Twenty Sixteen

 

To me, 2016 looked like turning nineteen, finding community in a new place, and learning what it means to trust.

It looked like school kicking my butt and people failing me. This year looked a lot like broken promises and being fearful. 2016 was the year of loneliness and doubting God’s plan for my life. This year was the year of breaking new year resolutions and trying to be perfect when I am helplessly broken.

But 2016 was also the year of first dates and falling in love with my best friend. It was the year of restored relationships. 2016 looked a lot like stepping out of my comfort zone and leading a small group of 17 freshman. It looked like learning to cheer for people and love them hard. 2016 looked like reading words that dig deep into my soul and people telling me what I need to hear. This year looked like proving my professor wrong and reading books that I actually enjoy. This year looked like accountability and rediscovering how to delight in the Lord. 2016 looked like becoming a coffee addict. It looked like being okay with being a mess and acknowledging that I don’t have it all together. This year was the year of new and redefining what home means.

Many firsts and many lasts. 2016 wasn’t awful. In reality, it was actually very kind to me.

This year was full of answered prayers and God giving me immeasurably more than I deserve.

In January 2016, I was desperately seeking to fill the thin, spread out places of my life. The places where I was falling short. I tried wholeheartedly to become less busy and all over the place on my own. I failed.

In January 2017, I will be asking God to fill in the gaps. I will ask him to fill the spaces that I cannot. Because without him, I am nothing. But with him, anything is possible.

I can’t wait to see what story He lets me tell in the new year.

So, what now?

It’s over. The election is done.

*takes a deep breath*

I have never been crazy about politics. It has always interesting to me, but never something that I followed closely. Until this year…

This election season I celebrated being old enough to vote!

What a blessing and privilege. I am thankful that on tuesday I got to exercise my freedom to vote and watch, what I thought to be, one of the most important elections in my time. I understand we all had (and probably still have) different opinions about how yesterday played out. Hillary supporters. Trump supporters. Independent supporters. There are people celebrating today. There are people lamenting today.

But guys, let’s not spread hate and disrespect.

Social media is filled to the brim with hate, confusion, distress, joy, excitement, fear, and bitterness today. Yes, I know the result of this election is not to be taken lightly. This President will change everything (and I think that might be a good thing).

But no matter your opinion of our new president, we are called to love.

We are not called to have a spirit of fear and we are certainly not called to throw animosity around like confetti. We are called to respect and love everyone — that doesn’t mean we have to agree with their political views. You can respect someone without approving their decisions.

So today, instead of arguing through Facebook comments and unfollowing the people that refuse to agree with you on social media, try showing some grace. Grace for the Hilary Clinton supporter. Grace for the Donald Trump supporter. And grace for everyone in between.

God gives us grace, and then He gives us more grace.

Imagine a country where grace triumphs over resentment. Imagine a place where people looked more like Jesus. Love over hate, guys. Love over hate.

I am praying for our country and praying for our new President. And I truly believe the best is yet to come.

 

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unfit: the struggle of feeling incapable and less than.

This year I will be leading a freshman small group through the campus ministry I am involved in. I am excited and expectant. But, if we are being honest, a few short weeks ago, I was far from enthusiastic about this seemingly hopeless challenge.

you see, I am a perfectionist. I’ll admit it, all day long. I devote my time and energy to fixing, to refining, to adjusting. because I can’t sleep at night if something isn’t done well. So when I was told that I would be serving as a small group leader this year, I panicked. How could I, the girl who struggles with fear of imperfection, serve and lead a group of freshman who are just trying to figure it all out? I am far from an expert when it comes to life. I can barely keep my own life in check.

only thing to eat is poptarts? it’s fine. 

did I wear those jeans the past two days? probably, but that’s alright. 

arrive to class to discover I forgot to complete the homework. take a couple deep breaths and it’ll be okay. 

my point is, I am still trying to figure this whole college thing out. so, how can I lead a group of freshman through this exciting, but sometimes terrifying season of life? how I am supposed to give them advice about things I haven’t experienced?

but I have several sweet friends who lovingly pointed out to me that I was looking at it all wrong. leading a small group isn’t about capability. it isn’t even about feeling “ready”. it is about being willing.

it isn’t my job to have all the answers. it isn’t my responsibility to have it all together.

my job is to pray for these students. to love them well. to send them encouraging texts on test day. my one job is to point this group of students back to Jesus. that’s it.

…

these days, I am trying to be real. transparent with my friends and with my family. real with myself. and I am attempting to be genuine with God. so I am going to be real with you for a second.

I struggle with feeling less than — unworthy, if you will.

when I got the email telling me that I would be a small group leader, I freaked out a). because I know it’s not something that can be done perfectly and b). because I have a fear of not being able to relate to people — on a everyday level, but also on a spiritual level.

…

my testimony is simple.

I grew up in the church. I was raised by two loving parents, in a home dripping with grace and truth. I experienced first hand what it looks like to be loved by my father in heaven. I asked Jesus to be keeper of my heart at a young age and have been protected from many things this life likes to throw at us. I am so grateful for that.

really.

but, I have always wondered why I didn’t get to experience this crazy moment where God totally turned my world upside down. why can’t I pinpoint a moment in my walk with the Lord where I felt completely changed?

many of my friends have powerful testimonies that leave the entire room in tears. mine is a little different. It’s ordinary — mundane.

but this week, I have discovered that God uses the ordinary too. one of my peers encouraged me this week with this truth-filled passage (stick with me, it’s long):

“My 12 year old daughter dissolved into floods of tears at the kitchen bench not so long ago after being at an incredible conference. She’d heard some of the greatest testimonies of God’s intervention into the lives of her “Heroes” in the faith. Incredible preachers who took to the platform to tell of how God had found them in their bondage and pain, in the drug addiction, their hopelessness, the alcohol stupors, sexual abuse, their reckless lifestyles as hit men and in gangs, as nightclub owners and backsliders and how he’d “taken their mess and made it into a message”.

I wasn’t sure what prompted the tears until she innocently asked if it would be possible for God to use her too. Her gentle heart towards his, her sweet compliant spirit, her pure hearted pursuit. Or whether it was necessary for her to go astray so she’d have something to testify too.

I know it may seem like a funny question, but surrounded by people who tell extreme salvation stories of all that God has saved them from maybe it was a reasonable question

Which made me think.

we are all saved

Saved for relationship with God. The end result is the same. And maybe so too is the beginning

I gave my heart to Jesus when I was 4 – I never got drunk, never had sex before I was married, never smoked or did drugs, never was the victim of domestic violence or sexual abuse… I am just like my daughter. I had an innate sense of God with me from a young age and that awareness constantly governed my choices and decisions as a teenager. I used to wish for the dramatic testimony and would ponder in my heart the verse that says “he who’s been forgiven much loves much”. I wanted to love God the most.

As I’ve grown up. I have realized with hindsight that although I didn’t get saved out of those issues I was most definitely saved from them… Gods faithfulness through the generations spared me from the heartache and pain of living separated from God, from abusing my body and from meaninglessness. Saved from things that I watched my friends endure. We don’t get to choose the families we are born into and therefore often don’t choose how the grace of God gets applied to our lives and the situations we find ourselves in but I most definitely needed the same grace that my friends did. I just saw it at work to spare and save me from the harshness of life. It was more like boundary fences that stopped me plummeting over a cliff rather than the net at the bottom to break my fall. Psalm 145:4 says “one generation declares your work to the next” and providing we tell the story well, it should be possible to spare each other from making the same mistakes over and over. The generations can get stronger and more beautiful as they live out purity and surrender from young ages.

I think of Mary. As a young girl God saw her heart towards his and marked her to carry his son. She found favour with God because of her purity. Paul exhorted Timothy — don’t let people look down on you because if your youth but let your life be an example in faith, love and purity (1 Tim 4:12) God chose Samuel as a young boy in the service of God and marked him as a prophet to a nation.

So to a little girl at a kitchen sink my response is “no”. You don’t have to sin to allow grace to abound — it already does and your story of encountering God is just as rich and necessary as anyone else’s. God found you, saved you and needs your sweet story to accompany all the other ones. He’s a master creative. No two stories of salvation are alike. Each are unique in their own right and point to his infinite ability to restore everything to himself.”

Cassandra Langton

my story isn’t radical — it isn’t the kind that keeps you at the edge of your seat. but the ending is the same as my friend who was sexual assaulted in high school. the ending is no different than my peer who struggled with alcohol.

we were all saved by the same Savior. we are all in need of grace (a whole bunch of it!!).

that is how I can relate to my group of freshman. the common ground will be, and is, always Jesus. today, I’m not looking at leading a small group as a hopeless challenge. I am viewing it as an opportunity.

…

if you could, will you pray for me as I begin this new season of life?

 

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back at it again.

hello, it’s me. *breaks out into song*

for those of you who don’t know, my old blog got deleted (boo!) along with all my blog posts (boo x 10!). so I guess you could call this my rebound blog – a clean slate, a new beginning. from this unfortunate scenario, I feel like God was forcing me to loosen my grip on my old blog. it was everything to me.

has anything ever consumed your every thought? have you woken up with this thing on your mind? have you consistently thought of ways to improve that object, relationship, or whatever else it may be? we all have that one thing…

and as cheesy as it sounds, my blog was that thing for me.

I was devoted to my blog.

sure, I was writing about Jesus, but I think I was talking about him more than I was actually spending intimate time with him. it is funny how a blog about God could actually pull me away from God.

so, I am back at it again (with the white vans… ha! I had to). and I am going to do things a little differently this time.

and while we are on the subject of “different”, this crisis (okay, that is a bit dramatic) has given me the opportunity to completely revamp the blog… starting with it’s name!

this phrase, with reckless abandon, has made such an impact on me this year. so naturally, it will be the concept of this new space. I can’t wait to tell you all the ways it has changed me and my view on christianity.

that is all for now. stay tuned!