Needs vs. Wants

          My time with the youth at church has provided me with a lot of food for thought lately!  At one of our recent meetings, some of the older girls were trying to determine if one of the middle school girls had a boyfriend.  After looking through pictures on social media, they finally just asked her about it.  She told them that she had dated a guy, but she broke up with him.  Of course they asked her why, and her response blew me away.  She simply stated, “I don’t need a boyfriend.”  The group of girls affirmed her for her response and went on to chatter about other aspects of their lives, but as you can see, I’m still thinking about her response.

            Since starting middle school, it seems like all I’ve wanted was a boyfriend.  In middle school one of the driving desires behind this want was to have a friend because friendships were hard for me in middle and high school.  In college, God has blessed me with some true, dedicated, caring friends who are unbelievably precious to me.  But the addition of good friends to my life has not lessened the desire for a boyfriend/husband.  I think through some immature beliefs and a good dose of TV shows, romantic comedies, and historical novels I came to believe that I needed a boyfriend/husband to be secure and complete.  At times, I could see that I was functioning fine as an independent, single person, but I still longed for that significant other who would understand me and help me explain myself to the world.  I think there was a part of me that knew that I didn’t need a boyfriend/husband, but that was overridden by the part of me that desperately longed for somebody to share life with.

            When my friend in the youth group said she didn’t need a boyfriend it was like a light bulb clicked on.  Many of the heroines I admired or novels I loved were written in or set in the past.  In the past, women really did need a husband or some other significant male figure in their life (father, brother, guardian) to survive.  My pastor preached about the widow of Zarephath recently, and she was one of those women who struggled to survive until Elijah healed her son and helped her.  She needed Elijah and her son to take care of her because of the constraints of the culture she lived in.  In the past, society bred the lie that a woman was of value only if she was a wife and mother.  Society dictated that she became a burden to her family if she did not get married.  This can be seen all throughout history until very recent times.  (There were exceptions, but they were few and far between!)  Many of the stories I have absorbed in my life were set against this reality.  While most of the relationships in the stories were indeed based on love, I think I also unconsciously recognized that the woman needed that relationship to be provided for and considered of value in her society. 

            I realized that I live in a very different world from these women of the past.  In 2013, it is very possible for me, as a woman, to get an education, get a job, and support myself without any help from the males in my life.  (I have relied on the support of my father to get me through college, but if I had needed to, I could have supported myself.)  In less than a year, I will be a teacher.  This profession will allow me to support myself for the rest of my life without a husband.  In today’s world I could even have a child through adoption or other means without a man.  My culture is one where women do not need to rely on men to support them.  I’ve known this in my mind for all my life, but I didn’t know it in my heart until my friend made her simple statement.  She doesn’t need a boyfriend to have a fulfilling life as a middle schooler, and I do not need a husband to have a fulfilling life as an adult! 

            This revelation has given me confidence about the path my life is headed towards.  Over the past few years, I have felt very insecure about the fact that I have zero prospects for a significant relationship anytime soon.  I felt like I needed to have a fiancé or be close to having a fiancé when I left school.  But that just hasn’t happened.  Now, I know that if I trust in the Lord, I will survive this transition to adulthood without a significant other in my life.  It is a blessing in an uncertain time!

            The realization that I don’t need a man in my life does not however diminish my desire for a boyfriend/fiancé/husband.  It is still a major dream for my life.  I believe that God created me to love in this way, at some point in my life.  Waiting for this relationship has been hard over the past eleven years, and I may have many hard years of waiting ahead.  God may never bless me with this relationship.  But realizing that I don’t need a man in my life has helped me take one more small step to being at peace with being an independent, single woman at this stage in my life.  God has taught me a lot and done many beautiful things in my life so far, and I know He will continue to teach me and create beauty in my life whether I am single, in a relationship, or married.  I am so thankful that God placed a girl who is wise beyond her years in the youth group at my church and used her to teach me a lesson I should have learned when I was her age!

Jesus Likes You

            I help with the youth group at my church, and I love hanging out with the teenagers there!  I also love helping out because I continue to grow in my relationship with Christ through the lessons directed at those younger than me.  This past Wednesday night, this message greeted us from the board: “Jesus loves and likes you.”  The youth minister explained that we often take for granted Jesus’ deep love for us and we often completely forget that Jesus likes us!  As soon as I saw the message on the board, it was like I took a deep breath and leaned into truth.  I am a very analytical person, and I am by far my own toughest critic.  There are many days where I really dislike myself whether it’s my personality, my appearance, my abilities, my faults, or something else.  I spend a lot of time wanting to be someone different or have different qualities.  There are also times where I wonder if anybody else likes me.  It was so nice to be reminded that, not only does Jesus love me with a love I can’t understand, he likes me.  In fact, he created me, so those things that I don’t like about myself, he planned them and formed them and developed them before I could even think or analyze!  He doesn’t like the sin in my life or my sinful actions, but he does like me.  And that is a beautiful thought to save away for the days when I don’t like myself.

One Year

            It’s been a year.  I can’t believe it!  This journey with blogging has not really gone as I thought it would which is exactly the way my life journey has gone this year.  I started this blog because there was a guy I admired, and I got to know him through his blog.  God used his blog to encourage me.  He had stopped writing as frequently, and I missed his wise words.  I sent him a letter telling him how much his words meant to me.  And on this day last year, he sent me a note back thanking me for my words and encouraging me once again.  As I thought about how much his words meant to me and how he was writing less frequently, I realized that blogging was something I could do, and maybe my words would mean something to those who stumbled across my blog. 

            As I often am, I was too scared to share my heart with my name attached to the blog or with the people I know.  Because of this there have not been as many readers as I thought there might be.  That’s ok.  This is a special place for me.  And one day, maybe I’ll share it, but not right now.

            It’s been a long journey this last year.  In fact the last four years have been a long journey.  It is my senior year of college, so every last brings reason to reflect and remember.  There are memories from this time that I want to erase and never remember.  I have experienced grief and betrayal by friends.  I have seen friends make stupid, heartbreaking choices.  I have turned away from the Lord and spit in His face.  But there are precious, treasured memories that I never want to forget.  I have found true, caring, loyal friends for the first time in my life.  I have sung and danced for the Lord.  I have learned to be a teacher.  I have become myself.  I have felt God’s grace in a way that I hadn’t experienced before.

            Life has not gone the way I expected it to, but I’m not sure I can imagine it happening any other way.  God has grown me in ways that he couldn’t if life had followed my plan.  God has broken my heart for things that it might not have broken for if life had followed my plan.  God has shown me that He makes beauty from the ashes and always will.  I might not have learned this if life had gone my way.  I didn’t know I needed to learn this lesson.  Before college, I thought that, because I followed the rules and was a “good” girl, God owed me a husband and a good life.  I knew that there was sin in the world and that I was a sinful person, but I didn’t know the depth of my sin or the depth of my need for Christ.  I didn’t realize that I can’t earn anything in my life; it is all a gift from God and has nothing to do with how many rules I follow or how many assignments I turn in on time.

            When I realized that I couldn’t earn the things I wanted, I was very confused and frustrated with God.  I wondered, “What is the point of following God?”  I pushed away from Him and the people and places that would lead me to Him.  I was running.  There was a point in the last two years where I realized that God has different standards from the world and that I truly desire to follow those standards.  But the damage was done.  I had already lost the habits I had implemented that helped me draw close to the Lord.  Finding those habits again or creating new ones has been a rocky goal that I am still nowhere close to accomplishing.  I still have many moments where I wonder what it’s all for.  If following God doesn’t guarantee me a husband or the life I want, then why should I follow Him.  No matter how many times I turn away and ask this question, I always come back to the reality that I can’t live apart from Him.  I need Him in my life, and I want Him there.

            This journey this year has taught me that I am far from perfect.  I have a long way to go in drawing close to the Lord and knowing His heart.  It is a daily process, and I cannot accomplish knowing Him without His help.  I am a human saved by the grace of God, and I am struggling to live out that reality in day to day life.  Here’s to another year of struggling and living life with God!

Pray

            As I mentioned in my last post, the D.C. high school mission trip was filled with highs and lows.  One of the lows was a particular situation our youth minister had to deal with.  I wasn't in his ministry group, so I didn't know the full extent of the situation until the end of the trip.  But, about midway through the week I did know that something wasn't quite right.  Then, on Friday before my group left for our mission work, I was having a conversation with the youth minister.  At the end of the conversation, he looked me in the eye and said, “I know you don’t know everything that is going on, but pray, please.”  In the past, I've had people share prayer requests with me and I've been in situations where I have prayed with urgency about something, but I have never had someone ask me so insistently to pray with so few details.  I've known this youth minister for a very long time, and I've never heard that kind of urgency in his voice before.  So that whole day I prayed.  I prayed for him.  I prayed for the people I suspected were involved in the situation.  And I also asked the Holy Spirit to intercede for me because I didn't have the words or knowledge about the situation.  It was a really powerful experience for me to have someone ask me so directly to pray for them.  And it was really humbling to know that I didn't have all the information but that God would respond to my prayers anyways. 

            In fact, God knew everything about the situation, and He was working in it long before I knew anything about it.  His handprints were all over friendships that were formed that were a positive part of this situation.  He was making beautiful things out of the dust of a situation influenced by the choices of sinful humans.  And that’s what He does all of the time in all of our lives.  That’s why we need His grace.  Because there is the choice between sin and God’s way, and all of us, repeatedly, choose sin.  When we realize our mistakes, God is waiting there to offer us grace, mercy, love, peace, and healing.  We all need it, and He offers it to us no matter how many times or to what degree we mess up!  Isn't God amazing?!

At the Corner of 10th and G Street

            In June, I had the opportunity to chaperone a high school mission trip.  We spent a week in Washington D.C. serving others in many different contexts.  The week was filled with highs and lows.  I have many memories from this trip, but there is one, in particular, that I want to remember.

            On Thursday my group had the opportunity to participate in an experience called Urban Plunge.  For an afternoon, we were sent out to an area of the city (Chinatown) with a list of activities to complete and information to find.  All of the activities and information we gathered were supposed to help us learn about the lifestyle of the homeless.  Some of the tasks were as simple as noticing our environment and the people around us.  Others, such as buying dinner for our whole group and another person with only two dollars per person, seemed a little more difficult.

            This experience stretched me because the adults were supposed to step back and let the kids take charge and make the decisions about how we would accomplish our tasks.  It was really difficult to not share all of the things I was noticing with the whole group as we walked the streets of Chinatown, but it was a blessing to see the students step up and take charge!  We spent the first part of our time trying to find a particular ministry in the area that ministers to homeless people.  We never did find the ministry, but as we searched, our students discovered churches that minster to the homeless. We also had a conversation with a man who was traveling through D.C. trying to get back to his home.  As we walked the streets of Chinatown, one of our main priorities was buying dinner for eleven people with only twenty dollars and finding a homeless person with whom to share our dinner.  As we walked, we discovered a public library and its uses for homeless people (shelter, bathrooms, water fountain, computers and newspapers to look for jobs, entertainment).  We left the library and headed to find a McDonalds to buy our dinner.  There were many homeless people outside of the library, but we knew we didn't have enough money to feed all of them, so we chose not to ask any of them to share our dinner.  As we walked on down the sidewalk, there was a homeless man sitting by a building at the corner down from the library.  As we walked by, he said he would take a hand-out of money or he would eat our left overs if we brought them to him.  We told him that we might be back to see him later.  At that point, I think we all knew that we had found our friend with whom to share our dinner!  For me, it was his willingness and resourcefulness to mention taking left overs that told me he was the right person with whom to share dinner.

            We spent a bit of our time deciding what to get at McDonalds to make our money stretch as far as possible.  Our students were so generous and took less food so that they could buy our friend a meal instead of just a sandwich.  God provided in unexpected ways!  The McDonalds was running a buy one get one free deal on Big Macs that ended that day.  This deal allowed us to buy two sandwiches instead of one! We left McDonalds with hamburgers for everyone in our group, two Big Macs, French fries, and a drink. As we walked back to the corner down from the library, we saw that our friend had another friend sitting next to him.  It might have been awkward, but God had already provided!  We introduced ourselves and explained that we wanted to eat dinner with them.  We learned that our original friend’s name is Tony and his friend’s name is George.  We passed out our sandwiches and all sat down on the sidewalk right there on the corner of 10^th and G Street to eat dinner!  It worked out that I was sitting so that I could see people as they walked past us.  There were some priceless reactions!  People took pictures, talked about us, and stopped and stared at us!

            As we began to eat, another man wandered over, and Tony introduced him as his brother, Donald.  George was kind and gave Donald his Big Mac because he hadn't eaten it yet and everyone else had already begun eating!  As we ate, the three men told us about their lives and gave us advice on everything from relating to other people to what a wife will do for your life! (Tony thinks a wife would tie him down!)  At one point in our conversation, Tony stopped and said, “Y’all are wreckin this world right now sitting and eating with a bum!”  And he was exactly right!  I am so thankful I was sitting in a place that let me see the reaction of the people passing by so I could fully appreciate Tony’s statement!  We didn't even have to talk to the people for them to know we were doing something unusual!  I pray that those people could see Christ’s love flowing between those three men and a group of teenagers.  That’s what Christ’s love does: it changes complete strangers into friends in forty-five minutes!  It wrecks the world of the people actively participating in that change and the people who witness that change!  That was probably one of the best meals I will ever have in my life, and it had absolutely nothing to do with the food I ate!

            I think we all would have stayed there all night long talking and laughing with our new friends, but, unfortunately, we did have to get back to our residence for the week.  As we finished our conversation, we asked if we could pray for Tony and Donald.  (George had left to get his dinner from an organization handing out meals for the homeless!)  Tony asked if we could pray “Our Father.”  So the main leader of our group prayed for Tony and Donald, and then we all prayed The Lord’s Prayer together.  It was one of the most amazing prayers of my life!  As we hugged and said good-bye, Tony got teary eyed and he told us that many people have told him that they would come back, but they never did.  He was grateful that we had followed through on our promise to come back.  For Tony, it was a powerful experience to have people be true to their word!  I hope that we were able to give Tony restored faith in the people around him.  It reinforced to me how important it is to honor the commitments you make and to simply notice what is right in front of your eyes!  Hundreds and maybe thousands of people have walked by Tony, Donald and George, and they all missed out on meeting amazing men who are God’s wonderful creations full of wisdom and joy!  The people who never came back missed out on being part of God’s provision for these men.

            The irony of this whole story is that I dreaded this activity the whole week before it happened!  I was worried about not getting enough to eat and talking to strangers who might be rough around the edges.  I have worked with homeless people before and had amazing experiences, so I don’t know why I was so worried, but I was.  At the corner of 10^th and G Street, I learned that my God is greater than all of our fears, worries, past experiences, and self-absorbed actions!  He works through us and uses us in ways we can’t imagine!  And there is so much joy in doing His work!

Beautiful!

Today, I am thankful for actors who pursue roles that challenge them to think about others and who are willing to tell the truth about what they've learned!  This is for all of the guys who have missed the opportunity of getting to know me because they have been brainwashed by our culture's standard of beauty!

Shattered with Hope

Tonight, my heart is full of grief and joy.  It is the oddest feeling. The cause of this mix of feelings is an organization I am a part of. It is a student-led, student-directed choir on my college campus.  It is a group that seeks to glorify God through singing, service, and fellowship.  I have been a member since my freshman year, and some of my dearest friends are in the group!  I am a junior now and had the privilege of serving this group as president this school year.  I have learned many things as a member and as a leader in this group. 
One of the most important things I have learned is the joy of singing and leading worship!  I've always loved music and singing, but never really took the opportunity to be in a choral group.  (I was always too scared to sing by myself in an audition!)  But when I got to college, I knew this was a group I wanted to be a part of!  It is not a large group, so I had to quickly get used to hearing myself sing.  It was intimidating and wasn't always easy to sing with people more experienced than I was.  But the struggles were worth it, because I have truly been blessed by the opportunity to lead others in worship!  I used to be the person saying, "I could never sing in front of others," but now, I want to tell people how easy it is when you forget that people are watching and simply sing for the Lord, our audience of one!  There have been a number of times where our choir was leading a church or another group in worship and I truly felt like we were experiencing heaven on earth!
One time we were giving a concert at a church, and we didn't have the words to all of our songs memorized.  Our director asked that the words be put on the screen, and then she invited people to join in with us.  They did, and it was the most amazing time of worship!  It was so neat to watch others worship in their own way and add their voices to ours!
Another thing I learned is that being a student leader is hard, especially in a tight knit group that considers itself family!  The people you are leading are your friends, and you have to be very careful with what you say and do as a leader.  You also have very little leverage to make people come to rehearsals or events, so the people who come are the people who truly want to be a part of the group and community.  I think this is one of the issues our choir ran into.  At one point in time, our choir was so large they had to have auditions to limit the number of people in the group for space reasons!  But even by the time I became a part of the group, the number of people started to dwindle.  Many of our members enjoyed the choir and community, but it was the first activity they dropped when schedules got busy or school got challenging.  We also had trouble recruiting new members because the idea of a ministry choir was unfamiliar to people, and as I've already mentioned, singing in public is unattractive to many people.
I became an officer of the group my sophomore year, and we spent many hours discussing how to re-energize the group and attract new members, but by the end of the year, the group had not grown despite our many efforts.  Many of the leaders were tired of the task of leading.  (As I've come to find out, it is very wearing to consistently get little response to efforts you make.)  Some of the leaders and other members were also making decisions about the communities they would choose to be a part of for their last years in college.  Unfortunately, the chose to grow deeper relationships in other communities.  And since they made that decision, I have seen them flourish in their chosen community!
But this is where the shattered part comes in.  For me, it was heartbreaking to watch my friends willingly leave the community that had brought us together.  Most of them left without even looking back or checking in on the group which hurt me even more.  It seemed like they just didn't care what happened to our group or to me.  God has used this situation to teach me so much about forgiveness and truly praying that the best comes for people who have hurt you.  God has also taught me about loving people no matter what.
Some people chose to leave, and I do think that hurt our choir.  BUT others chose to stay and a few committed people joined!  Our group has had a beautiful year of fellowship, worship, and service.  I am so thankful for the friendship of the people in this group.  I am also thankful for the dedication and faithfulness shown by these old and new friends.  We have a beautiful community!
And here is the grief, our choir will not continue to be a choir next year.  Despite the efforts and faithfulness of the people in choir, there are not enough of us to continue it.  Those of us who will be at school next year are making plans to meet and continue to have our community, but I know it won't be quite the same.  It is an organization that has meant a lot to me, and it has meant a lot to many other people who have gone to my school in past years.  I am heartbroken that it will no longer be around to be a place of belonging for people who might not fit anywhere else.  I am sad that over the past few years my greater faith and school community missed the work God was doing through our choir and could not help us continue this work.  I am sad that there will be one less group of singers praising the Lord.  However, I am expecting God to work through our members in other ways.  They all have a passion for the Lord which needs to be shared with others.  I know God will use them in great ways!
While my memories of choir will always be tinged with sadness and regret, I will choose to remember this group with joy.  I will remember the laughter and love we shared!  I will remember the way we supported one another in tough situations!  I will remember the joy of singing for the Lord!  I will remember brokenness and the restorative beauty of the presence of God!