Love is Never in Vain

This past week, I traveled to New York City with 9 fellow Hopesters and one fantastic admissions rep for what we call a spring break immersion trip.  It's basically a mission trip with a more unique title.  If I've seen you in person I've given you a basic rundown of the big events, but this is more of what I've been thinking about since we got back.

It's usually what happens, but God so exceeded my expectations on this trip.  I'm a second semester senior.  I have to confess that investing in new relationships really isn't the first thing on my mind right now.  I was also the only upperclassman on the trip, which made me feel a little disconnected especially in the first couple days.  However, I was committed to being there and excited to get to know everyone, knowing that lots can happen even in a short time, but still not sure where I really fit.  Here's the problem though- I was shutting off my heart to what God could be doing during the week.

Some incredible things happened within those on my team that week, and those are probably what's most important to me looking back, and what gives me the deepest joy.  Friends who have a deeper desire to know and follow Jesus.  There is literally nothing better than that to me, because knowing Jesus is the best thing there is!  I think we all realized to some degree that God's world is a whole lot bigger than Holland, Michigan and that people are people no matter where they've been or what they've done.  Honesty is a big deal- whether it is in telling life stories, or just in the way we live.  Perfection is a lie, and striving towards it is pointless and impossible.  We all learned these lessons and many more.  But its now that I'm back in my own life that I'm realizing what God did in my own heart.

I don't have the easiest time letting people in, really letting them in.  One of my prayers this entire school is that my heart of stone would be replaced with a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26).  I don't want to say goodbye because I don't want it to hurt.  It's easy to project painful past experiences onto the present.  I can have a really awesome relationship with someone but never let them into the deepest part of my heart.  I'm definitely not saying that every relationship is going to be super deep and meaningful because that would just be impossible.  What I am saying is that while it feels like I'm protecting myself by going into relationships with walls up, it really hurts me and makes me feel more disconnected in the long run.

We shared our life stories each night.  Incredible.  Tears in my eyes and jaw on the floor amazing people that God put together on this team.   I saw friendships form over shared pasts, I saw the freedom that comes from speaking things aloud, I see God's hand over each person in a unique way.  We spent our days together, sorting cans, working on a house, riding in the van, serving meals to the hungry, exploring one of my most favorite cities in the whole world, and laughing with and at each other.  Oh did we laugh.  The more time went on, the more the hardness in my heart seemed to chip away.

 I had thought that I had nothing left.  I knew the words God had spoken earlier in the semester: "God, how am I going to have the energy for this, how am I going to do this?"  "Baby girl, you're gonna do it with me."  Woah.  God did not forsake this promise in the slightest.  The growth and impact that I saw happen within all of us and the divine encounters that we had exceeded my wildest expectations for what the trip could be.  Because that's what happens when God does His thing.  Gratitude.  You guys, He's just that good!  He redeems and saves people and uses them to bring more of His glory to earth.  I'm in awe that I even get to be a tiny part of it, because I certainly don't deserve to be.

You've probably guessed where this story goes by now.  Heart of stone?  Shattered.  Gone.  Do I regret letting people in and loving them fiercely?  No.  Funnily enough, despite all of my fears and constructs, I don't.  I don't regret it at all.  All of the stress, anxiety, and planning that went into the trip?  Worth it.  Not only were my fears released but the anxieties that I was praying into were the prayers that were straight up ANSWERED.  Wow, God!  God calls us to love people.  I know for me, that the more time I spend with people, the more I love them. The more I pray for them, the more I receive God's heart for them.  I see them as incredibly made exactly as God wanted them to be.  How does all of this feel?  Joy.  Pure joy.  Loving people is never a bad idea.  It's hard and heartbreaking but its always worth it.  It's what we're made to do.

To my sweet team.  You impacted  me without even knowing it this week.  Thanks for loving so fiercely, me and most of all the people we met.  Thanks for being raw and honest and messy and beautiful with your stories, for seeking more of Jesus through them.  Thanks be most of all to God, for breaking my heart of stone and letting me experience Your joy this spring break!

To Bring Hope and Dignity to His Daughters

So I'm moving to Thailand.  I'll be working with NightLight International Bangkok, ministering to women working in prostitution.  I could be involved in a variety of activities, from doing outreach in the red light district in the evenings, to caring for children, helping with administrative tasks, working in the coffee shop (yes please!), or whatever else will be most beneficial to the ministry.  I'll also be learning Thai.  I'm going through an organization called Impact School of Missions, so I'll have training with a cohort of interns my first month in Bangkok though we will be placed in different ministries.  I'll be headed over in January 2015, and I'll be there for about a year.

How did I get here?  Why am I going?

Jesus.

That's the shortest answer that I can give.  Jesus suffered mightily on behalf of the sins of all humanity, because He LOVES US SO MUCH.  His love is freely given though it is undeserved.  His grace inspite of our sin is abundant.  Claiming to be a follower of Jesus means that I am willing to give my life in whatever way God asks me to.  It means that everyone deserves to know His name and what He did.  It means that since my heart beats for Him, it also beats for justice for the enslaved and healing for the broken.

The longer story of why I'm moving to Thailand for a year began in my freshman year of high school when I read Sold by Patricia McCormick.  It's written from the perspective of a young girl trapped in a brothel, sold for sex many times a day.  It was my first exposure to the existence of such atrocities and it blew my mind that a girl could be abused in such a way.  Not every child has the gift of this kind of innocence.  I read more books and learned more and got older.  Stopping human trafficking is something I've been passionate about for awhile.

I went to the Urbana conference a year and a half ago.  17,000 college age students gathering together to learn about missions, God's heart for the nations, and to worship.  It was a life changing experience.  There's a night there where we stood up if we were hearing God's call to long term missions in some way, and filled out a small card with whatever our commitment was.  The speaker, after telling her own incredible story of witnessing to the Gospel in one of the most challenging places on earth, was talking about how the Light of the Gospel of Jesus needs to shine in the darkest of places on earth.  In my mind, I saw eyes- dead and without hope.  I saw a red light, shining in the darkness.  I wrote on my card "to bring hope and dignity to His daughters."  I checked that I would go into missions long term.  And there you have it.  Other moments I recall up to this point were hearing the song "Reckless" by Jeremy Camp at a concert over the summer, a late 4am night spent pacing my house in November and realizing that I would be applying to NightLight, the settling of the knowledge that the answer to my "after college questions" involved bringing light to women who have been undignified and abused.  Several people in my life recently have been set free from the effects of sexual sin, whether it be pornography addiction or childhood abuse.  We are learning how interrelated all of these issues are, such as trafficking and pornography, and just how deep this kind of brokenness can run.  Their perseverance and continual claim that Christ is victor, along with the pain that I feel with them for what has happened to them, has inspired me to combat this evil in whatever way I can.

As I talked to friends, family, and wise mentors about NightLight, I have not had a single person tell me that they thought it was a bad idea.  God uses His people all the time.  A wise teaching that I recently heard was that the way to discern things is through the Word of God, the Spirit of God and the people of God.  The Word has countless mentions sharing the Gospel with those who do not yet know it, going to the nations, shining light, and a host of other commands that directly relate to my experience.  This verse is a prophecy from Isaiah that was made about Jesus: "The Spirit of the sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor.  He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives, and release from the darkness for prisoners" (Isaiah 61:1).  This is what Jesus is in the business of doing.  As far as discerning from the Spirit, I prayed and prayed.  I stopped praying for direct revelation and simply started praying that I would make the right choice and that God would put me where He wanted me.  I've been terrified at the thought of what lays ahead, yet I've never had the feeling that I was making the wrong choice.  I have to say, I think I'm three for three on this one.

This is about Jesus, not about me.  I want to see Him glorified in the time and place and with the people that He's going to be placing with me.  This isn't going to be a vacation.  I don't (yet) speak an ounce of Thai.  I don't know how to relate to someone who has been violated and abused for the profit of others every night for years.  I don't know what I would do if I came into contact with someone who could do these things to another human.  I don't know how I'm going to raise the funds that I need to be there.  I'm almost tripling the amount of time I've been away from home at any one time before.  I don't know how I'm going to process the darkness and pain that I'm going to work so closely to.

There's one answer: Jesus.  It's for Him and in Him and through Him that I step out into this next great unknown, away for the last time from this place called Hope, into a life that I can't yet imagine.  I am spectacularly unqualified for what I'm about to do, yet strength comes for the Lord.  These women deserve to know Him and be set free from their captivity, they deserve to know that they are fierce daughters of the Most High God, that He has called them by name, that His heart breaks for the evil that has been done to them, that He loves them pure and blameless, and that He wants them to know Him as Lord.  They deserve hope and dignity.

"The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it." -John 1:5

"There is no pit that God's love is not deeper still." -Corrie ten Boom

http://nightlightinternational.com/bangkok/
https://www.facebook.com/NightLightInternational

How He Loves

I remember a moment, three and a half years ago.  It was my fourth whole day at Hope College, at the annual favorite tradition, Groovin in the Grove.  Two straight hours of chapel band in the pine grove.  Hundreds of classmates giving glory to God.  I didn't know most of the songs we sang at the time, but "How He Loves" has long been one of my favorites.  It hit me in that moment, tentatively standing at the back of the crowd with my new roommate, looking out over the crowd, some with hands raised, all singing out.  These are my classmates.  I get to call this place home, go to school here, where so many people around me love Jesus like I do.  It was a new experience at that time, and it was so beautiful.  In a haze of lost and confused and what did I just do, God brought peace through that moment.

Fast forward, from semester one to semester eight.  After worship.  "How He Loves."  Everyone in the band stopped singing loud so I just heard the crowd behind me.  I thought of that moment freshmen year, when everything was so new that I didn't even have a context for it.  However, I knew that God would not forsake me and that He brought me to Hope beyond the shadow of a doubt.  I know that will be true of the next season.  There's something so powerful about declaring truth together.  Maybe we should do it more often.

I still love this song because it's so simple, yet so profound.  The God of the universe loves us, individually, by name, as His kids.  It's radical and beautiful.  I'm stepping into another season now, and its really important that I receive the love of the Father.  It's the response to His radical love that I live out each day of my life.

Especially in the big transitions, its important to seek more of who God is and to celebrate Him and the things that He does.  It's glitter snow and praying with friends and learning guitar and singing in community and Hudsonville Turtle Pecan ice cream during the Oscars. 

These gifts are not essential to the love the Father, and receiving them or not doesn't mean that someone is more or less loved by Him or that they have or haven't done (or not done) anything to deserve them.  It's just a tiny snapshot of the good things that come from Him, because He is goodness and He is the only way.

It's the Little Things

Here are some unsolicited thoughts on life that I have.  Take it as you wish :)

-True friends are the people who you can make laugh and who make you laugh.  Laugh often.  

-Pancakes late at night are always a good idea.  The waitress will probably give you the smiley face kids pancake if you ask, even if you are 21 instead of 12 or under.

-Encouraging others will probably encourage you at least as much as it encourages the other person.  Not that it's a reason to do so, but joy comes in looking away from ourselves.

-It's often what we don't expect that delights us the most.  Sometimes its good to let it happen and not burden ourselves with worrying about every detail.  I can panic about the future or enjoy the present.  There is a time for both of these things, but the second one is really important, especially right now.

-Sometimes God brings us through painful things to grow us, and the effects of that pain and growth can't always be seen right away.

"I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh." --Ezekiel 36:26

All that's dead can be and IS reborn.  Beauty comes from ashes.

I'm Not Who I Was

One of the marketing slogans for my study abroad organization is "Your World: Redefined," referring to different aspects of life that are redefined abroad, such as public transportation, lunch time, weekends, or whatever it may be.  This led to many jokes in my program, mostly around varying Chinese standards of bathroom cleanliness.  What IES can't tell you, is how true this may actually be, for more than bathrooms, etiquette, and sense of time.

I'm not who I was.

The hardest part of my abroad journey was coming back to Hope and realizing that the place that I left, and the person that I was then are gone and that they aren't coming back.  Reality set in after the initial face of running and screaming and hugging and unfulfilled (and fulfilled) promises for coffee dates.  My stories weren't dramatic in the way some people may have expected.  I could barely articulate anything.

Since September, I've gone through periods of intensely desiring pre-China Karen.  She seemed so much more confidant of who she was and where her life was going.  For me, coming home from abroad also aligned nicely with the beginning of the senior questioning, "So what are you actually going to do with your life like immediately in the next year when everything you've known for the last four years changes?"  The time that being at college was all that mattered is gone.  The kicker is that I had an answer to this question before I went to China, and then that got turned on its face.  I don't know who I am or what I'm made to do anymore.  (This is an exaggeration.  I have ideas and things that I'm pursuing right now, but these questions are still pressing).

I've spent way too much time and energy wishing for things to be different.  Also, just because things aren't the way I want them to be doesn't mean that I've done something wrong to deserve it.  This is severely limiting God's sovereignty and loving character.

I'm not going to have any huge ideas of what I'm doing for the next few years.  The feeling of unsettled turbulence probably isn't going to get significantly better, I'll just figure things out a little at a time.  However, I have the choice to be upset about it or not.  I can dig in my heels and protest leaving my home sweet Hope, or I can look back at the incredibly ways God has proven His grace, sovereignty and tendency to blow my expectations out of the water, and know that He has the next thing coming, and that right now is a time to trust Him.

God replaces the anxiety, the doubt with desire for more of who He is.  With His presence comes peace and contentment.  (Philippians 4)

I'm not who I was, and I can be upset about it or I can move forward with it, trusting that I'm being refined, for good even if it's at an alarming rate.  My life changed so utterly completely that it's taken awhile to figure it all out.  I finished a journal recently, and on the last page I wrote down a few things that I'm going to leave behind in that journal.  I closed the book, and made the choice not to let myself by held captive by those lies anymore.  Life with God is an adventure, and I'm thankful for where I've been and who it's making me to be.

To the Seniors-

This are some things that represent consistency to me (Jesus, Christmas lights, mountains (specifically Mt. Rainier), and coffee dates).

If you're a senior, whether college or high school or something else, or you're transitioning in life or you're not, this post is for you.

I moved back to college for the last time today.  I'll be gone for a week for spring break, and for a few days at a time for a weekend or whatever, but this was it.  One more semester.  I'm still wondering what happened to the other seven before this.

Ask me (or another senior) how I'm doing at some point during this semester (or last) and I'll probably give you some vague wild-eyed answer about how life is crazy or it's senior year or something like that.  If you want to know what that's like, it's a roller coaster.  One minute it's laughing until I cry with the roommates, the next it's comprehending the impending reality of fully supporting myself, paying bills, finding a job, and wondering if I could actually live off of minimum wage if I had to.  Back to my college life of joyful run ins with friends at coffee shops.  Next, "I'm literally going to never see 95% of these people after this semester... really?!"  If you're in high school it's college apps and the thought of not living in your house.  To be completely honest I finished that sentence about jobs and then opened another tab for my school's job website to see if they have any helpful postings.  See what I mean?

The last year of my life has seen more transitions, challenges, and joys than many other years before combined.  The best I can describe is that I've been left with a deep sense of "whaaaaat?" in many parts of life- faith relationships, identity, future plans, present plans, what I've done in the past.  I thought I knew who I was until I lived in China for a semester but then oh yeah I went to Colorado for the summer and then wait, hold up, I'm back in Michigan for this weird senior year thing, except ah crap, this community changed while I was gone and I changed too.  Yikes!  Where do I fit now?  365 days can hold a lot, people.

There's a song I love called "One Thing Remains" that I've quoted on this blog multiple times before, it was one of my jams a year ago, during the fall semester where my life got turned upside down.  Basically it says that the one thing that remains is God's love and the Truth of the Gospel.  This year, everything I thought I knew got turned upside down, except for this simple yet infinitely profound fact.  There were also a lot of times that I didn't feel like God loved me, or had a plan for me, or that I had screwed up and let Him down and therefore missed the said plan.  But I know that this is true.  I KNOW that the Gospel is true because God's Word says that it is, and I have seen it proven true multiple times in my life and in the lives of my friends.  I choose to cling to this truth and follow Jesus even when I don't FEEL like it.  This is perseverance and it leads to faith (James 1, Romans 5).  By no means am I saying that I have this figured out, or trying to glorify myself, (actually the contrary), its that I've had a big season of doubt but God is still who He says He is.

Tonight, I was sitting in my friend's living room praying and worshipping with more friends, feeling the confused angst that is everything I've just described.  I didn't want to be there because I didn't want to invest because goodbyes are hard and the future is uncertain.  We sang a few songs and I was writing frantically in my journal trying to understand what I was feeling, again clinging to that Truth in my mind but not in my heart.  But, God brought breakthrough (as He is quite prone to doing!)  Here's the gist- I am her.  I am the one He made His daughter, He made me the way He wants me to impact the world for His glory.  Why do I doubt?  This is where I realized I have a choice, and maybe you'll realize that you have a choice too.

Seniors, this is it.  This is all we get now.  It's easy to want to throw something at the wall because time is moving too fast and the big world is scary, or maybe you're not like me and you're ready for the next chapter.  But we have a choice.  We can stew in these emotions or we can choose joy.  I can look around the room and my heart hurts because this doesn't last forever.  Or, I can say I AM SO THANKFUL for this person and the role they've had in my life, and I'm going to be intentional when we no longer live in the same four block radius.  For most of the relationships, the intention will fade with time, and maybe, maybe, that's going to be okay because there will be new people in the next thing and the next thing after that.  Maybe enjoying the present is better than freaking out about the future.  Or, if you're in the other boat, don't write this off too quickly.  You are still in this time for a reason, and the next one won't be quite like it.  Because I know that God is who He says He is, because He's proved it before and He'll prove it again, the more I look for the evidence of this the more I'll find it.   This season has had rich parts and hard parts and so will the next season and the one after that.  You may be thinking, "well, DUH" but it seems that these truths are easier to forget then we'd like to think.

Here's to the last one- choosing joy and trusting God.  Le' go.

Lies

Lies.

They are persistent.  They feel like the truth.  They are straight from the heart of darkness.  They cut down to slowly, slowly destroy.  Their destruction is not outright, it is the day that I realize, I am completely in bondage to something that is completely untrue.

Our struggles lie not in flesh in blood, but in the rulers, authorities, and powers of the dark world and the evil spiritual forces in heavenly places.  (Eph. 6:12)

The thing is, there is victory and freedom from the lies to be found in Jesus Christ.  In His sacrifice for the sin of the world He adopted us as sons and daughters of Him, and He sent those powers of darkness to the grave.  The law that the punishment for sin was death was shattered in the moment that God became human and offered Himself for people who did the opposite of anything to deserve it.  Even though there are still struggles here on earth, and this is only going to get worse before Jesus comes back, we know how the story ends.  Jesus comes back and sends evil where it belongs, when the wrongs are made right and the tears are washed away, He makes all things new.

Alas, we are still here on earth.  We are still struggling.  The lies are still being whispered in our minds or spoken by people in our lives with such cunning.  I hate Satan.  Seriously I do.  I hate the one who causes the pain in this world and causes people to live less than their full identity as children of God, eternally loved, forgiven, chosen, full of grace, and full of God's fierce authority.  I hate the times that I let him rule in my life.

The times when the lies twist and twist and become the truth, when I walk in a broken version of who I'm supposed to be.  Yet, it happens again and again and it's going to until the day I see Jesus face to face.

I've had some struggles with jealousy and comparison this semester.  Things like, she's not friends with me- guess I'm not good enough to make the cut.  Look, she has it together and looks great all the time to boot.  What's up with you?  Well obviously these two people are closer with each other than with you.  You're just not good enough, because if you were they would include you more often.  Did you see how much fun they had?  Gosh.  You're just not good enough to have a group of friends like that.  Everyone forgets about you and no one really likes you.  Good luck being spiritual enough or pretty enough or funny enough or not-awkward enough to find a husband one day.  I HATE IT I HATE I HATE IT.

Even there, I was simply writing out of my heart, not trying to organize thoughts at all.  Three times in that last short paragraph I said the words "you're not good enough."  There friends, is the lie that is twisted into the core of my heart, since my childhood.  I don't know how it got there, and I really wish it wasn't there, yet so far in my 21.5 years, every time I gain victory it comes back in a new disguise.  Such is life.

Let's talk about everything's that's messed up with what I just said up there.  Most of these things involve my relationships with others, with the mindset that my destiny is controlled by other people.  The world says that I control my future, God says that He controls it better than I ever could.  As a Christian I am guaranteed persecution in this world, yet I am not defined or harmed by persecution.  Here's another main important truthful thing- I HAVE FRIENDS.  Not just friends, but really awesome, kindhearted, loving friends who I don't even deserve.  They love me, support me, and are for me in whatever I choose to do with my life.  I don't know how far I can go in speaking for them, but they enjoy spending time with me.  Another problem- I am not near grateful enough for what I DO have.  I disregard my friends to lust after the thrill of a new relationship, yet it is impossible to be friends with every single person I come in contact with.  Being at college and constantly surrounded by an ever shifting group of people doesn't really help this, but still!  Yikes!

Here's the main thing- NONE of these things are what really defines me.  My name is Daughter of the most high King.  My striving means nothing.  The very essence of the Truth is that I am completely UNABLE to gain any sort of salvation on my own BUT that Jesus did it all for me.  Because of that, I walk in FREEDOM from the power of darkness, and IN HIM I have the POWER to rebuke those powers of darkness back to the grave, where their ultimate destiny lies.

Friends, know how much I do love you.  Join me in rebuking these lies in the name of JESUS, who is more perfect and wonderful than we can dare imagine.  Let's walk boldly in our identities as sons and daughters, love each other well, and change the world for His glory.  Amen!