Dear,

I know your thoughts; I can hear them. (...engagements, graduate school, weddings, pregnancies, careers, babies, statuses upon statuses and photos upon photos, with hundreds of likes and congratulations and thanks-I-have-the-best-job/husband/kid-ever!, strung across Facebook like lights on an over-decorated Christmas tree, everyone smiling, happy, and living, everyone but...) 

You believe everyone else moves forward while you stand still. Your greatest fear is being left behind. But this is not a race, My love, and you are not losing.

I gave her those words because you needed to hear them. I gave her those words because they are true. Where you are is where you're supposed to be. You are not a late bloomer, dear one--just a different kind of bloom. You're not behind schedule--you're just on a different timeline. I have never been in the business of cookie-cutter lives. I value creativity over efficiency, for Time means naught to Me. Your story is as unique as the soul I fashioned to live it.

If you spend your life wrapped up in jealousy over everyone else's story, you will miss the beauty of your own. Don't be concerned if the plot looks nothing like the stories around you. Don't be afraid if it takes an unexpected twist. For I am the Author of this story, and I hold your best interest at heart.

You are exactly who I made you to be, Beloved. And you are right on time.

Dear God,

All I want for Christmas is You.

My Christmas List.

The glow of Christmas lights. Hot chocolate. The thought of snow, and fireplaces. Writing Christmas cards to dear loved ones while listening to familiar (or new!) Christmas melodies on my Pandora station. The smell of pine. Family traditions. Christmas movies. Decorating the tree with childhood ornaments. Apple cider. Snowflake earrings, penguin pajamas, and snowman socks. Caroling. Scarves. Baking cookies. Christmas pageants and live nativities. Making a list and checking it twice. Finding the perfect gift for someone. Wrapping those gifts in bright-colored paper (still listening to Christmas music). Christmas Eve service. Sparkling grape juice. Reading the story of Baby Jesus. Taking a ridiculous amount of pictures. Setting the table with fancy dishes. Cold weather. Snuggling under soft blankets. Being near the ones I love and holding them close--whether it be in my arms, or in my heart.

This is my list of things I love about Christmas. These are the reasons why I refuse to be jaded by commercialism, made cynical by all the ridiculous advertisements on television. Because those things don't matter, and they are by no means strong enough to overpower the things that really do--loving what is beautiful, and believing in miracles, and gazing with wonder, and letting the joy spill over, and thanking God for moments like these.

All The Children of the World.

Let the little children come to Me, and I will sing lullabies into the smooth hollows of their ears, Baby, my hands are full of birds that sing and diamond rings, until they breathe easy and slip into dreams, away from the ugliness that is the world, their innocence lost the first time they opened their eyes, for I put them in your charge, and you are a shedder of blood and a spreader of hate.

Let the little children come to Me, for you will brand them with your prejudice, you will fill the beautiful ears of My precious ones with noise that drowns out My cries, I love you, I love you, I love you. You will watch them starve and let them die, you will throw them to the flames for the sake of the ideologies you serve. In times of tragedy, you will grieve their loss and then forget, but I will not forget, for there are not enough sparrows in the world to account for their worth.

Let the little children come to Me, for they are the ones who will lead you when you have lost your way. Take their hands in yours. Feed them when they are hungry. Give them a cup of cold water when they are thirsty. Children are dying every day, and if you let them, you will sink to the bottom of the sea with a millstone 'round your neck. But if you hold them close, if you cradle them in your lap, there you will discover My heart. There, you will learn to love.

Let the little children come to Me, and I will wrap their broken bodies in light. I will hush their crying, catch their tears in my fingertips. They will be birthed into innocence for the very first time, and to them I will give My Kingdom. Come, little children. Come.

And He Came.

I've been searching for a job for months. Filling out application after application, reworking my resume innumerable times, writing eloquent cover letters, taking personality surveys, pestering potential employers with phone calls every few days, reciting the answers to interview questions in my head. Months of this routine, and nothing, absolutely nothing, to show for it.

A week ago, I reached my breaking point. The volcanic emotional sludge that had slowly been encasing my heart was on the verge of a destructive explosion that would most likely wipe out all life within a ten-mile radius. It took all the self-control I possessed (and probably a large portion I didn't) to keep the roiling emotions contained. 

But the containment couldn't last forever. And that's when things began to happen very quickly.

Thursday: That evening, I went to a Bible study. Being around fellow Jesus-lovers alleviated my dark mood, calming me enough to hear God speak. He told me I had been selfish. He told me that it was time to stop justifying my misery, as if I deserved to wallow in self-pity just because life wasn't panning out exactly the way I wanted. So, I took His hand and left the idols of my future expectations broken on the ground. In return, He gave me peace.

Friday: A friend informed me about a job opening, and I applied. 

Monday: I received a call to come in for an interview. 

Tuesday: After writing in my prayer journal and placing everything in God's hands, I went to the interview. 

Wednesday (today): I was offered the job. I accepted. I may also have jumped around in a circle in excitement. 

Months and months of searching and striving and dumping in my human efforts, when all along, He was just waiting for me to give it to Him. To acknowledge my own weakness so He could meet me there. He accomplished in a week what I could not do in six months. 

Tell me there is no God; your words will never be enough to convince me. For I see His hand everywhere I go.

What Grandpa Taught.

As my grandma wheeled him to bed, he reached over the top of the couch and patted me on the head. "I love you, Sweetheart."

I turned toward him and smiled, a smile that always came easily when he was near. "I love you too, Grandpa!" 

They were the last words we would speak to each other. It was fitting, for that brief exchange essentially encompassed the entirety of our relationship. Grandpa and I adored each other. Simple as that. We never had deep discussions about the intricacies of life. He never told me stories about his childhood. We just loved to be together, whether it was sitting at the table sipping coffee in the morning, or eating ice cream on the couch while watching Jeopardy at night.

My love for Grandpa was partly selfish, I'll admit. It was easy to love him, because he loved me. It was a love I never questioned. I just knew--I could see it in his eyes, hear it in his voice. I don't recall him ever speaking an unkind word to me. He was by no means a perfect man, but so secure was I in his love and so completely did I love him in return, I was willing to overlook every fault of his in an instant.

Since Grandpa died, I've been spending a lot of time considering what exactly made me feel so close to him, though we only saw each other once a year. And I realized that for me, Grandpa mirrored an essential aspect of God's love. 1 John 4:19 declares, "We love because he first loved us." I loved Grandpa because he loved me first, from the time I was a child. The knowledge that he loved me, the security I felt in that, fueled my love for him.

God loves us more completely and fiercely than any human ever could. If we could grasp that truth, or even a meager portion of it, our lives would be utterly changed. It's not a striving kind of love. It's not an always-trying-to-be-good-enough kind of love. It's a climb-up-in-His-lap-and-simply-enjoy-being-with-Him kind of love.

When someone loves us like that, it's an easy thing to love in return. In being loved, we learn how to love. I know, because Grandpa helped teach me.

While Visions of Axe Murderers Dance in My Head.

It was late, the fog nearly thick as the dark, smearing the trees on either side of the road into milky oblivion. My headlights granted me a small patch of visibility just ahead, and I fixed my eyes on the double yellow lines with the desperation of a child at sea clinging to a life preserver.

I knew the road well, but in the murk, it had suddenly morphed into a different creature entirely, eerily strange and impossibly long. I strained my eyes for the blinking yellow traffic-light that should be appearing at any moment, but only darkness filled my vision. The frantic thought even entered my head that perhaps I was on the wrong road, though I knew this was untrue. I had driven this road hundreds of times. I knew exactly where I was going. Still, I held my breath until that familiar yellow light winked lazily through the haze.

Only a few scenarios would have made that situation more terrifying. Scenario #1: An axe murderer appears on the side of the road. Scenario #2: My car breaks down. Scenario #3: The road is one I have never driven before.

The effect the dark and fog had on me that night, though it was really only a mild bout of paranoid anxiety, made me realize why I'm so terrified of life at this point in my journey. Because the road I'm on now is one I've never been on before--this highway of growing up, adulthood, independence, whatever you'd like to call it. I can barely see the ground before my feet. I'm driving painfully slow, afraid a sharp curve will suddenly appear, or the edge of a cliff. All I've got is my little square of light, and what if the next object it illuminates is an axe murderer? I'm blocked on all sides by the unknown, and this road never seems to end. I keep thinking, soon, soon, soon, but my headlights only reveal another empty stretch of road.

But the thing is, if I spend all my time looking at the shadows, I will inevitably crash. I do have a light source, small as it may seem in my own warped perspective. That light is guiding me, foot by foot, mile by mile. It pierces the darkness just enough to tunnel me through it, if I will but watch where it leads me. I may only see it glimpse by glimpse, but I trust that I am on the right road. And somewhere in the night ahead, a brighter light beckons, calling me home.

Forgive Me, Father, For I Have Sinned.

I have been selfish. I have watched my idols, so lovingly crafted, topple, splinter their brittle glass bones upon the floor, shards that brought my skin to bleeding. I have wept for them. I have cradled their lifeless faces in my arms, faces I formed by my own hand, their eyes empty, like me. I have been angry as they crumbled back to dust, for deep in the corners of my unacknowledged subconscious, I believed they were strong enough to save me.

I have watered the mud-hole of my self-pity, drowned all seeds of life in the sorrow I claimed as my right. I have coveted the blessings of others while neglecting my own. I have thrown temper tantrums. I have whined and complained and stomped my feet. I have ridden the winds of my emotions and used my pain to excuse it.

I wanted a part to play that was beautiful and grand. I wanted to travel overseas and offer bowls of rice to orphans, or move across the country and settle deep into the heart of a great revival. But I did not want it for His glory; I wanted it for mine. Not for love, but to assuage the guilt of my blackened heart. And being given no clear and magnificent purpose, I have doubted that I was made for any use at all, and buried my talents in the dirt.

These are my confessions, and they are only a few. I do not fear them, anymore. They may war against me, but they do not define me. No failure of mine can overshadow my identity, the new name given to me on the day God looked down and called me daughter. But I do ask forgiveness, for I have sinned. And this is the place where I drop the tattered remains of who I used to be, into the abyss that stretches ever on, far away from me.

For Those Days.

There will be days when you reach the point of breaking.

There will be days when the smile refuses to come.

There will be days when the cliches cannot sooth you.

There will be days when your skin itches with anger.

There will be days when your insides are screaming.

There will be days when the words will come out.

There will be people who judge you by those words.

There will be people who are offended by your honesty.

(But those people, are only cymbals, clanging.)

There will be people who understand your desperation.

There will be people who love you at your messiest.

There will be people who see you through the eyes of God.

There will be people who recognize that they are the same.

And those people, will make those days, a little easier to bear.

Epic Win: Addendum.

"This day is like the time of Noah to me. I promised then that I would never flood the world again. In the same way, I promise I will not be angry with you or punish you again. The mountains may disappear, and the hills may come to an end, but my love will never disappear; my promise of peace will not come to an end.

"You poor city. Storms have hurt you, and you have not been comforted. But I will rebuild you with turquoise stones, and I will build your foundations with sapphires. I will use rubies to build your walls and shining jewels for the gates and precious jewels for all your outer walls. I will build you using fairness. You will be safe from those who would hurt you, so you will have nothing to fear. Nothing will come to make you afraid.

"No weapon that is used against you will defeat you. You will show that those who speak against you are wrong. These are the good things my servants receive. Their victory comes from me."

-God, as recorded in Isaiah 54:9-12, 14, and 17