Joy-injected

Hi! It’s been a minute.

Well, for those who know, you know I process a lot by writing. And I haven’t been writing, so I don’t think I’ve been processing a lot. It’s been quite the past couple of weeks so I cannot truly imagine all of the things I have been refusing to process.

However, as usual, God arrested me and forced me to stop and to think about everything happening in my life. BUT he forced me to look at it differently. I have been thinking about things, but through this lens of negativity. Everything had bumps, ditches, hurdles, crashes, pitfalls – everything was negative. It was like I couldn’t win!

And I did feel isolated for quite some time. What with my health dragging me down and ministry crumbling to bits – I felt like a failure trying to put out raging forest fires with no knowledge of how and only holding a watering can for help. God did not feel close.

As I read the Word – he sometimes appeared. I read through Genesis and it was fun! But, he was so far away. That was so long ago. Yet, he still made his attributes known. But then I felt like he wasn’t here even still! Who were we to care about! In middle of nowhere Ohio with a bit too much pride and hardly any gifting, with no experience and low IQ’s, with hardly any energy and no insight – who were we to help?? I started feeling like the world was very big and I was very small and stuck in a tiny box – doomed to repeat and repeat and repeat and to burn and burn and burn.

So, it all seemed like it was going to shit in my head. Until this week. I started getting some divine intervention, I would call it.

1. I got a diagnosis. My health has been dragging me down for a while – it’s felt like a chain around my legs, my arms and sometimes my throat. I couldn’t do some many things (still can’t) that I expected to do. Yet, they kept coming and I didn’t know how to live! BUT – finally – after all of the doctors and all of the months, it turns out I wasn’t CRAZY! And it seems, as of now, to be a pretty straightforward diagnosis with next steps! I am not dying like I have felt every day since August! And soon, I will see a doctor that can help.
2. I saw Prati. At just the right time, as I was about to crumble under exhaustion and pressures – Prati walked into the door. It wasn’t long, but it was enough to remind me of so many things in my life. Her presence is so encouraging in itself, but so many truths rushed back into my head from even seeing her! She held me, she told me she loved me and missed me and that in itself was just too much. I remembered what she told me: I am special – God views me as his prized possession, He wants me, He loves me, I am not here by mistake, I am loved by the creator himself, I have a plan, I have things in my heart that were given to me by him, I have so much! And I am so thankful she came in to save the day – literally sent by God. There’s a piece of me that says – it was random and she was there for business and it actually didn’t feel that special. Maybe true, but there is no denying the truths that came out of that interaction aren’t real. And life changing. And peace giving.
   1. (More on who the heck Prati is –> here)
3. On my way home from (another) long day of work, I started listening to a teaching about: If our lives actually matter. He started by asking the questions: Doesn’t life just feel repetitive & pointless? Do you ever feel like you’re just living to work, only left with looking forward to vacation next year? What makes our lives significant? And he then applied it in some weird ways but used Luke 14 – where Jesus tells the host don’t invite your friends, “instead invite the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind. Then at the resurrection of the righteous, God will reward you for inviting those who could not repay you.” — for some reason this just hit me. When Greear asked those questions – that is how I had begun to feel about life! I felt like it was just another day, another task, another hurdle and it will all reset for tomorrow. Life felt lifeless. But then I realized that the answer to the question – what makes life worth it – was right in front of me! — PEOPLE. People are what makes life worth living! Not the job, the annoyances, the vacations, the money, your youth, the fun, the whatever – no, it’s the people. And God really struck me in the heart with that. How many people do I interact with per day? How many times have I overlooked someone who was perfectly placed in my life? How many opportunities have I missed to give to someone? Man, all these questions made me not guilty, but HAPPY. Happy that I don’t have to just go from one thing to another, but that I can look into a person’s eyes, see them the way God sees them and rejoice. For this is my purpose! To look out into the world and explore God’s creation. To see them as gems and jewels, come to life my God’s spirit in them. And in the process, teaching them that this is in fact who they are! This is why they are here, too! They are here to live their lives out as worshipers of God, interacting with other offspring and bringing him glory in our joy for being created!

SO, yeah – I felt stuck and weighed down. Honestly, I still do. But it wouldn’t be walking in faith if it were easy all the time, would it? I feel very fortunate to have opportunities to choose God’s ways instead of my own and despite my feelings. And I feel like God is pushing me forward, not letting me miss anything I’d regret. And I feel he is catching me before I hit the ground, right at the last second, when I’m about to crack my head open – saving me by whispering little truths into my ears to KEEP GOING. That he is there, that he loves me, that life is worth it, that people are worth everything, and to keep seeking him because it is there I will find the peace and joy I am looking for.

I am so blessed to have Jesus in me. I am so blessed to be able to interact with God – a two-way relationship where I sometimes even feel him at work in me, correcting me, encouraging me, loving me, strengthening me and more.

I cannot walk away from the day and say that God was not at work here – he is always! His hands are so obvious. And it’s so funny to think that I have wasted so many recent days on feeling hopeless and despairing. No, life with him is an adventure every step. It DOES NOT feel that way most times, but when I take a step back – there is NO denying it! God is there, he is holding our hands, he knows me, he rejoices in me and he knows where my foot will fall.