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Faith

Messy Milestones


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Fear and Truth

As I look back and reflect on the path that this blog has taken, I can’t help but smile at little at the randomness of it all.

Admittedly, I’m probably not the best blogger because of that. I guess you could consider this a “lifestyle blog” but most days it just seems like a peek at the inside of my brain – random, discombobulated thoughts floating around with no true sense of focus or direction. Okay, that might be an exaggeration, but still.

Community, Rhythms, and Other Thoughts on Moving

I’m not entirely sure when the shift happened, but there was one. In 2015/2016 as my faith and my relationship with the Lord planted roots and grew deeper, a lot of my posts reflected that. When I go back and re-read them, I remember how I felt the Holy Spirit giving me all of those words and just feeling like I needed to share them. I remember being in the days and weeks after my grandmother and aunt were called home to Heaven less than 48 hours apart from each other and just feeling like I needed to write down the things that were being revealed to me in the wake of all of that. The words that the Holy Spirit gave to me would serve as a beautiful piece of my story – a story marked, yes, by grief and loss but also of tremendous hope and healing.

But at some point, the journey shifts from grieving and into healing. And in my case, when I began to enter that phase, I realized that I didn’t feel led to write near as often. It’s been an adjustment and honestly a bit of an “identity crisis” of sorts.

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Hopeful Expectation

“Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed – that exhilarating finish in and with God – he could put up with anything along the way: cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!” – Hebrews 12:1-3, MSG

It’s been seven months now since I moved away from home. Not that Earth-shattering in the grand scheme of things considering that I just moved 2.5 hours away and I’m at least in the same state but hey, for me, these seven months have been jam-packed.

This move has been easy. It’s been smooth and natural and in many ways, it was a long time coming. But it’s also been hard. Difficult in ways that I don’t even fully know how to articulate to another person. This journey has been rocky and revealing and messy but I’ve been stretched in some ways and strengthened in others and so this journey also feels holy to me.

Hard and holy.

Two words that have been a recurring theme in my mind lately when I think of my life and the soul work that God has been doing in this season.

This time last year, I was going through Blue Letter Bible’s Chronological Bible plan and was reading of the Israelites’ journey through the wilderness towards the promised land. I resonated with the story, I thought. I had been journeying through a season of preparation for 2.5 years and felt like I was like the Israelites in a way and moving closer and closer to the “promised land” that I had been envisioning.

Admittedly, there is a slight sense of grieving over the story that didn’t come to fruition. But what I know of God and this life that we are doing together is that my grief for what could have been doesn’t negate the feelings of hopeful expectation for what is to come in this new story. And on this Ash Wednesday, that is what I am clinging to.

Hopeful expectation.

Lent is a season that is becoming increasingly precious to me with every year that goes by. It’s more than just 40 days of giving up candy or soda – as it so often was when I was a child. It’s an opportunity for reflection, fasting, and prayer. A chance to draw near to Jesus in the days leading up to His ultimate sacrifice. The words in the verses above – “Because he never lost sight of where he was headed” – stick out to me, especially today on Ash Wednesday. How many times have we lost sight of where we were doing and what we are working towards?

It is my prayer that this Lenten season would be an opportunity to re-orient myself and lean further into Him. That it would be a sweet reminder to not lose sight of where I’m headed. For me, the Lord is leading me to fast from sleeping in so that I can reestablish margin and space for spending time with Him in the mornings. And although the decision of what I’m fasting from didn’t really come until yesterday, I think it’s been a long time coming and a beautiful continuation of what the Lord has already been doing in my heart this past month.

And so I am here at Ash Wednesday in hopeful expectation and eager longing for what is to come and what the Lord is going to do through this season.

Remember God

We say it every year, but where has the time gone?? Here we are on the downward slope to 2019 and in a lot of ways it feels like 2018 only just got started.

2018 has been a big year for me I guess, which I did kind of expect going into it. I’m in a much different place, literally and figuratively, today than I was a year ago. The beginning of 2018 had me sending off applications to grad school in central Illinois and to child life internships across the Southeast. I prayerfully sent them off, assuming that God would send me off to one of those destinations in Fall 2018. But in the Spring, I realized that this path – even though I thought I had heard the directions from the Lord so clearly – was not going to be coming to fruition. I still felt a change stirring within me and I felt the pull to look for other jobs in other cities. So, in April/May the path aligned so smoothly for me to accept a new teaching position in Raleigh, NC. It all fell into place so well and I found myself spending the summer preparing for a move from Charlotte to Raleigh to live with my sister.

 

Remember God

Summer 2018 held a lot of expectations, I admit. I created this vision of what my new life in Raleigh was going to be like as I basked in the sweetness of feeling like I was so in tune with God’s calling for my future. And I think I was in tune, even though now that I am looking at the end of 2018 and life doesn’t look anything like I thought it was going to back when it started. In hindsight, I don’t think that I necessarily heard Him wrong but I think God, in His infinite wisdom, definitely nudges towards other things that are going to serve us better. Rather than send me to Illinois for grad school – where I know absolutely no one – He sent me to Raleigh to live with my sister, where I already knew a fair amount of people, and to a job where I already knew one of my co-workers from college. I know God provides protection to all, but it feels particularly true about my walk with Him.

I’ve realized in recent weeks, as I’ve come to acknowledge this feeling of being slightly “off-kilter” and something just feeling off, I’ve realized that at some point I mixed up the feeling of being expectant and having expectations. Somewhere along the way, I shifted from being expectant and hopeful of what God was going to do through this change and transition to creating my own expectations of what He would do.

Two very different things.

To me, the state of being expectant is to release control, leave room for vulnerability, and approach life with open hands that are ready to accept whatever comes. In contrast, having expectations means that there is a set outcome that we are envisioning, rather than embracing the mystery that comes with new experiences.Continue Reading

Clarity

Earlier this year, I shared a little about how I was reading through the Old Testament and how it really resonated with me and the journey I felt I was on as I began this year. Much like Moses’ journey with the Israelites into the wilderness, my walk at that time was very much in a transitional and “in-between” place. Not yet to point B but not all the way back at point A.

When I wrote of this back in March, I felt that I knew the general direction that God was taking me. I’d spent the past 2.5 years working towards a career as a child life specialist – preparing myself to move into either full-time grad school for two years or into a full-time child life internship for four months. But then, the plans changed. These two things that I’d a spent so much time praying over and preparing for were no longer in my immediate future. To be perfectly honest, as someone who plans for every possible outcome, I wasn’t completely prepared for this one. My answer to people who asked me what I planned to do if neither grad school or an internship panned out was “I’ll just stay here and keep teaching,” but there was a part of me that really didn’t think I’d need to consider option #3.

I think most of us have been in places like this. Surprised, anxious, and a little confused as to how we ended up here when we expected to be somewhere else entirely. It certainly isn’t a fun place to be in the moment, but when viewed in hindsight it is one of the most beautiful of spaces. Uncertainty forces us to face head-on this unpleasant reality that we are human and that we have a limited view of the world around us. It forces us to make a choice, even though I think we often fight against the obvious one. It’s the choice that we make to look to and rest in the One thing that is certain in this world. The One who created the world and everything in it and therefore knows exactly what we can’t see or decipher.

I don’t share my stories with you because I’ve figured out the secret to all of this and have navigated the uncertainty and fear that have been near-constants in my life perfectly. I truly have not. Many of my prayers in the wake of these changed plans looked and sounded a bit incredulous. I had to spend some time reconciling with God this new reality and why He didn’t give me some sort of heads up that He was switching things up on me. This was about two weeks of my life before He shared some powerful words with me.

Disappointment shouldn’t make me desperate and hard seasons shouldn’t put me in denial. Denying myself of hope, of joy, or of just simply the opportunity to trust my Creator fully and completely is exactly what the enemy wants. The enemy wants us weak and fearful and so easily crumbled when things don’t go our way and life gets tough.

Somewhere along the way within my story this truth become sort of the backbone of who God is shaping me to be, I think. He still has to stop and remind me of it along the way, as He did recently, but with every new page of this story it becomes easier to choose God over whining or desperation. Sometimes I think faith is like a muscle – we have to put it to use and actively work to strengthen it or it just becomes wasted. The person I was before God transformed my heart and my life through a season of loss and uncertainty was someone who saw disappoints and hardships as anything but the perfect opportunity to give it over to God.

There’s been several moments over the past few months when I felt like other people didn’t quite understand why I was doing what I was. Why I only applied to one grad school program and a small handful of hospitals for their internships programs. Why I was prepared to move to a small town in Illinois, where I knew absolutely no one, if I had gotten accepted to graduate school. Why I moved away from option #3 to pursue option #4 – realizing I needed a change of any kind and applying to several job openings in North and South Carolina. The simple answer is that I was just simply doing what God told me to do, even though it didn’t make complete sense to me either. A slightly longer answer is that I’ve learned that loving and following Jesus often means moving boldly forward, even (especially) when you don’t actually know what He’s moving you toward.

But just as God carried the Israelites through the wilderness and into the Promised Land, He has carried me to a place where I can finally say that I do know what the immediate future holds. And He so beautifully paved the way for this to come to fruition.

In early May, I accepted a teaching position at a new elementary school in Wake County, NC and I will be moving to Raleigh in July/August 2018. The area is a familiar one with many extended family members nearby, but also my older sister who has lived there since college and who will be my new roommate! These past few weeks have truly been humbling as I think about how God wove things together, answered prayers, and provided clarity that had been lacking for more than two years. Humbled and overflowing with gratitude as I pray and prepare for this new chapter!

The Big Plan

I struggle with what exactly to say here that isn’t super dramatic or super cliche. But lately that’s what the pendulum that’s been swinging in my mind.

On March 23, I learned that I did not get accepted to grad school in Illinois. And in the past two weeks, I have learned that I have not moved forward in the selection process at 4 of the 6 hospitals where I applied for an internship. Even typing that leaves a sort of sour taste in my mouth and I’m realizing that I haven’t really spoken the words aloud very much just yet. Maybe it’s a little bit of embarrassment or maybe just disappointment, but yeah. My thoughts have been swinging back and forth from the super cliche “God works all things together for good”-type of thoughts to the super dramatic variety that has me questioning everything from how could I have misunderstood God to do I even still want to pursue this career. (I hear myself being dramatic, don’t you worry. I’m working on it!) Now, that’s not to say that I don’t think that God actually works all things together – He totally does and I believe that He is doing that here too – it’s just a verse that is used so often in comforting others that it has started to become a little cliche at times.

I think there is a certain sense of mourning, a transitional period, when this vision that you held and felt so strongly turns out not to be the path forward at all. It’s a little jarring, to be honest. For months, I felt so called to Illinois for school. Even my family felt strongly that this was where my next steps would take me. I applied to six hospitals also, sure, but I felt so sure that grad school was in my immediate future. But I am reminded of the words found in Isaiah 55, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts (v. 8-9, ESV).”

While it’s easy to think that we know something because we are humans and small-minded, we serve a God who is so much bigger than what we can imagine. A big God who dreams big dreams for us. I think we (meaning me) can get so caught up in knowing the next step and knowing exactly what is coming our way when that is just simply not how life works. Just recently, in a perfectly timed message I might add, Bob Goff shared on Twitter, “What if we found out that God’s big plan for our lives is that we wouldn’t spend so much of our time trying to figure out a big plan for our lives? Perhaps He just wants us to love Him and love each other.”

But truthfully, even as cliche as the typical,comforting verses can be, I still wholeheartedly believe them to be true. As disappointed as I feel and as foggy as the road ahead appears to be, I know in my heart and soul that God is not done. I know that He is good and loving and faithful and that the future is beautiful, even if I no longer have a vision of what or where it will be. A dear friend of mine says often that “if it’s not good, than it’s not done” and this isn’t done.

I still have a few more weeks to potentially hear back from the two remaining hospitals where I applied for their child life internships. These next few weeks will be full of prayer and active listening to God. Lately, it feels as if I’m being directed to make a change in my work environment so that is something I am praying through as well. As someone who plans and thinks (usually overthinking) every detail of something, I think this is why this season and this experience is so jarring. But I can’t plan everything, no matter how much I think I am capable of it.

The big plan for our lives can only be directed by the One who can see the big picture, and that places me (and all of us, really) in the most steady and capable hands.

Courage

In the past few weeks and months, I feel as though I am finally coming to a place where I feel like I can hold the things in my life – my career, my stability, my relationships – all with open hands. A place where surrender is the initial response, rather than this clamoring for control whenever a change occurs or something bad happens. But it’s not as though the journey to this place has been easy – or that I’m necessarily great at surrendering to God’s will all the time.

It’s been a hard fought road to get here. And I’m crazy grateful for the growth, the bumps and the bruises, and the faith that has led me to this place.

When my life was turned on it’s head by a two year season of sicknesses, losses, and significant anxiety – my surrender was only born out of necessity. When life began spiraling out of control, I hadn’t stepped into church in months and was honestly the furthest from God I think I’d been up until that point, but I was in desperate need of something to cling to. I couldn’t control the things that were happening around me and I couldn’t make these terrible things go away but through the nudging and whispers that only God could give, I gradually found my way home to Him.

I’m not the same person that I was back then, but still I fight every day to remember exactly how that season of my life felt. I fight for that, not so that I can wallow in sadness but so that I can be revived each day by the pure joy and peace that God granted me through all of it. Because if I don’t remember how I felt, if I don’t remember the promises that were whispered to me as I stood in the front yard of my grandmother’s home, just 48 hours after she went home to be with Jesus, as the paramedics attempted to resuscitate my Aunt Shelia – than I will forget them. And to forget them is to forget the absolute miraculous way that God moved in my life and in my heart that morning.

We have to remember the way it felt to be utterly and wholly broken before we ever knew what it felt to be healed, fully and completely.

Which brings me to today. The present. If there’s anything that God is using this current season of my life for, it’s to teach me and show me the redeeming qualities of both presence and stillness. The gift of stillness has come primarily through the practice of mindfulness and meditation in recent weeks and has been incredibly grounding. God has shown me the gift of presence that has come in the form of both my active presence in my daily life in this season as well as the presence of specific people that God has sent to me in recent weeks. My cup surely runneth over these days.Continue Reading

Love + Ashes

There’s something that continually sticks out to me when I read the Bible, particularly when I read the stories of mourning and of repentance and that is sackcloth and ashes. When we read through stories of tremendous grief and sorrow, those two things are almost always associated.

Bible Gateway says this about sackcloth and ashes, “Sackcloth is a coarse, black cloth made from goat’s hair that was worn together with the burnt ashes of wood as a sign of mourning for personal and national disaster, as a sign of repentance and at times of prayer for deliverance.”

For some reason, the imagery that this practice of wearing sackcloth and ashes in response to mourning and sorrow and in the midst of repentance gives invokes in me this deep-rooted feeling – this deep stirring in my belly that is difficult to put words to but the closest I have is love.

Love + Ashes

It is when we are in deep mourning or deep repentance that we can more fully appreciate the love that is lavished upon us wholly undeserving people. It is when we humble ourselves, die to self, and repent that we can see just how much grace God pours out as a gift we never did anything to earn.

Ash Wednesday falling on the same day as Valentine’s Day could not be more perfectly planned, I think.

At the start of this Lenten season, the ashes that are being spread on foreheads today symbolize to me repentance. They symbolize this incredible sense of humility and smallness and sorrow that comes when we actually force ourselves to confront our sins. When we look at ourselves in the mirror long enough to see all of the ways that culture and society and the enemy have wedged themselves between us and God. And friends, to confront that and stand face to face with this demands our repentance. It demands our grief and our sorrow for all of the ways that we turn from God day in and day out – whether we mean to or not.

But on a day when culture and society are spewing out all of these manufactured tokens of superficial love and spreading guilt and shame to those without “true love” in their lives, Ash Wednesday adds some much needed perspective to the mix that is setting my soul on fire today. When we look at this day and at this season with a Lenten focus and remember why we reflect and repent during these 40 days – this Valentine kind of love just seems so obviously lacking. Lacking in substance, lacking in meaning, and lacking in the perfect love that came at the expense of Jesus on the cross.

The customary practice during Lent is to give something up until Easter and growing up, this was a practice that I truly never gave significant thought to when I was growing up in the Catholic church. My go-to was usually giving up soda or something like that but in recent years as I have grown in my faith, God has really laid it on my heart to consider not just what I could give up to draw nearer to Him but what I could potentially add in order to achieve the same result. That could be adding in the habit/practice of reading the Bible daily or meditating, two things I do already, but I think it also comes down to our posture. Sure, I’m already doing some of the things that can draw us in closer to God but where is the posture of my heart when I do these things? Am I doing them to just check it off a list or am I actively listening and actively quieting my mind in order to be more in tune with God?

As I write this, I’m also reading some excerpts from Pope Francis’ homily earlier today during the Ash Wednesday service at the Vatican and his thoughts perfectly echoes the cry of my heart lately.

”Pause from this compulsion to a fast-paced life that scatters, divides and ultimately destroys time with family, with friends, with children, with grandparents, and time as a gift…time with God,” he said today, before continuing with, “Pause for a little while, refrain from the deafening noise that weakens and confuses our hearing, that makes us forget the fruitful and creative power of silence.”

Silence and stillness have the power to amplify God’s voice and truth and it is my prayer this season that I am able to instill this into my own life. The kind of love that this day marks is not one that can be found on a store shelf or in the boxes of chocolates being passed around. No, it’s not a coincidence that Ash Wednesday falls on Valentine’s Day. May we all draw nearer to the source of the purest and greatest love there is in this season.

Two Years

On this #tbt, I find myself struck by beauty and grace that have overflowed since this day two years. Since the day I snapped this photo of snow falling in the distance on the San Bernardino Mountains in California just steps away from where my sweet grandmother was being laid to rest along with her husband and her son.

A few weeks ago, Mo Isom Aiken shared some thoughts on time in her Instastories that have stuck in my heart ever since.

(Side note: I highly recommend following her. She is hilarious but such a woman of profound faith. Her Instastory talks make me feel like I just sat down in church).

She said, “It’s not that time heals wounds but time has the power to sculpt our hearts, to grow us and to comfort us. God does all those things through time. He’s the orchestrater of time.”

Though I didn’t know it at the time, this day two years ago would more or less be the “end” of a season that was marked, yes, by profound loss but also by more grace and joy and growth than I ever could have imagined. But it’s been in these days, weeks, and months that have followed that I’ve really been put “to the test,” I think sometimes. That I’ve woken up and chosen to fight almost daily to remember some of the deeper and most painful moments of this story of mine, not so that I can wallow in sadness or anything but so that I can be revived each day by the pure joy and peace that God granted to me. Because if I don’t remember how it felt, if I don’t remember the promises that were whispered to me by God in His presence, than I will forget them. And to forget them is to forget the miraculous way that God moved in my life and humbled my heart through the story that He has had me step into.

It is through this season of my life that I have been led to this life I lead now. This life of nervously and joyfully stepping out in bold faith to do the things that He is asking me to do both spiritually and professionally. When I take a step back and look at the bigger picture of what God has done, it nearly takes my breath away. The ripples that were made by events from two years ago are still felt today and help recount the ways that God has moved and woven every part of this present reality together.

We have to remember our pain, I think.

We have to remember the way it felt to be utterly and wholly broken before knowing what it felt to be healed, fully and completely.

2018 Began with a Choice

For me, 2018 began with a choice. The details aren’t necessarily important, but it was a choice that said everything about who God is and who He is going to be in this coming year with me. It was a choice that honestly I was only able to make because of the journey that I have walked with God the past four years. It’s a realization that fills me with so much joy + gratitude.

It’s one thing to make a choice, one that you know without a shadow of a doubt is the right one – but another thing entirely to actually live in that choice though. To live with the results of that choice.

I’d argue that living in a difficult decision is harder than actually making it. Because in the days that follow, you start to feel another voice creep in. One that tries to whisper to you that you chose wrong. That you made a mistake. That the instincts you were feeling from God weren’t really from Him at all.

That’s where bold faith comes in.

It takes boldness to actually commit to something – especially when you can’t see further than where you are in this moment. I know that often, this is way easier said than done.

I get that.

But I feel that no matter where you are in your faith journey, bold faith should be something you are always in pursuit of. For me personally, my walk with God – specifically the past four years – was not always characterized by boldness. But somewhere deep down, I knew that this was what I was striving for. Because when you’ve been simultaneously broken and healed by God, you can’t help but want to throw off any and every chain that was holding you back and run headlong towards whatever He has for you. Because the God that heals and bandages the deepest of wounds also has the most beautiful plans and intentions for your future. And I don’t know about you, but the second that I caught a glimpse of what the future could be when I give up this false idea of control and just surrender my future to the One who is more than capable – I was willing to be as bold and daring as I needed to be in order to make that my reality every day.

Because when He leads you to a certain path, you can’t pull away and do things on your own. You just can’t. What I believe about God is that He is the God that breathed all of creation, me and you included, into existence. And He called it good. He has created things that are breathtaking. Things that are awe-inspiring and beautiful.

I have stood at the edge of the Grand Canyon, feeling so unbelievably small and humbled that the God who made all of that was the same God who loves little ole me and sees something that He could make beautiful and call good. Little ole me.

Some decisions are hard and you are faced with making a choice that quite frankly kind of sucks. But bold faith in the wake of that says to God that yes, this sucks and I’m not entirely happy with this but I trust You with my future. I trust You to lead me to a future that I won’t want to hesitate to say a joyful “yes” to.

Fall Update

Well hello, friends!

It’s been way too long since I have posted anything here, which seems a little crazy to me! Once upon a time I was a semi-regularly posting blogger and now I’m lucky if I find the time to even think about writing.

The first official day of Fall is this Friday and I could not be happier, even though my house has looked like Fall since the first week of September. Fall is truly my favorite season and I am just ecstatic to have football on TV, leaves falling down, and temperatures (slowly) beginning to drop.

Something I’m super excited about this Fall is the start of community groups at my church! Since I first started attending this particular church in January of this year, I really haven’t been able to devote a ton of time to cultivating a sense of community there. Each and every Sunday I just feel at home and so grateful that God brought me there so when they announced new groups were starting this Fall, I jumped right in! And guys, God has been everywhere in this group…and it was only the first official week!

Truth be told, I’m usually somewhat hesitant to be in a position where I might need to share some of my personal journey of faith. It’s not the neatest of stories and is filled with loss and grief but also grace upon grace upon grace poured out from Jesus. This past week, our first official meeting together, I found myself sharing a snapshot of my story – the two losses that I experienced two years ago this week. Soon after I spoke about it, I found myself sitting there in my chair overthinking all of what I had just shared and began criticizing myself for speaking up. I think I have the fear/worry that others might think I share my story to get pity or to have others feel sorry for me which couldn’t be further from the truth – but there I was thinking it.

A few minutes later towards the end of group, we were asked to reflect on what we thought God was saying to us and showing us through the week’s sermon and our reflection of it. One of the other women in the group spoke up and shared how she enjoyed hearing the stories of the other group members and how it was encouragement to her given that she and her husband were in the midst of a very difficult year. In this year alone they had lost three close relatives and I was just momentarily awe-struck by God’s work in that moment. It was then that I realized that it was things like this that make it so important for us to share our testimonies and our journeys with those around us, especially when they are so full of God’s grace and love.

There I was second guessing myself for sharing some of my story and experiences when what I shared was actually having an impact on someone else going through something very similar. She spoke of how encouraging it is to hear from someone on the “other side” of this when she clearly is still in the deep throes of grief. I nearly teared up right there and the entire time that we prayed together as a group to close out our time together I just found myself thinking, “Thank you God, thank you God, thank you God for bring all of us together in this group.”

And so today, on what is actually Gratitude Day (Sept. 21) I just felt like I needed to share that experience with you all. In Colossians 2:6-7 we read, “So then, just as you have received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, being rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, and overflowing with gratitude.” (CSB)

That couldn’t be more descriptive of me lately – “overflowing with gratitude.”

God is able to produce the most amazing stories and testimonies out of some of the messiest of circumstances and that is something always worth praising and rejoicing over. I can’t look back at the 2 years of losses and hardships any other way but through joy-filled eyes because I know exactly where Jesus was in every moment of those experiences.

Amazing grace, indeed.

Brave Surrender

Lately, it seems as though God has laid bravery on my heart. At nearly every turn, whether through messages at church or in books and blog posts, courage and bravery have been at the forefront for weeks.

For the longest time, I viewed bravery as doing something big. Something that no one would ever think of doing. I viewed courage and bravery as being fearless, but maybe that was just my young adult fiction obsession (oh hi, Divergent series) setting in at the time.

I think bravery and courage can look differently for different people, depending on a variety of things. For some, bravery may be taking that job in a new city or saying a resounding yes to a mission trip in another country. For others, bravery may just mean simply surviving and making it through the storm in their life at that moment. No matter the circumstance, I believe that God calls us into seasons of boldness. Seasons of putting our money where our mouths are, so to speak, and actually doing the things that scare us. Actually doing the things that God has ordained for us so deep in our hearts.

Truthfully, I just love the word bold. I love the sound of it and I love the imagery that it evokes in me. To speak it aloud just sounds brave and powerful, doesn’t it? Dictionary.com’s first definition of the word is: “not hesitating or fearful in the face of actual or possible danger or rebuff; courageous and daring.”

I just want to slap that on a Post-It and stick it in just about every area of my house.

But being bold requires faith. It requires trust that is placed in Jesus, not in something man-made or temporary. Sometimes one of the first bold acts we can do is place our hopes, our trust, and our fears in the arms of Jesus. The second is to then go and do. I’m currently in the midst of reading Shelly Miller’s book, The Rhythm of Rest, and in it there is a sentence that reads, “Faith is a brave surrender, an unwavering commitment to trust in a Savior who takes care of the details despite hurdles and hardships.”

I can admit to you that I know this is easier said than done. I believe that God has been bringing this theme and topic to my heart for a reason and not because I’ve mastered it.

I’m nearing the end of a long season of preparation and preparing to trade it for a season of action, a season of doing. Beyond that, a season that I already know will be one of the most bold and courageous things that I have done. I’ve written of it before, here and here. Beginning this summer and through the rest of 2017, I will be spending 1-2 evenings a week volunteering in a local pediatric emergency department with child life and wrapping up the rest of my online courses.

This Fall, I will begin completing and compiling everything I need for the application packets that I will be mailing to the 20+ hospitals across the midwest and eastern parts of the country in hopes to try secure an internship placement for the Fall 2018 semester. Should I receive an offer to intern somewhere, I would then enter into a season of unemployment and unpaid internship life for several months. It will be one of my boldest moves – trusting God with my future, with my finances, and with my security as a whole.

I’ve never thought of myself as a particularly brave person, but even I have to admit that it takes some semblance of bravery to trust God with every aspect of what I am embarking on. This career path, this journey, is one that I felt God calling me to back in December of 2015, three months after losing my grandmother and my aunt less than 48 hours apart. That experience had grabbed ahold of my heart and shaken me awake. It was, and still is, the moment where I felt God’s peace and power the most profoundly and deeply. I remember like it was yesterday, the way it felt as though Jesus was actually physically there next to me, arms wrapped tight around me and whispering to me that He would use this pain for something bigger. Something more than I could even imagine in that moment.

This time of brave surrender to God’s plan for my life comes from three years of learning who God truly is and who I am in his sight. I know that He is good. He is faithful and loving and powerful. He is my heavenly Father who seeks the best for me just as my earthly father does. My dad used to tell me all the time when I was growing up, “You can be scared, but do it anyway.” I’m sure I laughed at the time, my dad has the tendency to sound a bit like a fortune cookie sometimes, but the words stuck with me into adulthood and have only been echoed by God.

He tells me to feel the fear and the worry that I have, but to give it to Him and go do it anyway.

What I know about God is that he will bring this season to completion and fulfill every promise made to me in the process. There will be hardships and fear and uncertainty but I have experienced far too much with God to start doubting Him now.

“There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.” – Philippians 1:6, MSG

He Is Risen

This Easter comes at an interesting time for me this year.

I’ve just returned from a much-anticipated family vacation to Arizona and the Grand Canyon and truth be told, I’m still a wee bit jet lagged. But that’s not why this year is interesting.

For much of the past week, I have had a front row seat to some of the most awe-inspiring and beautiful God-breathed sights that this world possesses. North Carolina is plenty beautiful, don’t get me wrong, but it almost seems like child’s play when compared to the grandeur of the Grand Canyon.

Earlier this week, I posted a picture that I took of the sunset at the Grand Canyon on Instagram. The picture truly doesn’t do it justice, the sight of the moon rising over the canyon as the rocks were painted with a beautiful shade of red. I tried to capture as much of what I experienced as I could, but I truly had to learn to just simply live in that moment and use my eyes to truly see what was in front of me.

The thing that I was continually reminded of on this whole trip was how insignificant our time really is on this Earth. Not insignificant in terms of what we choose to do, but insignificant when compared to the vastness and enormity of God. I mean, think about it. The God who chose to create these rocks in Sedona with the most stunning shade of red is the same God who created me. Who created you.

Sedona, AZ

The God who can create some of the most magnificent sights on Earth is the same God who decided that the world also needed me in it. Who am I when compared to the splendors that God has formed? Who am I to walk on this blessed ground that God created when I am nothing more than a flawed, imperfect, and sinful human?

Who am I? Who are we?

We are God’s chosen sons and daughters. We are the ones who Jesus gave His life for, the ones whose debts He paid with His blood. We are the sons and daughters of a God who loves His children so deeply and so fiercely that He would give his own Son for us, despite our sinful ways.

To celebrate this Easter morning, in the wake of being so deeply humbled by our God is a unique and special place to be, friends.

“He is not here, for He has risen, just as He said.” – Matthew 28:6

Eight Years

Last Friday, The Vampire Diaries ended its eight year run on The CW. Why am I writing that here? Because the show’s ending is actually very bittersweet for me personally.

(Which does seem a little funny and almost embarrassing to admit, truthfully.)

The Vampire Diaries played an important role in my life. I came upon the show not long after discovering the Twilight series and both franchises helped to alter the course of my life, believe it or not.

Full disclosure, admitting my fangirling nerdiness to you in this moment feels very strange, but bear with me.

As I think back to the past eight years that I was a fan of this show, it’s truly incredible to think of the ways in which I have changed in that time. At the time, I was a freshman in my first year of college. I was naive about the world and thought that I had my future mapped out. I was a freshman education major who was obsessed with pop culture and yearned for a career in journalism – covering my favorite celebrities, books, and films. It wasn’t much after this that I stumbled on the world of fansite blogging and found the way that I could write articles on the things I loved while also keeping myself on the more realistic path of teaching.

It opened the door for me to learn and fall in love with writing and blogging. Through Twitter, I found other women who loved the same books, movies, and TV shows that I did and our friendship has lasted through marriages, pregnancies, and endures still today.

After joining a Twilight fansite as a contributor and learning as much as I could, I launched a site that centered around The Vampire Diaries. It was short-lived, but it was a stepping stone towards launching my second site for the Divergent series. From there, I found myself running headlong into a life that was glamorous, exciting, and wholly unexpected.

I visited film sets, attended Hollywood premieres with a press badge, and interviewed celebrities in the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills. I became obsessed with social media notoriety, with the names of those that followed me on social media, and finding a way to make this life my reality for as long as possible.

Throughout all of it, I pushed God out to the wings and kept my distance. I didn’t want to ask Him what my future really looked like because all I saw were the bright lights and glamour that I thought could keep me satisfied. I decided to pursue a master’s degree in mass communication and I thought I was set. Until it all came crashing down when I entered a season that led me to lose six family members in two years.

I’m not the same person that I was eight years ago.

And I have God to thank for that.

I do feel incredibly honored that God would allow me the chance to live out my dream like He did over the past eight years. He didn’t have to. I wasn’t even in the practice of communicating with Him at the time back then, but He still knew my heart. He knows all of my hopes and dreams. Though a career in journalism or social media marketing never quite panned out, that time still represents a period of my life that I will never forget. God granted me the opportunity to live the live I had always wanted – and then led me to the life that would sustain me far better than the other ever would have.

Uncomfortable

In life, I think it’s safe to say that we like to be in a relative state of comfort, am I right?

Uncomfortable

We don’t particularly enjoy being pushed too far outside of our comfort zones and we don’t care for awkwardness. I totally get it. As someone who is super socially awkward (#homebody), I totally understand the appeal of living within my comfort zone and staying in my own little bubble. But every so often, I find that I am reminded that this isn’t necessarily the way in which God calls us to live. He calls us to both love and live life boldly for Him and for His kingdom.

All too often, I find that I can be quite stubborn and set in my introverted ways. Maybe some of you might feel this way as well. My current reality is that I am working full-time as a public school teacher while also taking classes online part-time. Soon, I’m going to be adding volunteer work on top of both of those things. So basically I’m an introvert and a workaholic. For most of my formative years in the church when I was younger, church was basically something I did on Sundays and really sort of just went through the motions. For far too long, I viewed community as something that needed me to be open and vulnerable around others and that just didn’t seem like something that would work for me. But then, just over two years ago, I felt the Lord whispering to me that He wanted me to take not just a step outside of my comfort zone, but a giant leap outside of it.

He told me that He wanted me to leave the comfort zone of the church in which I had attended since I was three years old. I wasn’t in the habit or practice of regularly praying or speaking with God at this point, so truth be told, that whisper was probably a bit more like a yell. I had been deaf to the voice of God for a long time, but I heard Him then. And I listened. I obeyed.Continue Reading

Faith

For some time now (as in, the last two weeks), I have been reflecting, wondering, and praying over what my “word” for 2017 would be.

Now, I know choosing a word for the year is a very blog-y and social media thing, but I truly love the idea behind having a “theme” to help set your focus and intention for the year ahead. It can be hard to remember and to fully live according to that theme throughout the year, but it’s definitely something worth striving for.

Last year in 2016, my word was abide and I think it fit me well for where I was at this time last year. I was coming out of 2015, a year that completely changed my life from the losses of my maternal grandmother and aunt less than 48 hours apart to my decision to take my career in a new direction. I was in the midst of a season in which I felt the indescribable peace and joy of Jesus’ presence in my life so deeply and abiding in His undeniable presence and love in that season was such an incredibly beautiful place to be.

But as I’ve written in the past few weeks, I began to realize towards the end of 2016 that things start to look and feel different when you’ve “come out” of that immediate season of grief. While I certainly am not “over” the six losses that I experienced, the grief and the pain have gotten significantly easier. Now that life has returned to a sort of state of equilibrium, how then do I continue to root myself in God and abide in Him?Continue Reading

He Walks Before

Happy New Year, everyone!

There has been a plethora of 2016 recap posts and 2017 resolutions posts in the blogging world this past week, it’s come to be expected at this time of year.

2016 was an interesting year.

The year began with the losses dear family members, my paternal grandmother and our sweet Nellie in January. The New Year was a ending of sorts on a chapter of my life in which the Lord rescued me, guided me, and restored me. In the time between December 2013 to January 2016, the Lord called six of my family members home to Him. He called me to step out and make a way for myself in the church and led me to a new church home. He tested my faith through the students in my classroom, through the disease that my dad carries in his body, and through calling two of my closest relatives – my maternal grandmother and my Aunt Shelia – home to Him just 39 hours apart from each other.

Though this season came to a close in January 2016, I spent the remainder of the year wrestling in many ways with my next steps. My life had been changed, that much I knew. As I stood in the midst of a world that was falling apart around me, I knew I had experienced the amazing and unbelievable peace that could only come from the presence of Christ Jesus. The barriers that I had around my heart had come tumbling down and I was finally able to feel Him more fully and more profoundly than ever before in my life. I knew how to worship Him and sing His praises in that season because I had just seen firsthand what leaning into Him could look and feel like in the midst of turmoil. But once the dust had settled? Where I did I go from there?Continue Reading

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