Dreamin'

I'm a dreamer...always thinking of the possibilities. I dream of going to far off places and doing justice. These dreams have always been frozen in my mind as simply possibilities...reality always sets in. And what does the reality revolve around? MONEY. It always comes back to money...

Now, I sit here on the brink of a summer filled with possibilities that could actually become a REALITY! It could lead me far beyond anywhere I have been before.. mentally, spiritually and emotionally. And what's stopping me? MONEY. Again.

I have a chance to either spend 10 days in Fiji building houses and serving women who have had so much taken from them, but who have so much hope to keep going. And/or I could spend 5 weeks in Peru providing medical care to families in need by both serving them and learning skills that could potentially help me on a career path.

BUT, I am and always have been a dreamer, whose ideas never come to pass. It's easy to say and hear people tell me to pray about it or to trust that God will provide...and I know there is truth in that. But when the people closest to me present the actual reality to me and therefore don't support the possibilities...what am I supposed to do?

Motions

"I don't want to go through the motions, I don't want to go one more day without your all consuming passion inside of me. I don't want to spend my whole life asking, What if if had given everything? Instead of going through the motions..."

I don't want to go through the motions....but how can I prevent this when my thoughts, my actions, and my tasks in front of me are all consumed with school and my future...and things not from God? I know that all I am doing is to fulfill the passions that God has placed in my life, but if I lose my passion for God in the midst of it...then will it all be for nothing?

Help...I need guidance. I need a way to organize my thoughts and my knowledge in the various aspects of my life that require my full attention to remind myself of my reason to be here, doing what I am. I don't want to lose sight of my Jesus, but I feel myself drifting into the motions.

Draw Me a Map...

"Draw me a map that leads me back to you
I don't know where to go, please tell me what to do
Help me find the road you're on
I just need directions home
Draw me a map that leads me back to you

You're my destiny and destination
Understand my desperation - you
The only place I wanna be
So get us back to you and me"

Dierks Bentley, thank you. Thank you for these lyrics, though I doubt they mean the same to you as they do me, they really spoke to me and accurately portray where I currently am....lost in a forest of doubt with the light of faith seen faintly through the branches. I seem to have settled there, resting by a tree of complacency shadowed with doubt. I need a map that leads me back to the road I was on, back to my journey walking side-by-side with the one who saves and provides an everlasting companionship. Why can't I see? How have I suddenly forgotten how to move?

This post may be confusing with the overflow of analogical information, but hey, it's true. It's not like anyone reads this anyway...guess I'm safe.

To know and be known...

This passed thanksgiving weekend, my family and I watched a number of Christmas movies. Though I still haven't caught the Christmas spirit, I was completely delighted to just chill. Anyways, we watched White Christmas which I would argue is one of the best, if not the best, Christmas movie of all time. Though made in the 50s, it is timeless. The superb dance numbers coupled with fanntastic music and an overall homey feeling make this movie one of the best. We recently got the special anniversary edition complete with a commentary by Rosemary Clooney as well as a number of behind the scenes stories.

What really struck me though were the individual segments of the back stories of Rosemary Clooney, Bing Crosby, and Danny Kaye. They interviewed friends and family members to tell the real aspects of their lives. Immediately my view of them had changed, for the better. Rosemary Clooney had a quaint house in Kentucky overlooking a river which she used as a peaceful escape from the craziness of Hollywood. Bing Crosby had a heart for soldiers overseas, giving out free records to soldiers and donating millions of dollars to the war effort. And Danny Kaye, the goofball that he was, dedicated much of his life to the UNICEF movement, relating to children around the world through comedy and fun that went beyond any language barriers. Think Angelina Jolie and other present-day celebs are "do-gooders"? Well this guy was the original celebrity humanitarian.

I know what you're thinking, so these people had lives, big deal. What does that have to do with anything? My point is this, they had lives and it has everything to do with anything. You see, until I watched these bonus features, the only image I had of these actors was what I saw in the film. For all I knew, they were just the characters in the movie who randomly broke out in song (which I wish happened more often in life). But now, I know that they each had a story to be told, and I feel like I have a piece of their legacy, a piece of them now in my memory and a part of my existence.

Everybody has a story. Celebrities, the person sitting next to you at the coffee shop or walking passed you at school, they all have a story. I feel like I am so often caught up in my own story that I fail to find others' stories. But, I think learning other people's stories is the best way to get passed our own previous conceptions of them and move into their truth. And in that process, we are able to love more freely.

My mind is full right now as I try to wrap my head around the fact that there are 6 billion people on the planet, each with their own story to tell. And each of their stories are intertwined with hundreds if not thousands of others, creating this web that is the world. People's stories also connect the past, present and future to create this beautiful story of the existence of the world, a story that is written by God. One that is not constrained by limits of time, but just is. Now my mind is lost out there, somewhere trying to see the big picture which my brain will never have the capacity to know and understand. I'm rambling I know, but just make an effort to know people, I mean really know them, before it's too late.

Awkwardly Associated Affairs...

Do you ever have a random occurence of memories? Like something triggers something in your mind to race back in time to relive a specific moment. The trigger could be a smell, a sound, or even a place. Regardless of what initiates it, the result is the same: full momentary immersion in the past, either good or bad.



I had a moment like this last Friday while listening to the Phil Wickham sing-along CD; the song...Beautiful. No really, not only is the song beautiful, but that's the name of it too ;) I don't know why but this song brought me back to last year. Ironically, it wasn't Easter, which I would have thought because last Easter was truly spectacular. (If you didn't know, it was baptism Sunday where two lovely friends, Aubrie and Trinity, were baptised. They played two of my favorite Phil songs and beautiful was one of them. It had been the first time in a long time previoiusly that I had truly experienced God's peace and joy). Anyways, I was not brought back to that, nor was I brought back to long car rides with Jesus, at least not initially. No, I was immediately surrounded by a specific smell, I think it was a sugar cookie candle (or some other candle), the smell of my apartment last year. I think this song reminded me of the apartment because I had gotten in the habit last year of taking study breaks to dance around my apartment, and this song as beautiful as it is aloud me to truly destress as I moved around the living room.

Sadly, however, this brief moment of peaceful reminiscence was quickly overshadowed by the memory of the silent suffering that plagued my existence last year. I was reminded of how quickly fear, doubt, and insecurity can consume my thoughts. The minute I start thinking that way is the minute that negative thoughts start popping up at an exponential rate.

Now, I am going to use a Harry Potter analogy (because that has been the world I've been lost in for the passed week). So, if you are anti-Potter feel free to skip this paragraph. Anyways, in the 5th book, Harry starts having dreams that connect him to the bad guy Voldemort. At first, he is scared of them, not knowing what they are. However, soon he starts not only accepting these negative visions, but believing they are true. It even gets to the point where Voldemort uses these negative thoughts to trick Harry and ultimately consume him. It is not until Harry gathers up the strength to remember the positive moments in life that he can finally cast our Voldemort's thoughts. See video below (towards the middle) to see Harry being possessed....



My point is, without the restoration that Christ has brought me through recent months, I would still fall victim to the all-consuming thoughts of insignificance. I'm not saying that I have happy, positive thoughts all the time, but I am just seeing the growth that has taken place in my life since last Winter. Life's still a struggle (in the words of Miley Cyrus "Life's a climb" haha) but to have peace through it all, that's what God has changed within me.

Now, my only fear is that this peace has brought complacency. Or worse, that is has simply buried my doubt deeper, just waiting to come back. But all I know is that I need not worry about that, for I have Jesus on my side to forever be my hope and strength. It may sound cliche, but I don't care. It's the truth, simple as that.



Peace :)

Restoration :)

So I'm in a very contemplative mood right now....don't know why, maybe it's my choice of music this morning or my state of existence at the moment. Nevertheless, right now I choose to skip out on exercise physiology class and just write.

So I've been thinking a lot about the past and how I ended up here, how we all ended up to where we are now. Have you ever heard the saying "the more things change, the more they stay the same" ? Well, I think that saying accurately describes this world and every life in it. We are always changing, our situations in life are always changing, our thoughts are always changing...which is why things are the same with change. Change is constantly among us, which is why it is the norm in life. Think about it, when your life feels stagnant, how much more do you desire that change? We don't know what to do with complacency because it's not normal in our lives to stay in the same place, the same state for more than a brief period. At the same time, however, the thought of change scares the crap out of us, especially when we finally find a place that we actually want to stay.

So, I want to propose a different word for change, one which seems to have a more positive connotation to it. The word is: TRANSITION. Change comes with that negative connotation of fear, whereas a transition implies that you will be better as a result of you changing circumstances. Life's transitions are what keep me going (see James 1 or Romans 5 or Hebrews 12 for my reasons). I know that each transition in my life, however hard it may be, is for the development of my character.

I attended a worship service to kick of 24-hour prayer at ASU and a line in one of the songs was "You are my restoration". "You" being Jesus, if you didn't know. And overcome my a moment of shear happiness and realization, I fell to my seat just laughing. Yeah I know, not your usual response during worship, but it's totally justifiable. Consider this analogy (oh how I love analogies!):

In exercise physiology (yes even though I am missing class today, I can make it up with this analogy), I learned about the role of satellite cells in the muscle. See, when we excercise (mainly strength training and lifting weights) there are little tears that occur within the muscle. These tears are necessary for muscle hypertrophy (aka bigger biceps). This accounts for part of the soreness you feel after working out. Now, here is where the satellite cells come in, they are the cells that go to the tears in the muscle and restore them to health. Do you get where I'm going with this now? JESUS is our SATELLITE CELL! How cool is that?

So in life, we break. We fall down as we work so hard to get through life. But you know what? Jesus comes in to restore those tears we accumulate along the way. The beauty of satellite cells is that they not only restore you, but your muscle grows because of it. Therefore, though the soreness may suck, you get the desired result afterwards. Yeah, our struggles in life may suck, but we grow from that transition and will ultimately be so much better off because of it.

So work out today, literally or figuratively, and let our satellite restore you through your transition, whatever it may be at the moment in your life.

Finally, let's open ourselves up for restoration not only in our own bodies, but in the body of Christ as well. Let us unite through Christ and not let turmoil tear us apart. That is all for now. I just want to encourage you to accept restoration through your current transitions in life.

Peace :)

Two Decades...

Looking back...

I turned the big 2-0 on Friday (for those of you who couldn't catch my incredibly clever use of language, that means I am now 20 years old). Now on that day, a nice bank teller kindly reminded me that 20 years is 2 DECADES! Think about it, we learn history in terms of decades...the 60s, 70s, and 80s are all separated as decades. you see, it's easy to think of decades when you didn't live through them, it's easy to string them together in an unfamiliar array of time with inaccurate perceptions of how much time a decade is. However, when I think about where I was a decade ago, I was calling my self "a double-digit midget." I was fascinated by the fact that I was now able to write 2 digits down for my age, something that I know will be doing for 80 more years, so it seems like nothing special, but in my 10-yr old head, it was the pinnacle point of my existence.

So, my turning two decades old has brought me to reflection mode. The last two decades of my life have brought the most exponential change and growth that I will ever experience in my life. The last decade alone consisted of so much personal growth and maturity that I will never again be able to say I had. I not only matured physically, but emotionally and intelligence-wise as well. Granted, I spent my 20th birthday at a park playing on swings and springy animals, which may or may not show some kind of maturity haha. Still, my point is, that I am no longer the person I was a decade ago, nor will I be the person I am currently even tomorrow. Life is a journey filled with constant change, that is for certain. We are constantly being shaped, molded into the person that we will be, but that "person" will never be the same for long.

Sorry that was a tangent, kinda.

Anyways all this reflecting led me to the thought of my birth. Which led me to think of the events that preceded my birth. A couple months into my mom's pregnancy with me, she had a miscarriage, but somehow I was still there. I had survived while potential twin sister or brother had not. But why? Why me? Why should I have the privilege to live on this earth breathing its air and seeing all the beauty it has to offer? Even now, as unforseen tears roll down my face, I feel so unworthy , so guilty. What have I done with this life I have been so preciously given? What good is this gift if I am not living it to fullest for my creator, the one who literally CHOSE me?

Psalm 139:13-18
"For you created my inmost being,
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
Were I to count them they would outnumber the grains of sand.
When I awake, I am still with you."

He knit me, he made me, he knew me, he knows me, he thinks of me, he chose me, he LOVES me...

I am immensely humbled by all of this. My life is not my own, it belongs to my creator, my savior, and my one true love. Oh how easily my life could not have been; how easily could my position have been switched with my unborn sibling. My heart is filled with gratitude. Though my purpose in this life has yet to be revealed, I do not doubt its existence or the fact that it will come to pass.

Lord,
May you use me and this life you've given me. May I seek you first and give you all the glory. May every beat of my heart, every breath in my lungs be dedicated to you. May I not waste this mist of a life that will eventually vanish.

"Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way of everlasting."

This is my prayer, from now until my dying breath. I am entirely in your hands.

Amen.