Lessons in Trust.

Woo. It has been....A WEEK (or two, or three). God and I have been talking a lot lately.

I hate being stressed, but let me tell you--I love the conversations God and I have when I am. At the moment, most of my pressure points are future related. Travel, career, passions and worries all wrapped up in a beautiful mess of emotional outcries. So, given that most of those pertain to my general blogging subjects--I figured I'd share some of what I feel like I've been learning lately.

There are two obscure desires that I have had for a long time. I call them obscure primarily because of their specificity, but also because of what they entail:

1. Adopt kids that are in the 15-18 age range right before they get booted out of the system 
2. Find a way to help under-privileged high school students get abroad

I won't go into the details of why or how I'd like to make these things happen, but I will point out two things about these desires:

•  I don't generally like working with kids. Okay, that's an overstatement. I don't think I'm necessarily GOOD at working with kids, especially not teenagers. Nonetheless, for years these two things have been something I've cared deeply about, and I have often wondered why God would give me such a strong desire to help a group of people that I generally avoid like the plague. (sorry every high schooler I've ever worked with who now think I hate them--I don't, I promise!)

• In order to achieve at least one of these goals, I have to get back into the International Edu. industry and work with students. Most of these jobs require/prefer a Master's Degree, some counseling/advising experience, and previous work in a higher education setting. I don't have any of those things.

As I tried to sort out these thoughts I was reminded by a good friend that sometimes God puts us in seemingly impossible situations in order for us to be reminded that HE is in control. When God met Moses through a burning bush (Exodus 3-4) he commanded him to go to Pharaoh and tell him let His people go. Moses protested with a variety of excuses which God deflected one after another. My favorite excuse however, was this one:

10 Moses said to the Lord, “Pardon your servant, Lord. I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”
11 The Lord said to him, “Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord? 12 Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”
13 But Moses said, “Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else.”

In the end, God calms Moses down by assuring him that his brother Aaron will be there to speak with and for him. Summary: God wanted Moses to do something, Moses can't/doesn't want to, God makes it happen anyways.

As I reread that recently, I was reminded not only God's faithfulness, but also that in all things I can trust him. Perhaps sometimes God puts desires in our hearts that don't make sense so that we are reminded that He is capable of anything. His strength is made visible when we do things that are seemingly impossible otherwise.

So, I guess that's where I'm at. I have no idea what the future holds or where I'll be next. I don't know who will hire me or when. What I do know is this: God is good all the time. And today when I have an inevitable moment of despair thinking about the impossibility of everything I want out of life I will take a step back. I will remember that I serve a God who is able to do immeasurably (let that sink in) more than I could ever ask or imagine, and I will rest in that.

Ephesians 3:20-21
الحَمْد لله‎‎

Open the Eyes of my Heart Lord...

Part 1:
The past few days have been insane. God has been calling me out on stuff left and right. But more than anything He's been calling me to give it up to Him. What's "it"? EVERYTHING. My relationships, my worries, my family, and probably most apparent is my future and career. I'm such a planner and it's so hard to allow God to step in and take the reins. I'm stubborn and i love waiting until the last possible moment to admit I need help, and it's no different in my relationship with God. But over and over again this week God has made me so aware of his sovereignty and how much I need to let things go and allow His plan to take over. If God is love, and God is sovereign then God's sovereign will is going to stem from that love. Repeatedly in the past few days i've been convicted of how much I try to handle on my own and how little I trust god's ability to work things out for the best. Yet, in the end, there's no way around it. God knows what is best for us and regardless of how we drive our lives He will use our actions for his glory. Trust me when I say that believing God can take the worst situations and make them good is something i've struggled with just as much if not more than other people. But He does. Over and over God uses our mistakes for the glory of His name and though it may be hard there is no doubt in my mind that if I can just give up my worries to him He will do it again.

Isaiah 25:8

Part 2:
God is crazy. He has opened my eyes so much in the past few weeks. God works life out in ways I never would have thought of. I sort of stated this in my first post after getting here...but let me reiterate something. I am living in a condo with 11 other girls. Let me break this down a little further. Out of all the girls i'm living with....there is not one person who is all that similar to another. I can hear you saying "duh, of course you're not". NO. I mean we are different to the point that I came in thinking "oh my gosh i'm gonna go insane if I have to live with these people all summer". We are girls that might know each other casually at school but would never in a million years hang out on a regular basis. THESE are the girls I live with. But, here we are more crazy in love with one another than you can ever possibly imagine. We come from RADICALLY different backgrounds, from Christian homes, drug abuse, missionary families, alcoholism, and even abuse. We struggle with different things, we fear different things and we have completely different personalities based on our upbringings, yet, we are all best friends. These are the girls I hang out with on a regular basis. These are the girls that know my whole story. We have cried in front of each other, we have prayed with one another and we have laughed over unspeakable things together. The only way I can explain this is to say God is INCREDIBLE.