An Update

Nebraska’s skies are bright and blue, with cotton-like clouds scattered across a vast stretch of emptiness. There’s a peaceful stillness to the air here. Throughout the day, a mama bird flutters to and from her nest buried behind the gutters of our garage. The wind gives the curtains a gentle, steady rustle. And every so often, the sound of car driving by drifts through the ever-open window.

East First Street has been home for 3 weeks now. The gray-blue house with white windows and doors is slowly becoming ‘our place’. There are seeds planted along the front porch garden box, tomato plants growing in the backyard, and an herb garden on the kitchen window. We’ve baked cookies, forgotten house keys, washed the sheets, and broken a glass or two in our efforts to turn a house into a home.

Life is good. It is an extreme sort of different for this born-and-raised city girl, and I am reminded of that difference every time the northern wind brings the smell of the feed yard into my house, or the woman at the grocery store knows my name, or I can literally get anywhere in less than 5 minutes. But it is good. 

We are adjusting to life as we learn this unfamiliar dance called marriage. There are days we find ourselves lost in the bliss of doing life together, something so simple yet so beautiful. Other days we find ourselves overwhelmed by a future riddled with countless unknowns, desperate for time and answers we don’t quite have. Some days we stand bold and confident, excited to embark on the adventure He has laid out before us. And at other times, we falter and we fear and we shake, questioning just how exactly this is going to work. 

We find ourselves riding a roller coaster of emotions—excited, terrified, confident, unsure, homesick, wonder-filled, frustrated, joyful. Life comes in waves. But it is good, always so good. And God proves Himself faithful again and again, in both the little and the big ways. And we find Him bigger and stronger and mightier than our fickle hearts.

There are lots of plans happening and many changes in the works (one of which includes a new blog). So don’t stray too far, because we are excited to share this journey and all that God is up to.

Unending Change

January comes with snowy mornings and pale sunshine. Its gray skies and ice cold days leaving the fireflies and grass-y smell of summer a memory. The new year has been laced with memories of, “Remember a year ago…” 

C.S. Lewis once wrote, “Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, everything is different?” 

Amidst the wedding planning and the nannying days, the way those words resound in my heart is taken to whole new meaning. So much has changed in such short time. Hard maybe, but never bad. Exciting, yes, alongside challenging and stretching. I don't know that one can transition from one season to the next without using the word, “Bittersweet.” 

New cannot come without the old dying. Anticipation of tomorrow does not stand without some sort of goodbye to today. Every possible dream for the future is weaved with excitement, but threaded through the past is a sadness of sorts for something that is ending. 

Change is good. But change is hard. 

I have these conflicting desires. On one hand rests a desire for everything to always be new and different and exciting, for things to constantly be changing. On the other hand, I find myself with a want for the comfort of stability, the constant that comes with routine, the certainty that one can have when things stay the same. 

January turned the corner and I suddenly saw 2016 as the year of changes. Finishing my nannying job, a day-to-day living of life with a family which feels too intimate to be called a job. Marrying the man whose name makes me smile, whose gentle kindness melts me, and who gives the best hugs. Moving across states from the city to a small town, taking his last name and being known as his wife. Leaving the only home he’s known, boxing our few belongings, and leaving the States behind to fly to Haiti.

Every time the leaves change on the treetops, so will our lives. The thought is a bit daunting.

I think the fear is normal, maybe even necessary. Change and fear have this beautiful way of reminding me where I should put my hope. The seasons always change. Our lives cannot remain exactly as they are today. There is a time for everything under the sun, as the author of Ecclesiastes wrote. 

In the year of change and inconsistency and newness comes this whispering, “Embrace..” 

Embrace this, child. Embrace every single change through every single season. Because you know the One who does not change.

safety of the heart

It’s hard to tell which is louder—the pound of my feet on the pavement, or the pound of thoughts in my mind. It’s Tuesday morning and the light is early and golden. Busy cars drive their routes to work. The occasional walker hastily makes their way to the train stop. Tuesday is waking up to the world.  

A blogger I love recently wrote an article regarding the expression “Time heals all wounds.” In it he writes, “Once we reach a certain age, we learn that the healing of the physical wound is not the same thing as being returned to one’s original state of being. [It] does not equal “happily ever after.”

I’ve been waiting for time to make things as they once were. But ‘once were’ is gone the way yesterday is: remembered and cherished, but never held again.

I miss yesterday. The tin roof and thunderous rain. His crooked teeth and big brown eyes. Rice upon rice upon rice. Jolly phonics. Nighttime games with the rats in my ceiling. Cold showers and hot drinking water. Bugs and dirt mixed with sweat and tears, but a joy that runs deeper, a love that stands stronger, a purpose that stretches farther. 

Yesterday became a part of me in a way I never initially wanted. Today is wonderful, filled with such happy and exciting things. A family I love. A job with a little boy I adore. A fiancé who has been every bit kind and patient and loving (and who I’m crazy about). Words cannot capture the way I love today, or how thankful I am. But yesterday’s wounds will never mend me the same. 

And I’ve become the girl on a run who no longer knows how to trust her God with tomorrow.

I’ve learned to not expect safe from the Christian life in physical terms—ebola in Africa, sketchy boda rides, riots blocking roads, voodoo drums. Recently, however, I’ve realized I also cannot expect safety of the heart. Looking at the life of Jesus, I should expect just the opposite: weeping at Lazarus’s tomb, anguish in the garden, tears over Jerusalem.

My God is well acquainted with the sorrow.

Tomorrow is something I’m struggling to leave at His feet. In the midst of that though, I take comfort in the words of Job: “For He wounds, but He also binds up; He injures, but His hands also mend.” 

He cannot mend tomorrow what I haven’t surrendered today. The words of C.S. Lewis come to mind as I make my way to this thing called surrender.

“Safe?” said Mr. Beaver. “Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he is good. He’s the king I tell you.”

He is good, friend. Let us never forget that.

beautiful nevers

The page has sat blank before my eyes for nearly an hour. My coffee has long gone cold. The sun that was hidden when I first sat down has now brought light to the morning. I just feel like the words should be eloquent. When you had 90 days upon 90 days, what do you say when you're down to the final 8? You could never imagine the story, but you definitely did not imagine this.

As it is with the ending of one season and the beginning of a new, you find yourself looking back. A lot. And replaying the moments in your mind from the very beginning.

There's the day they took in the girl whose last name they didn't even know. The day you taught that class for the very first time. There's the day you decided you were going back. There's the days you realized motherhood is the single most demanding job to exist. Ever. And somehow, you miss those crazy days. The day he grasped a toy and laughed to no end is forever burned upon your memory. There's the day he was carried from the poor house to the nursing home and this. is. love. You've seen an empty building brought to life. There's the season your heart was literally torn in two. And then.. then there's the day that make all the bad ones worth it. There's the day he stood tall.

Looking back, I said a lot of never's. I could never go overseas. I would never be able to leave my family for 6 months. I could never do special needs. I would never love a dark and desperate country 2 hours from the coast of Florida. I would never understand Creole (ok, that' still a work in progress). I could never be a teacher. I would never meet a guy I wanted to date. I could never be a nanny. I could never… never… never…

I marvel at the way He has taken my never's, and turned them beautiful.

By now you would think I would learn not to have never's. But I am stubborn Israel and I've forgotten. Still He proves relentless. His grace is limitless and His mercy great. And I stand thankful.

Some moments are too sacred for keyboards and blogposts. And these final days in Limbe are just that. You've followed the journey from its very beginning, and it is far from over. But the next week I want to remember with ink on journal pages and quiet coffee mornings, waiting for the sun. The last 5 weeks have been a struggle of messy and heartache. But I can also say it has been absolutely beautiful. Never have I been more tested to trust He holds our every moment. And never have I walked away more confident in His goodness.

He has ordained it -all of it- from the very beginning.

May it always be so.

being enough

The transitions are finally over. That's what I told myself 3 months ago as I packed away my Haitian life in totes to be stored until the new year. Routine happened, and I settled into her ways gladly. Somehow rats in the kitchen and screaming children and constantly smelling of pee and dirty sneakers became... well, strangely normal. And I could see myself in that crazy class, with those sensory-play afternoons, and the dirt and the joy and the hard for some time to come. I started to plan on it. After an adventurous journey out, I landed on American soil, thankful to be back in the country of hot running water and laundry that actually gets cleaned. Ready for a break, yet comforted to know my return tickets were booked. 

The past 3 years of my life have been new places, changes, unknowns, plane tickets, packing and unpacking and repacking the one thing that has remained constant-- my trusty green duffel. It's had its joys as well as challenges, its thrilling adventure alongside complete fear, immense heartache and laugh-until-you-cry memories. And I would do nothing differently. 

It started as an 18-year-old in love with the adventure of Uganda, and overtime grew to be what it was always meant to be: the adventure of loving Him. As I have transitioned to loving Him, rather than the places or the people or the cultures He brings me to, I have discovered something greater and far more precious than any country or language-- His heart. 

"Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart..." I like to think this means be a good person, do all the right things, live the right way, and God gives you what you want. The past three months have taught me that it's anything but. I'm learning to live out this verse, to find my sole delight in God Himself. And I'm watching -as my heart desires only Him- how that changes the longings of my heart. No longer do I ache for countries and cultures and plane rides the way I ache for Him. Yes, I love packed bags and hot climates and the blur of foreign languages. I think I always will. But because I love Him more, I long more for what He wants.

In March I start a job as a full-time nanny for a most incredible family in the northwest suburbs of Chicago. There truly is no way to capture the immense bittersweetness of this season. But God has made it all so evident that this is what He has next. I am head-over-heels for this sweet boy and his family, and so beyond-words excited for what the next year brings. However the weight of these too-soon looming goodbyes is a constant weight that laces every moment. 

"You are enough for me..." I've whispered it walking through Bugiri hospitals where babies lay starved and toddlers burned. "You are enough for me..." I whispered it when she died, when special needs was overwhelming terrifying, when I was blinded by tears of homesickness. "You are enough for me.." I whispered it when I wanted to escape a small, suffocating island in the Caribbean, when rats ate crackers in my bedroom, when the classroom got crazy and I doubted morning would come. 

Now I need to learn to whisper it in the land where there is enough- where the electric stays on all night and comfort poses threat on my soul. You are enough for me. Always. 

There are ways in which this decision seems absolutely crazy and ways in which it seems absolutely perfect. My steps will tread in peace, because I know this is what He has planned next. And "next" is all I ever need to know. For when have I ever seen anything but good come from His hands? It's not heartbreak free, nor is it comfortable or easy. Most days, I want to run... but in the core of me I know: it is always good. 

And so I will stand in the land of because He says so. And I will choose to believe His goodness will never fail us.

When You're Buying The Bread Alone

or: the One who can feed the multitudes

I can feel his desperation as he surveys the crowd before him. The air is heavy with it. It's midday, and the nearest store is miles away. The hopelessness sinks in deep as he looks down at his hands, seeing how little he has to offer. His voice is thin, cracking at every word, "How far will it go among so many?" He stands there. Completely broken. Completely overwhelmed. I know it because I, too, have stood there.

The crowd is dauntingly large and the afternoon sun scorches everything it lands on. The crowd is murmuring, growing restless from the exhaustion and the heat. Feet scuffle and the unrest grows as the young ones cry out and the whispers mound. They hear his voice amidst the low rumble of the crowd.  "Where will we buy the bread?" At a loss for words, the air grows silent. They look on, dumbfounded. How can it be the One who knows all and holds all is asking the question? He had all the answers until now.

Moments pass. His question hangs there, suspended in mid-air. Even if bread could be found, and enough bread at that, how could they even buy it all? "Eight months wages would not buy enough for each one to have a bite!" The direness of the situation is not lost on any one of them. There is no denying it: they are desperate. The need here is greater than any person could fill. He steps forward, outstretched hands trembling. But he gives all he has-- 5 loaves, 2 fish. And his mustard-sized seed of hope.

"How far will it go among so many???"

The question haunts me, eating me away piece by piece. I know Andrew's doubt. I can taste the despair on the back of my tongue and feel it in my very bones. In a country where the need is so great, I look at what my outstretched hands have to offer. And I want to run, abandoning hope with every step.. because how can one girl living in the small town of Limbe help the multitudes? Really? The realization is backbreaking, the sense of defeat leaving me a crumpled mess on the floor. There is so much need just within these four walls, much less the roads you walk outside of here. Anything you may do literally makes you feel as though you are emptying the ocean with an eyedropper. It's never enough.

There is one who reaffirms my every doubt, and thrives on my feelings of inadequacy and regret. He tells me over and over again what logically cannot be accomplished. He makes certain I know that what I have to offer is not as good as the next guy's, so why even bother? He reaffirms my greatest fear, saying it's all been in vain- all the spelling words and the afternoons spent doing sensory play and stopping by the nursing home; the life I left in Chicago. Paralyzed by the overwhelming situation, I fall prey to his lies more times than I'd care to admit.

Yet still, there is One who speaks, and at His voice all falls silent. It's in the silence that I remember, and only there can I hear Him, "I never asked you to buy the bread alone, love." 

Oh, how quick I am to forget. 

What I have given can never reach to the ends of the crowd; it will hardly make it past the first small handful of people. But that's when I remember: I didn't give it to the crowd. I gave it to the One who turns water into wine and fills the nets with fish until they overflow and feeds the multitudes on 5 loaves and 2 fish. With eyes fixed not on the crowd, but on my sweet, ever-loving Jesus, I've entrusted to Him all that I have to offer. And only He is the one who can make it enough.

Throughout my life, I have been blessed with the opportunity to watch Him feed the multitudes again and again. And the past few months have been no exception. I have watched the ones around me take all that they have and all that they are, and offer it to the One who provides, the One whose steadfast faithfulness remains true from generation to generation. Their trust and humility and servant-hearted attitudes are nothing less than humbling and inspiring to stand in the midst of, stirring those who witness it to a deeper level of child-like faith. 

I don't know where you're finding yourself today. Maybe you've walked faithfully for years, with your eyes gazed solely on the One who can do infinitely more than we ever dare dream of. Or perhaps.. maybe just perhaps, I'm not standing alone here tonight, surveying the multitudes and the bread loaves in my hands? There's a lot I don't know, but this I'm certain of: I've spent too much time paralyzed by the crowds. I know not what the future holds, but I know Who I want to spend it gazing at.

"How far can it go among so many?" It falls on my ears again, the very same question. Only this time, the voice is strong, bold, full of expectant hope. Because this time, his eyes are not on the crowd. This time, he gazes right into the eyes of the One who can. And he knows he stands on holy ground.