I interrupt this blog hiatus to say...

…for your encouragement, prayer, and support throughout the ups and downs of the last 10 (only four? Sure seemed like 10…) years. 

I have so many memories...

Living in a big city for a month and loving it…introduction to independence and college life? Fabulous.

Receiving the worst phone call of my life…and living through the even worse 24 hours of angst before it.

The end of my very fabulous but very brief experience with “college life” due to said phone call.

A year of soaked up Daddy-moments that will last forever and horrific snapshots that will hopefully not last forever.

Saying goodbye to my earthly father and please dear God hold me tight to my heavenly Father.

Finding healing in the giggles and cuddles of little ones…and a new passion and direction in—who knew?—nursing. GOD knew.

That moment of pure terror when I had to give my first injection…haha. If only I knew what was to come…

Almost moving to Africa. Almost. And then realizing that sometimes I think my ideas are better than His.

Meeting incredible patients. Serving incredible (and sometimes not-so-incredible-but-equally-loved-by-Him) patients and finding myself to be the one blessed.

Standing on a dirt floor in Guatemala, looking at my hands and thinking, “Lord God you MADE me to do this, didn’t you?!”

Getting a sideline seat to a precious little one coming home to his family…forever.

Crashing and clinging in a sea of never, ever ending grief…and finding myself nestled in the palm of His hand.

Getting to love and be loved by another family. Grace, all grace.

Discovering what He has laid on my heart.

Nursing school. What to say about nursing school… Can I just tell some gross stories? No? You really don’t want to hear about blood, guts, and gore? About the time I was asked to get a r*ct*l temperature and, well, the guy had no…Okay, okay. You get the picture. Lots of delightfully gross stories.

Holding a home health job with equally gross and you-did-WHAT? kind of stories.

******

I could go on, and on, and on…but then you would stop reading (if you haven’t already?) and I would just be rambling to myself about stories and memories I already hold in my heart.

I have been wounded. I have been torn, and hurt, and buried deep. I have lost and been lost. I have been broken. But in the midst of it all, I have discovered that

He makes beautiful things.

"God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God's work from beginning to end" (Ecclesiastes 3:11).

Now, after a winding and sometimes tumultuous journey, I am *officially* a nurse (say WHAT?!) and looking at a new unknown. And while I could choose to be anxious, and terrified, and full of questions—and sometimes I do choose worry over trust—today I choose thankfulness. Today I choose to marvel at His grace, and His grace through YOU…loving and supporting me along the way. All praise and glory to Him alone.

Celebrating…

Um, He-LLO brownie cheesecake!

Relishing the moment with friends...

and family (or a part thereof)...

*photo credit goes to my lovely friend Rebecca*

...If I was super cheesy, I would sign this post "ASH, RN." But I'm not. So I won't.

Farewell....for now.

As I look back over the past year--and all the pain and heartache, interwoven with joy and numerous blessings, that came with it--I cannot pretend to understand this story God has been weaving in my life. There are so many things that don't make sense to me...and yet I know that God continues to reap blossoms of growth and new life from my bleeding heart.

After all this past year has held, I would be lying if I said I am free of apprehension as I look toward 2012. However, I know that nothing--neither life nor death, sickness nor the best of health, neither friendship nor relationships lost, poverty nor a bounty of blessings--NOTHING can move me from the hand of God. It is in this confidence that I move into 2012.

I have been asking God what He has for me this next year, and although He has not given me the road map of 2012 {I'd rather Him keep it anyway}, I have heard His still, small voice stirring in the deep places of my heart:

Be still and know that I am God.
You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

I ask, "God, what do you want from me in the next 12 months?"

He says, I want you to listen.

This world needs more people who are willing to listen to the heart of God. And although I am no master of this discipline (I am rather quite the novice), I want so desperately to hear. It is for this reason I am taking a year off from blogging. No, this is not a New Year's resolution...this is the result of much prayer and will be a daily choice to spend in different ways the time God so graciously gives me.

I don't know that I ever would choose to leave this writing place for any lesser task or calling, and I do sincerely believe that I will be back...for surely it was God who gave me this love of writing! I will most certainly miss this empty screen filling with my heart, although I want you to know that I will look forward to keeping up, periodically, with the writing and lives of those of you whose words have touched my life.

Please take the time today to reflect upon all that God has done for you in the past year...and how He might lead you in 2012.

Much love, friends, and Happy New Year!

Christmas...the birth of peace

From Luke 2:
⁸ And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. ⁹ An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. ¹⁰ But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. ¹¹ Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. ¹² This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” ¹³ Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,¹⁴ “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”

Glory to God and on earth...peace. The end of hostility between man and God. Freedom from strife. Peace.

I hear that word--peace--and I wonder. Where? How? How, when people cease living and choose dying? How, when money squeezes tight and families fall apart? How, when children cry alone at night, without family, without hope? Peace? ...how?

And yet that's why Jesus came, right? For peace. For reunification between God and mankind.

Once again, as the remembrance of that birth draws near, I sit still and listen. I sit with the shepherds in that long-ago field and cry out with the angels, "Glory to God!" And I whisper with desperation, "Please, God! Bring your peace!" Bring peace to this broken world.

"For unto us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6).

Even as I sit, I hear His gentle whisper in response: "Seek peace and pursue it" (Psalm 34:14).

He is here. He is among us...God incarnate. The Prince of Peace. I wonder, "Where is peace?" And he answers:
I am here.

THAT, my friends, is good news.

This Christmas, I am crying for a deeper longing to seek and pursue the Prince of Peace...to facilitate the collision of this world's brokenness with the very heart of God.

Wishing you a very joyful celebration of the Lord's birth...And may you find yourself seeking and pursuing the Prince of Peace this Christmas season.

PLEASE help my friends

Please, please take one minute out of your day to help my friends. They are in the process of adopting their 3-year-old daughter, who has been with them pretty much since her birth, from Kenya, but the process is taking longer than expected. Eden's mom had to come back to the States for the birth of their 3rd child, while Eden is still in Kenya with her dad. They just want to be reunited for Christmas and the birth of her little sister! Below is a note of explanation from Eden's grandma, and the link to a petition for Eden's cause. Please take a minute to sign it...it literally just takes a minute! Thank you so much!

Please, please, PLEASE take 3 minutes out of your day to sign this petition. As many of you know, my beautiful granddaughter, Eden, is in the process of being adopted from Kenya. The process is taking far longer than it should; and Eden is now separated from her brother, A*, and her mother (my daughter, M*, who is now in the US preparing to give birth to their 3rd child in January) while staying in Kenya with her dad, B*. The stress of the separation is tough for the whole family, but especially for 3 year-old Eden. PLEASE POST THIS LINK AS YOUR STATUS TO HELP BRING HER BACK BY CHRISTMAS. If you have any contacts that you think could help Eden's cause please let me know. Thank you

http://www.change.org/petitions/us-citizenship-and-immigration-service-uscis-expedited-humanitarian-parole-for-baby-eden-bring-her-home-by-christmas

People-Pleasing 101

First, take inventory of all the people in your life that you want to please.

Then spend hours and hours trying to figure out how you can make them like you better.

Above all else, make sure you NEVER make a mistake...and if you do, do not, I said do NOT let anyone else know that you messed up.

If someone criticizes you or points out a fault, wallow in self-pity for days and days and let that criticism inform your view of yourself.

Spend time with people who like you and avoid people who are less drawn to your people-pleasing tactics.

Remember, who you are is what others say you are.

If you follow these principles, you will be well on your way to pleasing all the people in your life.

Yikes. All that may sound crazy, but I'm sure I have done each of those things at least once in my life. For so many years my opinion of myself was directly related to what others thought of me or how I perceived others to think of me. I am still prone to this type of thinking at times, but I do pray that God continues to strip me of my people-pleasing tendencies. I heard a quote on the radio today that made me stop in my tracks: "It is wrong to give anyone the power to make us through their affirmation or break us through their rejection."

I don't know how many times I have allowed myself to be broken through the rejection or criticism of others, even if it was administered with all the love in the world. Rather than taking the comments before God and asking Him how He wants to change me, I simply turn in on myself in self-pity. I want to be so confident in my identity as a beloved child of God that no human being has the power to make me through their affirmation or break me through their rejection.

I must say, though, this people-pleasing girl is most definitely a work in progress.

A Different Kind of Orphan

Tomorrow is orphan Sunday. I have a huge heart for the orphan, and I am excited to see how God may one day use that passion to His glory in serving these kids He loves so much. I want to use this post, however, to talk about a different kind of orphan.

I hear the statistics all over...There are 163 million orphans in the world today, depending on where you do your research. I admit it...When I hear this, my mind immediately goes to pictures of kids with swollen bellies in Africa, kids who are obviously in desperate need of medical attention and the love of a family. However, just yesterday God opened my mind to something.

If you do the research, you may discover that roughly 13% of the 163 million have lost both parents. So, what about the other 87%, you say? Well, the other 145 million are missing one parent.

77% of the 163 million are missing a dad.

Wow.
That's 126 million kids, worldwide, without a dad.
Wow.

You know what blew my mind even more? On July 31, 2009, my little brother became part of that statistic.

I don't want you to think that, by including my brother in this number, I am discounting the terrible, horrible circumstances facing millions of children around the world who are suffering ALONE tonight. My brother is loved and cared for, has a warm bed to sleep in tonight and a full belly...while many kids are starving to death and dying from preventable diseases--with NO ONE to hold them or kiss their foreheads. There is a desperate need for people to adopt, foster, and sponsor children around the world...children who are missing one or both parents and enduring conditions not even conducive to life. Tonight, I pray that you will think about these needs and what you can do to alleviate them in some way. {If you want to know how, shoot me an email and I will gladly suggest some ways to get involved.} However, I also want you to think about something else.

Many of you may look at the daunting reality--163 million orphans--and think, "What could I possibly do to change that number???" I often wonder myself. For those of you who easily find yourselves overwhelmed when you think about the possibility of adoption, foster care, or even child sponsorship, I want to remind you that you do not have to look very far to find a fatherless child. They are all around us. They are in our churches, in the same schools as our children, in the homes next to us and just down the street...they are all around us. Maybe you think international adoption is out of reach for you and your family. The fatherless are not.

Not a day goes by that I don't long for my brother to be pursued by a godly man who will willingly invest his time in the life of a now-fatherless kid. And my brother had the best dad known to man...for 13 years of his life. There are millions of other kids around the world who have gone much longer without a dad in the picture.

Maybe you feel like you cannot adopt, foster, or even sponsor a child. Can you find the time to invest, even in some small way, in the life of a fatherless kid? Even by taking the time to call, to ask how the child's day was? Even by attending one of the child's sporting events so he or she has someone to cheer from the stands? Even by writing a card, sharing an encouraging Bible verse? Can you commit to faithfully pray for a fatherless child?

You don't have to spend thousands of dollars on an adoption in order to care for the orphan. You don't have to take hours and hours of training to become a foster parent in order to care for the orphan. You don't have to travel around the world on a mission trip in order to care for the orphan. All of these things are good, and maybe you should ask God if He wants you to do one or all of them. BUT. The fatherless are right before you, and their needs are not necessarily complex.

They want to know that someone cares.
They want someone to ask how school is going.
They want someone to shoot hoops with them after school.
They want someone to offer to help with their homework.
They want someone to give them a big hug, the kind that only a dad can give.
They want someone to take them out to dinner, just because.
Really, they just want to know that someone cares.
Can you care?

Tonight, I want you to think about these words in a different light:
"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: To look after orphans and widows in their distress {yes, even and especially the ones who go to your church and live next door and attend your schools} and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world" (James 1:27).

Choosing Thankfulness

Because I sometimes (believe it or not) struggle to find something to say, and because I need reminders of God's faithfulness so desperately right now, I was flipping through old posts recently. Two years ago this month, I posted these words written by my dad. He was in the thick of treatment for pancreatic cancer when he wrote them in February of 2009. And yet he was joyfully thankful.

“Nothing that happens to the follower of Christ, to those of us who with great joy call Him Lord, takes our Savior by surprise. His brilliant and awesome foreknowledge allows Him to know every detail well in advance. That is the stuff of thanksgiving, even in the midst of pancreatic cancer…God has asked His servants to be thankful in all circumstances. Sincere obedience is often carried out in the absence of happy, joyful feelings…but He is in control, and He can take something like pancreatic cancer and use it to accomplish great eternal good…Yes, we can give thanks for pancreatic cancer because of all this and for so many other blessings that He has poured out on us…”

Yikes, I needed these words. Like a smack upside the head. The reason I can be thankful tonight is because God sent His son Jesus to die in my place, to cover my eternal destiny. Therefore, nothing takes my Savior by surprise. Every mountaintop, valley, and pit...He knew them all well in advance. And He asks me to be thankful here. And yet here I am complaining too often, when he asked my dad to be thankful for a brutal diagnosis. For pain and suffering. For death. In the midst of my ick, I am so blessed. I am not withering away from a terrible sickness...even though I often whine like I am. Lord, give me your perspective and the thankful heart that is born out of a heavenly perspective...