A Dangerous Prayer

I want Jesus to wreck my world. I want Him to come and ruin my soul. Ruin my soul according to His desires for my life. I want Him to come and burn down every idol I've placed high on a pedestal above Him. I want Him to bring destruction to my selfish heart. I want Him to tear down my walls, the ones that keep me safe inside of this dangerously comfortable life. I want to be tested with provocative questions that convict my soul and leave me barren and open. I want my wounds to be cleansed with something far deeper than antiseptics. I want Him to cleanse away the sin that pushed me to this broken place. Once again. I want my future to frighten me, so I'm sure it's out of my hands.
I don't want to be worshiping idols when Jesus died on a cross and saved my life. Revived my soul. I don't want a selfish, conceited heart. I don't ever want to be so worried about my own life, so caught up in my ridiculous problems, that I miss caring for an orphaned child, a broken spirit and a homeless heart. I don't want to live comfortably. When I fall asleep at night in my warm bed, I want to remember the children that are sleeping under the stars.  I don't want these wounds to fester when the Healer tells me to just surrender. I don't want to be the one that weaves a tapestry of my future. I don't want to want when I have all I could ever need in my salvation.
I want my desires to reflect the One who created me. I want to love the least of these.
With absolutely no idea where God's plan for my life is, I'm jumping in blinded. I will walk by faith and not by sight. I will trust his wonderful, miraculous plan for my life. Wherever it may be. 
I want to pray this dangerous prayer. A prayer that will take me far from my comfort zone. A prayer that will move mountains of complacency in my life. A prayer that asks to be taken apart but never asks to be put back together again because He tells me "My Grace is sufficient for you." I want the words that slip from my mouth, the words that flow from my pen onto my paper to be genuine. I want to pray a dangerous prayer and mean it with my everything.

Jesus, 
come and wreck my life. 
Tear it to pieces so that I can be used by you.
And only you. 
Give me the strength to do radical things.
Not for me, and my glory.
But so that you can be glorified.
Above All.

Suicide Awareness Day Poem

The years have passed,

flown by,

just like all the adults promised us.

The memories have distanced,

we forget to wonder why.

But your story never leaves us,

your story is the truth that lingers.

Your pain is the scream,

the scream that never lets us deafen our ears.

Before, we tried not to look.

We excused ourselves from the pain we caused.

But your death left us aware.

It left us with guilt on our hands.

It changed some of us,

opened our eyes.

It passed by the others.

But we knew we couldn't just watch anymore.

The tears in your sister's eyes told us that.

Your best friend's broken heart,

it reminds me every time I see him.

Even five years later.

Sometimes I wonder, 

who you would be.

What your aspirations would have been,

if we would still be friends.

If maybe you would forgive us. 

Your death,

my friend,

was the hardest thing my 8th grade self had faced.

Your death, 

I wish I could have changed,

but I couldn't.

So today,

I have to learn. 

I have to learn to look for you in everyone I see. 

I can't close my eyes.

I can't deafen my ears to the silent screams that I know are around me.

If you listen,

they come in broken hearts,

empty eyes,

scars. 

I want to look like Love to the broken.

I want to bring Jesus to the lost.

I will not forget you, 

my friend.

 

So the question remains, How can we not forget? How can we not allow his death to be in vain? There are so many people walking around with the same pain my 8th grade friend was walking around with. Sometimes, you can't see it. Sometimes you can. So all we can do is look like Love. Look like Jesus, if just for a little. Don't ignore them because we don't know what to say. Don't walk away when you see bullying. Show them what love really means. Jesus came to bring life to the lost. We are all lost and dying until Jesus saves our life. Literally sweeps through and saves our life. Picks us up from the pits of Hell. We are chained, and he unlocks us. We are broken and he heals us. We were on the verge of dying. All spiritually, some physically. Some at the point of giving up. But Jesus can give them Life! For their dead hearts, for the people that want to give up. But they won't know his Love until we give it to them. They won't know we are different until we write Love on their arms. Until we look like Love.

So Much More Than Meets The Eye

Life is a beautiful thing. Our beginning is a cell, and somehow we are woven into the creation of a thinking, breathing, walking human being. DNA makes our character, our emotions and what makes us feel alive. When our souls feel crushed and our hearts are broken, our eyes know how to cry. When joy bubbles inside of us, our mouths remember to smile.
We grow, we walk, we laugh, we cry, we bleed, we run. Only a God so magnificent and all-powerful could have created us. He made an never-ending universe with galaxies full of stars, a blanket over heaven laced with holes, a glimpse of glory.
And still, He thinks of us. Still, He knows our name. Still, He holds our hearts.
He created life. He created people.
People are absolutely incredible. We have stories and hurts, wounds and scars, hidden loss and joy, desires and laughter. Yet we only reveal the things we want people to see and hide the things we are terrified that they might see. There is so much more to us than meets the eye.
And this summer, I met some beautiful people. Their stories have images that barely scratch the surface of who they are. Their eyes reflect the love of Christ and their smiles promise us that we are not alone in our battles. I heard testimonies of people who have walked through incredible pain and come out on the other side healed by Christ. Each and every one was so different, yet so alike.
 I met a little boy with a tender heart searching for love, the true Love. Children who's stories I pray aren't quite finished yet. I have seen joy etched on a child's face when she knew her Savior was in her heart.
I have met girls who just have a desire to fit in, a desire to be beautiful by this world's painful standards. Girls who pray that life won't turn out the way they fear. Girls with such precious spirits and a desire to follow God and just figuring out how.
God made us all so different, and we can't hold back because of that. He made us with different gifts, physical and spiritual.
He made us so we could guide each other, hold hands when it's dark and we are blinded by our selfish hearts in the middle of trial.
The stories that felt so painful at the time, when the pen was dragged across the tender spot of your heart, was beautiful when the words were aligned and the dark ink was shining from the light.
God doesn't waste a story with a tear-jerking middle. He doesn't waste a climax that makes you want to rewrite the entire story. He ends every story with a purpose. With a testimony.
This summer I saw my testimony used. I felt my faith stretched. I know God's not finished with me yet. Sometimes I wish He were, because I feel like I'm at just the right point, like I could stay right here forever. But He has more. More hurts, more smiles, more trials, more joys. So I trust that as this summer of my life that was just a beautiful chapter in the book of my life closes, the rest of the book will be wonderful, no matter where the Author of my life thinks my character needs to be tested and stretched. He has the pen, and I've given Him the tablet of my heart. 

My Missions Trip to Cherokee

I just returned from spending one of the most difficult yet amazing weeks of my life in Cherokee, North Carolina.
God has a funny way of teaching you to trust him during missions trips. He has a way of doing what he wants to do and doing in just the way he wants to do it. And the way he orchestrates things to happen is absolutely incredible.
    Our team of 24 people 19 teens and 5 adults had a VBS planned on the Armor of God for the Painttown Rec Center. First, I want to warn you that when you plan a VBS on the spiritual battle and how to protect yourself against it, Satan is planning an attack at the exact same time. On Monday we were telling the kids that the battle was a very real thing and by Tuesday we were experiencing how real the battle actually was.
    Before I left for this trip I prayed that God would use my life, my testimony in someone’s life, someone I could relate to. I was completely taken by surprise by how he brought a child into my life, a child that stole my heart.
    On Tuesday afternoon, one of the leaders asked me to help a little boy, Alijah, with his Bible verse.  In the process I learned things about this little boy that I have never experienced in my lifetime. Nearly everyone in Alijah’s life had abandoned him. His father, his mother. He lived with his grandfather and never got to see his two younger brothers. I shared with him how, even though it wasn’t the same, like him I was missing a parent.  On Wednesday Alijah was clinging to me, so I took him aside and showed him a verse that could only have come from the Holy Spirit. Psalm 146:9- about how God upholds the fatherless. I told him that even though his earthly father had abandoned him God was his heavenly Father who would never abandon him. Eventually I got to lead him to Christ. This was one of the most beautiful experiences in my life. Sometimes you’re unsure if the child is serious or not about his commitment, but afterwards, on his prize from memorizing his bible verse, without anyone’s help he wrote the following: I love God because hope. I love God for realz, and I love God.
    On Thursday, I was terrified to leave him. He told me I should come to his house sometime, and when I told him today was our last day, the look on his face broke my heart in half. I felt as though if I left him, just like everyone he knew, He would think that God might leave him. But God was busy teaching me something. He was teaching me how to entrust the people I meet to him. When I meet someone, I latch onto them and in my plans, I’m not letting go anytime soon whether or not that person realizes it. So when I first met Alijah my heart when out to him and my heart decided it wasn’t letting go, even though subconsciously I knew I’d have to leave in 4 short days. I was so confused, I kept praying “God, How can you let this little boy think that I’m abandoning him, that You’re abandoning Him? This isn’t fair.” Through my friend Sarah, God told me something. She said “I don’t think we should be sad for what we can’t do anymore, the rest is in His plans, I think we should praise God for what He was done this week.” God taught me that he loves these kids far more than I love them. His love for Alijah was so much greater than I thought I loved him. His plans were far more beautiful than what I thought would be good for these kids. He sees the greater picture, while I only see his snapshot of life and I have to trust Him with his plan. So with God’s help, I let this little boy go. I let him go, knowing that God plan was better. Hoping and praying that in the 4 days God let me be in his life, I gave him my everything, letting him know that I’d be praying for his precious heart for the rest of my life. Because he impacted me in ways you never knew a 5 year old could.
    That week was amazing. I saw 5 precious souls come to Christ and 19 teenagers rejoice with the angels. I saw Laurali’s smile light up everyone’s world. I saw the joy written all over Teya’s face when she asked Jesus to be her Savior. I saw Alijah cry tears for something I might never understand, but by God’s grace was given a tiny footprint on his life. I got one my first glimpses into the spiritual battle and understood how real it is, and how much I really do need the armor of God. I saw our team unified in ways I didn’t even know possible. I’ve grown relationships that I’m positive will last a lifetime. And most importantly I saw God’s grief and broken heart over his lost children and I saw Him love them with an everlasting love.

Beautiful

At YoliJwa this past week, my lovely counselor did a devotional where she had us take a clay pot and write the things that hindered us, and held us back from being who we really were, the things that keep us from feeling beautiful as God created us. Then she took us to the fire escape and had us throw them down and shatter them on the ground. A few days later, she constructed the broken pieces of our clay pots into the shape of a crown, in a representation of beauty for ashes in our lives. And this is my poem written about that.


Beautiful,
this molded piece of clay crafted by Hands from above.
Beautiful,
the way it was formed just perfectly.
Stained,
over time these painful truths were etched across the surface of my heart.
Stained,
in permanent ink, the hurt that couldn't be washed away.
Overwhelmed,
These thoughts swirl with confusion around my mind.
Overwhelmed,
The burdens lay restless on the tablet of my heart.
Shattered,
by my own desire or maybe an unfortunate turn of events.
Shattered,
either way the pieces of my molded clay being lie in a heap on the ground.
Broken,
with feelings that none of this could ever turn for good.
Broken,
The lies dance near my heart whispering to just give up on it all.
A promise,
"just wait, only a little longer, this is My covenant."
A promise,
with an impatient longing for the results to play according to my own will.
Beautiful,
the broken pieces that made the clay of who I am dance together in a symphony that promises I am still His.
Beautiful,
We have to be so broken to the point where God's Light can radiate through.
Beautiful,
And with a healed heart, He shines through the beauty of my shattered, stained glass soul.
Beautiful.

The Puzzle

Life is like a puzzle with one thousand pieces. When you open the box, it can almost be overwhelming. You start with the end pieces. The foundation. A heart prepares for what what's to come. Dreams enhance, with no photograph that comes with the box, it is the only thing to do. No map that came with these breaths, so you dream. Once the frame is built, there's a faith. A beginning. An innocent childhood is created with a smile to last a lifetime. A faith to move mountains.

You conquer the easy pieces first, the ones that align just perfectly with one another. The ones that form a face, or piece together the line that separates sky from land. Light from dark. It's a happy time because you can see what is being created. You can understand that ideas in the puzzle maker's heart.

The dark colors come, though. The colors in the landscape that merge together, and are only a collection of murky grays and painful blacks. Frustration builds when the difficult pieces won't fit. And there are still a million pieces left. You're overwhelmed because the in-congruent piece in your hand doesn't match any that are scattered across the board. It doesn't match the plan that you built, constructed; carefully and perfectly. The dark shades bleed together, hard to separate, hard to place. The scattered pieces represent your heart, especially the dark ones, they don't match and all you want is to fix them.

There's a whisper, a silent still small voice, one that you can only here when your heart is quiet and still. It says this: “You cannot see the work of art, hidden beneath the scattered pieces, you cannot see the drawing I've created, the one I've crafted just for you. Fearfully and wonderfully made this will be. I promise, if you can only wait and see. I know it's frustrating because I've been there. Child, you need only be still and know that I am God. Cast all your anxieties, frustrations, pains, fears and dreams on Me for I care for you. Child, do not be anxious, instead turn to me, bring your burdens, and most importantly, pray. I will bring you a peace that no one will ever understand. I hold you in the palm of my hand. Do not fear. Trust that this plan is bigger than you'll know, For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are My ways your ways.” You will only hear His voice, when you are silent, when your heart is breaking, when your soul is alone, and your mind is listening.

When finally, this life is complete, your heart has mended, your soul is redeemed and the puzzle is beautiful, will you understand. The dark pieces were necessary to create the entire picture. You were blind to see how wonderfully they merged with the lights. How even the pain was needed to create peace and healing. With the masterpiece completed, the photograph pieced together, you will once again be able to turn to the Creator, hear His voice, fall to your knees and worship the One who knew how you would cry and doubt, who knew you would look away and fall and stumble in the dark, who knew you would smile at the little blessings, who knew you would grieve they way you did when you thought all was lost. He knew and still, He never turned His face away from you, He never let his fingers untangle from yours even though you forgot how they felt against your skin. When eternity is at your fingertips and the life behind you makes sense, you smile at the imprint in the sand you left in the span of forever, and you turn to worship, praise and adore the One who led you through it all.

Frame Savored Memories

Memory savored in a frame, 

locked on a heart,

trapped in time.

The face is hidden,

abandoned by this stratosphere.

In the heavens,

dwelling with the angels.

A never-ending fall,

through an endless black hole burned in my heart.

A void,

from the star that shone brightly in my soul.

Silenced in an instant,

shattered in a second,

yet unbreakable for eternity.

It's your face I'd dance to life.

Tragedy feels so real,

I wish to awaken from restless slumber

and discover death a nightmare.

The chilling numb

 just a dream.

The raw wounds 

only a fear.

The tears 

a frozen rain.

The antiseptics dowsed,

still drowning a wound,

but if this is numb,

then what is pain?

 Peace indwells the numb

in a miraculous uniting joy and pain.

Even when you cannot feel,

your heart longs,

in rest.

Even when the fear approaches in a haunting moment,

Your soul breathes,

in peace.

Even when looking at their smile through framed glass,

threatens to drown you in tears,

your heart beats,

in joy.

Even when the burden seems more to bear,

you revel in the lightness resting on your shoulders.

It's these moments when Eternity is engraved deep within our hearts.

The wonder of waiting is discovered,

and the Peace is overwhelming.