perfected, confirmed, strengthened, established

there are many days when i start to blog, type a paragraph that seems pointless, and then quit because i feel like what i have to say isn't quite there, isn't quite deep enough, isn't quite ready to be forever stored on the world wide web. when you put something on the internet, apparently you can never get it back. apparently it can never be destroyed or erased. or so i hear. this could be false, since i know only enough about technology to make it as a college student. but this is not one of those erase-retype-put it off days.

i should be studying for my final tomorrow. i have been studying for my finals. but i'm itching to write about whatever comes to mind right now. i am in this selfish, having-issues-of-entitlement mode regarding this week where i keep saying to myself, "you have worked so very hard this semester. harder than anyone else. you deserve to not have to study for your finals. you deserve to not have to even take them. as a matter of fact, you just deserve to get all As in all of your classes because of how motivated you've been this semester."

but this is not the case. i am not entitled to an easy semester, good grades, or the praise of others. it's only by God's grace that i've made it through this semester of hellish schoolwork anyways. at the beginning of it, i prayed for grace to do my schoolwork, and i got it. so i pray for something, God gives it, and suddenly i think i'm entitled to it, that i deserve it for some reason? i'm crazy sometimes. i get to thinking that i earned the things God gave me. always the "me" factor. as if i could do any of this out of my own strength. i would have been dead weeks ago. or on the floor of my bathroom sobbing every night.

luckily, the Lord has been showering me with His grace every morning and every night. even when i am so unfaithful about my time. even when i am not diligent about reading the Word consistenly. even when i am content with letting my academic acheivement define me. even when i let my mind wander and my heart falter. even when i let what i want get in the way of God's desires for me. even when my faith is small and weak. even when i find myself completely incapable of loving the way Christ has called me to. God is so good and faithful in showering me with perfection, acceptance, completion, wholeness. He is renewing me day by day even when i feel i'm just wasting away into this brutish little frame of over-acheiving pride. the Lord speaks something different over me:

it will no longer be said to you "forsaken"
nor to your land will it any longer be said "desolate"
but you will be called "My delight is in her"
and your land "married"
for the Lord delights in you
and to Him your land will be married...
as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride,
so your God will rejoice over you.
[isaiah 62.4-5]

i am the Lord's delight. and so i am praying to have "the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God." [1 peter 3.4] a woman after God's heart. He already sees me redeemed. i'm just relying on His grace to complete the good work that He has begun in me. i am truly excited for whatever's coming next. the Lord is so good to me.

as for me, it's good to be

sometimes i forget how blessed i am, how i truly am surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses, how there are continually people encouraging me and loving on me and pressing me toward the Lord, often without even knowing it. in my thoughts, i frequently focus solely on those moments when i'm not encouraged, or those moments when i feel the exact opposite is happening. but in reality, i am encouraged a lot. the Lord is encouraging me every day, drawing me with an everlasting love, pursuing me with consistent kindness. all of this when i don't want to be near. all of this even from afar.

if i can't dance - i don't want to be part of your revolution

the more i dance, the more i realize how different i would be without it. there is so much i can only say through movement. there is so much i am no good at talking about, there is so much i am no good writing about, there is so much it's no good crying about. sometimes it only makes sense to dance. this is the outlet the Lord has created for me to speak.

there are so many days i have no words. dancing is the only thing that feels right, that can be an adequate response to what God has done in my life.

over the summer, the day i asked how to use the sound system in the chapel changed the way i could interact with the Lord. everything that was upsetting, everything that was difficult, everything that was encouraging, everything that was awful and wonderful and true could be danced. i couldn't explain it, i couldn't do anything with it but take my body, my silly little frame that the Lord has made into an offering, and move.

for some, moving seems like running. for me, it's one of the only ways i have of grappling with life, death, hope, and God. of actually facing them. it is like nothing else i know when it comes to meeting the Lord. praying, singing, reading the Word: all incredible, all things i love to do, all things that the Lord loves. but dancing. oh my goodness. moving in the Lord's presence is like being tiny and seen at the same time, being so small yet so loved. dancing. the only times i feel worthy of praising such a huge and wonderful Savior. oh my goodness. dancing. you may have no idea. but dancing.

the Lord's revolution has dancing.

something worth holding onto

although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it. -helen keller

healing takes time.

because God takes His time. not because He enjoys our pain but because His love for us is enough to let us stay there while He is a doing work in us.

i always knew this. but i also always assumed it would come easier to me, and in a shorter time frame. and yet, still, i'm me, alone and frustrated by my complete inability to heal myself. by the fact that such a long long time later, i am still wounded.

i have to catch myself in the net, pull myself back on board, and remind myself that it is not me doing the healing at all. it has never been me. (repeating it to myself: it has never, ever, ever been me.) the Lord has been healing me all along, slowly but surely, more gently now than it felt before. His touch is so evident in how my heart has changed.

and still, i complain. maybe not externally, maybe not the way i do about my term papers. but i do make my case. God, why are there parts of me where i still feel injured? why are there certain aspects of myself that are calloused? why, Lord, can i not bring myself to feel things i felt before? why is this still so hard sometimes?

it's not the thing itself anymore. it's the side effects. it's the parts of me that have changed as a result. they are now my battle. they are now my prayer.

it's the deep parts of me that i don't reveal to anyone. they are where the healing is going to happen soon. i know it.

in certain areas, i have become more of a runner than i was before. i hide. and these are the deep repercussions of being hurt. these are the remnants of pain. this is what is left of what i gave away. broken pieces.

it frustrates me that i have such a hard time admitting it most of the time. i'm scared you won't understand. i'm scared you'll think of me differently. i'm scared you'll treat me like i'm shattered. i'm scared you'll actually read this.

and somehow i muster the strength to care less about you and more about the Lord. i sit. i try to start. i fail. and i procede. i force myself to type. because in a lot of ways, this is the only place i feel comfortable and uncomfortable with where i am.

i worry that one day, a long time from now, i will wake up and realize that i am the same. i fear that i will accept this brokenness as part of who i am and who i always will be. and while brokenness is an innate part of my humanity, this specific brokennes, this exact wound, is not who i am. it is not who i will be. it is only part of shaping me into the woman that God has intended me to be all along.

"this too will pass" and the places where i was cracked, i will be sealed. and yet there it will be, the place where the blood once was. the spot that was once so cold and foreign will be warm and familiar, part of who i am only because the Lord has changed its nature.

it seems contradictory. but it is no longer a reminder of my failure and shame, of all the ways i did things wrong. it is a testimony to all the things the Lord has done right. this hurt will be part of me only because the Lord is redeeming it. this mark will be mine to cherish, because God has made it beautiful in its time.

people are not little stones, or keys in someone's pocket

on march 31, serbia formally apologized for not doing enough to stop the massacre of bosnian muslims in srebrenica, the un safe zone. the main reason for this apology was to do something favorable that would benefit serbia in its quest to enter the european union. yet they did not call the killings genocide, as the UN and the hague have already done.

sometimes i think about how often i am serbia. i apologize to get something in return, whether its something material, or just a pat on the back for doing a good thing. i also don't call things for what they are. i am good at skirting around the issue, at apologizing for something lesser than what is required, at making my faults seem justified when they are not. i don't want to make amends for concessional gains. i don't just want some surface-level declaratory statements that mean nothing in reality. i don't want my actions to please others. i want my everything to please God. this is my wish.

wish (v.): to want, desire, long for

eyesight

i love how well God loves me. how radically, how sweetly, and how carefully. i love how He is working out things in me that i don't even realize. i love how He has given me certain traits and characteristics that are preparing me for something. something big. He has given me eyes and dreams. and even though i have trouble with the eyes and can't see the dreams yet, i love Him all the same for them. because i know they are coming; i know that in time, and in grace, they will come.

you cannot say too much
finish your thoughts, i will listen
when no one is strong enough
to carry your heart and its vision

i know you're scared that you're still unprepared
to live out all the dreams you are wishing
but don't hide away, my love

and you'll have to find your own way
that's okay, it's okay, my love
don't let 'em tell you
you have to see through anyone's eyes
but the ones God gave you

you have a song that's as bright as a fire
and the dark has a reason to fear you
so sing when you have no voice
i'll hear you

-from i will hear you, by alli rogers.

surprise, suprises

while i never thought this day would come, it has. i am thinking about grad school. key word: thinking. as in, i researched a little bit about what i would need to do and where i could go and what it would cost. i always was turned off by it because international affairs grad programs sound terrible to me. just because of who i am. but i was drawn to them initially because of the implications. doing something that could change the world, for example. figuring out the right way to do development, finding a way for countries to cooperate to prevent genocide, yadda yadda. real life stuff, but also real mushy-gushy i will personally end poverty stuff.

and then i realized that the Lord has given me a passion for french. for speaking it, studying it, reading it, writing it. and just because it doesn't have some immediate go-getter path right afterwards doesn't mean it's not for me. but then i also think... how can the Lord use this? france, ministry, right, obviously. but how does this fit with grad school? does grad school have a place, as my parents have hoped? i always thought no, but now i've gotten to thinking that i might like it. and then comes the tricky little statement of intent. i don't have any professional goals or plans. i don't have any reason to study french at a higher level except a love for french. i do not know if this is enough. but i guess if God wants me in grad school, it will be.