I am a two.
To those who are familiar with the Enneagram, I basically just told you all my dirty secrets. Although the Enneagram is considered an ancient personality typing method (making a trendy comeback), I would consider it more of a rigorous soul assessment. It has forced me to confront everything lurking in my heart: hopes, dreams, fears–both what I would die for and what I would die to avoid.
And, as much as I’ve tried to run from it, I am a two.
So what does that mean? Continue reading
It’s been one year since I began feeling so sick. One year since I spiraled into a maze of doctors appointments and the fog of illness and the anxiety of unanswered questions.
One year later, a lot of people are still asking me, “how are you feeling?”
And I get that. Although I began feeling like myself again somewhere around August, it’s been a long road of recovery and I don’t think I’ve been very good at keeping people updated with the slow, steady work of getting better. Continue reading
I heard once that in previous centuries time was not viewed as a line you move through, with a beginning and an end, but circular–the way the sun rises and sets, or the year always circles back to spring.
In my own heart I often recognize this circular pattern. I learn something true about living every day, and I do my best to remember it. But new thoughts come, distractions drift my mind away, and the sharpness of this truth becomes dulled. Months later, I’m reminded of these truths again and around the circle goes. My prayer is that each time becomes like the blow of a great hammer, driving it deeper and deeper into my soul. Like the unforced rhythms of grace.
When I first started this blog nearly three years ago, one of the first things I wrote about was love. The more I live & pray about living, the more I’m convinced that this is each of our great lives’ works–the work of love.
Lately, when people ask me how I’m doing, I want to say, “Let me tell you a story.”
A story of how much of a mess I have been this year.
A story of the God who has met me there. Continue reading
I recently re-discovered Tenth Avenue North’s album The Struggle. Many of their songs focus on making sense out of suffering. I’ve found myself thinking a lot about these lyrics in the past few weeks:
All I hear is what they’re selling me
That God is love, He’s isn’t suffering
And what you need is a little faith in prosperity
But oh my God I know there’s more than this
If You promise pain, it can’t be meaningless
So make me poor if it’s the price for freedom
I wonder sometimes how innocently I’ve believed the lie that what God wants most is for me to be happy. Of course in my head I know this isn’t true; although God loves me, what he wants most for me is my joy in becoming holy, in becoming more like Christ. But to follow Christ means to follow the way of suffering. So why am I alarmed, as Paul says, that I must suffer as well, whether it may seem big or small? Continue reading
Sometimes life is a wild ride. Sometimes just when you think you’re regaining your control of it, it defies your illusions and shows you just how little control you really have.
I’m usually not someone who has trouble being flexible, but at the beginning of this year I was really holding tightly to my plans for the next 12 months. And instead, the past three months have felt like utter chaos and I”m still a bit woozy from the whiplash.
This last month has been encouraging in many ways. I’ve begun to feel better and am hopeful that I am finally on the upswing, even though it will still be a gradual road. I’ve also been blessed with a lot of sweet moments with friends, new and old. I’ve been given a glimpse into just how precious this life is here that I live, and this has made it much easier to let go of my thoughts of what this time was supposed to look like.
But when I’m totally honest, some days are still a struggle. I struggle with looking back and wondering what I could have done differently to bring a different outcome. I struggle with guilt over how my problems have impacted those closest to me in ways they didn’t deserve. I struggle with wanting to control the future–wanting to guarantee that the next few months will bring full healing, that our trip to Europe was merely postponed instead of cancelled, and that life will continue on like it was before February.
The problem is that nothing in this life is guaranteed. The only thing each of us can do anything about is the moment we’re in right here, right now. NOW is the only guarantee.
Except Jesus.
Because while I want to control the future and make amends for the past, the only thing I can cling to in utter assurance is Christ. No matter what the future days, minutes, hours hold, he will hold me fast. I am guaranteed his presence and his eternal life. I can rest confident in his faithfulness every moment, every day.
One of my continued prayers during this time is for this season to help me recognize even more the beauty and sufficiency of Christ. Years ago, I sort of claimed this verse to be my life’s theme, and now I pray that the Lord would help me understand the meaning even deeper and richer this year:
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. – 2 Corinthians 12:9-10
Thank you, Jesus!
Another year, another Christmas letter! Merry Christmas from us both to all of our friends & family out there.
As I’m writing this, the snow is flurrying in the wind, soup is bubbling in the crock pot, and a cup of steaming tea sits by my elbow…life’s little blessings are so good. And yet this year we have also been blessed in big ways as well as small, in challenging and painful ways as well as joyful. Ben and I have been spending Advent reading through the daily prayers from The Divine Hours, and it’s been so profound to spend time praying towards the coming of Christ together, anticipating the echo of his second coming, which we all long for in this crazy life!
To highlight some of the big events in our lives this year:
In other news, it looks like we’ll be headed back to Europe in Spring 2017! Jenna will be assisting with the Shine Seminar this year, and Ben will be working remotely and being amazing support as always. He’ll also be coordinating technology for the Mobile Ministry Forum’s 2017 conference in the Netherlands.
Our first few years of marriage, Ben and I used to joke that we could give ourselves slack, because we were simply “baby adults,” trying to figure out the world together. Now, however, we consider ourselves moving into the “toddler adult” stage–starting to form stronger opinions and wills of our own, yet constantly running up against our own limitations and inexperience. We’ve tried a lot of new things this year, and learned a lot along the way. We’ve also made a lot of mistakes, which I suppose is part of the process. I’m so thankful the grace of God is big enough to cover over it all and redeem it into part of His Story.
In the midst of a world that feels harsh & increasingly polarized, and the consistent desire we feel to be doing good & life-changing work, we keep coming back to 1 Corinthians 13:
“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.”
And now these three remain: Faith, Hope, and Love.
Merry Christmas, everyone! May you be blessed by the faithful love of our Lord, who is with us in the midst of our pain and our questions, and redeems both our sorrows and our joys for His Glory! We are so thankful for each of you!
Dear You,
The one with the big dreams and all the big uncertainties.
The one who feels like she’s failed.
The one who sees what things could be, yet it feels so out of reach.
The one who looks back with “if only”s.
The one who fears she’ll never be good enough, strong enough, smart enough, funny enough. Continue reading
I find humanity a lovely, fascinating, complicated and sometimes frustrating thing.
I know you feel the same. I hear it in our laughter together over ridiculous viral videos, our confusion over a global crisis, and the love and loyalty we carry deep inside.
I hear it in words of loss, pain, and mourning; squeals of happiness or the silent smiles of deep joy. We all share this collective joy and pain of living. We all know what it’s like to be loved, and we know what it’s like to be lonely.
All my life I’ve felt what you might call the tug of the artist–the desire to be creating, inspiring, and making beauty. Only recently did it burst into my mind with sudden clarity–how every relationship is, in essence, an act of creativity. Taking two people who are completely unique and forming a relationship that has never existed exactly like this before. Continue reading
The thousands of pointed leaves have emerged like butterflies, suddenly wrestling themselves out from the cocoons of white blossoms. Grass is mowed and warm rains fall and it’s easy to be lulled by the quiet hum of it all.
And yet just this week, earthquakes have shattered the earth of two countries. Children have gone missing in countless more. I walk down the street under these canopies of leaves only to see men and women digging through recycling bins or just bowed by the weight of it all.
All…it’s a word I’ve used before, saying “All is grace.”
What do I really mean by those words? When I hear them said by others, what do they mean?
Do they mean that every circumstance in our lives is a gift from the hand of God?
That there is no such thing as evil, only good which we struggle to recognize?
Does it excuse or wipe away the pain of abuse, betrayal, heartbreak, terror because really it was just the difficult grace of godly discipline?
I want you to know that the answer, for me anyway, is No.
I couldn’t have walked the last two and a half years of my life without recognizing the presence of evil in this world. I can’t stare in the face of someone who has survived horrific abuse, brainwashing, and pain and tell them that this was a gift from God. Even amidst his sovereignty, I cannot say to them God chose this.
What I can say, however, is that there is grace in the midst of it all. That choosing to re-interpret our lives through the lens of the Gospel and the power of the Holy Spirit is a powerful testimony to resurrection. That there is no pain or evil beyond the scope of God’s redemptive and creative power.
What man intended for evil, God turned into good.
THIS is the story of Grace. This is the potential for every moment, every breath of our lives. We can speak the words “all is grace” because we trust in a God whose grace uses our enemies to turn us in reliance upon Him, who uses our failures to humble and teach us, who uses our disappointments to draw us back into the Everlasting Arms.
I believe this is part of what Paul meant when he described himself “as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.” The apostle John declares, “For from [Christ’s] fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.“
Grace, this gift of second chances and hope of redemption in the midst of death.
This story of wildly unexpected endings and the promise that evil is not the last word.
Our responsibility is to receive, and then obey.
And within it all is the germinating embryo of resurrection.
Downwind of Grace 