A New Thing

“Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
    I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
² When you pass through the waters,
    I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
    they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
    you will not be burned;
    the flames will not set you ablaze.
³ For I am the Lord your God,
    the Holy One of Israel, your Savior;
I give Egypt for your ransom,
    Cush and Seba in your stead.
⁴ Since you are precious and honored in my sight,
    and because I love you,
I will give people in exchange for you,
    nations in exchange for your life.
⁵ Do not be afraid, for I am with you;

“Forget the former things;
    do not dwell on the past.
¹⁹ See, I am doing a new thing!
    Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
    and streams in the wasteland.

It's new years again! If you read last year's post, you know that I don't make new years resolutions so much anymore on account I need to work the kinks out of my life as I go rather than let them stack up for 12 months and resolve to work them out later. The thing about this New Years though,is that it comes at a perfect time to close this chapter of my life and look ahead to the next one. 

The Year 2012 for me was filled with some of the very most wonderfullest things ever, as well as some of the very darkest valleys, deepest rivers, and most painful trials. I'm more than ready to put it all behind me and look ahead to the new thing that God has planned for me. The passage above comes from Isaiah 43. I thought about posting the whole chapter, but I figured I'd probably lose the interest of my readers before I got to share my own thoughts so anyone who wants can look up the whole chapter and read it on their own. 

I love that it starts out with the promise that in all the hard times, no matter what, God is going to be with you and because of the great worth that we are to him. I love that He goes out of His way to state and restate that we are precious and honored and loved and that we belong to him. We are His! That's exactly what I've needed to hear as I've walked through the fires and come out covered in the ash of things I once held dear. 

And then after listing all the hard things that we go through and assuring us that He'll be there for us, He explains to us that we've walked through those things so that He can start fresh and do a new thing! 

The Lord is a master planner and builder, working out all the tedious details with great care and concern. He's perfect and He's a perfectionist. Whose to say that a master perfectionist won't take things apart and start brand new when one of His precious children tries to "help" and messes up the work He was planning. Not that he can't correct small mistakes and work them into his masterpiece as character..but isn't it a wonder to think that His plan for us is SO great and SO perfect that sometimes, instead of correcting to the point of something disfigured or way different than originally planned, He'll just scrape away the old stuff, lump the clay back into one solid thing and start over? I love the idea of that. It makes me feel loved. So loved that He won't settle for a  final work with imperfections, but will remake the parts that need more than a small adjustment. He renovates if need be. 

A new thing. That's what I am. I was made new when I welcomed Him into the darkest places of my heart a couple of years ago. I was made new as I walked through various trials in high school and called upon him for a rescue. I was made new my freshman year of college when I said "yes" too many times and my heart burnt out on ministry stuff and needed a complete restoration. I was made new after working at a summer camp that wiped me out but shaped me in more ways than I can count. I was made new when began to serve with The Bridge of Storm Lake and came to know more of the love the Father has for His children. 

And I am being made new today. Actually, I feel most like I've come to a place of rest in my journey. I know I am blessed and loved and that not everyone who goes through pain is so privileged to enter such a place of rest. But being home has been beyond wonderful. Seeing my extended family at Christmas time was such a blessing and provided much joy. I think what I love most is that there is no time limit on my time alone with God. I don't have any classes to rush off to or assignments to complete. At the same time, my heart is so dependent on God. If I go a day without time spent alone with Him, my heart is   an open target to the attacks of the evil one. 

Last night I spent some time with Jesus and it was perfect. I memorized Psalm 103. That was perfect too. In all the trials and painful things I've gone through, I've wanted more than anything to be like Job who, after having lost much, He fell on his face and worshiped the Lord saying "The Lord gives and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord."  One of the greatest desires of my heart has been to be able to say that. It's a scary desire to have. In order to see that happen, He has to take things away. I've been trying to practice saying those words the last couple months. I want to be able to face the pain and the trials and say, "Praise God" in spite of all of it. Some days I can. Somedays I struggle. It's actually not easy. It's no wonder Job fell on His face when He did it. I wouldn't have the strength to stand up and say those words.  In Psalm 103, the psalmist starts out by praising God..commanding the deepest places of his heart to praise God. Then he goes on to name the hard things in life that he goes through, But God is in control of those things. He writes of the promises the Lord has made for the hard times we go through. He speaks of the Love the Father has and how the Father knows how we are formed. As he closes the psalm, he commands the angels and servants of God to praise him. Those who know of his goodness and actually see how God works out good things. And then, in one final, triumphant command of his own heart, the psalmist praises the Lord with his own soul again. You should read it.. it's so great. 

I think it's easy for someone who has lost much to feel hopeless. To look backwards and feel the pain of what is no longer there. That has been my biggest pain. But the biggest joy is looking ahead. There is nothing. You could, perhaps, feel the pain of that. Nothing. But really, it's perfect. White pages ready for God to write the best novel in all of history. A solid foundation to serve as the perfect starting point for grand architecture. A blank canvas for a priceless masterpiece. A new thing. Not blemished, not broken, not chipped or cracked. Not weak or dull or ripped and ruined. Perfect. In every beautiful way, the Lord is making a new thing and we have only to trust in his perfect plans. 

"Ashes Ashes we fall down, it always feels too soon. 

But when we walk on golden ground, all will be made new." 

~JJ Heller

Christmas Time

Christmas time is here! By that I mean, the time of year when I have no concept of time. I generally find myself waking and starting my day somewhere between 9 and 10 am. I think lunch happens anywhere between 2 and 4 and who knows about supper. Bedtime is also very obsolete. Last night, 9 of us siblings were all gathered in the Yellow Room playing "Bang" and reading books at midnight and considering another round or two. The 9 siblings included everyone apart from Ken, who had a physics final today and thus chose to be responsible and go to sleep at who-knows-what-time-because-he-disappeared-a-few-hours-before-we-noticed. :) I love Christmas time! 

Another wonderful thing is that all 10 of us are home. Well... all 10 of us were home. Ken's off taking his finals and Kurt went somewhere too. Yesterday was our Kohl family Christmas! It started with us all waking up at various times... a couple of the siblings were watching Tin Tin when I came down stairs and I joined them. At some point in the middle of it Rose made pannekuken and one by one more siblings emerged. I think at some point later Rose made stuffing for our turkey dinner later and the left over stuffing became our lunch. I think it was early afternoon when we commenced gift unwrappings and it must have been close to 4 when we were finished and there were various siblings taking naps, playing Age of Empires, and I think Kyle was off dreaming up ways to create mini weapons of mass destruction. Right now he's gluing pages together from a vintage English textbook from the 50s so he can hallow it out and hide his "Materials for building weapons."





In 20 minutes (which really means nothing to us) we'll play Clueless or Bang for who knows how long.. hours most likely.  Clueless! That's another thing that happened. We spent hours, perhaps even a whole day, making our own Clue Board of our house. 

The whole premise is that a houseguest left upset and one must now find out who did, where, and with what. The suspects being the 12 members of the Kohl household and the the rooms being 12 of the most frequented rooms in the house. The "items" (weapons?) include such things as a squirt gun, box of matches, broom, 2 X 4, frying pan, wooden spoon, ipad... etc. (There's about a dozen). 

It's incredibly fun! The last game we played I was pretty sure it was Mom in the Basement with the Hammer, but it turned out to be Kyle in Kit's room with the squirt gun. Heh :)

Another thing about Christmas Time is that since there is no concept of time and there's always something to do and someone to do something with, it is easy to neglect one's time alone with God. We all love Jesus and we have talks and encourage each other this way and that. It's easy to not miss Jesus, but at the same time, something is missing. I don't always actively notice a spiritual dryness or ache of need for God when I'm home. Well, usually I don't. But this time around, after crash landing at the end of my semester, it's way more obvious to me when I don't spend straight up alone time with Jesus. But home is perfect for that, also. While the house is busy and fun and exciting, there are pockets of rest and peace and calm and quiet. 

Planted

As Christmas quickly approaches, I'm reminded of Christmases past and all the joy and peace that came with them. I like joy and peace. I wish I felt it more often. 

They say it gets easier with time. What they don't tell you is that everyday you will find something new that reminds you of what you lost. If anything, I'd almost wager at this point that it gets harder with time. But, perhaps easier, to trust God. What else do you do? Cry and admit defeat? No, in all things we are more than conquerors through Him that loves us. 

Currently, I'm sitting in a coffee shop after having read a whole list of God's promises for the umpteenth time. They are soothing. I like thinking of God wanting good things for my life, especially when I can't see them at all. Last night, as I was falling asleep I asked God to show me himself..to give me a glimpse of what He was doing. I saw briefly a river and a tree. Then a gardener growing a tree. As it grew, he caused the branches to go this way and that. The tree liked to grow its own way and the branches became tangled amongst themselves but He made it beautiful anyways. 

"He leads me beside still waters." That's what I heard as I saw the river. I didn't understand any of it as I fell asleep. I tried to imagine myself resting under the tree or perhaps cooling off in the stream.  But then I could only think about how I walk through the valley of the shadow of death. How could a glimpse of a river give me any sort of hope for my broken heart? 

This morning as I clicked open various emails to get them out of my "unread" folder I came across my "Encouragement for Today" email from Biblegateway. I have found much hope in many of the articles I've read and I was more than encouraged when I read the title of today's post.. "Planted by Streams."

The verse at the top of the page was Psalm 1:3 "He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers." That is when things started to make sense. Yes, He leads me beside still waters... but He plants me by streams of waters as well. The fruit yields in season. Right now I can say without a doubt that my season is wintertime. Many things have been pruned away from my life.. good things..cut off. Things look dead to me, life seems dead. But amongst all the nothing there is to see in my life, there is a blanket of white. Christ, in the purest form, has blanketed the dead things around me to make them beautiful. And when my Spring comes, the snow will melt away to water my soil and the dead things will bud to life again ( I hope) and joy will surround me. Not that I don't have joy.. I do! A deep, unmoving joy that cannot be shaken. But it is not an overwhelming joy. But I will wait for it. I wait for the snowmelt to flood my rivers of joy and bring life back into my resting trunk and broken branches.  
During finals, my roommate who is a elementary education major, was working on a lesson plan about trees. She asked me, "Do you know the 4 things a tree needs to grow?" I began to think, "Uhm..Roots, sunlight, water.. uhhm.. I don't know.. dirt?" She replied quite enthusiastically, "Oxygen!" 
"Oh right! Okay so if we think of ourselves as trees, the roots are our faith, the sunlight is Jesus, the water is the Word, and the oxygen is our Christian community.. right?" "Sure! That sounds good! I never thought of it like that." "Ha well.. now you'll never forget what a tree needs.." 
True as can be.. I have all those things, Faith, Jesus, the Word, and Christian community. Take any one of those things away and you have a dead tree...or dying tree. God puts us where we need to be for maximal growth. He doesn't plant us somewhere and leave us to die. I know for SURE if I had not had such a great community of believers around me in the last couple months, I would have given up all hope and fallen into a deeper valley than the one in which I already walk. Praise the Lord for the blessings He gives us. Praise the Lord for the seasons we go through. Winter, to me, is the worst one. I hate being pruned, I hate having things cut off from my life, I hate cold and deadness. But the end result is always overwhelmingly fruitful. 

Finals day #5

Rest. Today is the day. This morning I woke up at 5:40 and got myself together enough to wash my hair and meet my friend at Starbucks by 6:30. Armed with a peppermint mocha and a cinnamon roll, we headed to the mall and practiced our signing and took our final final and all was done by 9:30 am. 
Done. Free! Praise the Lord!!

Finals Day #4

Today's menu: Research Methods and Vitamin E

I know it's a little cliche to say something like, "Three down, two to go" since *everyone* else is saying similar things like that... so I won't. But! In just 25 hours from now, I'll be home free! Well.. I won't be home.. but I'll be free! Research Methods has been the trial of all trials this semester..well not really, I've been through worse than just that class, but it didn't help in making my future seem any brighter. Oh well though! I endured, and I considered it pure...uhm...pure.. awful.. BUT! I can consider it joy that it's going to be over! Woohoo! 

Finals Day #3

Woohoo! I've now made it through two rounds of finals and look forward to my 3rd foe this afternoon. I'm not worried. Research Methods tomorrow night might be the death of me.. but we won't worry about tomorrow since tomorrow has enough worries by itself. 

So, yesterday, my final was in the morning and so I spent my morning studying before heading to the exam. Upon returning home I ate lunch and hit the books for todays final. I kept telling myself I needed to spend some time with Jesus but...didn't happen. Lesson learned... you can't walk on water when you don't see Jesus. So today, Jesus and Dev Psych are my priorities. 6 hours to next test... 

Finals Day #2

Another exciting day of examinations and studying!! Day number two! Praise the Lord that Day number one is now in the past. Good bye, Biological Psychology...you will not be missed. 

It's Tuesday!!! I'm now one day closer to break! One day closer to a weekend full of adventures! One day closer to rest. One day closer to the sweet smiles from my precious siblings. 

Today I conquer Social Psych... in a little less than two hours from now, actually. I'm ready to be done! Woot! I should probs cram in a little more studying though.  Woohoo! What an exciting time! Time to cauterize all those wounds caused by these esteem-shattering classes. Yay! 

Finals Day #1

Thank goodness! I've been waiting allll semester for this.. the end. This has been by far thee most brutal semester of my life, school wise, coupled with emotional pain and spiritual darkness dumped on top. 
I look forward to rest. I look forward to going back to my parents house where I will receive hugs every day and I will wake up to the smell of the wood stove warming the house. We'll put aside the stresses of the future and the pains of the past and we'll tell our funny stories and spend hours playing round after round of Nerts and drink pot after pot of coffee. We'll make cookies and read books and spend hours cleaning mom's kitchen, only to mess it up again within 3 hours and have to clean it up all over again. We'll spend Sunday afternoons falling asleep to Planet Earth movies whilst we all pile all over the couch and fight over the 3 blankets that we keep in the living room for such times as naps. 

We'll stay up til 2am watching Sherlock or Dr. Who and no matter what time we lay our heads on the pillow, we'll actually sleep because we don't have ten million thoughts about our uncertain futures spinning through our minds keeping us awake. We'll make eachother coffee and bring it to them in bed and encourage them to wake up since we can't wait to spend another day together. We'll eat scones and drink tea and read Calvin and Hobbes comic books...even though we've read them all at least 5 times. We'll play Age of Empires (3 at a time) and make eggnog from scratch. It will be SO wonderful. 

Until then... I have a marathon of finals. Monday..tuesday..wednesday..thursday..friday. But everyday is one step closer. Praise the Lord!

Walking on Water

"And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." ~Philippians 4:7

My sweet community of friends and family keep asking me how I've been doing lately, given the difficult life circumstances I've found myself in. I keep telling them I'm fine. I've been joyful, actually. Beyond all explainable reason, I've been joyful and fine. That is, I'm fine when I look at God and see the hope that I have. I'm fine when I think about how loved I am and how every part of my life is already planned out and I need only to place my trust in the Heavenly Father. It's a miracle, really. I keep telling my friends how amazed I am that I don't feel destroyed or even broken. I feel loved is what I feel. 

Honestly, I feel like I'm a little bit on a mountain top with God. You know..when you're, like, happy and can't really explain it other than that you really love God and you feel like God really loves you and being sad doesn't even seem possible? I kinda feel that... when I'm keeping my eyes on Jesus that is. 

That's not to say that my heart doesn't hurt sometimes or even not at all. It does. In fact, when I first started drafting this and pulling thoughts and verses together (I actually put time into this blog) I was happy. I was fine. I felt no pain. Now, hours later when I actually sit down to write it, my heart is throbbing. While I've honestly been able to tell the friends and family who have been pouring out love onto me that I've been fine, I think I worry about the days to come when I won't be, but they won't think to care any more. And that is where the doubts creep in. 

When Jesus asked Peter to join him on the water, Peter was fine. It was the most insane and terrifying thing to do in a storm.. step out of the boat. I mean, seriously.. there was a storm going on. Even though Ben Franklin had yet to fly his kite with a key on the string, I'm sure people weren't completely stupid about lightning and water. Plus, I mean.. it's the sea. It's deep and there are things that eat people in it. And storms have big waves, right? Who's to say that even if you are standing on TOP of the water that a big wave isn't gonna come over top of you anyways? It's not like Jesus was standing on smooth as glass water tension... it was rough out there. And Peter trusted and took the steps out onto the water. 

But then, he looked around. He saw the waves, he saw the rain, the lightning, and he saw the darkness. He stopped looking at Jesus and began to fear. And then, he began to sink. Once I saw a cartoon where he was slowly sinking into the water like it was slow moving quick sand during which he had the time to say, "LORD! I'm siiiiiiinkiiiiing" and then casually Jesus was like, "Oh Peter, ye of little faith.." as he pulled him up. 
Somehow.. I don't buy it. I imagine that the surface tension broke and he went down. And the Bible says, "immediately Jesus stuck out his hand to rescue him." It was probably his reflex reaction that grabbed at Peter. You know, like when you start to drop something and somehow you develop Spider Man skills and catch the thing before it gets too far. Like when you don't even have to think about it.. you just snatch at whatever just fell off the counter or out of your hand or off of your desk. So, that's what Jesus did with Peter.. at least that's my speculation. And that's what Jesus does with me. When I look at Jesus, I'm fine. I can trust. I can live. I can breathe. I can have joy and feel loved and legitimately be happy and free. But when I look at my circumstance and situation and the storm around me, it hurts. I'm sad. I'm afraid. I sink.  Then.. Boom. Jesus pulls me up again. 

I feel so loved by God by how my heart has not been shredded to pieces. One of my friends said when she was praying over me that she was thankful that my heart was so full of Christ that it could not be broken. Sometimes you don't realize things until people say them to you.. or to God and you hear them. It's an amazing thing that it can be that way.. that God's love can guard your heart so well that even the most breaking of things can't break your heart. 
I am loved. People keep telling me I am and I know that full well. There is a man who fights for my heart everyday. He goes to war for me and he fights to the death. His death. For every lie that seeks to put an arrow in my heart, he fends it off with His mighty hands. For every knife that seeks to cut my heart to pieces, He stands in the way. I am guarded on every side. 

I am hard pressed on every side but not crushed. I am so well guarded that the harder I am pressed, the closer I come to Jesus. I am loved. The more things I go through, the more things I come to know about Him. He loves me enough to walk through the dark valley with me and not just wait for me on the other side. He loves me enough to carry me through the rivers so the waters do not sweep over my head. He is the fireman that comes out covered in ash and burns on his arms because he took off his fireproof coat and wrapped me in it before carrying me out of the burning house. He is my hero. And He is Jesus. My Jesus. I am His and He is mine. He sees me as precious and I know He treasures my heart. 

There is no reasonable explanation for my joy right now. But God is not reasonable. He does what doesn't make sense.. He loves the unloving and serves the ungrateful and rescues the unwanted. He is crazy. He doesn't wait for you.. He waits with you. He whispers his words of love in the ears of those who listen to those who speak unloving things. He sings over the broken ones who claim He's not there. He has set out to heal you before you know you're broken. He plans with great detail the ways he can show His love to us. He knows the plans He has. Plans to prosper His loved ones.. not to harm them. Plans to give them a hope and a future. He has those plans and He carries them out. 

He loves adventure. We hear about the adventures He goes on with His children and we say, "Sir, you offend reason." And then we see Him. He walks on water and in the crazy delightful idea of an adventure we say, "But I should like to offend it with you." And thus He invites us to step out onto the water. While in the midst of a storm, getting sea sick riding in a water logged boat, He invites us to take a break. Get out of the boat and trust God. 
If you're really brave, you can walk on water, even in a storm.