Failed Expectations.

I'm distracted. And I'm troubled. This morning I physically couldn't even finish my breakfast. Why? Because a relationship has failed me. It's failed me because I packed on all these expectations, an end game that wasn't healthy, and now I'm hurt by nothing the other person did, but by what I thought should happen and didn't because I'm not in control. I'm spending my time running through conversations and situations in my head that I could engage in to fix this. I backed it into a corner and now I feel obligated to fix it. Am I obligated to fix it? Probably not. Have I acted in a way that deserves reconciliation? Most likely. 

I'm reminded of Hosea and what a picture of redemption that is. I'm not sure if it's completely applicable here, but it's comforting and convicted. I am Gomer, constantly doing what I want, pursuing my own interests and ultimately failing in the process. And yet The Lord continues to chase after me. To welcome me back when I realized the error of my ways, and even when I haven't. There's no end game with Jesus. He doesn't save us because he wants to personally be responsible for the most number of people in heaven, or because he wants a lot of friends. He saves us because he loves us, and because his love is so great that it can help but turn into the action of saving. 

I am not Jesus. But shouldn't my love for Jesus turn into an all consuming and limitless love for those around me? Yes, most of the time I enter into relationships with people that way. But all too often it so quickly turns to "I'm gonna try and love this person a little extra because I have a crush on them" or "I want her to be my friend so I'm gonna be extra intentional about that one." Why do I do this to myself? It's toxic. Instead of coming out as loving I come off as overbearing and pushy. Instead of drawing people into the person of Christ I scare them away from me. I try to do it all on my own but call it the "love of Christ" or "love for my brother/sister in Christ." 

There are a lot of conversations running through my head, apologies I need to make because I'm selfish. Am I feeling compelled by Christ or compelled by myself? I'm not sure yet. I am thankful that there is grace in relationships. That there is grace in Christ. That I'm able to give myself grace for mistakes because Christ does. I'm called to abide. I'm not called to make my own story, turn my life into a you-choose-the-ending chapter book. Trust and abide. Those are hard concepts, but I will cling to them because they are truth and because I cannot fix the relationships I have soiled with my plans, but God can. 

Untitled.

"Feel the deepest longings in your soul that will never be fully satisfied until heaven. Don't be afraid of sadness. Face the hidden sin in your heart that makes it clear how undelighted you are. Don't be afraid of the brokenness. Let the pain of disappointed longings and the guilt of terrible sin drive you to consider the gospel in a new way. Only then will Christ enter your life and deeply change you from the inside out, installing in you a growing awareness of his relentless love and sustaining hope for a better day." -Larry Crab

The world is broken. Its imperfect. As humans we are broken. We are imperfect. We cause each other pain. The world causes us pain. Sin is painful. It hurts and leaves us unsatisfied. Leaves us with holes striving to be filled. But we're so immune to the pain. We shrug it off and don't allow ourselves to experience the deepness of the hurt that is actually consuming us. FEEL THE PAIN. Let the pain and the sadness and the longing drive you ever more the Christ, where on the cross he took on pain, and loneliness, and despair, and frustration. He understands it. He's been there and he wants to help because he's the answer. Until heaven he is the most satisfaction my longing soul will ever feel. No matter what I'm really searching for he will fill the void. But its okay to feel. Its okay to be sad, and angry, and lonely, and desperate, and failed because that's a product of sin. My sin and the sin of others around me. People will fail me, they will let me down, they will hurt me and make me cry. No matter how hard I try they will never completely fulfill me. Even good relationships will only be temporary and will involve moments of hurt because my soul wants more than they can give. Every piece of my brokenness, and the hurt I experience, everything should be pointing me closer and closer to the redeeming love of my savior. He fills the spaces between my broken pieces and makes me whole. Even when I feel unworthy he does this for me because no matter what I am his. I am his family and he love me. He loves me.

"So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God." -Ephesians 2:19

I am a member of the household of God. Let that sink in and hit you.

A Perpetual Love for Sunrises.

I think that I've always loved sunrises. I'm a huge morning person, and sunrises are pretty much the ultimate symbol of the morning. Mornings are still and quiet, not many people get up early enough to watch the sunrise so I've pretty much got the whole world to myself. I love that. I'm a huge introvert so having the whole world seemingly to myself is pretty darn exhilarating.

Recently I was trying to think of what made me fall in love with the sunrise so much. I've seen a lot of sunrises in a lot of different places so it was a tad difficult to pinpoint the exact one that made me love all of the others so much more. But alas, I am a persistent daughter of a gun and I found it. The funniest thing about it is this sunrise isn't even one I watched, and it represents one of the worst days of my life, but I guess that's maybe why it means so much.

This sunrise: 

Background on this - was taken in Virginia Beach on the morning of August 21, 2011. If you've been following my word vomit on this blog for a while then you'll know that is the same morning that my friend Eric passed away. I've only ever seen this picture of it, but I'm so eternally grateful to the girl that woke up literally before the sun was up to snap this amazing picture and print out hundreds of copies for all of us to have. You may never see this, Hyler, but thanks, this picture has helped to change my life.

So why is this my favorite sunrise if it's a reminder of such an awful day? It may be a reminder of an awful day, but its also a reminder of something so much sweeter - that every day, every sunrise is an incredibly gift. We're not guaranteed tomorrow, Eric taught me that, but sunrises are a breath taking way that God wakes us up in the morning and says, "Welcome to another glorious day on earth!" Much like my tattoo* its a simple but meaningful reminder that there's no reason to not live every day like the gift that it is and to live it for Christ. 

Today marks 3 years since painfully learning the lesson tomorrow isn't guaranteed. Today marks 3 years of the sting of loss and the sweet reminder of how found I am in Christ. Time doesn't heal all wounds, but it eases them, it gives them perspective and allows you to learn from them. My life is different because of this. My life is different because of sunrises. Thank the Lord for sunrises. Thank the Lord for every tomorrow.

Watching the sunrise over the lake with my some of my sweet summer staff friends, they love me so well, woke up before 5 to indulge my crazy love in sunrises (:

*Tattoo - dad knows, mom doesn't. More on what it is, the meaning behind it, and mom's reaction if she catches that in here. I think it's a great story that I can't wait to share.

Guidance Counselor in Training.

Fun thing that you'll be hearing a lot about in the next couple of months: for the next semester I'm interning with the guidance counselor at Floyd Elementary School.

So far I've been there for 4 days. Four whole days, and let me tell you - I love it. What does a guidance counselor in training do? Well funny you asked because I'm kind of an almost expert on that topic. I spent last week meeting all of the schools 30+ new students, taking their picture, and then making a poster with all their pictures, so basically I spent the week doing arts and crafts. But that's cool. I like arts and crafts. Starting next week I'll get to meet the kids that I'll be mentoring this semester, our lunch bunch groups will be starting, and I'll finally get to see what it looks like to teach a guidance class.

There's a lot to look forward to this semester, and a lot of exciting things have already happened. I left the first day of school with an official badge, a parking spot (that someone else has been parking in, but whatever I still have one), got to eat in the teacher lounge and have my own desk. Life is good. Life is exciting.

So far, so good. After these four days I'm more than ever in love with being in a school.

Sorry, I know this is incredibly bland. More details of the good, the bad, and the funny will surface as they occur. Lord knows this is going to be one heck of a journey.

Water from the Sky.

It's been raining since Friday. Today is Monday. Society tells me that I should find this depressing, that this is supposed to suck, but it doesn't. I love this. Rain is refreshing. Rain is calming. Rain is the reminder of a promise (okay, well technically its a rainbow, but the rain has always reminded me more of Noah and the flood than any rainbow will). Rain is great at making you slow down and stop all your craziness.

When I was little I told myself that when it rained that meant that God was really sad about something so he was crying a lot. Seeing all the unrest that's happening in the Middle East and Africa right now that theory could hold. If all were watching all that crap happening to my creation I'd probably cry for four days straight and counting too. But of course 6th grade science taught me that rain just means there was too much moisture accumulated in the atmosphere. Thank you 6th grade science for ruining my innocent childhood imagination.

But rain isn't sad. It brings life. In drought stricken areas people have gods that they worship that are devoted to rain. Rain is everything. Rain is life. We're all here complaining about how we can't go outside and hike and are forced to sit around and watch Netflix all day, but imagine if you lived in equatorial Africa where it hasn't rained in months? You would probably be dancing in the streets for four days straight.

Sometimes I honestly don't know where my mind goes with these things, but I do know that I'm thankful for rain. I'm thankful that it waters my garden for free, that it washes my car, that it allows me to slow down, that it cools the air, that it makes the plants for green. I'm thankful that the Lord gifted us with something as powerful and equally life giving and destructive as rain. Water from the sky.

Through a DIfferent Lens: Champion & Emily.

Champion's basically always on my mind these days. Between missing people and remembering the things I learned, not a day goes by where something about Champion doesn't make its way into my conscience. But today Champion was heavily on my mind. Today I got back the pictures from my disposable cameras and was reminded on that whirlwind and wonderful month.

Knowing well ahead of time that my bosses would be confiscating cellphones my first thought was this: go to Best Buy and get myself a DSLR camera (and basically put myself in $500 debt the night before I leave). Thanks to the ever sensible advice of my little sister/roommate I was a smart steward of my money and spend $30 on two disposable cameras rather than a spur of the moment $500+ on a fancy camera. So off to camp I went arms with a mere 56 frames to capture my 4 weeks at camp.

Things that you should know about disposable cameras:

1. Picture quality is below average at best.

2. Literally EVERY picture is a gamble. There is no way to know whether or not it will actually turn out.

3. There's a flash, but let's be real no one knows when to actually use said flash.

4. The day you finally get the pictures back is like the best and worst Christmas all wrapped into one. 

5. I was pretty confident that there would be at least one fellow summer staffer with a nice camera so my disposable venture was worth the risk.

Things I learned because of disposable cameras:

1. In 2014 people will look at you funny when you whip out a disposable or ask them to take your picture and hand them one.

2. With only 56 frames every picture really is worth a thousand words. Each one tells a specific and special story because each picture is used with a purpose (well most of the time). 

So armed with my 2 disposable cameras and ready to be a quasi-photojournalist I went. And after getting the prints back and realizing that I am - in fact - a part of the population that doesn't know how to actually used a camera, and throwing away numerous duds, I was reminded of the story behind each and everyone (even the sucky ones). 

This is the more detailed story of my time at Champion - one picture at a time. (Sorry if you're sick about hearing about Champion. But also not sorry).

This is Emily and Bridget having a chat during one of the last days she was at camp. Emily was one of our favorites. On day one she ended up in the craft shack with a fat lip from tubing and announced to us that she wasn't doing any of that crazy again the rest of the week. Thankfully for us that meant we had a new friend to hang out with the rest of the week. (The week Emily was at camp was the week crafts was the most dead so having her come around every day was such a special treat). She never wanted to make anything, she just wanted to talk. And talk we did. (I also got to chat a bunch with Emily's leader Olivia a bunch so we really got to know her special story). 

Emily was the oldest child in her family and had dropped out of high school to be the caretaker for all the babies. Olivia told me she wasn't sure how the family would even survive the week with her away. That broke my heart. But something she kept saying as she told us about all the struggles in her life was "But I know Jesus is looking out for me." 

I'll never be able to fully understand or comprehend all of Emily's situation, but to be able to watch this girl who was forced to grow up so incredibly fast enjoy herself to no end for a week with nothing on her agenda but having the best week of her life was one of the most special things I've been able to experience. To hear her say that she knew Jesus had her back gave me so much hope and put my life in to perspective. Am I really thankful for all the opportunities I have? Not really.

Thank you for humbling me, Emily, and for adding so much joy to and brightening my first week at camp. You're a star.