One school year. Two semesters. Nine months. Four journals. Four seasons. Thirty CRUs. A bottle of shampoo. Candles burned. A few boxes of tissue. The same box of dryer sheets I've had since freshman year. Endless boxes of cereal. Skype chats. Books read. Pieces learned. Games of scrabble won (and lost.) Papers written. Cups of coffee. and vanilla chamomile tea. Pictures taken. Dreams ignited. Whispered prayers. Dark nights. Moments of desperation. Moments of absolute, unbridled ecstasy. I'm not sure how to summarize this year...but here's a some random snippets from throughout the year. Mostly the fall. Get over it.
"Lord, let me make a difference for you utterly disproportionate to who I am." -David Brainerd
"You gotta get hungrier and want it even more." -John McEnroe
"Drinking Jesus is like drinking through a swizzle straw..." -Steve Rieske
"Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it onto completion until the day of Christ Jesus." -Phillipians 1:6
10.03.09 Everything over my head is under Jesus' feet.
"Believing is seeing." -Jeff Wilbarger
"Being listened to is so close to being loved, most people can't tell the difference." -David Oxberg
"If grace is an ocean, we're all sinking." -John Mark McMillan
"We can do no great things, only small things with great love." -Mother Teresa
"Intense love does not measure, it just gives." -Mother Teresa
"When darkness veils his lovely face, I rest in his unchanging grace."
"Thou on my head in early youth didst smile, and though rebellious and perverse meanwhile, Thou hast not left me, though I oft left thee, on to the close Lord, abide with me."
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Monday, April 26, 2010
Friday, April 23, 2010
He.
Getting ready to spend a weekend of laughter and love and being together with some of the coolest people I know...
It's starting to hit that this is it...two more weeks and I'm done being a junior in college forever.
I've already accepted that I'll be a puddle on the floor more than once before then.
It's hard to say how I'll remember this year. Sure there were a few defining moments. But mostly, it was a lot of not-so-defining moments. And yet, those were the defining moments. The ones where I had to choose if I was going to live life for myself or for my King. It was a lot of learning to love and embrace the journey that is life. More than that, learning to love and trust my Father, whatever that journey brought.
And ya know what? He kept loving. He never ever let go. He chased me down. He put His arm around my shoulder. He let me cry. He brought me laughter. He sustained me. He whispered truth into my ear.
Friends, He's good. Life is not going to get easier, but I am convinced knowing Him is only going to become sweeter.
It's starting to hit that this is it...two more weeks and I'm done being a junior in college forever.
I've already accepted that I'll be a puddle on the floor more than once before then.
It's hard to say how I'll remember this year. Sure there were a few defining moments. But mostly, it was a lot of not-so-defining moments. And yet, those were the defining moments. The ones where I had to choose if I was going to live life for myself or for my King. It was a lot of learning to love and embrace the journey that is life. More than that, learning to love and trust my Father, whatever that journey brought.
And ya know what? He kept loving. He never ever let go. He chased me down. He put His arm around my shoulder. He let me cry. He brought me laughter. He sustained me. He whispered truth into my ear.
Friends, He's good. Life is not going to get easier, but I am convinced knowing Him is only going to become sweeter.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Restless
Some days are just blah. I feel so little motivation to do anything. To be anything. I'm probably a total drag to be around on these days. Everything seems futile. Just empty.
This deep longing within points to the fact that life isn't what it was meant to be. My heart knows where it wants to be but wastes life on worthless things. It's this tension between life as it is and life as it should be.
Tomorrow's Easter. How I so desperately want to be alive. How desperately Jesus wants to give life. What else, besides love, would bring him to spill his blood for me. And Who else could rise again, winning over sin and death forever, but Jesus. So with him I will walk out of the tomb into new life. The tomb that could not keep him in. It's empty.
This deep longing within points to the fact that life isn't what it was meant to be. My heart knows where it wants to be but wastes life on worthless things. It's this tension between life as it is and life as it should be.
Tomorrow's Easter. How I so desperately want to be alive. How desperately Jesus wants to give life. What else, besides love, would bring him to spill his blood for me. And Who else could rise again, winning over sin and death forever, but Jesus. So with him I will walk out of the tomb into new life. The tomb that could not keep him in. It's empty.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Stuff I like...
-sunshine
-sweating
-flip-flops
-Nick Drake
-Esperanza Spaulding
-Tim Myers
-good conversation with friends
-showing up to church on 3 hours of sleep because of said conversation
-rollerblading
-flowers
-bird songs
-Passover
-Kim Nazarian and the NY Voices
-awkward moments with Sarah Acker
-little kiddos
-how inadequate I feel trying to understand the cross
-the bloody reality of the cross
-that Jesus gave all of Himself for all of me
-the life that poured out of Him in death
-the freedom in knowing I owe nothing to myself because Jesus paid it all
-that the disciples were not a lot different than I can be
-that Jesus holds his life so loosely because he knows Who truly holds it
-that Jesus has felt the weight of all I have ever experienced
-that the cross exposes how pitifully broken I am and yet how beloved
-the love of God of which I have just scratched the surface
-sweating
-flip-flops
-Nick Drake
-Esperanza Spaulding
-Tim Myers
-good conversation with friends
-showing up to church on 3 hours of sleep because of said conversation
-rollerblading
-flowers
-bird songs
-Passover
-Kim Nazarian and the NY Voices
-awkward moments with Sarah Acker
-little kiddos
-how inadequate I feel trying to understand the cross
-the bloody reality of the cross
-that Jesus gave all of Himself for all of me
-the life that poured out of Him in death
-the freedom in knowing I owe nothing to myself because Jesus paid it all
-that the disciples were not a lot different than I can be
-that Jesus holds his life so loosely because he knows Who truly holds it
-that Jesus has felt the weight of all I have ever experienced
-that the cross exposes how pitifully broken I am and yet how beloved
-the love of God of which I have just scratched the surface
Friday, March 26, 2010
A Love Story
Child of weakness, watch and pray, find in Me thine all in all.
If you've heard my story before, you might recall a certain encounter with God at Indy CC a little over a year ago that radically redefined my life. In that moment, while singing Jesus Paid it All, I found myself truly drowning in grace for the first time. I found real life. Since then, I've been journeying through different seasons and finding that God is faithful through it all. The last few months have been a true test of walking by faith, not emotion, not intellect...just plain faith. It's hard to seek His face, and not His hand. Sometimes I've felt like a screaming baby, so wanting God to just shove a pacifier in my mouth and give me something tangible to grab onto. The problem is, He's never been holding out on me.
The problem is me. I'm so often spiritually unaware. I'd rather focus on myself and fail to see God's hand in everything. But He is a gracious Father and one thing He will never hold from us is His love. His answers to prayer may not be the ones I want, but they are what I need. So when I asked to clearly know His love, He showed me in the sweetest ways. The unconditional love of a dear friend who after I had confessed my struggles to her, only held me closer because of it; puffy, white clouds against a brilliant blue sky; Him waking me up at 6:30 am before an exam so I could be with Him, truths from a wise friend via Skype, the pure, childlike love of a certain five year old boy, and Oasis.
I went to Oasis not really expecting any emotional high. But I did want God. For most of the night, I was at peace just sitting in the back, listening, soaking up the beautiful sound of God's people making much of Him, with little Danny sleeping on my lap, but at the end of the night, God decided to yank me out of it. He took me back to the place He had grabbed me fifteen months before, weeping in the truths of Jesus Paid it All. "Child of weakness, watch and pray..." I tried to sing the first verse, but I knew it wasn't going to happen. I tried to stifle the sobs, but they were the kind that come from your deep within that aren't worth even trying to stop. But there was so much joy in the letting go. So much freedom. So much assurance that the good work God began is still going on. So much relief that God is still near.
God is good. He is faithful when I am faithless. He is timeless. He has a plan. He is love. That is what I will take into whatever comes at me next.
O praise the One who paid my debt, and raised this life up from the dead.
If you've heard my story before, you might recall a certain encounter with God at Indy CC a little over a year ago that radically redefined my life. In that moment, while singing Jesus Paid it All, I found myself truly drowning in grace for the first time. I found real life. Since then, I've been journeying through different seasons and finding that God is faithful through it all. The last few months have been a true test of walking by faith, not emotion, not intellect...just plain faith. It's hard to seek His face, and not His hand. Sometimes I've felt like a screaming baby, so wanting God to just shove a pacifier in my mouth and give me something tangible to grab onto. The problem is, He's never been holding out on me.
The problem is me. I'm so often spiritually unaware. I'd rather focus on myself and fail to see God's hand in everything. But He is a gracious Father and one thing He will never hold from us is His love. His answers to prayer may not be the ones I want, but they are what I need. So when I asked to clearly know His love, He showed me in the sweetest ways. The unconditional love of a dear friend who after I had confessed my struggles to her, only held me closer because of it; puffy, white clouds against a brilliant blue sky; Him waking me up at 6:30 am before an exam so I could be with Him, truths from a wise friend via Skype, the pure, childlike love of a certain five year old boy, and Oasis.
I went to Oasis not really expecting any emotional high. But I did want God. For most of the night, I was at peace just sitting in the back, listening, soaking up the beautiful sound of God's people making much of Him, with little Danny sleeping on my lap, but at the end of the night, God decided to yank me out of it. He took me back to the place He had grabbed me fifteen months before, weeping in the truths of Jesus Paid it All. "Child of weakness, watch and pray..." I tried to sing the first verse, but I knew it wasn't going to happen. I tried to stifle the sobs, but they were the kind that come from your deep within that aren't worth even trying to stop. But there was so much joy in the letting go. So much freedom. So much assurance that the good work God began is still going on. So much relief that God is still near.
God is good. He is faithful when I am faithless. He is timeless. He has a plan. He is love. That is what I will take into whatever comes at me next.
O praise the One who paid my debt, and raised this life up from the dead.
Monday, March 22, 2010
World Water Day
On a day we are complaining about the rain, take a few minutes and think about the people around the world who do not have access to clean water, the children that die of diarrhea and other preventable causes. How crazy it is that all we have to do is turn on a faucet? Not walk five miles and carry the bucket on our heads...
Water is a necessity for life. Today is a great day to give it to someone who needs it. Check out blood:water mission, an organization started by Jars of Clay that's doing some sweet things.
Water is a necessity for life. Today is a great day to give it to someone who needs it. Check out blood:water mission, an organization started by Jars of Clay that's doing some sweet things.
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