A little bit of everything

There's something so great about being in community with people. You find freedom in it and honestly I feel so at home that my community naturally becomes my family. It's also tough at the same time. People share things with you and you break for them and the same goes for me sharing with people and they break for you. I love it. I love everything about being in community with people. I thank God that he did not intend for me to walk this life alone.

The past couple of weeks has really challenged me. I'm continuing to being shaped, molded into who God wants me to be. And it's hard. I struggle with what to do and how to live this life God has blessed me with. I want to be vulnerable and open, but I struggle in doing that. I have a love hate relationship with the church right now, but still find myself present in the midst of that. God's been teaching me about prayer through a book a friend got me...and it was something that I truly thought was dumb when I started reading it, but now find it to be completely perfect for the place that I am in my life right now. And that gift makes me think that is probably the best thing for me to actually come to understand. Half the time we think something we are doing is dumb, but in all actuality it is quite beautiful if we would stop being so self-centered and just look at what God is doing around us and in us.

Some news and some prayer requested. Some friends told me that I should look into getting counseling soon. I think that they are right about it. I'm excited to see how God will work through this. I know that it will be a great healing process from things that have been heavy on my heart for years and years. I know it will be good for me, but I'm still a little nervous about it. I do appreciate your prayers and support.

Slowing down

God has been slowing me down quite a bit lately. I'm still extremely busy and the next couple of months are going to be intense for numerous reasons. But being busy and God slowing me down go hand in hand. I feel it's something that we all wrestle with. How do I spend time with God when all I seem to be doing is filling up my calendar with meetings, gatherings, and daily life stuff? God has a sense of humor in my life and has cleared a lot of time for me to just not have anything on my schedule during the day. So usually this is the time where my mind plays mind games on myself and I sort of beat myself up with my fears...specifically Eugene. "Be still and know that I am God" has been on my heart. I'm not still. Rarely am I still, ever. Ask the people that know me. But I am finding incredible joy and peace during the times where I am still and align my heart with God. I don't know what is going to happen to me in the future, or what I will be doing, or anything that I think matters, but I do know that what I experience in the still times is what makes me want to live my life with God and people wherever He leads me. I'm desiring that cry in my heart that yearns for the couple of minutes of stillness to worship God. "God's joy is my strength!" I don't know how else to explain that one, but I'm being transformed to understand that more and more everyday. And that's my prayer for the people I am surrounded by daily. That God's joy will be our strength. My identity, my strength, comes from God. And I find I don't get that through other people, even though I wish that could happen, because I only get disappointed. Those couple of thoughts are just what I'm been processing and struggling with during the past couple of days...

Writers

I have this love of reading that has been alive in my soul every since I was a little kid. I find myself to be a sucker for autobiographies or true stories. Mostly because I get a sense of who that person is...like I'm invited into their world for a brief season of life. That lasts until I put the book down.

At times I have so many thoughts running through my head that I want to be able to write them down in an eloquent, fancy pants sorta way that I stumble around ultimately failing in my own endeavor. I want instant gratification so bad that I just consider myself completely unworthy, unintelligent, and a failure that I give up. I just can't compare myself to regular joe blogger/author because he just says the right thing at the right time. Obviously he's put more thought into his thoughts and can make them flow from one sentence to the other. Stacie, you can barely make a thought become a coherent sentence. I know that's not true. I know I can flow sentences together to make a couple paragraphs of thoughts. But I've come to realize that even though I want the ability to write a beautiful story, a story that will challenge and exalt me of course, that story resides within me. Maybe it will come out one day and I'm ok with that. Until then I will continue to tell about my daily life which consists of failures unimaginable to the naked eye as well as complete and utter joy. I'm no c.s. lewis, but I have a story of my own. A story that one day might be shared with you. I'll just sit back and listen to the stories or people around me in my life...which I mostly get in the way. I think that some authors who write their stories spend an incredible amount of time listening. I think I'll start there. After all, when I listen peoples lives change and transform mine.

All days are new

I've been really challenged lately with just living in the present moment. I just automatically want to jump forward to where somehow life will be just the way I want it. By doing so I lose grasp of the times I have right in front of me. Brennan Manning's Raggamuffin Gospel spoke directly into my life. I have some quotes about being present that I want to share.

It is only now that we are in the presence of God.

I can only say that forgetting all that lies behind me, and straining forward to what lies in front. -Phillippians 3:13

There's a lot of things that get in the way of experiencing Gods love because of my dwelling on something I didn't do, or something that is coming up quickly in the future. But what do I miss in the meantime? I sure do miss life. I miss seeing Christ present in our people's lives and I miss seeing what God is doing in my life. I also make my life more important than everyone else...which is not intentional, just part of my personality. I start to think the world should stop what it's doing and hold me by the hand to comfort me in all my insecurities.

I think, if anything, this past year has showed me that Jesus values me as I am.

But I put on hold my value in Christ when I start to think about past or future events. I stop looking at God as my Hope and I look at myself as my hope.

Do we see God's beauty right in front of us? The beauty that makes us just feel at peace with the world, with ourselves...that we are indeed beloved sons and daughters.

My heart aches when I process that. It aches because I want that so badly yet I get in the way of truly experiencing that when I start to take over my life. Here I am, send me...is what I want my life to be about.

To me, experiencing life in the present moment is more beautiful then a thousand worries.

Hard night

I think sometimes you see the beauty of the love of our Father when He just allows us to just cry and cry and cry until we almost forget about what we are crying about. A long time ago I used to think that I didn't have anything in my life that I needed to work on and now I feel like I have so much to work on. I do find that humorous. But last night, I didn't really find the humor in that. Because during the evening I felt completely broken. And even though I might have argued about the timing of things being revealed to, God obviously knew that it was the time. It gives me hope knowing that in all the mess of my life God is refining me. I won't sit here and not tell you that it's super simple and that I don't ever cry, because then I'd be a liar. ;) But I'm glad I'm learning...more so glad today, definitely not so much last night. I just wanted life to go away and not wake up for a very long time. I also felt alone...my roommate was home, and I definitely could have talked to her about what was going on, but I just didn't even want to talk. I had some friends praying for me and I know that God was hearing them. I just know that I don't want to be stuck in a place where God can never ever change my heart because of my stubborness...though He has his ways and can basically do whatever. I just want to take what I got last night and apply it. I can tell you it's not going to be easy. I keep learning how hard it is for people to truly get in to my life...and how I always want to be the strong person who can take care of myself. But God broke me of that. Broke me of being strong and wants me to take hold of his strength over my own. It won't be easy, but I would much rather rely on his strength and let go of my own. There will be more tears and more frustration and more pain...but I'm being refined. I don't know what God is doing with me, why I feel so broken sometimes, but I am learning to just be in those moments.

Eugene

It's becoming more and more real that my God is leading me towards Eugene. And I cry sometimes about the people that I am leaving here in Indy who I really love and consider authentic family. So in the midst of feeling like it's going to be hard God blesses me with a verse to just hold on to. It's in Isaiah 62: 12. "They will be called the Holy People, the Redeemed of the Lord, and you will be called Sought After, the City No Longer Deserted." It makes me realize God is doing so much in my heart to prepare me. That I no historically that verse is not about Eugene, but I really felt like I want to authentically experience that there in Eugene. It's a city that has 96% of people that are unchurched in the whole entire city. And my heart longs to see that Eugene is Sought After, the City No Longer Deserted. Even though I know I am leaving behind people I love dearly, I know they will always be my family, and that ultimately God is doing some really cool stuff in our world.

Today in church I looked around and thought about how beautiful it was to see so many people love Jesus sitting in one room. And I pray that people allow God to move them where He wants them. Wow...God's doing great things in Indy and I can see that with people that I meet and know personally. I pray for Him to continue to move here in a place that desperately needs Him.

And please pray for Eugene. It's a city where people need to be loved and cared for. God will do the rest. Amen!

life

Today at work i was thinking i don't think i would have ever pictured my life to be like this...and i don't think anyone else did either. Well, maybe some people could have seen my life turn to this, but man they never told me, haha. I always go back to my thought a year and a half ago...that i would be teaching in ips, living in an apartment by myself (which is something that I've always wanted to do), going back to grad school for my masters, and saving up enough money to buy a new car/wedding (which is funny cuz that was no where close to happening and isn't any closer now), and just living like the worldly person should live. Looking back i can laugh at those thoughts because it's not what God ever wanted me to live into. Some of those things may happen because i'd like to get married one day and have a safe car that i can trust to drive around...don't have the best track record with the car that's for sure! :) But i see how that master plan that apparently i had all figured out would have destroyed me in so many different ways. I just wanted to be stable thinking that was going to do the trick of some sort of perfect world for me and then God challenged all of that. He took away my control of my life and sent me in a direction i would have never have thought i'd go into and still sometimes think it's funny that he's continuing to throw me off in every day situations. So yeah whatever i went into the training school, hehe, which no one really has any idea what the heck that is and half the time i can't even describe it to people because i don't know what is going on, haha. So it's been fun. :) But during this program i realized how much God was changing my heart and refining me. It's been really hard at times, tears were shed, and other times it was truly wonderful. All of it has been purposeful, and sometimes i still am figuring out what the purpose was/is. But i know that my heart has changed and i pray that we all are continuing to change...change is good.

I'm still learning to be ok with the fact that I felt like I'm being called to live a life of being uncomfortable...that maybe I'll never have that stable life i dreamed of. That my heart is for missions and i don't know exactly what that means, except that Eugene ties into that. i love the fact that i didn't know anything about church planting and then God ended up giving me a desire and heart to be apart of it...and i've struggled through the process of being on the team. I've just been encouraged from it because God has done some really cool things lately in regards to Eugene. I've got to talk to some people about it pretty openly and also have a job interview coming up. Also, all of my paperwork is filled out for my oregon teaching license, just waiting for my first aid card. It's just cool to see how God has been opening these doors for me. Everyday i'm blown away because I never knew my life would be like this. And i pray that my life just keeps doing crazy things. I feel it may and that's ok.

And sometimes i think i am crazy for living this life. Because it's not the "normal" life that people expected me to have. But this has been more fulfilling then anything else I could have chosen for me. And shoot, I'm still young...I got a lot more life to live and many more opportunities for God to do some crazy, off the wall things in my life. I'll probably kick and scream all the way, but in the end God wins. Thank goodness He does or i'd never be where I am today.

"May he give you the desire of your heart and make all your plans succeed. We will shout for joy when you are victorious and will lift up our banners in the name of our God. May the Lord grant all of your requests."
Psalm 2o:4-5