WEST | CHASING THE SUN

I decided I would write updates in the car. Unfortunately, the car has no internet. Therefore, this is my life, a week late.

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So we’re on the road. 

Literally. I’m somewhere in the middle of Missouri surrounded by nothing but trees and hills and the occasional billboard advertising anything from caverns to insurance. My family of seven is galavanting off in one of those 12-passenger extended-cab vans that my dad procured two days before we left. Good thing too, or else we would have never fit everything in here. I also managed to claim a bench to myself today. Which is nice, since we probably will drive 11 hours by the time we pull over.

We’re heading out west.

Mom and Dad have been wanting to take a family trip out west for years, and they decided this was the summer to do it, since I’m going to move out next year and they don’t know how my schedule will look after that. 

We’re going to be gone for two and a half weeks. We’ll start in Phoenix, Arizona, to visit some amazing (crazy, fun, loud, pretty much second-family) friends, then bop up to the Grand Canyon for a few days, see Bryce Canyon, camp at Rocky Mountain National Park, visit Arches National Park, and go stargazing on the Great Sand Dunes. I’ve heard the sky is so clear there that the stars come out to dance in the thousands. I’m hoping it looks like Neverland spilled pixie dust and feel so close I could touch it. 

I’m pretty excited. In case you couldn’t tell. 

But you know, the adventure has already started, even though we still have 20+ hours to go. 

We passed St. Louis. It was storming, so we couldn’t sight-see. We’re going to stop back there on the way home (because really, we have to do the arch, and they have an awesome city museum. With slides by the stairs. No joke.) But you know what was really cool? Passing the arch, with the city all lit up like someone broke a glow stick over  black pavement, the clouds boiling black and gray and then there was this flash of lightning right behind the arch like the crack of a period at the end of a sentence. A flash of revelation, white-bright, and then gone. Back to scattered pinholes of light. 

It could have been a poster like the ones they sell in gift shops. I taped it up on the walls of my mind to remember it by. 

About an hour outside of St. Louis we pulled off on the side of the highway because of a hail storm. They were only about the size of the jelly beans my little sister had packed, but they sounded like baseballs. My little sister hid under her blanket, which she kindly shared with me. I feel like I now know what it feels like to hunker down in a bunker, with the dirt explosions flying over you. Ok, it wasn’t that bad, but it was really, really loud.

My baby brother (ok, he’s 8. still my baby brother.) asked me, “Is everything gonna be fine?” I laughed and assured him it would. And it was amazing how he laughed then and pressed his nose up against the glass, trying to see the hail against the black asphalt. My little sister started giggling under her blanket and poked her head out, not wanting to miss it either. Amazing, how much faith they had in my words, “We’ll be fine.” I wish I had faith like that. I think Jesus smiled at us.

Little Man is an artist. :)

Some brave little cars sped by us in  the hail and rain. I wondered how they could see, considering how our windshield had looked like a blend of stars flying by in warp speed in Star Trek and the weird way your world bends when you stick your face in a waterfall. (...because...all of us have done that, right?)

To top things off, when we checked out of our hotel this morning, we were told a tornado had touched down just ten miles from us. And I slept that whole time? I mean, ten miles isn’t really that far. I wonder if I would have been that person who was asleep when it picked up their bed. I doubt I’d wake up in Oz. Not everyone’s as lucky as Dorothy. Instead, I had breakfast with my momma and this sweet Mississippi lady who needed a seat. We sat over waffles and biscuits and gravy and talked about school and kids and she told me to stick with what I love and always be friends with Mom. Which I was already planning on, but I liked her for saying it. I love talking to strangers like they’re already friends. Her name was Vahn, and she said she’d keep us in her prayers. 

Also, I drank coffee this morning. Which is really weird for me. 

So that’s what’s happening these days. That, and a lot of funny and quotable conversations with my family, a Meet the Robinsons party on the front two benches of the van, an Arby’s run in which I described a movie characters life and the family guessed who it was, (which is incredibly entertaining in case you were wondering), and jamming out to blaring music until Dad makes us turn it down. Our family always seems to have a trip theme song that gets stuck in your head whether you want it to or not. 

More to come later if internet presents itself, but for now, we’re just chasing the sun. 

SOUL | THE DRAINING DAYS

It’s 11:11 and I want to make a wish. 

I can’t think of something fast enough.

I’m tired. My mind feels like it’s running thick with the day and my eyelids are heavy with the weight of it. It’s amazing how tiring a slow day can be. Moving slow as syrup. Slipping by, but you’re drowning, swimming in that time.

Too much time. Alone. With people. In general. 

People. 

Being an introvert, I have mixed feelings about being around people. Especially lots of people. If I could choose, I’d pick one-on-one time with a best friend, or a small group of my closest companions, over a big party. Most of the time. But I’m also a decently mild introvert, so I don’t necessarily mind groups either. I just tend to make smaller groups within the group. 

But honestly, knowing that, you wouldn’t think I’d love a job in retail. In a bustling mall full of... people. Colorful, shape-shifting crowds of traveling souls from who knows where. We get people from all over the world, so I mean that in a literal sense. But I do love it. (Ps. It’s a tea shop, which also may have something to do with it.)

Sometimes all those people blur together and it feels like ages ago that I met that one, or handed something to that one, even though it was only two hours ago. It can be easy to forget. Easy to brush over these people, who come and go so quickly. 

But I don’t want to do that. I want to slow down. I want to remember. 

I want to remember the young man getting a gift for the parents of his girlfriend. It was his first time meeting them, since he was flying back to China. He wanted the gift to be perfect. He took so much time picking out the tins he wanted, was so careful choosing tea he thought they would like, was so concerned about how full the tins were and whether there was any possible way they could find out what he spent on it. 

I was tempted to be annoyed. He was taking so long, worrying about so many little things. 

And then I thought about honor. And how much he was trying to treat them with honor--how he said he wanted the tins to be full, it didn’t matter the price; it would be rude to leave them half empty. And these little things suddenly became so striking to me; because there are very few people who are concerned with honor these days. 

It was worth my time to help him. 

I want to remember the family with six children, the talkative father and the mother from Dublin, where big families were normal. I want to remember all their big eyes, how young they all were, & how completely unashamed those parents were to bring them all in, overflow our small store with their six joys. The little brown-eyed girl in her purple tutu skirt with that shy smile. The baby boy with big blue eyes whose name was Samson. 

Who knows what they could do, one day. Who knows what is in store for the boy named Samson. Who knows what pillars he could shake and what parents it would take to raise him. 

It was worth my time to pour them all those samples. 

I want to remember the radiant white-haired woman who came in “just to bask in the beauty of the teapots.” I want to remember the sincerity in her voice and the ease of her smile and the way she walked so steady with her cane like she loved living. It was easy to see that when she was listening, she was really listening; and when she spoke, I wanted to listen. She asked my name like she knew the importance of names. Her name was Eleanor. And when she pulled out that tract I wanted to hug her for her gentle boldness, and I loved the look on her face when I asked, “Do you love Jesus?” and she answered, “Yes.” 

It was a joy to tell her that I did too. 

Sometimes, people tire me. Maybe it’s because we are all so busy carrying the weight of our own old soul, that we forget others are as well. 

But when I remember to look, I’m always reminded. 

Souls are beautiful. 

And it is an honor to see the soul of a stranger.

They’re unique and they’re challenged and they’re precious and they’re fighting and they’re growing and they’re changing and they are so, so affected by little things. Little moments. 

Little moments that I can be a part of. Because when souls collide they leave marks; it’s part of how the Potter molds his clay. And we are living vessels that he fills over and over again. And what is the purpose of being filled if we do not also pour out? What is the purpose of receiving if we do not also give? And what is joy, if we do not share it? 

This is what I will choose to remember on the slow days. The tired days. 

And this is for the people, whoever they are. 

Thank you for the honor. 

Thank you for the moments. 

Thank you for the little things.

I love it.

I even love the way you drain me.

RAIN | THE SOUNDING

The sound of rain always makes my heart pound a little harder. Beating with the great calm, with a power so steady, so alive and beyond control.

One of my favorite things to do is stand outside just before a storm. Just to feel it. The wind is strong and you can almost taste it coming, the smell of the rain almost here. The grayness of the sky so close, too close and so thick you have to let it wash over you when it opens up its heart and pours it all out. 

But that wind. 

The first fleet-footed messenger of the rain. I let it wash over me like the drops that will follow, push through my hair and break the dry corners of my eyes and soul and bring the rain. Bring the pounding heart. Bring the sound of things made new. 

What if we came like that? 

What if, when we entered a room, they felt us bring that strength and gentleness and freedom, without our ever saying a word? What if we brought the presence of the One who opens floodgates and rides the clouds like fire and brings the rain like thunder in our hearts?

I want to walk like rain. 

I want to live like that, with a great outer storm and an inner stillness, taking the world with this uncontainable torrent. 

I want to pound with it. With this freedom I’ve been given. To move steady as the sound of rainfall, cleansing as the scent of a storm. A person who washes away and washes feet and walks on water.

Can you imagine? All our hearts beating together like rain? What we could do?

Never alone. That’s what he said about us. He never leaves us, to be sure. But I think I’m also coming to the realization that I am rarely without another believer close by. Father is always surprising me with others in his heart, in places I never thought to look. Showing me that I am surrounded by witnesses to his grace. Other gift-receivers, grace-takers, joy-givers. 

A raindrop feels alone, I guess. Falling at speeds like that, with no knowledge of where it’s going but crystal clear with purpose. Then the collisions begin--these glorious breaking and bondings. So many single beings bound as one. Raindrops in a storm. All together, breathtaking.

What’s so fascinating about rain is how forceful and yet how gentle it is. It’s water, after all. The life-source. Cleansing, reviving, releasing. It can rush and destroy and wash away, and it can bend, and fill, and replenish. 

It gathers and it spreads and it brings life wherever it goes.

And I want to do that.

I want to come with power and gentleness. I want to make the Enemy tremble at the sign of my coming because of the One who is at my side, the weight of his glory on the wind. I want to destroy the things the things that constrain the people he loves when I walk into the room. I want to be the river that rushes to them, the deep well that draws them, the quiet waters He leads them beside, if only for a time. 

Isaiah 55:8-13 (NIV)

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

    neither are your ways my ways,”

declares the Lord.

“As the heavens are higher than the earth,

    so are my ways higher than your ways

    and my thoughts than your thoughts.

As the rain and the snow

    come down from heaven,

and do not return to it

    without watering the earth

and making it bud and flourish,

    so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

so is my word that goes out from my mouth:

    It will not return to me empty,

but will accomplish what I desire

    and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

You will go out in joy

    and be led forth in peace;

the mountains and hills

    will burst into song before you,

and all the trees of the field

    will clap their hands.

Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper,

    and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.

This will be for the Lord’s renown,

    for an everlasting sign,

    that will endure forever.”

(emphasis added)

I trust the One who sends the rain on a dry and weary land. The one who knows the depths of my heart, the only one who can take my sounding, and fathom me into something more. This is the sound.

This is the sound of you and I. 

This is the great calm.

This is the storm. 

These are the children of Living Water. 

THE HEART | RECLAIMED

I’ve been thinking about the heart lately. 

I’ve been reading this book called Waking the Dead by John Eldredge. (He’s the author of Wild at Heart and Captivating too, which I would highly recommend to all of you.) I’ve been making my way through it really slowly, because I was trying to read it during school... and we all know what gets done during school besides school... yeah, pretty much nothing. Ha. Anyways.

I’ve mostly been reading it sitting on a box in the back room at work during my break. It’s great. Pretty much, it helps me snap back into reality--REAL reality--when I get caught up in the stress of being on the job. The reality that I have purpose outside of my performance. That I am significant. And that I want every single person that comes within 20 feet of me to feel significant too. 

Because they are. 

Waking the Dead is about reclaiming the heart. 

Listen to what I'm listening to? 

Do you remember that scene near the end of Prince Caspian in Narnia, when the Pevensies and Caspian are kneeling on the beach and Aslan says, “Rise, Kings and Queens of Narnia”? Caspian remains kneeling humbly while the rest get up. And Aslan gets this glow in his eyes and this fond warmth in his voice when he says, “All of you.” Caspian is still trying to come to terms with the idea of being King: “I do not think that I am ready.” I think there was almost a laugh in Aslan’s voice then, you could almost touch the joy in his answer. “It is because of that that I know you are.” 

I love that scene. I love it because it’s thick with reality and I have to breathe it in deeper every time I think of it. 

Because honestly, how often do you feel like what Father calls you? How often do we feel like we are capable of what we are called to do, to be, to live and breathe?

And how much does how we feel matter? 

Because often, I don’t feel like a chosen and beloved, purposed, predestined, redeemed child of God. I feel like a failing perfectionist, a worried, drained, confused, overly-analytical-and-yet-never-in-tune lost kid.

Remember that pain of being human that we all know? Yeah. That. 

The pain of hurts we can’t, or don’t want, to handle. The idea that we’re not enough and yet always too much.* The way we all deeply need and yet often deny needing to know that there is something. more. 

Something more than this. More than us. 

At least, I need that. And then I came across this verse: 

Ephesians 1:18-23 (NIV)

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.

The same power that raised Christ from the dead. 

Can you imagine the force, the life, the incredible might that it took to raise Christ from the dead? That brought death caving in on itself? That ruptured the darkness and drew a line in the sand saying, “Come no further”? The same power that tore the curtain and made the clouds boil black and said that Satan’s time was up? 

Yeah. God’s power there. That’s what we’re promised. That’s the God that stands with us.

But it’s the last line that gets me. 

Us. 

We are the fullness. And he fills everything in every way. Fills us in every way.

John Eldredge quotes St. Irenaeus as saying, “The glory of God is man fully alive.” 

And that’s why it’s so important to guard our hearts. To reclaim them, if we’ve lost them, if they’ve been wounded in any way. Which they all have. 

We are meant to live fully alive. Not relying on how we feel, our accomplishments, our so-called positions or dispositions. Our hearts are reclaimed, bought with the priceless blood of a sinless man, the Son of God. 

If you feel like nothing, that’s a lie. 

God didn’t die for nothing.

Do you believe that? I always squirm a bit here. Um, yes. I believe it. When you put it that way. But I struggle to live that belief. And that’s what I want to change. 

I want to live like I’ve been reclaimed. Chosen. Transformed. Undone. Remade. 

And here’s what struck me hard:

He is, and I am willing. 

He is the great I AM, so that I don’t have to be. 

It’s not about how I feel. It’s about what Father calls me. 

He makes everything glorious. 

And I am his. 

What does that make me?

*In Captivating, Eldredge addresses this feeling: of being too much, and never enough. It is one of our (especially women’s) deepest wounds. I’ve never forgotten his short descriptive sentence. Amazing how striking such a small thing can be, how powerful the truth of it is. If it struck something in you, I would definitely recommend that you read the book. 

COURAGE | A SHADE DEEPER

I dislike shallow things. 

Which might be why my first post isn’t a “Hi, welcome to my blog!” sort of deal. You never really get to know a person from an introduction anyways. You get to know a person -- really understand and be able to predict them -- after you’ve talked to them, watched them, been around them in groups, seen how they handle things, and gone through something rough together; after you’ve laughed really hard together, most likely over something that nobody else would get, that somehow randomly inserts its memory into multiple conversations afterward that earn you at least a few weird looks. For me, those generally come from escapades in the kitchen that went hilariously awry, very quotable stupid remarks, or have something to do with getting lost. Which happens a lot, in case you wanted to know. 

In any case. Back to shallow things. 

{by studiowonder, found via pinterest}

Sadly, we live in a culture of shallowness. People ask, “How are you?” but don’t really want to know. People rarely have reasons for what they say they believe. And even fewer people align their actions with those beliefs. 

I have acted, believed, and protected my own share of shallow living. It’s easy to live shallow. Often, it’s safer. You don’t rock the boat, you don’t threaten, your thoughts don’t wander to the dangerous realms of “what if...” 

But you live half dead too. 

How many people get asked, “How are you?” and wish they had someone they could really give an answer too? Or have a dream they won’t follow because they’ve gotten the hint that it’s “silly”? Or are more content with not knowing, than knowing and having to be responsible for their actions with that knowledge? 

What if we all were just brave enough to be a shade deeper than the rest? 

{via pinterest}

Courage, dear heart.

That has been my favorite line in all the world for as long as I can remember. My parents read the Narnia series to us when my siblings and I were little. C.S. Lewis has since then become my hero, and I adore all of his books.

But to me, Aslan’s whisper of those words to a frightened young Lucy--those three words that came like a soft crack of light, the tiniest breath of strength in the darkest journey--those words encompassed everything I wanted to be. How I wanted to live.

I want to live with courage. I want to challenge others graciously. I want to care for others selflessly. I want to listen without an agenda. I want to speak with love and gentleness. I want to give recklessly without counting on a return. I want to trust God relentlessly. I want to stand for something bigger than myself. 

And that, I believe, takes more courage than most of humanity believes. 

A woman with a beautiful soul once remarked to me that we underestimate the courage it takes to live an everyday life. That we dismiss the fact that we all know the pain of being human.

I don’t want to do that anymore. Living is a deep thing, and often, I feel like we are collectively taught to belittle how deep each and every one of us is. We avoid the depths in each other because we don’t know what’s there, and we’re not sure if we can handle what we’ll find. The fist-knot in our chest that says, “Let’s not go there...” Don’t tell me what I don’t want to know.

But I think deep down, we all desperately want to know. 

Want to know that someone else has the same hurt, doubt, worry, dream, quirk, delight, sorrow, preference, or love that we do. 

We are relational. It’s how God made us. 

And what amazes me is the fact that honestly, if we knew everything there was to know about a person, I doubt there would be a person on the face of the planet that we could not love in some way. 

God does. 

He knows everything about everyone, and he delights in them. He loves and cherishes EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. And he died once, and he fights daily, for them. 

And if we had the courage, dear heart, could we not live recklessly deep, knowing that our God is with us?