Stop Your "Why"ning

It's funny how defeated you can find yourself in spite of knowing how the Lord loves you and that you are valued. This has been quite a week of digging out spiritual splinters and I think I'm cresting on a great realization that could very well cause a mild explosion in the walls of my heart. 

This morning I woke up with an anxious sort of heaviness weighing on my heart that I could not understand but figured it was probably a sign I needed to spend some time with Lord to sort things out. 

I found myself wrestling with the "why" question that I think I've heard everyone ask a billion times every time something bad happens. I guess, for me, when I ask why, I usually imply that it was a bad thing that didn't need to happen and God better have a darn good explanation for whatever the heck that was that I just went through. 

I guess I usually ask why when I have no idea what is going on or have been caught off guard. I think I feel like I'm in the right and someone else is in the wrong when I find myself broaching such a question to some other party who had caused the offense. 

As I was asking God my "why" questions I found myself wondering if it was okay to be upset with or mad at God. I wondered if there is ever a point where He is wrong. In my head I could tell myself that "no, God is never wrong" but that didn't offer much consolation because that puts me in the place of helplessness and makes me feel guilty for feeling pain at the things God has brought me through. 

And then I wondered if there is ever a point I need to forgive God because usually pain at things past are a result of unresolved bitternesses that I've allowed to reside in my heart and usually dissipate after some time spent with the Lord, asking for His strength to forgive whatever pain has my heart set in turmoil. 
But it's confusing when it's God that you feel like you have a problem with, yknow? It's tricky when you feel like it was God who betrayed you. When you put your faith in Him to protect you and take care of you and guard your heart and you got hurt anyways. 

You did everything "right". You surrendered. You trusted. You stepped out in faith. And this... this pain. You put yourself out there and got shot. And it's like, "what the heck was that??" I mean, if I was doing my own thing, trusting in my own self, running my own show, yeah I can understand my heart getting put through a rock tumbler, but what about when I prayed about it and it seemed right? When I followed where He was leading and He lead me into the lion's den? (Oh hey Daniel. Nice to see I'm not the only one who has been through this).

I don't like that cartoon. Mostly because Jesus is like, "did I miss one?" He doesn't accidently miss one. He plans and decides and allows and makes things happen. Yeah, he told that stone to conk you on the head. 

One of my all time favorite movies is called "They Ultimate Gift." It's beautiful! It's about this man who dies and leaves behind a series of gifts for his grandson who is spoiled and selfish and ungrateful. 
(I won't give too much away because if you haven't seen it, you neeeeeeeed to!)

Basically, the grandfather gives more gifts than just monetary valued things. He gives the gift of work and friendship and thankfulness.

I found myself requesting that the Lord cause me to feel overwhelmed by His love in an instant and just accept everything as "Because He loves me, it was somehow a good thing. " Well, I sat and listened and waited and...nothing. I've already learned that lesson. "Because He loves me" is not always good enough because I can ask if/then questions. I can't always expect that hearing, "Because I love you" will make my heart hurt less than it does. God does not work that way. 

Whilst writing out all my "whys" in my quiet time to the Lord I got the idea to write down all the really big unpleasant things I've walked through that I never really understood but was thankful for them being over. 

After I had that list going, I decided to write down next to them what gifts the Lord had given to me as a result of those trials. I had only written 16 things that seemed most significant, but by the end of it I had 63 gifts written down that were direct results of those trials or conflicts or difficult circumstances. 
Hello! 63 is a lot for just 16 situations. 

The really funny thing I just felt the Lord whispering into my heart "Read Isaiah. I have something for you to know and it's in Isaiah." Well Lord, Isaiah is a big book and Bible Russian Roulette doesn't always work out very well.... where would you like me to go?  "Isaiah 63. The number is 63 on purpose"

So, I opened Isaiah 63 and it started out something like "Who is this coming from Edom, from Bozrah with his garments stained in crimson?..." Ha... that's great, Lord, but..uhmm... a bit random don't you think?

Well I kept reading. It's a treasure hunt with the Lord, ya know? I dug that well a little deeper and right about verse 7 I found water. 

"I will tell of the kindnesses of the Lord,
    the deeds for which he is to be praised,
    according to all the Lord has done for us—
yes, the many good things
    he has done for Israel,
    according to his compassion and many kindnesses.
⁸ He said, “Surely they are my people,
    children who will be true to me”;
    and so he became their Savior.
⁹ In all their distress he too was distressed,
    and the angel of his presence saved them.
In his love and mercy he redeemed them;
    he lifted them up and carried them
    all the days of old."

And so the whole rest of the chapter went like that. We have the answers to our why'nings already. 
We just don't really look for them. 

In all my trials I have been given gifts such as the gifts of family of friends, the gift of thankfulness, humility, endurance, patience, gentleness, hearing God's voice, seeing God work, understanding forgiveness.

 I was given the gift of learning to love others, learning to trust, learning to walk by faith, learning to be faithful. 

I was given the gift of appreciating my home and my own bed. Appreciating things I had that took for granted. I was given the gift of having others pray for me often. I was given the gift of being encouraged and learning to encourage others. I was given the gift of receiving many hugs in the moment of needing them. I have been given the gifts of fighting for others and having them fight for me when the enemy speaks lies. 

I have been given the gift of contentment and being happy for others. I have been given the gift of hearing that I am beautiful. 

I have been given the gift of being used by the Lord in spite of my circumstances and state of my heart. I have been given the gift of laughter and joy and looking for God in all things. 

I have been given much. So much more than I shall ever fathom. 

I'm sure we will all have a million and one more "why" questions to ask. But we can rest assured knowing that God has an answer. Knowing that we were not betrayed, knowing that "Because I love you" has more weight to it than we can carry. 

We are loved. Ask all the questions you want, but some way, some how the ultimate conclusion will always be that you are loved. You are loved deeper and richer and fuller than you heart can possibly comprehend. 

A Happy Heart

Yesterday was rather humid and I didn't monitor my hydration as well as I should have. By the time my head hit the pillow a little after 11, my head felt a little like I'd been hit by a truck.  It was probably a combination of not having any coffee and not really drinking any water. :/ It's amazing how much that can affect you. 

Same with drinking in God's word. I'm a little behind in my reading plan... all the laws and feast prep business in beginning books of the old testament are a bit like trying to run through a snow drift, not very easy, not very fast. 

However, all the people who think there's nothing to get out of Leviticus or those books, you're missing out if you don't read them. It's a glorious thing how just getting in the word changes your heart a little. It changes how things taste to you anyhow. Like, music your listen to or websites you like to visit. Not that I've been particularly inclined to listen to really vulgar music or visit inappropriate websites, but the secular world just isn't as appealing, yknow? Kinda like when you decided to go from eating processed foods to natural foods and somehow, the chemicals and preservatives taste awful and unappealing. 

I like that. 

I feel like I'm on a treasure hunt, actually, with my quest to get to know the Lord a little better. Like maybe the reason we read about all the wells being dug in the old testament is to illustrate that our intentional seeking after the Lord is a bit like digging a well. It make take a little bit before you've progressed to being able to just drink your whole fill but if you dig deep enough, the water will be there and you will have a wellspring. 

My life has been full of adventure, lately! From renaissance fairs to tea parties, thunderstorms, coffee drinking, late nights, pancake parties, time in the word, workin' out.... It's been a glorious first couple weeks of summer. It's taken me quite a bit to convince myself that I have nothing more to stress about on account the papers and exams and research projects and deadlines are all behind me. Only recently have I been able to sleep past 6am or sleep through the whole night for that matter. What a blessing. :)

I think, though, I'm getting a little antsy for ministry. My top two love languages are service and affirmation and I think not having that many opportunities to serve or encourage others it making me feel a little helpless and burden-like. Last night my roommate and I had some friends over for supper on account one of them is going to China for the summer. It was so wonderful! Having people over makes my heart happy. 

Another Day

I'm on day three of having a piece of glass in my foot. On saturday I went on some pretty grand adventures that left me soaked and cold from the rain and thus I removed my sopping wet shoes whilst driving home so as to thaw out my frozen toes a little. 
Unfortunately I decided that the effort to put the sopping wet shoes back onto my frozen toes was not entirely worth it for the short walk to my front door from my parking lot and managed to catch a small shard in my heel. Which, obviously isn't all that big on account I didn't realize it til the following morning whenst I felt some pain in my walk and examined to see it had become swollen and such. 

It's small enough and deep enough that I can't do much more than keep it clean and hope it works itself out on its own. It's an unpleasant business, but I'll live. 

It seems as though the rain may have let up for a little and I believe I shall be so inclined as to venture out on an adventure and, perhaps, explore the Hickory Hill trails a little better. I'm not usually one to enjoy doing things on my own, but I suppose I shall take advantage of the solitude before the summer gets too crazy. 

This is the first time in, well, my whole life that i haven't been spending these last two weeks of May with my family in Storm Lake drinking copious amounts of coffee, staying up til 3am partying like it's 1699, and filling every day with adventures of side walk chalking, coloring, kitten cuddling and bread making. It's a little odd to find things to do with myself just on my own, but I've enjoyed so many hours alone with the Lord which have been huge for my heart. 

I'm finding a lot of things that the Lord can work on me, especially if I give him opportunity to this summer. How I hope my life looks changed for the better when classes begin again in the fall. 

We'll see, I guess. :) 

Tipped in My Favor

They told me You would be for me
So now I need to know
Is this a love that can save me
Or say You will then don't?
Will You stay with me when nobody is around?
If this is real, then tell me now

Can you hold me together?
Can your love reach down this far?
Can you hold me together?
Cause without You holding my heart
I'm falling apart
Falling apart

Today is one of those days where I battle my worth. If you've read my blog entitled "Worth it" you know just what battle I'm facing. I know I'm valuable. But somedays I don't feel it. Or the evidence that Satan has lined up against me seems to be more believable than the evidence Christ has. 

Which is why I found myself drawing the above picture. Somedays I wish I was a better artist so that I could better express what I think Christ is trying to show me. Today in my quiet times I felt myself writing over and over, "I wish I had value." All the while looking through parts of my life and thinking, "I am nothing. I'm worth nothing." 

It was during my journalings that I began scribbling and the result was what is pictured above. I drew myself in the scale, surrounded by nothing because I feel like all I am is all there is. 

My girl friends and I come to this point often. I think it's easy for us to see all the times that people didn't fight for us, didn't find us worth it, didn't think we were worth keeping, didn't want to stick around, and that somehow determined that our worth was the equivalent of dirt. 
Or we look at the times that we were extra, a burden, a pebble in a shoe, unwanted, discarded, left. And that also determines our worth...less than dirt. After all, dirt can at least be useful for planting beautiful things and healthy dirt is worth a good price. 

But, at the same time, I know we are of some value on account the Lord went so far as to die for us. Which, of course, is not nothing, but sometimes it's hard to fight the lie that He loves us because He has to. Like a parent who is obligated to look after us or take care of us because, well, that's what parents do. 

And then we are told, God is not just a father figure, he is in love with you and wants to be your first love. As if that comparison is helpful, since those kind of relationships perfectly show how love endures all things... or not. 
It's one of those things where you want to be loved because they want to, not because they have to. 
I mean, you can tell when people do things out of obligation rather than desire. 
And perhaps that is God's way of telling us that HE wants us to love Him because we want to and not because we have to. But our religious growing uppings have taught us that we should love God because that's the right thing to do. It's a commandment. An obligation. A priority. 

But I don't want to be an obligation. I hate that. I hate being extra. It's one of the worst feelings in the world. It doesn't make you feel valuable when you're a burden. And maybe I'm still struggling through some of the darker times in my life when my attempts at pleasing the people of this world failed miserably and my dreamed up sandcastle accomplishments washed away faster than they took to create. 

There's a line from a song I love that goes, "May my losses show that all I truly have is you. Cuz all I truly have is you." It hurts in a good way when I hear it. Like when someone finds a knot in your shoulder when giving you a back rub. 

And perhaps we craft our identities out of dreams and goals and shape them into mighty ships to help us sail across the ocean of life. And then life becomes a storm and everything smashes into oblivion and, like Paul, we find ourselves adrift on the last plank existing, which turns out to be a beam from the cross we hung Jesus on. Because we built that into our lives somewhere. It was a part of us, but not all of us. But then it becomes all we have left. 

I think the ultimate battle of worth is knowing that even though I won't be worth it to some people, and that my value in this world is gonna be dirt from time to time, some how the scale is tipped in my favor anyways. By faith I can believe I have worth from some where, even though I can't see it with my eyes. 

I think the Proverbs 31 woman can be just as much of a spear as she is an admirable gem. 
We women in the Christian culture are all given this measuring stick to remind us of all the traits we may or may not have and we beat ourselves with it when we don't measure up. 
Or we let others beat us with it. That too. 

We want to be worth more than rubies because of our talents and abilities to sew things and make warm clothes, because of our independence and confidence and gifts in providing, we tell ourselves if we can laugh at the future and be creative and busy ourselves with various things, than we have succeeded and we may consider ourselves worth something.

But...it's not that. I don't think Christ put that in His word to be a comparison chart. But, it's there and we do. 

Some times I wish it said, "She loves Jesus." And that was the end of it. Cuz then I could be like, "Check! Yes, I make the cut!" And then me and all my friends could be like, "good enough" without any add-ons or extra features. Good enough by ourselves. 

And maybe that's just what Jesus wants us to see when He takes everything away. A gentle and quiet spirit weighs nothing and everything at the same time. 

This Little Light of Mine

Mmm!! It's a beautiful thunderstorm-y morning! A perfect reminder of how beautiful and mighty is the Lord and how He loves us in the best ways! I feel so loved when I have a rainy quiet time! I LOVE rain! It's a beautiful thing and it makes a cup of coffee taste extra delightful. 

And while I am so thankful and overjoyed in this moment of being cozied into my couch with a cup of coffee and scripture all set out before me, whilst my walls and windows rattle at the thunder, what has prompted me to start this post is complaining. 

I don't really have a starting point since what I want to do is complain about all the people that complain. But I'm so content in this moment that I don't want a single negative thought to ruin it. 

I think it's a tricky subject and so I shall handle as gently as I know how. 

In the last few years, mostly since coming to college, I have been pretty convicted on the negative things that come out of my mouth on account they are usually a result of the negative things existing in my heart. In my high school years, both pre and post my Jesus encounter, I was probably the most negative, complaining person out there. My catch phrase was, "sad day" and all of my classmates at North Star Academy could probably tell you that it wasn't me if "sad day" wasn't said at least once or twice in a single sentence. I was never especially thankful for my life circumstances, especially since I didn't really think I had much to be thankful for my senior year of high school, which was probably the peak of my negativity. I think I mostly justified my negative attitude because my situation seemed painful enough to deserve it. 

But here's the deal, I didn't have all that many friends. I tell my current friends this sometimes and they don't usually believe me. But making friends was a really big struggle for me in the past. I could excuse it to the fact that I was home schooled, but I had enough exposure to other kids to have made friends, had I the talent for it. 
I'd like to say that I wasn't a socially awkward person, but maybe I was. However, my current theory to my lack of friends was that I was too much of a complainer and no one wanted to be around Negative Nelly for too long. Which makes sense, given that I don't like to be around complaining Johnny Rainclouds for too long either. 

The Lord was so gracious to me in that time, though, because I did have a friend or two that stuck around and poured Jesus into my heart and gave me things for which I could be thankful. I have one best friend who has stuck it out with me since we were 2 and 3 and I don't deserve her, but I'm ever so thankful for her anyways. 

Upon coming to college and having no friends and not being good at making friends....I basically just existed without friends. Fortunately for me, my sister is probably the sweetest someone to have ever walked the campus sidewalks and she graciously permitted me to be in her presence and she shared her friends with me as well as exemplified the beauty of not complaining. 

After a semester of being around "Christians" whose fruits of the spirit left something to be desired and feeling quite empty myself, I realized that even in the time since encountering Jesus, I had been living off the fruits of other believers lives, their joy, their patience, their peace, that I wasn't really planting it or growing it in my own life and it was high time I let the Lord change my heart. 
It took several months of intentional surrender and seeking the Lord to make me a person made beautiful by what was on the inside. 

It took a lot to learn to control my tongue and not find something to complain about for everything. During that time I realized, people bond by complaining. In class, the way to talk to your classmates is to be like, "Ughh... we have homework due Friday" "ugh sucks" or "oh my gosh it's so hot in here" "yeah it's awful" or "Ugh rain" or "Ugh..the sun is too bright." If it's sunny it's too hot, if it's cloudy than it's too gloomy. If it's raining than it's yucky, if it's snowing it's terrible, if someone says it's nice, than it sucks to have be in class. 

You see it in your facebook feed all the time, "Don't wanna go to class today..this sucks" 
"6 hour shift at work today..ugh" "Didn't sleep last night..ugh" "it's raining...ugh" 

Okay, first of all, I'm really sorry that 'sucks' ever showed up in my blog. I hate that word and I try not to let it be in my own vocabulary as much as possible. But, you get my point... this world is impossible to please. Even Christians have a lot to complain about, it seems, and I haven't exactly found it to be encouraging thus far. 

It's tricky, like I said, because I feel like I'm complaining about people complaining...which is not helpful on any level. 
But seriously, it's like in Monsters Inc. when they start out powering the city by the screams of scared young children and it keeps the city going. But then they find out that laughter is a better form of energy and they switch over to trying to make the children laugh rather than scare them. 

Complaining may give you something to get a conversation started with a co-worker or a classmate, it may help you to fit in around your friends, it may make you seem pretty cool when you complain about something and everyone agrees in some approving way "OH MY GOSH YES I KNOW RIGHT!" But, it's.... it's negative. 

When I moved to Iowa City, I sensed the spiritual darkness... the heaviness, almost right away. And one morning in a desperate search for some encouraging words I found myself in Philippines 2 that starts with, "If there is any encouragement in being united with Christ Jesus..." I read those words and was like, "If there is an 'if" then there is a 'then'." And I found what it was.

"Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation. Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky"

I miss the stars. I grew up out in the middle of corn and bean fields and the only lights to worry about were the neighbor's yard lights....but they were like half a mile away anyways and my siblings, friends, cousins and I would spend summer night after summer night marveling at the stars from our trampoline or the kitchen roof (which isn't so steep). I live in the city now, and the stars are a little less visible with the light, but the ones I do see, I love. 

I think it's a beautiful thing that the act of not complaining can be significant enough that you stick out like a star in the night sky. Not complaining is so counter-cultural to our world. And it's not just joining in the coffee pot conversation, speaking thankfulness words are just... soothing. 

I don't consider myself to be a good example of someone who doesn't complain. Goodness knows I have my vent sessions with my friends more often than I should. Thankfully my friends love Jesus and they usually always have some truth to speak back to me and point out the things I can be thankful for even when the situation I'm venting about isn't exactly ideal. I do the same for them. We look for Truth together, as if it were some grand treasure hunt or I Spy. 

I think complaining is a lot more dangerous, especially for believers, than we may even realize. It makes us so we can't see. When we complain, we can't see Truth, we can't see joy, we can't see peace, we can't see light... we can't see Jesus. 
Like in starwars when Obi Wan puts the helmet on Luke..

And Luke is like, "With the blast shield down I can't see anything. How am I supposed to fight?"
(Ignore the part about trusting your feelings that comes after that)

Basically, if complaining was the blast shield, you can't really fight. You can't fight the spiritual darkness if you complain, all you do is join it. (You know, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em type deal). 

We try to blend in and fit in with our friends and co-workers and classmates and strangers by complaining about whatever little anything we can find that might be possibly awful. 
But that's just it, we're blending in. 
How are people supposed to see the light of Jesus when we hide it under a bushel? (Sorry sunday school teachers, we shouted 'no' as children, but yeah, we're gonna hide it. Maybs we'll bring it out when Jesus comes). 

It's so funny, though, because as believers we gather around our little Bible studies and talk about how being a Christian is so hard, and sharing Jesus with our friends is so hard, and looking like a loser is so hard.... and then we give ourselves pats on the back being like, " You put an anti-abortion bumper sticker on your car, good job!" or "way to not cuss when you stubbed your toe!" or "I didn't honk when that guy cut me off in traffic!" As if we've accomplished something there. 

You know, speaking encouraging things isn't as hard as it sounds when you marinate yourself in Jesus for a little bit every now and again. 

Last fall semester I ran my little experiment in my classes to see what would happen. I was gonna 1) Say hello to whom ever I sat by in class and ask them how their day was going 
2) try to say something positive about what ever they say negative. 

That was fun! If your curious to know how that experiment turned out, I ended up with friends in my classes. Friends who wanted to share notes with me if I missed them and often asked after my day as well. They weren't believers, but they didn't seem to mind that I was and even encouraged me in my faith by saying things like, "good for you, keep being bold." 

Whaaaat? Living counter-culturally and not looking like a freak?  
As it turns out, this world is starving for things that aren't negative and heavy and heart wrenching. 

I recently found a list of life goals I made back in 2007. One of the things I had on there was, "make a difference some where or have an impact on someone." I'm not sure I'll ever know if I accomplish that one until I get to heaven, but I don't know that people who don't complain and speak truth into my life are some of the most impactful people I've met. The times people have caught me mid-sentence and showed me where I could be thankful have made such a lasting impression on my heart, as if they dug a pool and filled it with Jesus. 

I guess mostly, I want to implore my fellow believers to find less things to complain about and more things to be thankful for. I love you, truly, but we gotta get past this whole complain-to-make-friends-and-look-cool thing. It's not as affective Gospel sharing as you might think. Don't try to be friends with people, try to be Jesus with people. Like.. love them. And build them up. And encourage them. 

Think happy thoughts, they lift you into the air!

a post with no purpose

I am so loving my free time! The only thing that would make my Jesus & Workout days better would be if I could see people more. But, all the same, I don't mind time alone with my Heavenly Father. 

Yesterday went a little differently than I had planned, but it was a good different. Originally my plan was to spend a little time with Jesus, trek my 12 miles, and then wash up and rest. It actually happened that I spent a lot of time with Jesus, met up with a friend, and then prayer walked for 4 miles. It wasn't 12, but it was glorious all the same. Talking with Jesus AND having a friend was delightful! Plus we did the trails behind my favorite cemetery and it was beautiful. I just love Jesus really a lot. 

One of the things my friend reminded me of is the importance of being thankful for the people in our lives that stay, even when a lot of people leave. I can remember how miserable I was the first several weeks of my sophomore year when I didn't have a single true friend to talk to and I spent many night crying and praying the Lord would grant me one, single friend so that I wouldn't have to be alone forever. :)

How blessed I am to now have more friends than I can count, including 2 very close friends. :)

Worn Out

"The Lord says that there is nothing you can do that can make him love you more. There is also nothing you can do that would make him love you less. He loves you because He loves you, because that is what he is like. It is his nature to love and you will always be the beloved. And He loves you 100%. He won't love you any better when you become better, He loves you 100% right now. And even if you have no plans to become better, he will still love you 100%. Even if you don't want to change, he will love you 100%. Even if you have no plans to walk with him, he loves you 100% because that is his nature. He loves 100% all the time. And his love is unchanging. What will change, says that Lord,  is your ability to receive my love." ~Graham Cooke

As I said earlier, I'm wanting to grow in love this summer. It truly is something that can only come from God. The more I push toward getting to know God better, the more I seem to struggle with it. With loving others that is. Not everyone, of course, but a few. And it's not that I don't love them, it's more that I don't love them very well and I have no strength within myself to summon up enough love to love them as well as they should be.

If I were Bilbo, my speech would go, "I don't love half of you half as well as I should like, and I love less than half of you half as well as you deserve"... or something like that. 
I'm not a confrontational person. I haaaaaaaaate conflict. So much so that I won't even defend myself when someone wrongly assumes something of me or misinterprets what I say or how I say something and take it offensively. I used to fight for myself, but I think I've encountered enough people that defend themselves against how I shouldn't have been hurt and it's my fault for taking it the wrong way, that I'd just as well rather not stir up the water any. 

But at the same time, it's not helping me any. I'm getting exhausted and finding it more and more difficult to be around the porcupines in my life and find myself distancing more and more. 
I know how to forgive and get the quills out of my heart, but I've heard often that the definition of stupid is doing the same thing twice and expecting different results. 

I don't know what results I'm expecting different, though. That perhaps if I love the hard people, they will soften. Or maybe if I don't defend myself and let them walk all-over me, they'll start treating me better. I don't know, either way, I don't know if my strategy is working and I'm on the edge of giving up.

But, worn out is good sometimes, right? It means you're using it, anyways. For example, my running shoes. In the last 3 days, I've managed to walk/run  36 miles and today I will hopefully make it to 48. I got these shoes last summer and the treads on them are nearly gone and I really need to get new ones. I'm glad they're worn out! It means I put them to use!

Same with my Bible. One time, one of my atheist friends asked me if it had been my grandma's Bible on account it's seen better days. He was quite shocked when I told him my parents had given it to me brand new for my 16th birthday. Yeah, it's a little worn out and the pages are starting to fall out, but that's because it goes with me everywhere and I read it often. 

But, maybe my current struggle to love better, to experience God's love better, is a sign that I need another heart re-shaping. I wince at the thought. The last time the Lord brought me through a heart-transformation trial, well, I still marvel at how I survived it and I'm quite sure I could stand to go the rest of my life without going through something like that again. 

I guess I need to learn how to make my love more united with Christ's. Because it's not like I'm not spending time soaking myself in the Word and spending time alone with Christ. But that fact that I'm struggling to find love in my heart for a few prickly pears is rather..disturbing. 

I'm not even that broken. I would say I'm quite whole and that my joy is quite overflowing. The Lord has blessed me in such big ways, so I'm not wounded into a fetal position. But I feel helpless all the same. 

To Live is Christ

School is over now! Summer has come again and I have two weeks of freedom before me to do whatever I please with out a care. 

My only daily scheduled requirements are working out and spending time with Jesus. It's pretty much perfect.

Actually, I'm quite excited about it! As I spent the entire last week pretty much confined to my couch or the hard wood floor, surrounded by notes and scholarly articles and papers and textbooks, I didn't allow myself much time for either and, well, I can't say that I felt especially good about myself coming out of it. 
I took my last final and went straight to the gym after it and 2 1/2 hrs later, felt a good sort of exhausted as I walked home to wash and pack and ready myself to see my family later. 

Shortly before the school year ended, one of our ministry leaders gave a talk on Spiritual disciplines and the importance of being disciplined to be in the word this summer. I was rather convicted by it as I have been a little fallen out with my Jesus time as late, which is never a good thing for me. 

So to challenge myself by way of spiritual and physical health this summer, I've mapped out a couple different 90 day plans to keep me on track and ready for the spiritual battle I'll face my final semester of school. 

Firstly- B90x. <--- that's the spiritual one. I'm shooting the read the entire Bible in 90 days. Today I finish Genesis and start the first 15 chapters of Exodus. I've read some of these stories so many times already, but they never get old. Everytime I am reminded of how God just loves. He loves his people and He loves to do great things to show it. There's so many just little blips of things where God shows up and says things that are just wonderful. 
For example, when Jacob is running away and sleeps with a stone as a pillow and God shows up in his dream and says, "Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go; for I will not leave until I have done what I have promised you" And then Jacob is like, "Sure the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it."<--- That's me!

I'm just casually putting my head against a rock like no big deal and then something amazing happens and I'm like, "oh hey! God is here and I didn't even know." What a clever line, Jacob. Do we always just expect that we must invite God to be with us in order for him to show up? Like, we pray, "God we invite you to be among us" or "God please show up tonight" or "God, you say where 2 or more are gathered together, you'll be with us" and then we think "But if it's just one of us, he's not." Whatever. Ready or not you shall be caught,  he's gonna be there no matter what. 

I love how the Lord loves me through His word! I'm so excited to dig deeper into as the summer progresses! Hopefully, my heart shall see much transformation and my capacity to love will be busting out of my heart seems. I want to love better. 

Whilst reading through the Bible, I'm attempting my 1000 miles in 90 days again. Last summer I only made it to a little over 500 miles, so we'll see what happens this summer. I have thus far conquered 16 miles. Heh. We'll see, we'll see. Last summer I didn't drink coffee and so maybe this summer will see great improvement. :)


This past weekend was one of the most wonderful things I've experienced since my time in Nicaragua. That's saying a lot because I have experience a lot of wonderful things between then and now. 
My sister, best friend, and myself packed ourselves into my car at 9:30pm Friday night and began our journey back to good ol' Storm Lake, IA. I don't mind long car trips, especially when I'm driving. I rarely let myself be still long enough to think and process through life and I find long drives to be conducive for deep discussions or quiet thoughts. We arrived home some time before 1am and sneaked ourselves quietly upstairs and found our assigned beds and by 1:15 found ourselves tucked in where we belonged. We were home! 
Although I was quite exhausted from being up @ 6am to study for final, working out at the gym, and driving the whole way back, sleep didn't come very easily and I was fully awake again before 7:30. 

Saturday day was filled with family, friends, and fun time. It was exactly how it should have been with someone to hug and talk to in every room of the house while preparing the house for Ken's grad party, drinking copious amounts of coffee, and stopping to rest every now and again by way of doing crosswords with the siblings whilst sitting on the big red couch. 

Sunday was just as perfect with more coffee, some church, and then a rainy sunday afternoon nap whilst North and South played on the TV. We finished our evening with apples to apples and a couple rounds of Sardines-in-the-dark. My friend, Amanda, and I retired to our bed by 1am and got up at 6 to journey back to Iowa City. 

Of course I was exhausted when I got back. A good exhausted. I'm always a little more emotional when I'm tired. 
In the midst of all of our wonderful sibling/friend hanging outting over the weekend, there was some singing and worshipping, because we love Jesus and that just... happens. 
My sister showed us this little music video to go along with one of the songs and, well, it got me. 

In this part here, the line is, "you bore the wrath reserved for me and now all I know is grace." 
I think it's beautiful. I like to think in pictures and this one shows a little more than the physical goings on in the crucifixion. 

I wish I knew the spiritual world better. I wish I was more aware of just how much the Lord fights for me every day. I wish I wouldn't be so apathetic about my walk sometimes. 

I wish I was a stronger believer. Truly. Which is why I want to workout my spiritual muscles this summer. I want my life to make a difference and I want my faith to matter. I want to be a person that encourages people to love Jesus more and inspires them to walk closer. But, more often than not, I don't think I qualify to have that kind of influence. 

Here We Are

My heart is beating so fast right now. I don't know if its because of the coffee consumption levels or the anxiety of my final exam in 3 hours. 
I'm up to my neck in my clinical psych notes. I've got the main gist of Short-Term psychodynamic, Cognitive-behavioral, experiential/emotional, and interpersonal therapies down. :/ Unfortunately, that's just scratching the surface of need-to-know.

lalala okay... I probs drank too much coffee... or not enough. Idk. I'm gonna study some more. 

Prepare for Landing

Right now I feel a little bit like the poor X-Wing fighter guy in the original Starwars movie "A New Hope" who gets hit and catches on fire and screams "Yeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!!" as he crashes to his doom into the Death Star in the closing battle. Maybe the references is a bit too specific and vague at the same time, but if you go back and watch the film, you'll know what guy I'm talking about. 
I feel a little bit like an evil genius this morning. Yesterday afternoon I spent my time developing an idear for a model and studying psychology research articles to better enhance my proposal. I'm not a computer geek and I'm not a science person and I really could care less on how we learn in development, but for my final psych paper I had to develop a research experiment and model and  produce possible outcomes. At first I figured out what kinds of things might be interesting to know, such as how a child learns the meanings of the words "Where" and "is" and then basic commands based on tonal and visual cues. I had to develop a model for it, and since my brain has been a little burnt out lately, I decided I needed to see my model on paper before I magically commanded my computer to spit it out. 
I love paper. I'm a bit of a granny, I suppose, as I find computer graphs and formality to be far too complicated for the likes of me. 
This morning I retrieved my crayons and layed on my floor drawing out potential graphical ideas and configurations so I could see for myself what I would need to punch into my computer to produce an equally impressive graph that could be added into my typed up proposal. 
I'm not thrilled with it, but when all is said and done, I'm at least satisfied and I feel a lot of relief in knowing that I have checked one more thing off my list and can now devote all my time to studying clinical psych for my exam tomorrow. 

I think I'm going stir-crazy. I get my energy from people and I've rather spent my last several days in my living room in front of my computer with hardly a human interaction at all. Last night I allowed myself to step out onto my front steps for a few minutes and was quite pleasantly surprised at the sound of birds and the smell of freshly cut grass. I realized, at that point, that the world is still turning and life still exists beyond my humble walls and electronic devices. I'm quite excited to think that in one more day, I shall be making the ever-so-pleasant summer drive down highway 20 with my best road-tripping partner back to the lovely Storm Lake, Iowa where I shall have all the people interaction I could want as well as see the stars and hear the peaceful sounds of the country. 

Everything always feels a bit like a dream when it's just out of reach. 

And The Pressure is On...

It's survival mode now. I've not gone grocery shopping in almost a month now so as to use up the food in my refrigerator and in my cupboards before it goes to waste and before I spend more $$ than I have to. 

A week ago I ran out of milk and eggs, bread, peanut butter, and every other normal thing one might keep in their fridge. Last night's supper was celery and two apples. So healthy! 

However, seeing as I'm doing supper with some people this week as well as baking a few things, I finally broke down and replenished my eggs and milk. 

I've spent the last 2 full days (Monday and Tuesday) editing a paper, which finally cut down to only 7 pages. (Go me!). Once I had that turned in a little after 9pm I looked up my next writing assignment and whilst sorting out the details of inventing and proposing a model for development with full inclusion of graphs and inputs and outputs and so on and so forth, I had a slight break down and I think my brain turned off right then and there. I looked over at my roommate who was also not much excited about the projects she was working on and gladly shut down her computer and my suggestion of a shopping adventure, to at least get out of the house. 

So that's what we did and upon our return shortly after 10pm, I concluded that my brain truly was not going to function well and excused myself to sleep. 
I should have attempted something more, apparently, as the overwhelming stress refused me to rest until at least one in the morning and I awakened at exactly 6am not feeling much rested at all. 
I somehow convinced my body to sleep at least one hour more (though not especially well) and so I took my time getting ready for work. 

I had made coffee the day before and chilled it to be ice coffee for today. I made sure my 20oz water bottle was washed and ready as I knew a large amount of coffee for the day was quite in order. 
Unfortunately I'd failed to pay attention or monitor my coffee consumption during yesterday's writing frenzy and was quite saddened to find the coffee only amounted to about 6oz and left my lovely bottle looking quite empty. I had not the time, at that point, to make any more and thus a little milk was added to psych myself into thinking I was drinking more than I was. 

Fortunately for me, there were only five young toddlers in need of a watchful eye and so not much energy was required. In fact, when their child's stories got boring I switched over to reading them my clinical psychology notes, and hoped they wouldn't notice that it didn't quite have the same rhyming scheme as the previous books on colors and shapes and brown colored apes. 
...They listened to me read 5 or 6 slides before they became caught up in the play plastic fruits and airplanes on wheels.
No matter, they were well enough behaved and my clinical psych got more attention than I could have hoped. I even managed to take 3 practice tests (there were other workers present as well) and nothing too eventful transpired beyond looking up to see that every last book had been pulled from the bookshelf and there were puzzles dumped out on top of the books. 

This post, obviously, is an other procrastination of my model proposal. It's due in 24hrs and 13 minutes from now. :/ I wouln't worry too much if I didn't know how much I need to study clinical. 
*sigh* I suppose I'll read my cross-linguistics differences paper in hopes of sparking an idea for a proposal. 

Whole Means One Peace

I didn't mention this before, but it's finals week again here at Iowa. Last semester was by far the most exhausting and miserable finals week of my life, especially given what I had been through emotionally the week prior as well as the amount of finals and the fact that they were all big classes and several other little factors that went into it. 
I came to the end of finals week much like in the cartoons when the poor character is sliding through the dirt and comes to a halt and their limbs and extremities are bent every which way and they look more like a train wreck than anything else. I remember getting home at 10:30 Thursday night, having just taken my 4th and most difficult final with my brain being so exhausted. I'd believed I had failed the final and I'd believed I'd failed the class. It's the most defeated I think I've ever felt in my entire life and whilst wiping away tears and having no strength to fight whatever lies about my worth Satan gladly spoke into my heart, I began studying for my next final which was to be at 7:30 am the following morning. I was going to meet a classmate at 6am to study and so I knew I'd need to be out my door by 5:30. I was a defeated broken mess as I crawled into my bed that night, with not much hope for more than 5 hours of sleep. I'm glad to report I passed the class in better standing than I though possible. 

And then it was over. I'd survived and I packed up my broken self and went home for the most wonderful winter break of my life. 
I'm quite thankful that this semester's ending it much less dramatic and painful than the last. 
With only one difficult final that's not til Friday, and 2 final papers, I feel so blessed by the Lord in how my heart will be a lot more whole this time around. 

Currently I'm surrounded by a couple different textbooks on how to make your life happy and meaningful whilst I write a paper for my positive psychology class. It's amazing to me how people can spend 30 or 40 years studying and searching out how humans can find happiness in life. 
They say things like, ignore the stressful things in life, find a distraction. Talk only about good things and don't give vent to the hard things. Exercise more, spend time with people who make you happy. 
All this little surface level coping strategies that don't even begin to reach down to the core of our beings where pain and brokenness grows best. There's a lot of ideas about self-empowerment and finding peace from your inner self. But it does nothing but put feel good lotion on a gaping wound. 
The more I read the more I find myself thinking, "Gosh dangit... these people need Jesus. Everyone does." 

My heart breaks for the authors of my textbooks and the leading psychologists that study how to be happy. My heart breaks for everyone, actually. 
The other day I just felt the Lord requesting me to spend my evening with Him and I found myself watching sermon clips and reading Bible passages and listening to my worship play lists on grooveshark and my heart grew more and more restless with every affirmation and reminder of how great my Father's love is for me. The more I sat there feeling loved the more anxious I became fore my friends who aren't aware of how loved they are. 
At one point I was watching this 8minute youtube clip of pastor's sermon talking about how loving God is and I just felt like the Lord wanting me to share it with my atheist friend who has expressed curiosity on occasion. In my mind I was like, "idk Fern. That's kinda bold, kinda crazy. If he is on facebook chat right now, than that means the Lord wants you to share it. If not, then you can let it rest."
Why I thought that, I don't know. It's not like I should be making deals with how the Lord commands my walk. But I checked my facebook chat right then and sure enough, the fellow was online. Of course I prefaced it with some explanation and statement about how I hoped he didn't think I was totally insane for sharing it and that was that. I have no report on if he watched it or what he might have thought, but hopefully sometime down the road.. perhaps when I get to heaven, I'll get to see whatever became of that. 

I have come to believe that as long as I'm acting in obedience to the Lord, He's gonna use it whether I see how or not. It makes things a little less intimidating when it comes to the moment. Obviously not completely un-intimidating, but it's like wearing a seatbelt in a car crash. You'll probs come out with seat belt bruises and cuts and scrapes, but it's not like your head went through the windshield or anything. 

You know what makes me happy? Hearing people sing worshipful praise music. I feel loved by Jesus when I hear it. Or perhaps it's that the love for Jesus in the hearts of those singing glows so much that I'm caught up in it. Whatever it is, it touches my heart in some of the deepest places and the joy I experience is quite overwhelming. I heard singing last night. :) 
Some godly young men gathered around a little campfire on a cow farm on a dirt road far from the disturbances of the city and the partying and the blare of emergency sirens. It was the most beautiful and peaceful sound I have heard in such a long time. I think I could have stayed and listened forever. 
It didn't take long before the joy of my heart spilled out of my eyes as I rather unexpectedly found myself wiping away tears, which is saying something because I don't cry at all that much, and especially not in front of people. But it was beautiful, truly. And God was there. And I loved that. 

And that is how my finals week has started. As if the Lord wanted to remind me that He loves me infinitely much, even though he has been reminding me of that every day. He didn't have to take me to a bonfire and shoot off fireworks. He didn't have to surround me by people who love Jesus and just naturally talk about Him in conversation. He didn't have to bring me to a place of hearing sweet music sung by the richest voices. He didn't have to do any of that. But all of it happened in one night. And I feel so beyond loved and valued and delighted in by the Lord. I love where the Lord has me. 
I am content and satisfied. 

Yes, content. At peace. My heart is cradled in the hands of Jesus and I am quite pleased to leave it just there and let him love me in ways I couldn't have ever asked or imagined myself. 

Write These Down

Deuteronomy 7:9

Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments.

"You are faithful, God, you are faithful."~Matt Redman

How shall I never know the full extent of how faithful the Lord has been to walking with me  every step of the way of my life. Lately, I've been compelled to look back at old prayer journals and of course I am more than amazed seeing how the Lord answered so many prayers penned years ago and have long since been forgotten. My Lord obviously didn't forget because he continues to answer them, even though I did. 

I LOVE writing. Obviously... I blog quite a bit. :) But I think I connect best with the Lord when I write, or blog, or journal. It helps me to see what the  Lord sees as I try to understand my own thoughts whilst jotting them down and sorting them out. I love that the Lord wrote me a whole big letter, 66 books long that proclaims His faithfulness again and again. And then, He's wrote me. My book. My story. Just one more book of His faithfulness. By God's grace, I was inspired to start writing out my prayers into journals so that I would be able to see how He worked in my life a little better. 

This is a picture of some of the prayer journals I've filled going back as far as 2006...I didn't even fully surrender my heart to the Lord til Nov. 12th 2008. I know that date because I wrote it down and I remember exactly where I was and at what time when I did. It's funny that I kept a prayer journal before I gave the Lord my heart. But I think, mostly, at the time I started I didn't know what I thought of God. I didn't know if I even believed Him to be real. Perhaps that is why I started with writing letters to Him in a book, as I believed him to be distant at best (if He really was real) and snail mail, hand written letters, seemed like the best way to get a hold of Him, as He could read them at His own pace, if He had time. He wasn't obligated to listen to me say words, or stick around listening to me make endless request as I would last minute remember to pray whilst drifting off to sleep. 

I suppose it started as an experiment. If God was real, I wanted to be able to see it. On paper. And my life would be the proof, since my life was the most real thing I could compare anything to. I didn't really know what to think of the Bible or things people said. I mean, I grew up hearing about God and I'd been told a billion times over that God was real and God was love. But as I didn't experience those things to be true in my life, I don't think I believed it in the deepest places of my heart, even though I accepted them as a truth of some sort. 

And now, more than a thousand pages of letters to God later, I would say that, with my life as proof, I am loved by the most faithful God in the universe. 

I was reading this morning in one of my journals from 2011 just a little blip of an entry that was obviously written whilst being on a retreat with my ministry and must have come after spending a little time alone with the Lord. It's dated October 1, 2011 and it simply says, 

"In the last few minutes I feel like God was telling me to abandon my pride and my dreams of......

and focus wholly on Him. He wants to be close to me too, but he can't when I build walls. He wants to give me joy and life" 

Funny how I wrote that and seemingly forgot it soon after. A year exactly to the date later, God decided it was time to tear the walls down. With wrecking ball, bulldozer, and all of His best demolition equipment on hand, my pride and my dreams were removed for me. And I have my 2012 prayer journals that write of the pain and brokenness of it all and I dare say I wrote that I didn't see it coming. 

But I have experience joy and life beyond what I could have ever imagined in the months since then. I could tell you story after story about how the Lord comforted and sang over me and quieted me with His love. 

Recently, I was interviewing a close friend for one of my final papers and since I was asking her about things that help her to stay positive, we got on the subject of how being positive coincides with being peaceful. And then it was like real life dot-to-dot game as we realized that when you are peaceful, you are also patient. And patience helps you to be gentle, and being gentle helps you to be kind, and being kind goes with being loving and love goes with goodness and, well, I think you know where I'm going with this. 

Faithfulness is one of the fruits of the Spirit. I have had discussion with friends on what fruits we need to work on more in our lives. I think I've come to realize that it doesn't quite work that way. Not one fruit of the Spirit at a time anyways. I know there are times when we've said something like, "Well, I need to be more patient" or "I need to have more self-control." But it's not like one is an apple, one is a banana and one is an orange. I think they are all the same fruit, one packed with every essential vitamin and health feature you could want. If you find that you are missing one thing, such as patience or self control, I think it best that you check your heart to make sure you are not missing or lacking in all of them. As it is, I don't think it's quite possible to have a basket full of love and kindness and totally be lacking in gentleness and goodness. 

But God is all of those things. He is never more of one and less of another. He is 100% all of the fruits 100% of the time. But, if we experienced all of him all of the time, I think we'd be so overwhelmed at the glory of it that our hearts might burst from the inside out. 

I have not always been aware of His faithfulness as I have come to be aware of His love and his patience. Learning of His faithfulness is a hard lesson to learn, actually. If you don't already know about it, I suggest you start being thankful for it now, because it takes a storm and a beating to realize it's value, it seems. It did for me anyways. How would I have known of it if I had not seen it. And how would I have seen it if I was not shaken to the very core of my being? 

Even still, I can never live in a way that will fully give Him glory or credit for how He has carried me through the fires and dressed my wounds. If I am to think of Him like the Sun and me being like the moon, made to reflect the light of the Sun and give off light where the earth is dark, I can only imagine that I am the sliver-est of crescents on many a cloudy night. But it's funny how that works, isn't it. The moon is always reflecting the Sun 100% of the time. It's just that we don't always see it. And for believers, we are bringing glory to God 100% of the time because he has already made us glorified. We just don't always see it, nor do we always realize it. I think too often we look at the clouds in our life and think that we are worthless and serve no purpose at all. What we don't know is that our lives are more significant than we'll ever know. 

But the thing about the moon, is that it stays in its place and does its thing every day whether the clouds are there or not. And we are to be as faithful as that. Always reflecting God's glory and light no matter what kind of storm might be making it difficult to see. He is the example of faithfulness for us and we are to do the same. 

And we can be assured that in His faithfulness that He who began a good work in you will carry it out to completion, until the day of Christ Jesus. And sometimes, in the process, He has to break down our walls and our towers and remake a few things just so that he can be close to us and give us life and joy. But, He is faithful. He won't stop until He is finished. 

Revelation 21:5

He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”