when things don't go as projected

What is Christmas?
Is it family?
Mine is in fragmented pieces in scattered places. I'm on my own this year.
Is it presents?
Shipping Christmas cookies to the ends of the earth was too costly for even the one person who always made sure I had a gift to open Christmas morning.

What makes Christmas magical?
Is it the glowing tree adorned with ornaments and handmade trinkets that tell anecdotes of decades past? These store-bought baubles and bells are already falling off the limp, sagging branches.
Is it red cup peppermint lattés, hot cocoa by the fireside, spiked eggnog, watching holiday classics, or cuddling under warm blankets on snowy nights? This summer Christmas doesn't have any of that nostalgic charm.

So if not for presents, for family, for trees, if not for snow or for wintery things....

What is Christmas about?

Maybe it's not about giving purchased things, but about being generous with love.
Maybe it's not about the traditions and comforts of home, but about being comfortable with a new definition of home.
Maybe it's not only about being with family, but becoming family with those around me.

Messiah's first Christmas: new family, new home,
no evergreen glowing, and, probably, no snow.

Maybe the magic of Christmas is found in a baby's redefinition
of family and home and the things that I hold as a Christmastime tradition.

Maybe Christmas means, when things don't go as projected,
we learn to find beauty in the unexpected.

the love story of the water and the rocks

The water is beautiful.
She is enchanting.
She cascades down the rapids, fast and free.
Withholding nothing.
Every part of her is swept away
swirling and splashing downstream
on her way to whatever may lie ahead.

But the water is nothing
without the rocks.
The rocks carry her smoothly across
her flowing stream
then spread themselves down
down to the bottom of the waterfall
each ledge gently catching the water and easing her descent.
The rocks are her backbone
showing her off
unveiling her grandeur.
No matter how many times she falls,
he never ceases to catch her at the bottom,
easing her back to the serenity of her smooth, level ground.
He lines her floors and shores
giving river shape and dimension.
She carries merrily on her way,
ever unaware of the sacrifice he makes for her.
For each time he catches her fall,
each time her cascade crashes upon him,
even as he eases her away,
he is giving her a part of himself.
She is unknowingly wearing away at his foundation.

But the rock has never harbored a single bitter thought
towards the water.
For he gives her meaning,
and she gives him purpose.
One would be nothing
without the other.

a glorious adventure

"Living in dependence on Him is a glorious adventure."

Sometimes, your inadequacies are staring you so firmly in the face that you can't see to look beyond them. Sometimes fear is the most natural reaction. Sometimes you don't go exploring beyond your own back yard because you're too afraid. Sometimes, you do.

When I was presented with an opportunity to say goodbye to home once again and follow the Wind to a place of loving and serving and discipling passionate youth, my first answer should've been an eager welcome of such an exciting challenge. But instead, I responded by listing off my fears, my misgivings, my shortcomings, and my faults. I tried to think of every reason why I wasn't cut out for the job, why anyone else was a better choice than me.

Sometimes, I forget to believe in myself. And those times, Dad always sends me people who know how to believe in me.

I've learned that Jesus doesn't want to use me. He's tired of His children being used. Instead, he chose to invite me on this journey with him. He opened two doors and promised to walk with me on whichever adventure I stepped into. And being the thrill-seeker I am, I picked the crazier option. The one that didn't make sense and I couldn't figure out the details. I picked the option where depending fully on Dad is a non-option. I know I can't do this alone. But I know I don't have to.

These words still sound funny coming out of my mouth.....
*deep breath*

I'm moving back to New Zealand for another five and a half months to staff a DTS. And I leave in 30 days.

The school is called a Pilgrimage DTS (Discipleship Training School- the program I just graduated from). It's about journeying to encounter God. Furthermore, it's about backpacking New Zealand to find Him in nature along the paths we take. As a school leader, I'm the one helping students and walking with them thru both the spiritual and physical journey.

I've been backpacking maybe twice in my life. Did I mention I feel unqualified?

At this point, I have more questions than answers. Why is it so last minute? How am I going to pay for this (yes, I have to cover my own living expenses and plane tickets)? How am I going to survive outdoors in the fickle weather of springtime New Zealand? How am I going to have the emotional energy that helping others through this God-encounter will take? How do I say goodbye to my beloved home again, so soon after being reunited with it?

I DON'T KNOW.

But one thing I know for sure:
When Papa invites you to backpack freaking New Zealand with Him....... You don't just say no.

Support me! -> www.youcaring.com/aGloriousAdventure

on falling in love.

Two weeks ago, I caught my heart falling in love with one of my best friends. Entranced by the silent beauty of the post-midnite hours where time ceases ticking and instead gently drifts and quietly ebbs. Warmed by the soft yellow lites overhead and the honey-sweetened Brazilian tea. Held in the strong yet gentle arms of one who has known the depths of loss, rejection, hope, and triumph. Side-by-side in a tea shop booth, drifting in and out of wakefulness, my mind held on to fragmented sentences of his comforting voice telling me why I am treasured and loved. My consciousness was drifting into dream land, but my heart was fully awakened. Forcing my eyes open for the thirty minutes that it took me to drive home, my mind finally kicked into gear and let my heart know what was really going on. You're falling in love! it said. Foolish heart. Right after a conversation of why you two aren't best for each other and should not pursue romance, you go and let yourself fall for him! What are you thinking? Are you masochistically trying to get yourself hurt?? My mind wouldn't let me forget the pain of a broken heart, and tried to preemptively talk my heart out of loving so that I wouldn't be threatened by rejection down the road. But, in customary fashion, my heart declined the well-meant warnings. It's okay, my heart whispered. I'm meant to be in love. 

Throughout the next week, Jesus continued to whisper the same curious words in my ear. It's okay, beloved, he said. You're meant to be in love. WHAT?! Jesus, of all people, YOU should know that I'm meant to guard my heart. I'm meant to protect it from the wiles of love-hungry men who intend to steal its treasures and loot its resources. I can't go giving my heart away to people who I'm not meant to marry, or eventually I won't have a whole, in-tact heart to give to my husband, right?

That's what the church always taught me!!

It's not what I'm teaching you, Jesus replied. The only command I gave you was to LOVE. Fall in love with me and that which I'm in love with. Your love is not a depleting resource. The more you give away, the more I will fill you up, and the more you will have to give. The purpose of living, my dear, is falling in love. 

To fall in love is to see only the best in someone; to overlook their faults; to call out the Beauty within them; to refuse to give up on them. It is when your heart says to their heart, 'You are Beautiful.' It is deep crying out to deep. It is namaste: the Spirit in me recognizes the Spirit in you. It is an attraction that sees imperfections as a unique source of wonder and artistry. It is a determination to do only that which shows the utmost consideration to the needs of a person's heart. It that not how Christ has loved us?

"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." -Jesus

In church, I was taught, "Jesus is madly in love with you." I was also taught, "Love people as Jesus has loved you." I was NEVER taught, "Be madly in love with everyone," although it seems as though this should be the logical progression. Fall in love with everyone? Yes. That's it. That's our purpose in living.  That's how everyone will know we're His- if we love like Him.