried, because this past year was just so hard to live through. Words can't describe and so that night the groans that Romans 8 talks about came out--deep anguish over what was lost, a grieving.

"And Christ lives within you so even though your body will die because of sin, the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God. The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead,  he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you." 
(Romans 8:10-11)

I woke up the next morning and the love of God--which I had been crying out for, longing for, had a desprate need for--because I knew that I did not have within myself the capacity to love as He did, did not even know how to go about loving in this way that He commanded all throughout 1 John 4--suddenly it was there. I was just wrapped up in the love of God in a way that cannot make sense unless you have known that full assurance, peace--I suddenly knew beyond doubt that I had all I needed, the full depths of who He was, like in a way that's past knowing. It was just a part of who I was (am) now.

"So where does this leave the philosophers, the scholars, and the worlds brilliant debaters? God has made the wisdom of this world look foolish." 
(I Corinthians 1:20)

It was something new in me--God blessing and filling me up and reminding me that He is very present, ever present on the Earth--and that as I seek I will find, all I need is in Him, that even the worst that I can do will be covered by this love and that should I seek Him my whole life I will never come to the end of the goodness that is Him, all that he longs to pour out into me and through me. Like a good friend said last night, "We're not a pond, we're a hose." All that He is can flow out of my life and bless others as I rest and abide in Him allowing Him to reach out through me. It's good...and it won't make sense to anyone unless they are in Him! And He invites us into all that goodness, no matter where we are!

"So God did what the law could not do. He sent His own Son in a body like the bodies we sinners have. And in that body God declared an end to sins control over us by giving His Son as a sacrifice for our sins." 
(Romans 8:3b)

25 is a new year--beyond reaching a pivotal birthday into realizing that I can face anything from this point forward and it will be cake. I have hit and lived through the worst that a life can offer you. Jesus has shown up solid and become such a deep part of who I am that to separate would be to take the very life away from me--and you just can't do that! He rose from the dead--and so will I! It's bizarre how far this year has taken me--and I haven't traveled more than 8 hours from my home at any period during this time...

"But to those called by God to salvation, both Jews and Gentiles, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. This foolish plan of God is wiser than the wisest of human plans, and God's weakness is stronger than the greatest of human strength." 
(I Corinthians 1:24-25)

Mexico was like a culmination of all that year--a chance to stretch my wings and realize that the cage I had been living in for so long was starting to rattle--God was on His way, up to something, whispering on the wind. I'm stretching my wings, dreaming, anticipating, so fully hoping in the God who has taken a little bird who might have always claimed she was only a songbird and declaring over her life that she is an eagle, she has great strength, that what she carries changes atmospheres, people's life directions, hope--she just brings it, a result of a deep connection and abiding in the Father who speaks such strength and grace into all His children. She will be His beauty on display in a way most people have never seen--and don't be afraid of it! Lean in ever closer, and carry my heart, O my daughter.

"Therefore, dear brothers and sisters, you have no obligation to do what your sinful nature urges you to do. For if you live by its dictates, you will die. But if through the power of the Spirit you put to death the deeds of your sinful nature, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God." 
(Romans 8:13-14)

I will do whatever I will do, says the Lord, it matters not what you think I'm capable of or what you think I'm up to. I am the one who moves and breathes and gives life--the very life of the world. Any of you aligned with Jesus and living out this life in His life have no idea what you are in for! This life changed the world, gave wind to sweep under your wings (Holy Spirit) and went through (is still going through) the whole world. Do you think that has ended? Do you think that it could ever end?
Jump in--no telling what we'll see, only sure thing: Jesus is King and He does as He pleases.  
What hope!!!

"Remember, dear brothers and sisters, that few of you were wise in the world's eyes or powerful or wealthy when God called you. Instead, God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful. God chose things despised by the world, things counted as nothing at all, and used them to bring to nothing what the world considers important. As a result, no one can ever boast in the presence of God." 
(I Corinthians 1:26-29)

I am so aware of how incapable I am--but monstrously absorbed in the fact that God can do as He likes through a life laid down. This is powerful, wholesome, stake-your-life-on-it truth...may it be the truth that changes your world as you walk through this life with Him, fully aware of His grace and how much hope He longs to bring into this broken world. If He can make me, in the middle of all my unknown circumstances and whatevers!!! trust--the one who used to be so fear-filled and worry haunted--if He can break me down enough to believe and fully walk in all He has for me--just think of what He can do in you! Never put the limits on Him--practice letting go! Letting go is having an insignificant faith--a faith that lays down all it has ever believed about what we think He can do and then laid down all that we think He should do in us or others and just chosen to have our vision expanded, our love (and ability) to love change and has been set free into believing that anything is possible and Jesus is at work everywhere. Do you live that way? Does your life proclaim an effortless, totally able God? Expand your vision of yourself, those around you and the Lord you serve! And if you have gone through utter brokenness--as I have this year--rejoice in it, for you know He is in the middle of it!

I was in Yosemite last Tuesday, reveling in sunshine, flowers and the delight of knowing my God. I went (for the first time in I don't know how many visits to Yosemite) into the little chapel on the valley floor and just had a moment of thankfulness and praise before the Lord. He has made my life come alight even in the middle of the crazy that was this year--I was even sitting in a pool of sunshine in that little chapel--and I know that that will continue to be the reality of my life in Him. No matter what we may be going through, we live our lives out in the sunshine of His love. That's where all this beautiful life comes through...

Praise Him Through the Storm--I'll Say Yes!!!

"I take refuge in you, Lord"

This is definitely my verse today.

Haha, what do you do when everyone around you seems to be crumbling?

You have nowhere to look but up.

And boy am I glad!

I just had another of those emotionally exhausting moment with the fam (learning to pray my way through those--words just don't cut it sometimes) and then immediately tuned in to the International House of Prayer's Prayer Room (http://www.ihopkc.org/prayerroom/) and man--you can't even hold on to exhaustion or depression when you hear people really praising the Lord! So thankful that I could tune in--totally turned my night around. The situation with my fam has escalated and at first as I listened, I was like, "How can I say God is good?" as they repeated it over and over. Then I realized that it was just time for that sacrifice of praise. Fifteen minutes later, I was up out of my seat and dancing in my bedroom!

I think I'll choose praise every time I run into problems--who's with me?

When Love Comes...

Every once in a great while, something extraordinary happens. An epiphany comes, seemingly out of nowhere, and your life is no longer the same. That’s what happened to me tonight…

I go to the Stirring every weekend at 6pm, religiously. I was feeling a bit obstinate today, so I got there late, sat alone, worship had already started. As we worshipped I was so intent, like I’d never been before. I could hardly sing or move around (very unusual for me). I gradually became aware that I felt like a newly married bride—just wanting to be near her husband, hungry for him, not sure if she could spend a day without him. That’s the strength and intensity of the desire I felt. It was just bizarre. It took me over…no other focus. I just wanted to be with my God, look Him in the face and hear the words He had to say to me. I never wanted anything more; I’ll never want anything more—just to be with Him.

Needless to say, I was a mess. When they started preaching, I immediately knew I needed to leave. I am a shy, rule oriented person, so standing up in the middle of a church service, gathering my things and walking out the door is not the norm for me. But there was almost a roaring in my ears and I couldn’t even focus, I knew I had to just go, Go, GO!

I left—and as I drove away I began to realize what all this was welling up inside. All my life, I have been chasing after other lovers. All my life…Each one got taken away from me, or I chose to leave them (mostly they were taken, with my consent). I mean, I loved my cat with all my heart, I loved Haiti, I loved S-----…when those weren’t going on, my heart was always searching, creating little love affairs. I loved so many—in my poor way—though they never knew. I was too afraid to publicly love—that would require risk. So I built shadows of the dream that love is, and was content, in my way, with these…I knew no other way.

They talked about loving Orphans tonight—my calling perhaps because I was one. I only learned to truly love another being with my first trip to Haiti, where God started ripping out bits of my heart and began to put in beautiful bloody bits of His own. I began to beat for a cause—and it ruined me. It brought me to the end of myself, looking up at God, crying out for Him to do something! Make it better! Heal this hurt! How can you live with this?” He smiled at me, comforted me, sang over me…He knew I’d understand soon.

Then S------—the poor sucker!—last of my shadow loves and most deadly. Loving him exposed the broken parts of me—the lie I carried that hissed, “Unworthy”, the belief that I would never be pursued—loving him ruined me. And I looked at God and moaned and said, "I don’t know if I can bear this!” God took His broken daughter in His arms, loved her past her shame and said, “You are my Bride.”

You are my Bride…broken, hollow, empty, soulless, fearful…

He said it again, “You are my Bride.” She began to look around, saw “Worthy, Adored, Radiant, Joy” written on the walls of her heart. She began to hope.

“You are My Bride.” Destiny pouring out for her, dreams taking shape, hope restored and restoration coming…

“YOU ARE MY BRIDE!” This last one was a shout and with it all fear was dismantled. All that the little girl had built her life upon was suddenly in tatters and she found herself looking into the face of her King, her Father, her Bridegroom and laughing with Him at it. And they began to rebuild together, from the inside out.

That is what is happening in me. That is why I am overcome with my desire to be with Him—I know now who my True Love is and my heart is finally able to feel all that it was created to feel. And all that it wants—every beat of it—is to be with Him. It knows that it can have no other lovers and that all it needs is found in Him, and so it thirsts for Him achingly—oh to know the goodness of God and eat at His table. No more wandering beggar in rags, trying to find crumbs where she could. Now I know I am the Princess, the Desire of His Heart and I will preside at His table. His banner over me is love and I shall never leave its shade.

I’m finally able to only want you.