no one shovels sunshine

Do you ever have a day when you, in your very innermost being, are convinced it is going to be a bad day? Like it’s the coldest week of this winter, your heat in your apartment is out, you almost overslept for work, and when was the last time you actively read God’s Word. I mean, yeah, that one verse in Proverbs 17 is still relevant, but that’s about a week old now. Praying and meditating is good. They need fresh input to be great.

Anyway, I was convinced today would be a toughie, but it’s impossible to shovel sunshine. God provided not one, not two, not three, but four undeniable blessings that spread light over my entire day. Just regular Joe-shmoe people saying, “Hey, I can tell something isn’t right, here’s a thing to make your day better.” And I knew it was God. 

God is just... He knows, man. He sees my anxiety about the wedding. He hears my concern about life after. He is no stranger to my fear gnawing away at the hope to pursue overseas ministry. And today He shared the sunshine with me. And today I am challenged to trust.

crash wedding diet

I’m not stressed out. 

You’re stressed out.

You’re projecting your stress on to me.

Side note: did you know that when I’m stressed (which I’m not) my body decides it isn’t really hungry and, in order to avoid nausea, I’m most content on Gina’s Y2K Liquid Diet.  But I’m not stressed out.

There are pieces of wedding planning that I thought would be difficult, like invitations and food and clothes. Turns out, no big deal. Do you want to know what has actually been the most harrowing on my nerves and overall well-being? RSVPs and the rehearsal dinner. No one warned me about those things! No one told me jack about the internal angst that would spring up from random emails telling me who is or isn’t coming to a party that I’m throwing in a place I’ve never been. And am I throwing this party or are my parents?

Which naturally flows into my colorful portfolio of current stress dreams. Like the one where Eminem is giving me poetry/rap lessons and then my dad shows up at my practice session, but I’m embarrassed and think he won’t enjoy poetry culture, so I ask him to go away. In the dream, his feelings are hurt so my feelings are hurt and I go to him to try to fix it and then my mom tells me his feelings were never hurt in the first place, but I miss the poetry show.  Or the dream where I can’t get into my mailbox, no matter how certain I am that I know the combination. Or the dream where it’s like the day of the wedding and Tanner shows up to marry me, but it isn’t him anymore, but everyone else thinks it is, and how does a girl deal with that?

I’m a little stressed out.

But the moments of quiet have been a blessing as well as a reminder. Sitting in the silence doesn’t feel like sitting with a stranger anymore. Lately, quiet feels like a warm cup of tea, over which God and I talk quietly and he reminds me of his big love for me, and my family, and the world. So I can stress, and you can stress if you want, but even stress that functions as a crash wedding diet kind of loses its luster when it gets compared to big love.

coffee cup poetry

rhymes on a cup
tiny words to fill up
your soul: brain coffee
so read while you drink
while caffeine sinks
into your system: energy
coffee cup poetry
a cup to you from me,
your barista: brain-coffee-energy-lady
who brews you two hot commodities
please
think with me
about the color blue,
about the shades whispering
through the sky
or reflecting
in her eyes.
think about blue lights
how blue looks cold,
but it belongs in summer
because gray is colder
and it belongs to winter
just like white.
white noise, white space,
we're stuck on one channel in one place,
just quasi-members of the human race.
white noise, white space,
white light from stars
through the night,
eternal night
in the void between galaxies
and here on a rock sits you and sits me
writing poor poetry,
just a blip in the void's memory.
just think with me
about eternity
about infinity
about some piece of humanity
going on endlessly--
now pause.
catch your breath.
the inevitable end
hasn't happened yet
so let's sit down for a pour over coffee
just the void and you and me
and discuss the point of everything
continuing
"there isn't one," says the void
in a voice too much like white noise
"existence is meaningless"
so the void is a nihilist
and the void looks at me
so I say, "it seems like vanity,
true
but what if you
were made to be family
to the maker of infinity
and purpose is found simply
in the harmony
of you
and the God who made blue
and gray
and white
and that makes me sound religious
which makes you and void suspicious
of my agenda
but now the void and I have both shared our coffee thoughts
and the time has come, like it or not
to think
think about blue
think about God
think about you.


update: in this interim period between training and school and life, I'm trying once again to write a book.  we're going for a short story/poetry collection this time. wish me luck.

2020

It’s a new year, a new decade, a new chapter...and the right words are whispers waiting to be heard above the racket of real life.

The book of Joel is God’s command and plea to His people to correct their hearts toward Him. He tells them the end of everything we know, the disaster that will afflict humanity, and He says, “If you come back to me, I will still be faithful to protect you from that.” But the end of Joel is open. There is no final answer to the result of the people of God, because we are still living in the time when the answer must be made. That is the entire purpose behind the last two years of Bible school, and the key to goal of however many more years God chooses to give me: people need to know their Creator is waiting for an answer. Will they love Him? Will they accept His terms? Or will they be numbered among the ones who reject Him?

It’s a wild time to be alive.  On the one hand, Tanner and I are getting married in six months! (Ohmygosh six months) My wedding dress arrived and is ready for alterations as of today, bridesmaid gifts are here, my sweet friend Lydia is almost done with invitations...we are actually getting married! On the other hand, our church may not be behind us going on to the Missionary Training Center this year and that hurts. He is involved with the missions team; I teach Sunday school with another lady; we attend a small group that we love.  Yet we might not have been presenting the right questions to the right people, or pursuing moving forward as missionary candidates in the most visible places. It’s a confusing, dizzying place to be.

But my brother is right. All we can do is pray, and be willing to accept and follow the guidance given by the leaders we are blessed to be under. God designed things that way, not us. 

So, my reader, pray for us through excitement and disappointment. Pray that we would be still in these moments so that we might move only when the Holy Spirit says “go.” Pray that we would be surrounded by people who desire God’s will to be done.

Thank you <3

thankfulness in color

(in my dotage, i am learning to fall asleep anywhere and be thankful for the moments of rest)

(i have a family full of love and i am thankful for my time with them)

(i have friends and they are full of love, too)

(tanner is home and there is all the love to be shared)

I am worried and thankful, so I guess I must choose peace, but with people like this, it is much easier to make that choice.

if i were...

If I were to write a blog post I would write about how God has provided a place for Lydia and I to live.

I would write about opportunities to relax and spend time with girls that I barely know and yet feel so connected with.

If I had the words, I would wax poetic about my desire to be certain that I am not an emotional, verbal bulldozer.

It might be worth telling about some truth nuggets from class.

But it’s hard to be faithful to a blog no one reads.  I’ve always had this vision in my head of a time when some of God’s people want to support me as a missionary.  Then, because I was faithful with an online journal, they would have access to me and God’s work in me over the years. And I still have that dream. 

I’m learning that breaks are okay if they have a purpose.  I’m learning that patience and waiting does not always mean proactive pestering in the white noise.  I’m learning that it’s okay to be ready for changes I’ve never even imagined being ready for until now.

Tanner is in Africa, practicing this whole missionary thing, and we couldn’t talk for a while. When we finally could talk, I informed him that he has ruined me. He cleans my car when it gets snow on it, he buys me snacks and coffee, he listens to me when I’m fragile and I cry.  I’m spoiled and also happy and I miss him. And I’m thankful for him. And for some reason he loves me back and it blows my mind.

And if I were to write a blog, I would say that the future looks bright and hopeful and plain old full. 

where has all the time gone?

I am overwhelmed with lists.

There is a list for things that need to be done on my phone: messages checked, emails responded to, figure out how to get the cloud to stop telling me my phone can't back up... A list for homework, additional promises, future plans, insurance, food prep...All of it to attempt to make sense of time spinning faster than my hands can catch.

I am learning that I don't pray the way I ought.  We've been going through Daniel and the man fell on his face three times a day to talk to the God he knew was holy, and I think to Him.  I cast my stray thoughts to Him in moments, but I do not know how to bow in prayer for more than ten minutes at a time.  And they're sporadic minutes.  Not that I need a prayer schedule, but something needs to change because Daniel was a man of God and people knew it and I want people to know it about me, too.

The days are shorter and colder.  Some days it feels like my friends are shorter and colder, too.  This isn't bitterness, because I see the sweet moments we have.  I mean that they are tired, and worn, and this world seems so heavy for all the young Christians around me.  They are world weary, when I think we are meant to be heavenly.  Why do the cares of this life mean so much to all of us? 

October is a hard month for me.  The second hardest is February.  They're claustrophobic months that creep into my sense like snakes looking for an extra skin.  These are the months that I need to remember God is sovereign.  Over my feelings.  Over my worries.  Over my cares.  And over all of the feelings and worries and cares carried by the world around me.  And God is love.  Love is defined by Him.  I am learning that love flows through me best when I am not focused on sharing how I am worried today.  Love is better expressed in sharing the joyful mess of who God has made me for today.  Like, there is only triumph for us now that we are in Christ and I don't understand why we so quickly forget that.

October is a hard month for me.  But I am learning it can be easier.