I find it a little telling that I am anticipating some sort of disaster or heartbreak. My life right now feels peaceful. Which makes me nervous. I have become so accustom to the battlefield that I feel out of place   when I'm not 'surviving'. I feel like I am just waiting for my car to break down or some ailment to strike me.  Jeremiah 29:11 just seemed to manifest differently in my life. I felt that the 'fire' i endured would be my blessing and this side of heaven I wouldn't really get to understand it. The part that is hardest for me to wrap my mind around is that I haven't been praying lately, or reading my Bible. Is this just the enemy keeping me luke warm? My friend the other day said to me, "Christians don't think it's from God unless they are totally suffering or don't want to it." I laughed cause it is so true in my own world. I miss my time in the word and journaling to the Lord, but I still haven't been able to define what "relationship" means between Jesus and I. What does He want out of it? Otherwise aren't we then only pursuing in vain. Pray for me to have understanding, because I miss Him.

I will become what I desire....

"I have been worrying that we all live our lives in the confines of fear."

What if my father had told me as a young girl that I was beautiful? Who would I be if my mother held me without fear or restraint? Who would she be if her mom had touched her face gently and told her she could be anything? These pathways that have carved their ways into our brains and stubbornly they refuse to relent of fear. I listen to this song and I want to dance wildly around the room and fight for the freedom from the thoughts that press down and keep small. I want to desire MORE! I want more than the daily grind, my insecurities, the finite of my faith and the obsession with fading beauty. Apathy has become America's coping mechanism to avoid all things scary and worthy! The little girl I once was use to be so on fire for life and what it might unfold into. I was broken, like most of us. My parents became human and disappointed me like inevitably they would.  I realized that nothing in and of this world would be "enough", which was a reality I was never going to be prepared for. The rubber met the road and my hope in Jesus had to be the "all" i was needing. 

I have been worrying that I am living in the confines of fear.

I'm afraid of failure, I'm afraid of loneliness, I'm afraid of vulnerability and I'm afraid of my desires. 

I'm terrified of not breaking out of my fear and being who I was created to be apart from the sin of man and my own weakness. This may not necessarily look extreme on the outside, but within I want the storm to leave nothing untouched. I pray that it manifests into my world and others notice a change. 

I have felt so loved by the Lord lately. I know that feelings are not necessarily indicators of truth and as with any relationship there are highs and lows, but I am basking in this season of warmth.  Many of my friends and family are struggling through some pretty dark times and I am just so grateful that I can be available to them and not stuck within my own sorrow. One of my favorite quotes sings, "I know that I am filled to be emptied again, the seed I received I will sow", and I feel as though the Lord is giving me a season of peace to sow His love and light into others. What a blessing. There has been a long winter in my life and I feel the ice beginning to thaw. I love my new job, I have found peace in my singleness, and I'm excited for what the future holds.
I'm currently walking through a separation between one of my friends and her husband and it has been a not so subtle reminder of my own dissolution of marriage. The grace of God is the gift of time that allows for those wounds to heal and fade, but lately the memory has felt more than close. I remember laying on my bed soaked in sweat and tears, surrounded by my closest friends and Melly wrapped herself around my fetal positioned body whispering over and over in my ear....this will not be your story. I didn't believe her at the time, because the pain was so palpable, but she was right. God is faithful to redeem and restore and even bless. I am so thankful to Jesus and those that loved me in His name, for baring the burden with me; during a time that felts so hopeless. I want to give this same gift back to as many as I can. So, how can I pray for you? What can I believe for you when you can't believe? What truth about yourself have you forgotten that you need someone to call you daily and remind you of? It would be my honor to love as I have been loved. After all we are the body of Christ and when one member of the body is weak is it not the job of the rest of the body to pick up the load until full healing is reached. If you are one of those who is in a season of summer then I implore you to be available, be sacrificial and in humility love as you have been loved. I'm adding to my prayer from my last post....I not only pray that I will love the Lord with all of my heart and all of my life, but that I will also love others in His name. How funny that 31 years of life and it took me that long to start understanding the greatest commandment. Every day I am in awe of the simplicity and equally the complexity of my God......oh how I love Him!

He loves you.....

"When He heard therefore that he was sick, He abode two days still in the same place where He was." (John 11:6)

In the forefront of this marvelous chapter stands the affirmation, "Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazurus," as if to teach us that at the very heart and foundation of all God's dealings with us, however dark and mysterious they may be, we must dare to believe in and assert the infinite, unmerited, and unchanging love of God. Love permits pain. The sisters never doubted that He would speed at all hazards and stay their brother from death, but, "When he had heard therefore that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was."

What a startling "therefore"! He abstained from going, not because He did not love them, but because He did love them. his love alone kept Him back from hasting at once to the dear and stricken home. Anything less than infinite love must have rushed instantly to the relief of those loved and troubled hearts, to stay their grief and to have the luxury of wiping and stanching their tears and causing sorrow and sighing to flee away. Devine love could alone hold back the impetuosity of the Savior's tender heartedness until the angel of pain had done her work. 

"Who can estimate how much we owe to suffering and pain? But for them we should have little scope for many of the chief virtues of the Christian life. Where was faith, without trial to test it; or patience, without nothing to bear; or experience without tribulation to develop it? -streams in the desert

As I grow older and further away from the magic of innocence and naivety my heart longs to reconcile God' love to the incredible amount of sorrow I see each day. I struggle with finding the purpose of my prayers when they seem to go unheard and unanswered. My small brain and little faith cannot grasp God's plan or His love in it. I hadn't thought of the discipline it must take to "abode longer". We being evil give good gifts to our children so how much more the heavenly father gives good gifts. I know as a friend I want to rescue, save, heal and spare and I just can't imagine the restraint our Father must have to hold back and allow the pain to do it's work. I once heard a pastor say that the thing he was thankful for that thanksgiving was a strong heart. Tears just flooded my eyes because I knew how much he had endured and suffered and so the richness of his gratitude was priceless. I'm thankful for the strong heart that the Lord has given me, and the vastness of His love. I pray to the Lord that whatever His will be that He would grant me the mercy to love Him all the days of my life, with all of my heart. I pray this for you too friends who are struggling to understand why He 'therefore'  abodes. He loves you.