The Purse Talk

I'm having a hard time unpacking my purse.

Six months is a long time. Everything changes--that's what they tell you, that's what you mentally know, that's life. But there are artifacts--and for some reason, those are the worst to face.

The girl who held this purse before me, the one I left in America, didn't know what it meant not to be able to afford anything. She'd had a regular paycheck for a while and was used to buying chocolate just because she felt like it, or a new candle. She didn't know how much she would give away and use to travel the world. She didn't know what an empty bank account looked like and she didn't have to scrounge together money for gas.

The girl before DTS hadn't had other things emptied out too. She didn't know what it meant to really take someone into your heart and then have to be emptied again, seemingly immaturely. She didn't know about not having a chance to let those feelings bloom.

The girl who owned this purse wasn't sure of the future, but she enjoyed thinking about it. She didn't know what it would cost and she didn't even know how to give herself completely but she was willing to go where she was sent.

It's funny to walk out what is required of you. You don't know, going into a situation or relationship or new set of circumstances what it will mean for you, what it will ask you to give up. The word I hear and see for this trip, the one that sums up all that happened to me and all that we as a team experienced is "emptied". Maybe that seems like a weird choice or doesn't make sense: but if there's anything that happened in India, in Northern Ireland too, it was an emptying. I knew, more than I ever have before, what it means to give up everything for the Kingdom. I went absolutely broke for it--literally. My bank account, my heart, my broken camera, all my shame, my fear, my ability to protect myself, my body's ability to function--all were at one time or are permanently, poured out. Offered. No longer mine.

I hate looking at that purse, because it shows what I lost. And much of it was worth losing and I am immensely glad for the relief losing those things has brought...but many were good things (in my estimation) and the little girl in me cries over them. If I had known: but you never can.

I don't want that girl from six months ago to see me, to know me. My old self and who I am today: I don't know what they would say to each other. Honestly, I think they would be shocked.  They're such different people--and so to even run into her belongings stirs up something in me--almost a longing...

Knowing what I know now--would I have gone?

Sadly, the answers is no.

But isn't that true of all of us? If you had known the pain, loss, frustration and grief that would come to you in each season, you wouldn't have gone. None of us would! No one willing subjects themselves to that which brings them pain.

I've been reading through the Problem of Pain by C.S. Lewis since I started traveling home. He makes many good points, but the theme that keeps surfacing for me is the beauty pain, suffering, brings. Not that you willingly undergo suffering or choose that as your lot in life (that's the edge of something else that we will not get into here...) but that you have the ability to take hold of it...it is happening, there is no use denying that, but how you react--that speaks volumes and will either plunge you forward or hold you back--and you won't know the outcome of all of this until years later.

The thing is, though I have lost much, I have gained the Kingdom. With each giving up, relinquishment, another piece of Heaven was allowed to be part of me and my reality and how I operate. I traded my "self"--at times, a gruesome display, for I mistakenly believed that what my heart fell for was good for me--for the "me" that He has been willing, and always ready, to create in me.

Self will--it's what we all fight for, against and with: my desires pitted against the Lords. I die to live, that's the choice. I've been choosing it for years now.

India was easy: I love developing countries, their hustle and bustle, the beautiful ways that they do life. I am not afraid or overwhelmed by honking horns, being the only white face in a crowd, not understanding a language...not to say that there are not moments of weakness, but that it becomes a joy as I adjust to the new surroundings. Being in India was not the most difficult part of my trip--it will forever be my joy. There were other, deeper things going on in me that caused me my pain, what I am walking through now. That's why it hurts to go through the purse: I remember how lighthearted and happy that girl was, how excited she was to learn--and I, on the other side, know the beauty of being refined.

It's a costly beauty: but it's one I had been anticipating and knew was on its way, I just hadn't realized the avenue by which it would approach. I had some words from the Lord about me coming into abundant joy and beauty before I left, and these two have come, but in ways unexpected. Through pain.

I have relinquished my circumstance to God and asked Him to have His way in my heart and there: there is where the healing can and has begun. The desperate pieces in you, when offered to the Lord, become the places His glory shines through. He gave me the ability to survive this and not only survive, but thrive. He has a new day coming for me--and encountering and passing through deep pain with Him also ushers me into deeper heights of glory--full joy! I don't take other relationships for granted--interacting in a healthy way with anyone brings me such delight these days--because I know its not easy. It's not to be taken for granted.

In this season of letting go, I have been given much. Dreams and vision for the future: to be a force of light and life to Ireland, to come alongside a struggling base and see a city changed. I even dream further out, into Haiti, in a way I have not let myself for a while. This time of testing and refining--pain--is not and never will be wasted.

Nothing is wasted...

Back to that purse! I am not that girl anymore. I am something more: Christ lives in me.

Here in Ireland? haha...how good is God.

 Ireland…you forget where you are sometimes…the only thing I can compare it to is waking up from a dream—except that all was before is now past, almost beyond my ability to recognize it as fact because it feels dream-like. And being here, among this tribe and finding out who I am among them feels more substantial than anything that was before. I get to live in the dream—things I had been hoping and praying, almost without any faith that they could be reality—they’re here now. And yeah, that seems dramatic—but it’s the most accurate way for me to articulate my present reality.

Let me paint a picture of where we are as a school and what God has done with all these hungry children of His: a lot of repentance (and heart-felt, not contrived) which has lead us into His Presence, worship where we touch heaven and camaraderie that brings hope. It is obviously not without its limitations and times when we must press through into all that He calls us to, but He is drawing more and more freedom and joy out as the days go by. I personally am finding myself in a new place: coming out of drought. I had few close friends who were near geographically, now I need only to step outside my bedroom door—well, actually, they live with me…I don’t even have to get out of bed to have relationship—they’re all right here, asking me how I am doing, choosing to be present with me. It’s deep relationships and community which is open and near,  deep trust developing, an awareness among us of the Spirit of God moving and we get to be part of it.

My favorite room is the Prayer Room—I keep flying away to this sanctuary where we press in and ask for more. And it’s coming—in a little town where class lines are drawn and hatred can press in close, God is unlocking hearts. A tiny team goes to the pub every Tuesday and last week a patron was talking with one of our older leaders about my fellow YWAMer’s. “I want what they have,” he said. The leader, Damien, said, “You realize what they have is God, right? And He’s available to you right now?” And this gentleman prayed and accepted Jesus and is now praying for us! This is the first of many, I am declaring in faith!

We have intercession multiple times throughout our week (we are LOVING hearing from God together!) Today Damien (same guy in the pub) told stories of villagers he knows—they’re struggles and hang ups, wrote their names on pieces of paper, and had us circulate the room in teams praying for them. We’re learning what and how these people live…there is so much more that the Lord wants to point out here. I can almost see the chariots of fire and angels ready to descend on this town, to finally bring hope and life where the enemy has for too long had his way. Join us in our brave Warrior prayers! I am running with excellence and among excellent people.

This World is Not My Own--Only He Sees Clearly

I struggle to post this beacuse I worry that I'll be percieved as exalting myself, as though I've done something impossibly good and deserve praise. It's the opposite--I have been found so needy and lacking these seasons that I find it hard--even painful--to take a close look for myself at what I've "done". As I'm peering out at what seems to be the wreckage of my life through fingers covering my face, He gently prys away my hands and holds them in His and explains what He sees. And it changes everything.

A little something that came to me after worship at Bible study yesterday and then I'm done:

"I'm at a place in my life where most people would say, 

'You've made it!'

but I'll let it all go to possess Him

the value of knowing Him is more to me 

than any accolade from men,

any money I could pursue

I will leave it all when He says

and He has said, 'Go.'

So I walk out into the unknown,

asking for His strength and 

guidance,  knowing He will work 

out His will in me

His timing is perfect, holy and He

is working out the cross through 

me bringing purity, holiness,

righteousness--all that is good and smells

of Him--to flow out of my life in a way

that is evident to others and blesses

others. May they find Him as they look at me."

God Treats Me Like a Princess

     "If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise it, or to be unthankful for, these earthly blessings and on the other, never to mistake them for the something else of which they are only a kind of copy, or echo, or mirage. I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that other country and to help others do the same."

--C.S. Lewis, from the Hope chapter in Mere Christianity

Friday before Easter (or "Easters" as its regarded in Nacho Libre...I prefer neither!) and I'm sitting at a Starbucks, just having to get stuff off my chest before...I don't even know what before?

--a conversation about a place I may or may not go

--deciding I will leave this country--which I'd love to do but have tried before and feel really unsure of--because it kind of left me in a mess when it never worked out

--trying to hope again--for a lot of things--but feeling SO unsure

--trying to figure out my life--which is impossible and completely exhausting

--hanging out with fam for the weekend

--sorting out that we are not getting the puppy I thought we were :( (no goldenpoo's on my birthday!)

--figuring out that life is not what it seems, nor is it what I envision--and that's okay and I can let it go...even when I feel like holding on is the ONLY safe option

--wrestling with being so different from people's perceptions and what they want from me [no, my profile pictures are not always super happy ones because I happen to think those are false misrepresentations and I prefer the artsy (slightly suffering) look because it reflects more fully my experience and reminds me that I am still alive, even after all I've been through...so let me post it and quite saying how sad I look--that's freaking life!] haha, slightly opinionated here

--teaching a SHARK unit (the boys in my class are going to DIE!) I'm so excited--I put it all together yesterday and we are going to have FUN!

and then there's the Cinderella movie...

haha, most random blogpost ever--but this is exactly the mess that I feel my life is in and instead of moping I'm writing--so chill out and hang with me--we're going somewhere.

     I reached this point yesterday where I just felt like such a mess, crying as I drove away from my friends house, and just feeling tired and purposeless. It's all just feelings, I know--nothing based in reality, my life is good--but there's this piece of me that is really unsure in this time and just searching--almost frantically. And I have no answers, so this piece of me keeps getting more and more undone. It was the worst last night--but that's often when you are truy able to deal with whatever is going on inside you, when it comes to a head, IF (and people miss this and cope out--you know how) you keep pushing through. So I did...kept asking, hanging out, calling out to God--and He brought me back to that movie, one scene in particular. I have watched this movie three times now (3! I never do that!) and the scene is the one where her dress is being transformed. She's spinning around and around as her rags are transformed from tatters to glorious ballgown and hope comes to rest on her (in the form of butterflies) and the adventure--everything she'd ever dreamed about and was never sure could come through--suddenly becomes possible. And it's literally more than she ever could have dreamed.

     And she didn't get there in that instant. That instant was the moment when it all became transformed and she was shown for  who she really was. But the true transformation--the good heart that the life of the Father in her finally brought out--had happened in all the moments before this one: every moment she chose to say 'yes' and served those who despised her or didn't even acknowledge her at all...all those hours when she did the menial tasks when she'd much before anything else...being submissive when it seemed humanly impossible to do so, choosing kindness and forgiveness and letting all the ugly, bad things done to her not make her bitter but more able to love, filled to a fuller capacity.

     It was the journey of a thousand yes's, a thousand times of letting the world work her over and expose not the ugliness inflicted upon her but the true beauty of her heart--refined. Tossed through the fire and not overcome but made more beautiful and of more worth. All that tried to destroy her only showed her off as more of the beauty she had become.

    And then she got the dress. And then she was shown off for all that she had become. And then she moved forward into her destiny.

    And I'm right in the middle of that--not sure at all what is to come but knowing it will be glorious--for He is good, and He is at work in me.

God treats me like a Princess.

Just Waiting?

Waiting…

I’m going to be one of the subjects of a photo shoot my friend is doing. The topic of the photo essay she is creating from all of these pieces is “waiting”. She only asked me yesterday to be part of the process and at first I was caught off guard—then I realized: ‘this is perfect.’

Not perfect in the sense that it will have no troubles and will be exactly like heaven and Jesus (they are the few perfect things I know of—really perfect). No, rather in the this-will-make-so-much-sense-to-do because-it-is-who-I-have-become over the past few months, no, years.

It’s been years of waiting.

Years of wondering and trying to get by and failing and asking for help from the only one who truly understands and can help me get through this because all other resources fall short because they can’t see the core of who I am and all I am going through…but…He does.

The relief of knowing Jesus—that is where I stand now. I consider it not an exclusive place, but a sacred place, a place not every person gets into, can fathom. Hope is so deep there that no matter what life brings and the pain your soul may feel you keep pressing further, deeper into all He has for you.

For you know that He is good—His faithful closeness to you in the moments when you cried out have taught you that He is near always and to be trusted. You know—deeply inside yourself, past all the doubts that try to speak but have no authority anymore because He entered that place first and proved Himself faithful before they ever started to shriek—you know He can be trusted. You even know that He is good, crazy as it seems, uncertain as it shows up in your life. You know who you are in Him—the wild goodness, dreams, abilities, talents, loves of your soul—you know all those because He has taught you who you are and what you love and He is the one who created you so we always know that He knows best, even when it can seem ludicrous to us. Like, for me, I am a Warrior Princess. I wave flags in worship, waging gentle war, changing the atmosphere. I am a writer, a lover of children, an educator, a dancer…distant, subtle dreams blooming under His care.

I will hike many miles in my lifetime—first here in California along the PCT and eventually in Haiti where many live far up in distant mountains and valleys (Haiti is a land once described as “mountains upon mountains”) and we will walk to them, offering the good news of tremendous love offered by Jesus Christ. I don’t know how, I don’t know when, but I know—beyond what anyone could say of me or about me, who He has made me to be.

And He’s good.

And I’m good, as I hide myself in Him.

Now is waiting—but wondering, becoming, all that I need to move forward and through all the years before me—is also being arranged and birthed—really set to light in these years.

So if you are waiting…wondering…searching…I ask you to search Him out.

Wait for Him.

Cry out to Him in the night, the moment where truth (the truth of your life) becomes despair and you just need a Savior.

He will be there. He has always been there and will always choose to be there.

Great love.

Died on a cross.

To save YOU.

My waiting is no longer fear—all trust. May it be the same for you.

We Are Not What We Seem

Hmm...there are a million things i should be doing--sleep comes to mind--but my chances at internet are spotty and I feel like writing: so here's the blessing. The rambles of an often crowded mind, not sure of her own existence or its worth. Fighting her way to the top and excellence because she can't let up her own pressure that she puts on herself. Happy...no. Introspective...always, a little too much.

I remember being twelve. That summer when I had a lot to think about and not much to say and my mom's one comment as we drove down the road was, "It takes more muscles to frown than it does to smile." She was right--but I hadn't even realized what I was doing--and it takes so much effort to figure the world out--it's just exhausting.

I'm not trying to figure it out anymore, I promise. I gave Jesus my trust--instead of being in control--and that gave me the joy that no one in my family had ever truly experienced (we're a family of depressives) and I was a new breed.

So...I'm not happy these days--but that isn't the condition for joy is it?

Happiness is beautiful but it is dependent on circumstances and doesn't stay. Joy--for me defined by one of my old college professors (don't I sound distinguished saying that!)--is the endless knowing that everything will be all right...that this is not how the world ends and we have so much more to look forward to [I (obviously) expanded the definition...thank you Professor Griffin, for making that distinction between joy and happiness for me--its helped see me through many a rough day.]

Happiness, no. Joy, yes--the joy of knowing the truth of the resurrection and the even greater truth of living out what came before the resurrection every day alongside Him. Of giving up what I wanted, everything i wanted! (oh! the ache!) because to know Him was and always has been far more precious. To look into His eyes and realize that He knows what He is doing with me and this waiting--endless waiting--is all being woven into a beautiful story that never will end. That the joy He imparts is always going to be more full than any cheap substitute the world dangles in my face.

I keep hearing this message of overcoming and how powerful and full of joy our overcoming is. That we wouldn't wish this pain and ache and wondering without answers onto anyone--not even our worst enemies--but the Lord chooses to use the pain and the mess and the uncertainty to refine and refresh and strength us. That we are not what we seem--and the Lord sees the heart: all that it has gone through, all that it has endured and the gold He is creating--and it amazes, it overwhelms Him. (Read the end of Song of Songs--and listen to what Mike Bickle says about it.) And when the end comes, with all our accounts before Him, it won't be a "my, my, my, you could have done better" (Jesus, change the tape in my head! haha) but a "my, my, my look what you overcame."

We stand with Him, we stand for Him in all the worst life has to bring and He finds us beautiful. In our incompleteness, all the ways we don't measure up, He sees the heart behind it and says, "well done. you were one of my kids and you loved me." And that's His favorite, we're His favorite, just being His.

I guess I live for and I'm learning to work for a different joy: His. And that's all.

You Shall Love Me

It's been a long week...well, to be truthful, a long year :)

Everything is ready for next year--but none of it is within my sights. Strange place to be...

When the course of your life is set by your Creator, but you, the human, have no idea, it becomes a dance of sorts, your whole life a dance. That's often how I see Jesus and myself--dancing.

It's close, it's interactive, it's give-and-take--you searching out this other person as they move and respond with you. I want to say, I often don't do a very attractive dance. I wind up spinning off in the wrong direction, forgetting the dance steps or squashing His toes. I've often been seen racing off into the dark when the dance floor is clearly lit up and waiting. I squander my time, playing in the sand when I should be learning the steps of the dance.

In truth, I am an awful dancer, the most uncoordinated of any group. I actually took quite a few dance classes/exercise classes involving dance and it was pitiful! Even the simplest steps could elude me--I would waltz my way tragically through the course...I could learn a dance--eventually. I just had to stumble through the first round, go back and see it taught again and voila! after a bit of practice, I could find my way...

But the time, you must put the time in...it's going to be a struggle, perhaps a bore for those watching you not get it (your classmates) and it takes perseverance. It takes setting your mind to it. All of life is a dance.

I come from a long line of self-defeatists, for whatever reason. Struggle becomes a reason to muddle through life, not the power behind you to overcome. I could have learned that, almost learned that. But instead, the Lord had a different plan, a redemption to be made even of my uncouth family--we do not have to stay the same. What our fathers carried and claimed as normal can be laid down in our lifetimes so that we can skip forward, happy and FREE! I am my father's daughter, but I am not his burden bearer--for I have turned to another One! It really began in high school, this learning to carry my cross instead of giving up and admitting defeat. I took a Calculus class (shudder with me) and found that for once in my life, my brain failed me. I simply could not grasp the concepts with the ease and pizazz that I had been capable of at any other time in my studies. It was the strangest feeling, failing that class...

But I didn't fail, I persevered. I cried through homework, got a tutor and received a 3/5 on the AP Calculus test--which earned me four units of college credit, not bad! It was the hardest thing I'd ever done, but also the most rewarding.

Enter river guiding, Hebrew, student teaching in a self-contained 6th-8th grade classroom--perseverance has been my gift and like any truly good gift, I have had to struggle through it. Nothing has been easy, not for years now. I can't even remember what it feels like to really relax and know that nothing bad is going to happen--because it just does. This is not my pity party, just my weary truth--I get tired of waiting--and for what, I don't know!

So, the dance--ever continuing, ever beautiful, ever painful, ever close...the gift in your suffering (for some say all suffering is alone, no other human can understand the pain you go through or how you experience it), the anguish--it has brought you a closeness with God that you could not have imagined, dreamed or even longed for before. I'm so tired of all of this--my heart cries out sometimes--and then the moments become reframed: I'm close to you in this, says the only One who can understand. See, we don't get healed, except by His wounds. And we can't love someone--truly, in an empathetic, other-comforting way--unless we know what they have gone through, their pain has been real to us. So I don't know what the Lord will do with my life--some days it looks like nothing!--but I do know He loves. And He brings redemption--and He sees pain.

And that's all I need.

"I saw Him there, hanging on a tree, looking at me

He was looking at me, looking at Him, staring through me...

He had arms wide open, a heart exposed

He had arms wide open, He was bleeding, bleeding...

He said to me, 'You shall love me, You shall love me, 

You shall love me, you shall love me..."

--Misty Edwards, Arms Wide Open

Choosing to be Fearless

I need a....

I would love to have a...

If I could just pin it down and bend it to my will...

Sorry, I've never not had an opening line as I write. Usually I have my first sentence fully formed before I ever get to my blog page and then it just free flows from there (no, I do not write these ahead of time, edit them to death and then post them--surprised? Don't be...God knows I am a recovering perfectionist and if I didn't just get out all I was thinking and feeling--with no looking back--it would never appear on this page. Hence the sometimes too much information/slightly strange posts. Hey, you're the one reading it! I didn't twist your arm!) Back to real life...blog life...whatever! (throws her hands up in the air) 

The point is, I want to understand love. I want to have it figured out to the "T" so I no longer have to obsess about it the way our freakin' modern culture does constantly. I want to pin it down, strangle it if I have to and understand it completely. I don't want it to be messy or unpredictable or not go my way--I want it mine and I want it now.

And that's why I have so many issues! I am being slightly ironic in this post, but the way I feel about love and how I wish it would behave just goes to show how far I must go in order to learn its secrets. I hate that I can't control--but that is loves very definition. No one has it pinned down or gets it right--we all stumble and mumble through it and a few of us (maybe they really are the lucky ones--or maybe they're just normal people with the same insane amount of issues who choose to be fearless) make it to the marriage altar and vow to stay together FOREVER!

Oh, man...I'm like one of those guys with commitment issues--except I'M NOT A GUY!! Haha, you just have to laugh.

But seriously, forever freaks me out. Maybe just because I overthink EVERYTHING constantly and can't help but analyze my life to death (I also pray, which keeps me from being a witless ninny--God helps me face life :)) but the idea of marriage is a LONG idea...it doesn't end (in my book) until one or the other of you keels over and dies.

See, that would be the end of my thought process--expect I started to fall in love once. The madness of that infatuation stage goes beyond what they show you in movies with the staring into your eyes deeply and never wanting to look away and the taking a walk by yourself for an hour and a half, just talking it out with God to try to get him out of your head only to having it destroyed by seeing him for fifteen minutes. Listening to his stories of his childhood (really, only got to hear one--wish there were more) and hearing his heart as he talked about the world and just wanting to be around him. I couldn't get enough. 

But I was too afraid--and stuck on my own idea about what my world would look like--and I wasn't fair and I sent mixed signals all the time and never, ever did I want to keep him from his dreams--and I didn't think those dreams could hold me. (Cause I'm my own God, right, and I know.) I didn't choose to be fearless, to risk it all and see what could be--I let it go...

And I just want to know what love is...because I think I botched my chance at learning to love fearlessly and I need God in the middle of all of that. 

I was reading Thomas Merton today and I just got stuck on one paragraph and then it made me cry:

"Let us, therefore, learn to pass from one imperfect activity to another without worrying too much about what we are missing. It is true that we make many mistakes. But the biggest of them all is to be surprised at them: as if we had some hope of never making any."

My theme for the year is both "Letting Go" and "Consecration". I don't know how those two could possibly exist in the same--universe? mind? sentence? They're diametrically opposed to one another--they'll never come into rhythm together. But maybe that's how God works--in all the ways we'd never expect Him to, except that we gave Him a chance. Maybe that's exactly what love is--facing the impossible with hope, knowing that you are not alone as you take this journey. Maybe the only way to love is to let go of all your thoughts and intentions and place them in the hands of another, trusting that they care enough for you to take the best care of you that they are possibly able to. I never understood that--my mistake...

I have to get used to my mistakes--forgive myself and move on and quit being so surprised at what they are and what they teach me. My small life matters--and He will keep loving me past my own insecurities and failures for the rest of my life--I never have to question that. Can you imagine the goodness of God?

Oh I needed to get that off my chest.

So...this year I will--choose life, mistakes and all, and learn to enjoy it for what it is. I will allow my heart to heal and continue to hope. I will stop trying to control all my outcomes and lean into love, His good, never-changing love. Whatever is around my corners is good.

I just want you (dear reader) to know that my feelings for that boy--ah, man!--have changed. God taught me forgiveness (for the poor dear had no idea what he was doing, his affect on me) and not to be ashamed of how I had felt ("How could you let someone you knew so little of get so far into your heart?" was the lie from the enemy that used to shame me).  My heart goes on...(cue Titanic music)

Love will make its way to me, steadily, softly--in the meantime, God has shown me more love in my lifetime than many know in any marriage. I am not ashamed to say that He is all I need. My life is in His hands--horrendous mistakes and all--and there is always hope! 

There is always hope.

Some more Merton, from No Man is an Island:

"It is, therefore, a very great thing to be little, which is to say: to be ourselves."

"A multitude of badly performed actions and of experiences only half-lived exhausts and depletes our being."

"It may happen that a man who is able to accomplish very little is much more of a person than another who seems to accomplish very much."

"A man who fails well is greater than one who succeeds badly."

"For we cannot make the best of what we are, if our hearts are always divided between what we are and what we are not."

"But, above all, we must learn our own weakness in order to awaken to a new order of action and being--and experience God Himself accomplishing in us the things we find impossible."

That's love for me. 

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?

Letting Go Love

My life has been crazy for the last few months...

Have you ever noticed that you have to step back from a situation/problem to really realize how it has affected you and what it has done deep down in your soul? Yeah, that was this weekend for me.

I lost my faith these last few months. Faith in the little God who liked to sprinkle fairy dust through the air and trip alongside us singing...but that faith was replaced by a Faith in a God who knows us to the core of who we are and still desperately longs to let us be known and to know Him. He will stop at nothing to get at your heart (even deep pain) and exists solely in your life to breathe on your dreams and shape you into them--and that will take a lot of gasping, enormous breaths and groaning as we emerge through the storm (wind, rain and tears) with only the Promise that He will be there and we have nothing to fear.

And we have nothing to fear.

To be our best selves, our most complete selves, our true selves comes out of a deep, aching vulnerability. A facing of all your worst fears with the ability to move forward out of them unscathed. It's a completely bizarre and intensely rewarding process that God only blesses His warriors with. If you were made for the battle, you will go into training.

That's where I've been the past few months. Continuing to take orders and follow His commands in the middle of miserly, dire circumstances where hope should (and often was on the verge of) being snuffed out. But we kept pressing forward, He and I, every once in a while coming clear into the light, able to see each other's smiles and He'd laugh and say, "We're not through it yet."

At moments I hated the "We're not through it yet." It seemed a soggy waste to go on when there was no progress--but that wasn't the point. The point is never how many people you find to love and hug on you back--its to learn the letting go love, the love that Jesus showed us for the first time on the cross, where He gave everything He had in a loving, desperate act and then stepped back and let us figure it out. How would we react to this strange giving of all He had? Would we choose to believe that He had indeed opened a way for us to be a part of a mystical "here" and "not-yet-here" kingdom? Would we love Him back?

The choice is everything, but the choice is never forced. It is simply offered, to believe trust and fall into or to walk away from. I have seen many of both and in my loving, in my giving of my best over and over again for His glory I have seen some love me desperately back (you know who you are, the ones who give me long hugs and pray with me until we get kicked out of church and talk with me as I mourn what could have been) and there have been others who crushed me and my dreams and sang as they walked away. And I have continued to love both.

Because my example is Jesus. always will be (O Perfection!) and He reminds me that I love them because He first loved me. Joy will come as I keep looking to Him in hope, holding my empty hands out again to be filled with His love and then spread it everywhere He deigns it wonderful for me to be. They can do as they like, the love will never stop and thus the throwing out His love every place I encounter will, by the same token, never have its end.

And I am grateful.

These last few months have been wonderful scary and hopelessly dramatically full of His love. I love the work He is doing, despite the pain, and I will continue to follow His course as many days as I have breath.

Join me.

Getting through the Heartbreak! :)

You know, the one thing that breaks my heart (literally) is the way that we men and women can play games with each other.

I see it do so much damage, the little bits of flirting coupled with the indecisiveness on the part of some of the parties involved...like one of my favorite pastors says (Nathan Edwardson) it leaves us women "wondering and wandering".

I was involved in a situation like this several years ago. Of course, being me and the scared rabbit that i sometimes revert to, I was very hard to read. (I don't make it easy for a guy to pursue me :)) And yeah, maybe it was all in my head. But is it normal for a guy to tell you about how he asked a girl to the dance and then asks you to show up as well?

Wondering and wandering...

Yeah, I didn't go to that dance. Instead I hung out in my dorm lobby with a few other girls and scrapbooked my heart out. The result is hanging on my wall, a sort of forgiveness to myself for letting my heart goes so far out there for this guy only to find him (perhaps not intentionally) rejecting me. There was so much hurt in me after this incident--I remember heading out to the back 40 (a little bit of woods behind my college) and probably straining my guitar (as well as the ears of any who heard me) as I cried out my heart in song.

Heartbreak comes so easy to us girls...

So much has been written about sexual purity that it can get a bit overdone. How many times do we have to hear...? and it still hasn't penetrated on some level--girls make crazy choices still...

I want to address the heart.

That's what I lost in my "battle" for purity...that's what I was never warned about, not directly. I read Elisabeth Elliot's Passion and Purity book over and over until it was worn out, then gave it away and a friend (Justina!) gave it to me for Christmas. I practically had that book, which details her relationship with Jim Elliot, memorized (and read as many other purity books as possible) but it was no help when I faced the relational stickiness of my life.

 Maybe we all need to get hurt to learn. Maybe joy only comes and can truly be felt on the wings of sorrow (because God truly does work all things for our good--take heart!). but if I can shed some light on this subject and bring hope to another soul, I'm more than happy to share my pain and how God has brought me through.

See, we women are just made differently than men and we need to realize that and move from that. We are created with very tender hearts--and relationships just look different for us and to us. Smart guys know this--they get the girl by talking her up, activating her heart. We lose our hearts before we lose our bodies--this is the truth. And it doesn't take much--a little bit of hanging out, hearing this guy's story even minutely--if that guy is in anyway attractive to you, you'll be hooked.

And I know, it is a little different for everybody. This girl likes a guy who owns a truck goes hunting and works on the farm. This girl wants a guy who has a college degree and a kind heart. This girl wants the guy who feeds homeless people and will travel the world. The right guy at the right time...that's who you fall for.

But what do you do when your dream guy shows up, becomes friends with you and then moves on?

I've felt that pain...it was like someone had taken a firecracker and set it off in my heart, oblivious to the damage it would cause. I walked around with a brokenness in me that I didn't know could exist. Oh, and that wrenching? it would only get worse if I saw him. I never understood what they meant when they said you could die from a broken heart--until I saw him unexpectedly in the library one day (we hadn't been talking for months) and my heart about tried to twist out of my chest. Excruciating.

But there is hope, redemption and healing...I left that scene, went and stood in the hallway and all of a sudden a balm (call it the balm of Gilead) came flowing over my heart. I literally felt a warmth flowing over my heart, bringing healing to broken places. I knew my Lord had seen me, seen the part I played in this affair and loved me still--would even comfort me and allow me to be wrapped up in His arms.

That's how I made it through the next couple years as I worked on my teaching credential and he worked on his relationship with the other girl. It was lonely--the loneliest times of my minute existence--but I was never alone. The tears were caught, the questions settled by peace and strength that I never knew I could have came. I was even grateful--not for the pain, but that God had His timing--and I knew that dating at that time of my life would have been ridiculous--there was just too much else going on.

The time will come...and a worthy man will come along, one who will treasure your heart, that precious peace of you that you must not give away freely. That is worth fighting for--and worth healing for.

And when rejection comes--and your heart gets crippled--stretch out your hands to Daddy. He loves you dearly and He will see you through the process--for however long it takes. For so many years, I felt such shame...but God saw me even through that. Loved me there. He'll do the same for you. His love is that great. It is enough...

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.