In wandering, there is blessing.

We all go through periods of wandering, and in regards to faith, it might be something we feel as though we know a little too well. It comes at different times, and we usually try to avoid it like the plague, but inevitably, wandering happens because life happens.

Life happened for me in these last six months. I had been seeking the Lord with all that I was for quite awhile, but when my plans still weren't panning out, when my circumstances still seemed like one question mark after the other, I became directionless and quite frankly, exhausted.

So often, my relationship with the Lord is based off feelings. It is one of the trickiest traps we can fall into. But I fell and I fell hard, and even though I was trying to seek Him throughout those dry months of summer, I wasn't feeling Him so I continued to wrestle with Him.

Two weeks ago, though, Jesus performed the most tangible act of grace that my young faith has yet to experience. It not only flipped the flickering switch of my heart back on, but also reminded me of how phenomenal and real our God is.

I prayed that Saturday morning after I found out I didn't have to work, telling Jesus that I didn't know where we were currently at. I told Him I needed to be refreshed in a new way, in a way that would wake me up and remind me of His goodness and His realness. He takes me on this hike that tons of Jessup students went on, and brings me head on into a situation where nothing but His power, His knowledge, and His peace could have brought me through.

My lifeguard training was suddenly being put to use, to care for a stranger that had gone down a steep waterfall, completely slicing both his forehead open as well as the right side of his stomach. He was in pain, he was bleeding profusely, and for two hours I was the primary responder that had to anticipate what was going to happen next. I was going for a day of sunshine and friends, but instead I was at the bottom of a canyon, potentially holding a man's life in my own two hands.

You're told in training that adrenaline kicks in; you might get really shaky, you might panic, you might have an emotional breakdown during and after. These things never came into full fruition for me though. Jesus kept me calm throughout all of it; weirdly calm. I have never been in an emergency situation period, much less been the person controlling one. Yet I knew exactly what I needed to do, even though I had only been trained months earlier. I had the confidence to stick with my gut when others tried to call the shots, I had the empathy to be with that man with my words, keeping him stable, talking with him to distract him from the pain. I had all of those things though, because of the Holy Spirit's divine power in me. It is the craziest thing that has ever happened in my life, and I can't stress enough the timing of it in relation to my walk with the Lord and the way He used that day to glorify Him.

He showed me His realness that day. He proved to me, even though He doesn't have to and shouldn't need to, that He is here and He is living and He is intricately involved in my life. In all of our lives.

That's grace, you guys. That is phenomenal, divine grace. Jesus put me in a situation that He had been preparing me for since I got that job, knowing I'd be there that day, knowing I'd be in a time of wandering with Him, knowing that it would wake me back up and ultimately bring Him every ounce of the glory.


It blows my mind all over again to write it out, even though I have processed that day out loud already so many times.

I know this is a novel, but I encourage you; let wandering bring you to the feet of the living Jesus, and be ready for that moment in which He reveals the work He has been doing in midst of our humanness and unawareness.

PS, look at the poem I wrote on the entry for Sept. 3. This all happened the next day. Jesus is so real.

There is nothing like a beautiful, Friday afternoon to yourself. I came back today to an empty apartment, which normally I wouldn't like, but for a few hours tonight, it was so perfect, and so needed. I put on my sweats, whipped out ingredients for this delicious toasted barley salad with caramelized corn, zucchini, and tomato, and listened to the lovely music of Bon Iver. The window was cracked in the kitchen, sun pouring in, and the slight breeze was enough to make my soul overflow from happiness.

The salad was even more flavorful than I could have imagined. All the produce was seasonal, fresh, and organic, thanks to the amazing Living Social deal I scored. (I got $20 worth of Whole Foods groceries for only $10! Did anyone else get it? It was practically a steal.)

I used red corn and yellow corn, and summer squash along with the zucchini. The dressing makes the salad-- lemon juice emulsified by olive oil, with pepper, fresh basil, and garlic. Honestly to die for. I paired the salad with organic chicken breasts seasoned with lemon pepper, black pepper, lemon juice, and some dry basil. It was the perfect combination and made for a very fulfilling, satisfying meal.

In a perfect world, I would have an actual camera to take an actual picture that could actually display the detail and colors of the meal, but until money grows on trees, I will continue to use my phone. (Which kills me by the way, really kills me).

I'll be heading home after work tomorrow to get in some productivity alongside some relaxation, so rest-assured, I will be posting again very soon!

Happy weekend!

Together, we are a struggle and a Victory
a battlefield and a Shelter
a question and an Answer.
You’re consistent and I’m consistent
and sometimes that makes our
relationship hard.

I love You but can’t always show it
don’t always show it
won’t always show it
yet somehow You are able to love me back
unconditionally
fervently...
painfully.


I don’t know why You do it.
Why do You keep doing it?
Sometimes I wish You wouldn’t
because the fact that You will always be here
just always, forever, be here,
can be hard to understand
especially when it’s true.

It makes zero sense
when I know the pages of my heart
are riddled with black spots and tears
and big gaping holes that at times seem impossible
to fill.

It’s just that its thirsty for something
but doesn’t know how to quench it;
so it grabs onto everything but You
and is surprised when it doesn’t fulfill.
It should know better by now,
but the missing piece remains
and its directionless
body is leaving a stain.

I don’t really get You sometimes
I hope it’s okay that I may never get it
but I want to trust enough to know that
You are real and You are good
and dryness is okay because dryness is life.

You aren’t in the business of substituting
trials for joy
dead fruit for new fruit
patience for deliverance;
no, Your goal is to work with me through it
wrestle alongside of me
push me to believe in You,
because You believe in me.

Loving You is hard and not feeling You harder
because all I really want is
to talk with You for hours
and hear You say my name
and be hugged when I cry
and gently pushed when I’m scared
but since Your love calls me to faith
I will try to understand that
by choosing to do life with You.
One day those things will be true
and never again
will Love
be something that is
hard
or confusing
or questioned
but rather
natural
and instinctive
and perfected.

Perfected.

I will wait for You there, Jesus.

 

Hello my dear friends!

I realize I'm sneaking this post in last-minute, (and by that, I mean right before the month ends) but that seems to be my pattern anyway.

Hopefully that habit will be changing soon, though, because I have much more serious goals concerning my blogging life!

As most of you know, throughout this last year I have really begun pinning down where my passions lie, and what that means as I start pursuing a career for after college. Writing has always been a strong-suit for me, yet after doing Journalism pretty seriously in high-school, I thought I had closed the door on that part of my "writing journey." I started this blog about a year-and-a-half ago, mostly for fun, but since then I have seen and learned so many things about the world, myself, and my love for the written-word!

Alongside writing, there is another passion that has overtaken me. Growing up, my mom has always been an absolute master in the kitchen. To this day, she sits down every Thursday night and goes through a binder (thicker than most of my college textbooks, I might add) to fish through recipes she's collected over the years for meals to make throughout the week. She's always been a healthy cook, too, but especially so in these last four or five years. She receives a "farmer-box" (formally called CSA for Community Supported Agriculture) every week, uses only (mostly) Cooking Light recipes, and all-around knows how to create not only food, but meals.

As a little girl, the fact that my mom made dinner for the entire family after teaching all day long was simply part of my life. Every day we would ask her, "Mom, what's for dinner?" because we always knew it would be something homemade! It wasn't until I hit college (stereotypical, I know) that I really discovered the appreciation I had for my mom's cooking, and thus how it triggered the immense love for food I have within me as well. (It was going to kick-in at some point, the genes for phenomenal cooks run too strong on both my mom and dad's sides).

Finally, then, this last year I began putting two-and-two together: I love to write, and I love food...what can I do with that? Bingo! The answer came and the dream began: I wanted to write about food. I wanted to go anywhere and everywhere, tasting my way around the world, around a city, around a kitchen, and write about what I learned. (Because let me tell you, there is a LOT you can learn from food). This summer I toured Sacramento Magazine, had an amazing interview with the editorial editor, and learned what it was like to really be in that profession. I left the conversation feeling more sure and more excited than I ever had about anything else I had pursued.

Earlier this week, I received a phone call from that same editor, telling me she had remembered how I mentioned I wanted to be a food-writer, and that had talked with their food critic about me. The food critic said she would love to chat with me, and all over again I felt that surge of joy--I had wanted to see the magazine's office to make a relationship, gain some information, and simply become educated before I let my ideals run wild. Getting that phone call was one more affirmation, almost, that yes, this is something I am meant to pursue.

Now I am waiting for a reply for when I can meet with her, and there I will again to make a connection with someone, (someone who happens to be doing the exact job I am interested in) and be able to learn even MORE about what writing, and food, and people mean to her and how she applies that into a career.

That being said, I am going to be starting a food blog alongside this blog, in which I will probably infuse some aspects of this blog into the food one. I am still researching it, wanting to get a good solid start before I jump in, but be ready, because it is coming and it will be something I take seriously!

Lastly I just want to thank all of you. I don't really know who reads this, and whether it is all the time or just a pop-in every once in awhile, but I feel your support regardless. I have processed on this blog, shared, learned, and more, and you have been with me every step of the way!

Here's to, yet again, another chapter. :)

 These last few weeks of summer have been filled with laughter, encouraging conversations, adventures, and reminders. I am so thankful for the close friends Jesus has given me; they are all different, but each add something so sweet and special to my life. I would be nowhere without them.

Here's to the (tear) last week (and a half) of (my) summer!

 

Nathan and Caitlin already celebrate their one month anniversary tomorrow! It was such a beautiful wedding. So beautiful that they are being featured in a bridal magazine. Only those two, only those two. If you haven't had the chance to see the photos, follow this link and enter "cnw" as the password! There are a million pictures. And yes, I did look at every single one.

I have been loving summer as of late. Swim lessons are so much fun for me, and even though my job can be scary and intimidating at times, (that would be lifeguarding-wise, of course) it has grown me in so many ways. Between getting to know adorable little kids and seeing their progress as swimmers, bonding with staff members, improving my lifeguarding skills, and turning 10 shades darker, (no exaggeration) I have really grown to love all of it! Plus, I've discovered how much I like working with kids! I never knew!

The Lord has also been so faithful. He is always faithful, but when I become vulnerable to the world I stop seeing just how faithful. Slowly but surely, He has truly been helping me achieve a genuine joy and confidence that is of Him and His spirit; not of this world, and not of my flesh. I am learning not to live season to season, but rather take my relationship with the Lord and thus my relationships with others one literal minute at the time. I went to Metro community groups last night for the first time since winter...and what a blessing. Convicted, challenged, encouraged, uplifted. It was a beautiful reminder to sit among believers and realize that we are all humans with worries and struggles, but as a body of Christ, we can persevere and pursue righteousness and hope and truth together. The Lord didn't intend for us to go through life alone, and I am so grateful to be doing life with Him and those who love Him. [Corporate] fellowship is something, quite shockingly, I have let slip completely, and last night was the perfect wake-up call to be involved once again!

I hope your summers are going so well, even if there have been those moments where direction is not present and life seems like it is one question mark after the other. I encourage you to surround yourself with believers who will wrestle and grow through life with you, because it becomes such a beautiful mess once experienced.

Happy Monday!

OH! Huge ps! I am going to Sacramento Magazine tomorrow to receive a tour and interview time with the editorial editor. I get to ask questions, wrack her brain, see what this whole magazine world is really like, and hopefully open the door to a potential place of volunteer work or internship. Exactly what I have wanted to discover more since Christmas break when I decided journalism might be the route I once again want to travel down. :) God is so good!

Crossroads. They happen so often. Some are minor, others major, but no matter what, they involve a decision that at the time seems to carry the weight of the world with it. When we were little, our biggest decisions were as simple as whether we were going to get a hot lunch or bring a cold lunch, or whether we wanted to play on the bars at recess or tackle a game of four-square. As we get older, though, it seems that these crossroads happen much more frequently, and the path we have to cross only gets larger. Decisions have more consequences, both good and bad, and those decisions no longer only effect the immediate context; they effect the bigger picture that is, essentially, our life. 



The summer months always seem to bring these decisions, too. Thoughts about the future attack our minds, disorganizing the nicely, previously compartmentalized thoughts that we stored away during the school year when we 'didn't have time to think about them.' Now, though, our purpose goes beyond our schoolwork, beyond our classes, and I think that in some of us, like myself, we temporarily lose a piece of the identity that has been shaping us for so long. We are students, and we have been for 15 years, but when summer hits, it's like our thoughts are cut loose to explore all those areas we ban from the months of August to May. For three months we are not students, and our lives do not revolve around deadlines and events and classes. We get a small dose of the real world before we go back to a comfortable routine that is so engrained within us, it's almost like culture-shock when we don't have it.

My thoughts have been world-travelers since school ended. They've taken me to a crossroads where I must choose what I really, truly want to pursue in my education, and if that means I must make a decision I can't even fully process yet. They've led me to ponder why I chose to do what I'm doing this summer, when essentially I was not ready (that has been my not-so-small dose of the real world). They've had me redefining what family means as I grow older, and what it looks like to cultivate those transforming relationships. They’ve had me up, down, and around every nook and cranny of my mind, reminding me that they want attention, too.



The crossroads we encounter are usually blessings, but they so often appear as curses first. As time goes on though, it is the decisions we make at those crossroads that help shape us into who we are. Right now, I feel as though I have been in a huge transition, although I don’t really know what I am transitioning from nor transitioning to. I have been wracking my mind all summer trying to figure it out, to find some direction, but all that ends up doing is leading me to ten different crossroads of thought, when I am only supposed to be approaching them one at a time.

If there is one lesson I am being taught, it is that decisions and choices and change are all disciplines that require some trial and error. Whether the Lord has me cross a particular path before I feel I am ready (which actually means I am ready, but just scared) or He has me wait patiently while he prepares me to cross, I ultimately need to learn to give it up one thought, one action, and one road at a time.


(Wedding-Dinkey Creek photos/post to follow) :)