Snippets of the Crazy-Slow

I think I have written a thousand, a hundred, okay....maybe a dozen....yes at least a dozen blog posts in my mind over the past six weeks.

Sometimes they were just snippets of a thought.
Other times they had some meaty length to it.
All of them were amazing...she says so humbly...or at least in "my" mind's eye.
But alas, none of them made it to paper...or even screen....so maybe they were just to feed my soul in the interim of waiting to pour out my heart here....to you.

Life has been busy and slow.
But I have said that here already.
I just wish that I could expound more on what that feels like, what that IS in my heart and soul.
Maybe I will soon...or maybe not...
For now, I think I will just share what that conglomeration of this fast slow motion looks like.

1) My Granny fell and broke her neck six weeks ago yesterday. Her neck has been healing beautifully and the brace is now off. She is, as you can imagine, having a lot of pain there as her body learns to hold that weight on its own again. She had a trache for awhile which miraculously came out on its own about 2 weeks ago and the hole, or stoma, as the medical professionals call it is completely healed up. She has been from hospital to rehab to hospital and now back to rehab again. Each change has been filled with its own ups and downs and scares and joys along the way. Granny suffers from dementia so currently our family {mom, sister, aunts and cousins} rotate being with her around the clock. As she is back in rehab, we know that we are on the home stretch...at least that is how we pray since she has been IN rehab and BACK to hospital once already. If you are the praying kind, would you please pray for her recovery, the infections her body is fighting, and for our family for strength to continue with grace in this long journey?? Thank you.

2) I got a new part time job of which I am currently in Week 3. I have translated for Haitian students and families via our local Board of Education off and on for the past 10 years or so. Last year, all the translators had to re-interview and come "on staff" officially. In the interview process, I was asked if I was interested in tutoring to which I promptly said, "Yes!" So I am not officially a tutor IN an ESOL {English as a Second Language} class room for 90 minutes a day. Two thirds of the class are Haitian kids. I am working at a middle school so the kids are lovely and moody and frustratingly beautiful. I feel like this job is a gift to me and seriously, there are some that I am ready to bring home with me. {And I really don't say stuff like that....their stories/hearts are just wrecking me...}

3) We are OFFICIALLY foster parents!! Yay! and WHOA! This process has been long and arduous and I am not even talking about the paper work. I do not think going in that I was preparing for the emotional and mental onslaught that would ravage my being.

Will the first child living in my home really NOT be my own biological baby? 

Am I really ready for this? 

Can my physical body handle what investing into these lives will mean? 

Can my heart? 

These, along with a hundred practical questions racked my brain to no end. I wanted to quit MORE times than I wanted to move forward and something, Someone bigger than me kept propelling us forward one painful step at a time. I have been forced to face my own fears and judgements and life choices, and I am sure this is NOT the end...which scares me honestly, but did I mention my heart is now wrecked beyond repair? In the good ways...the ways that you know that this is right and good and part of the crazy-grand-scheme-of-things.

4) And finally....this one is hard and exciting to say all at the same time. The Lord is healing me. Really and truly. Heart and soul, of course, but specifically in body. About four years ago, I began having unexplained pains that over the course of the following year and half increased in frequency and intensity. With a possible diagnosis of fibromyalgia but unable to take the prescribed course of medicine given to those who suffer with this unseen illness, we made some radical life changes and left South Africa and moved back to the United States. While my physical issues were not the primary reason for us making that life change, they were the catalyst that propelled us forward. For the past two and a half years since then, I have fought a daily battle of balance in my life, trying to find the right amount of work-to-rest ratio. To say it has been hard would be an understatement, and just when I was ready to accept that maybe this is just the journey of learning that God wanted me to go through to learned more about His grace, the Lord sent someone to remind me of His promises to me {more on that story later} and He is really healing me. It is a slow heal, like synapses and muscles coming together in harmony again, but I am getting stronger every day. There are still good days and bad days and I continue to work to believe that He IS still JUST as faithful on the bad days...but I needed to say it nonetheless....thank you, Jesus, for this healing.
{P.S. THIS was actually on my God-sized dream list!!}

There is more...of life and potential changes on the horizon and buzzing around in my heart of things still to come....but I feel like this is all I can share for now.

I am excited to be living His plan in this season, in spite of the HARD parts too...
He is going deep and wide in the caverns of my heart and soul,
 and I feel SUCH an assurance that I will never be the same.

Five Minute Friday :: Again {He is STILL God}

I have spent the last ten days off and on hearing the whirs and rhythms of the hospital cadence.

Granny fell and broke her neck.

It always sounds so dramatic and serious when I say it out like that. And I suppose it is. My analytical brain refused to focus on the severity and merely deals with each task at hand -- errands, work, sitting with Granny, supporting Mom, whatever was needed and fighting off the effects of the flu within my own body. Then two days ago, my heart caught up. I hit a wall. Emotionally. I had to stop.

I am still here, Lindsey.

That still small voice, reminding me again of His truths, His purpose, His plan.

I am still in control.

When I hit the end of my self...again...He is there.

Be still and know that I am God.
I am working on your behalf, on her behalf.
I see the beginning from the end and every step in between.
Trust in Me as you still your heart again to the melodies of grace flowing from my heart to yours.

I AM still here.

Mom with Granny on Friday, January 25th
{9 days after surgery for broken neck}

**Update on Granny as of 4:30 p.m. EST :: She is doing VERY well today. She is off of the ventilator. She is wearing a trache collar now, which apparently is a step up. She had physical therapy today and was able to sit up for awhile. This morning she was very alert and recognizing people as well as communicating as much as she can without being able to speak because of the trache. She is resting peacefully now.

Prayer Request :: Please pray that she will pass her swallow test when they give it and that her sugar levels would be under control.

When Tears Come...

Sometimes the ache is so big you can hardly breathe.
Sometimes the sorrow feels so real you cannot separate it from your skin.
Sometimes the movement in your soul
violates the peace,
the joy,
the radiance
He longs to display
within all those broken pieces.

Like a warrior
you fight
Hard and strong,
Swift and sure,
Noble and steady
in your aim.


And then there are days,
weeks,
months,
seasons where
the emptiness is too great to carry,
and you hide away,
fragile from the touch of the world,
lost in a sea of faces,
even the beautiful ones that hold you so dear.

The anguish burns away your passion,
your dreams,
your destiny.

Nothing to hold close
Nothing to draw near
to your heart,
your hand,
your cheek.

And there you stay
for awhile,
as sorrow burns pupils
begging to be released
from the torrent of angst that rages inside.

Until rebelliously
one tear
finds its way
down the curve
of your downcast cheek
past the carefully constructed walls
your heart has long held high.

When tears come,
words fall.

When tears come,
prayers spill forth.

When tears come,
peace floods the abandoned corners,
filling every crook and crack,
lifting shame and condemnation from the shoulders of the weary,
splicing pride and comparison with the very sword of truth,
breathing life into marrow
and felicity into dry bones
where dreams seem lost
and promises seem all-but-about-to-come-true.

And there the still small Voice speaks
with groans that flout intelligence
with whispers that quiet the dissonance
with Light that defies the darkness...

May it be well with your soul, My child, 
right where you are,
right in this season,
right in this moment.

May it be well with your soul.

"Oh yes, people of Zion, citizens of Jerusalem, your time of tears is over. Cry for help and you’ll find it’s grace and more grace. The moment he hears, he’ll answer. Just as the Master kept you alive during the hard times, he’ll keep your teacher alive and present among you. Your teacher will be right there, local and on the job, urging you on whenever you wander left or right: 'This is the right road. Walk down this road.'” 

~Isaiah 30:19-21 

Also linking up with these beautiful communities....
 Hear it on Sunday, Use it on Monday, Playdates with God,
 The Soli Deo Gloria party, and In, On, and Around Monday 

and with....
Jennifer, Mary Beth, Ann, Duane, and Heather
and the encouraging communities they have created here on the web.

also with Michelle and Emily at Imperfect Prose.

So thankful for places like these to share our words together...

When You Just Cannot Make Sense of it All

Maybe you just lost someone.
Someone you loved with all of your heart.
Someone who meant the world.
Someone whose presence the world is now oh-so-empty without.

Maybe the dream that you have longed for
The one you imagined as a little girl
The one that would make life just perfect
Has all but broken your blooded hands
As the doors have slammed over and over again.

Maybe you just feel desperate
The walls are closing in
The bills are piling up
Your health and mind are not what they should be, what they used to be
You wonder if healing and breakthrough will ever come

The kids have destroyed the house, the car, the yard, the neighborhood.
The man you loved, and to whom you gave half your life, walked out the door
The woman who pledged I'll-keep-your-secrets-and-you-keep-mine friendship just broke your heart
The believers, the brothers and sisters of His body, turned their back on you in your hour of need.

When life is just so hard
And you wonder how to make sense of it all.

Cry.
Cry hard and deep and long and good.

Run.
Run fast and strong.
Beat your chest.
Raise your fist to the sky.
Shout up at the heavens
and scream, "Why?"
Fall into a puddle.
and cry some more.

Sit with your grief
Your questions
Your anger
Your heartbreak
Feel them deep
Deep into your soul
In the place where deep cries out to fathomless deep

Embrace your sorrow
Your should-have-beens
Your wish-it-could-haves
Your want-it-back-that-way

And cry.
Cry some more.

Let yourself mourn.
Give space to be broken
Let go of perfect
Release the noisy pressure of "Its-time-to-let-go!!" pounding in your head
Breathe deep again.

Grieve hard and strong and long, if needed.
Throw out the timelines.
Forget the try-hards.
Abandon should-bes.

Let yourself be human
Real.
Raw.
Afraid.
Honest.
Broken.

Scream into the pillow
Or punch it.
Let the rage run its course.

Walk out into the crisp cold night.
Let the tears come
Draw ragged breaths over and over again
Let your soul mourn.

Cry again.
A lot.
Until you think there are no tears left to cry
And then ...
Cry some more.

And day-by-day
As you let the anger and hurt and disappointment and frustration out,

Breathe in grace and truth and love and mercy

Let it wash over you

Let the contours of your soul find rest

A 

little

more

each 

day.

Exhale hurt.

Inhale grace.

Exhale heartache.

Inhale joy.

Exhale injustice.

Inhale mercy.

Exhale brokenness.

Inhale healing.

And one day...

you will begin to see

that the grace....

....outweighs the sorrow.

May it be well with your soul

As you plumb the gaping depths of your brokenness.

May the warrior be the child

As you crawl into the arms of the Father.

May your scars remind you that you are real

As you see the miraculous signs of healing.

May you be patient with your heart in the process.

May you find refuge in the shelter of His wings.

May you know how desperately you are loved.

May you feel Him wipe every tear from your eye.

Also linking with Jennifer, Mary Beth, Ann, and Duane 
and the encouraging communities they have created here on the web.
So thankful for places like these to share our words...

The Miracle of the Little Things

"Ow!"

I said to myself as I woke up with this nagging thingamagjig moving around my eye. I blinked a bit and pressed my eye, and went on to get dressed.

I visited with my mom, met the French lady from California waiting in our house for her friend to arrive from the airport, baked cookies, and planned for the day. All the while, the foreign entity in my eye just would not seem to quit its persistent annoyance. We searched for drops to bring some ease, alas to no avail. I scoured Google for natural cures, imploying them immediately with vigor gaining only increasingly, severe irritation for my trouble.

With frustration and exhaustion, I collapsed upon my bed fighting tears and hysteria. {Sometimes reading Google DOES NOT help the psyche}.

Yet in the midst of the unrelenting aggravation, I couldn't help but think about those little things.

You know the little foxes that ruin the vines....

...getting rained on on the way to a meeting
...babies and pets throwing up on those newly cleaned floors
...constant nuisance of an invisible speck in the eye

Little agitations and frustrations fling unwittingly into the day and threaten to overthrow our sanity. Before we even know it, we find annoyances and hurts and anger to be our companions. They destroy our peace and shatter the cadence by which we move and breathe.

When no relief would come to my eye, I eventually fell into a fitful sleep, and when I awoke, the pain and redness and displeasure was completely gone.

I fought the rest because I had "things to do" and "came to Haiti to help" but apparently, for today at least, those were not in the plans.

Just like my body needed tears and rest to heal itself, so does my soul, my heart, my character.

And while the little things COULD destroy me, they could also be the very thing that lead me back to the safety of His arms, if only I take the time to trust in His ways.

"He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress; My God, in Him I will trust.”

~Psalm 91:1-2

When God Changes Your Story

I get hung up a lot in what I used to do, what I used to represent, how I used to live, where I used to be heading, and in general, the person that I used to be. I must often be reminded of the fact that we live in seasons of life, sometimes in the shadows even.

I found this picture on Pinterest with these directions attached in the note:

1) Paint the canvas all crazy like

2) Use painter's tape to create a herringbone pattern with some missing

3) Paint over the canvas in white

4) Remove tape and voila!

For a non-crafty girl like me, this seems doable, and actually, kinda beautiful. The color and the white contrasted together in this herringbone pattern produce eye-pleasing results.

And somehow this reminds me of my life....

God painted beautiful colors.

A great childhood with amazing parents. A dreamer's heart to do the impossible. A sound mind to achieve no matter what. A strong body to work hard towards every dream. A relentless will to always see a way when others saw brick walls. A solid education to open doors both home and abroad.

A dancer. A missionary. A singer. A friend. A reader. A fighter. A lover-of-the-Truth.

The colors of my world bled rich and true and vast and deep, sketching insight and exquisiteness onto my soul.

But as is so often true, we never understand or truly appreciate rare and raw wonder until it is tainted or changed.

So, as the Master Artist began layering slabs of adhesive onto my canvas, seemingly marring the arresting artwork He had created, I lamented the loss of all that "I was." Being the ever-blind and often-ungrateful clay, I raged and tugged against His touches. Yet He persisted still, with a vision in mind that I could not yet see.

Until...finally, at the moment when I could take no more of these repulsive intrusions, He ceased. And I breathed a sigh of relief.

He's done.

He's really done.

And then....

No.

Oh please, Master.

It cannot be.

No more...please do not take everything from me.

I look up, and I see His eyes. The eyes that with gracious intensity, burn through me like fire, patient still even through my flailings.

Unhurriedly now, yet with purposeful intent, the strokes of His brush proceed to wipe away every sign of the loveliness and charm He had provoked from the canvas after years of work, leaving behind a white empty space, void of character and desirability.

And in that space, I render myself useless, unworthy, unloveable, unwanted.

But not to the Master, it seems.

For when I open my eyes, glazed with tears from the loss of my yesterday's glory, I see His gaze still steady and strong searing my soul, my pride, my claim on myself with His unrelenting grace.

Slowly, and yes, even painfully, He begins the process of stripping off the layers He has strategically placed there to uncover a loveliness that would not have been possible without the artistic ravaging.

A beauty I am still uncovering.

A grace I continue to discover.

Daily I am learning still to yield to this journey, to lay myself at the altar of His purpose, knowing that He loves me more than His own life. He proved it after all. Nonetheless, I am so often stubborn, filled with pride, longing to prove myself to Him, to the world.

And still, He stares deeply into the wells of my humanity, causing me to gasp at the weakness there and still more, to sit in awe of the regard He continues to pour over me.

My friend Cara said it like this....

"When you were knit together inside your mother, God made a pronouncement upon you. He made you something. He did not pronounce you an alcoholic or a liar or a screw-up. He did not pronounce you a cheerleader or a missionary or a pastor's wife or a mother. He knew those things might be part of your story, but He made you with a depth that goes beyond your doings and your labels."

{read the rest here}

Source via Pinterest

The Paradox of Emptiness

Have you ever wondered if your own personal desert season will EVER end?

When will I find my life long love?

When will I hold my own babies in my arms?

When will I have enough money to buy that house?

When will I get that dream job

or afford to stay at home

or buy the right car

or take the perfect vacation?

When will eating chocolate actually help me LOSE calories?

Okay, so maybe the last one will never REALLY happen...

...but sometimes life feels like moving from one waiting room to the next, checking in, watching others go in and out of those sacred back room doors, wondering when it will be MY turn, feeling forgotten or maybe even abandoned.

Won't you please join me over at Must Love God today

to hear the rest of my own journey through seasons of emptiness....?

Five Minute Friday: Loud

I used to describe my mind like this....

There is a factory filled with workers and at least a hundred floors. Everyone is busy constantly with important business to attend to. The moment a message arrive at the penthouse, the boss is screaming for the poor peon to already be on his way to the mail room with the next message.

Shouldn't you have been moving already?

When I told a girlfriend this in college, she said the boss in her mind would tell his bottom level worker to take a load off and have a drink.

I remember being in awe of such a mind.
A mind at rest
Or at the very least,
A mind that could SUCCESSFULLY choose rest and enjoy it.

The cacophony in my head resonates as a part of my being the same way as my heart cries for the oxygen it desperately needs.

And still He teaches me.
This Father of mine.
He is so gracious, so gentle with me.
He has to be
For I, left to my own devices am a taskmaster, seargant general commanding the troops relentlessly...

And somehow He gets that about me...He really understands me...He is acquainted with all my ways.

And He daily, hourly, even minute-by-minute leads me beside still waters...



Wonder what this Five Minute Friday is all about? Here it is in the words of the creator of this precious space....

"We finger paint with words.

We try to remember what it was like

to just write without worrying if it’s just right or not.

Want to play Five Minute Friday? It’s easy peasy!"

Hop over to Lisa-Jo's place and join in....come on...be brave...you will not regret it...promise!!

Five {and a 1/2} Minute Friday: Brave

I want to be brave.
Brave enough to swim the English channel
Climb Pike's Peak
And travel around the world on a wing and a prayer.

I want to be brave
Brave enough to say I'm sorry
I forgive you
I love you
I need you



I want to be brave
brave enough to lay down my guard
to open up my soul
to boldly go there

I want to be brave
to be WHO HE created me to be
to write
to sing
to dance
to work
to play
to love

I want to be brave
Brave enough to be still
Brave enough to search deeper
Brave enough to cry without reservation

I want to be brave
Brave enough to demand answers
Brave enough to accept waiting
Brave enough to rest in the tension of the two


I want to fly higher
I want to dream bigger
I want to love better
I want to know the depths of me
and you
and Him

I want to face my own fears
knowing that I cannot change them
tame them
shape them
guide them
into a place where I am comfortable

But I can stand here
shaken to the core
wishing to be anywhere but here
And somehow
because He is with me...

I will be brave.

There is something about these Five Minute Fridays that....{shew}....just blow me away sometimes...plumbing the depths of my heart. I read the prompt but did not have time to write immediately so I let the word....brave...marinate in my soul...and this is me...so much of the REAL, RAW me in a way that I have a hard time doing because the analytical, incessantly-demanding editor in my head often demands his own way.

So I hope you will join me for my favorite writing time of the week and BRAVELY write your own 5 minutes...or at the very least...visit some amazing women over at

Lisa-Jo's...some of them I am even privileged to call "friend."

Five Minute Friday: Empty Spaces

My mind is a jumble tonight as I sit to type out my 5 minutes.

I think about my week, my thoughts, my heartbeats that have led me up to this moment. I have shared here in this space about my aches, my worries, and my fears that maybe I am just not cut out for us.

I look deep into my heart and soul and come up empty, void because this heart loves much and hurts deep and this mind thinks long and works harder than it should to understand what only the spirit can truly know.

I wish I knew all of the answers, the reasons, the pathways of His crazy, radical, dizzy grace but I find myself often at a loss to know and understand.

And still somehow, even if it only seems to be in the margins, there His love shines through, like a beautiful splash of light across those hidden dark spaces of my soul, reminding me...when I will listen...

I am here.

Every Friday I link up with my pal, Lisa-Jo at The Gypsy Mama

where she and a few hundred or so other writers join together

and share 5 minutes of free, beautiful, unedited words

just letting then artist soul fly free and unfettered.

Join us?

Relentless Love :: The Wrap Up

Our Relentless Love journey has come to a close, at least here on the blog.

However the life lessons that I have learned will stay with me for awhile. I think that is how I have seen His relentless love the most across all of these stories....through the people themselves....through the way that they bravely shared of themselves by giving their words as a gift - to me and to you - in this space.

Through Kamille's story of finding complete abandonment with Jesus as a little girl as well as how she did not mind going first in this series with short notice I discover such childlike acceptance, kindness and grace. In Katy's heart I find a woman whose deep feeling produces a giving heart so big that even she does not even know the capacity she possesses as she shares about the God who sees. With Christina's words, I see a woman who knows her weaknesses well, but acknowledges a Savior who loves her in spite of them, because of them and openly shares her story with the world.

As Cara weaves her morsels sharing of His indelible love, ink turning into blood, transforming us, I see a woman whose very nature exudes a passion for, a desire to know Jesus better. Sarah recounts the psalms with the heart of a poet, and I am enraptured into this Jesus that she sees and knows so personally, so intimately, and I am drawn into the love affair of a God who never quits. Paige comes clean about the time where her desire to be right and the busyness of life caused her communication to be a sounding gong to the ears of her listener, and through the sharing, she teaches me that telling our stories, even the mistakes, even when it is hard, can bring a world of healing to those around us.

In Jen, I learn bravery, to step away from the only life she has known to a life where she had to step into her dreams, to trust that the Father's love was bigger than even the limits she has placed upon herself, and she inspires me to have faith in the God of innumerable possibilities who persistently pursues our hearts. As Jennifer shares the words of the Father to her, to us, to me, I am enraptured by His breathtaking love, His invitation to trust Him, and I want to BE that little girl again just holding Daddy's hand, climbing into His lap, twirling & dancing & laughing with my Father.

Annie's courage to tackle love in the face of grief showed me his healing power not only in her life, the life of readers across the globe, but also in my heart. To be a part of therapeutic breakthrough and encouraging another to share their REAL, RAW stories just shows me the connection of His relentless love in and through each of us. Anna's raw grit always challenges and spurs me forward. Her words about battle scars and crooked toenails share life in the cracks, through the hard, in the yes, buts. Her encouraging words to me through this writing project remind me of how we can impact another's life without even knowing about it. And, Holley's heart always blows me away and hearing her own journey of struggle and chasing after something to find love and acceptance shows me the wrestling of my own soul and where it can truly find rest.

It has been my pleasure to host each and every one of these ladies this month. I hope you have learned from them, their lives, their choices, their setbacks, their love for Jesus and more. If you have, would you let me know? And what spoke to you? I would love to know. It encourages me to know that you have been encouraged!

May your life be a continual pursuit of a deeper understanding of His Relentless Love .... for you!

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The Chase {Guest Post :: Holley}

It's the end of February and the Relentless Love series is winding down, and I am happy to share the final guest post writer with you -- my friend, Holley Gerth. I have said it before and I will say it again, Holley, besides my mom of course, is one of those people that I would like to be when I grow up. She is a published author, counselor, life coach, Dayspring card writer, co-founder of {in}courage, Squee! business entrepreneur, dream weaver {and builder}, lover of people far and wide and so much more. Oh and by the way...she's MY age!! I have looked up to her since the first words I read of hers on her website months ago. When we met at Relevant, imagine my delight when she carved out time for us to sit together and connect for a few hours. What a treasure! Holley makes her home in Arkansas with her sweetheart, Mark. Her blog home is Heart to Heart with Holley {I mean doesn't THAT name in and of itself just tell you WHO she is and why I think she is so fabulous?!?!?}

The Chase

I’m born into a home that believes.

I start a relationship with Jesus early.
I’m the good girl in high school.

But somewhere along the line,
I confuse relationship with rules.
I weary of the legalism and when college comes, I rebel.
I’m the prodigal daughter who talks at parties about missing God,
who mistakes affection for love, who tries to fill the hole inside her
with anything but the only thing that can.

I imagine God running from me.
But instead, in that impossible way of His, he pursues me.
He sends people into my life that teach me about grace.
He forgives again and again and…again.
He whispers to me in the middle of the night
and tugs on my heart in the middle of the day.

He is relentless.

But I will not relent.

Until my choices break my heart wide open
and all the hurt pours out.
“Now, I’ve done it," I tell myself.

But God isn’t done with me yet.
It seems He takes all that hurt
and washes my feet with my own tears.

How?
How can God love like this?

I keep trying to earn my way back.
I want to show that I will be a good girl for good now.

But God will have none of it.
Instead he simply wants all of me—just as I am.

And, finally, I begin to believe it.
I slow and let that love-that-never-stops-pursuing catch me.

When I do, I’m surprised at what comes with it too.

JOY

What I thought I had to chase out there in the world
turned out to be what was chasing me all along.

I’m so glad God never gave up.

(And that he never will.)

**photo credit**

This month I have asked some of my fellow bloggers to join me here at The Little Missionary Girl All Grown Up to share how they have seen the Relentless Love of the Father in their lives in moments of brokenness, heartache, and valley-of-shadow moments. This post is the 11th and final in the series of that exploration into the passion of the Father for us across miles, across personalities, across hearts that are His. To read more of the posts, click here and here.

His Love Pursues {Guest Post :: Jen}

Jen is a friend that I have never met {in real life} but I feel like I have. Does that make sense? We made a connection over our time in Africa, and then in the choice to sabbatical. It seemed like the Lord brought her into my life at JUST the point when I needed a friend who understood the hard place and decision we were having to make. Jen makes her house a home with husband Jeremy and her two blonde-haired beauties {1 boy, 1 girl} in Texas. The way she has made space for God to use her in her artistic endeavors has and continues to inspire and challenge me. From photography to knitting to trying out new & healthy recipes, it seems that there is not much that Jen cannot do when she sets her mind, heart, and hands to it. Her blog home is I Believe in Love where she shares all of her artistic ventures. You can also find her kind, heartfelt, and practical words at Today's Mama.

His Love Pursues

Relentless love... The word that comes to mind is pursuit, God's pursuit of us, because of His love. Welcome to my story of God's relentless love for me...

I've been in the non-profit, full-time ministry world since 1996. What an amazing journey of traveling to 17 nations with my husband and kids! In 2005, my husband and I, along with another friend, founded Ten Thousand Homes whose aim is to bring HOPE and HOME to orphans in southern Africa. However, by 2009, I was spent. After 13 years, I was exhausted in every possible sense of the word. I knew I needed some sort of break, but there was a tug of war going on in my heart. I (and my husband) thought that if I just changed some things up, it would be ok. After all, there were children with no parents and they needed people to love them, and I was tired? Come on. God's love for those kids is relentless, but so is his love for me. That's when I heard it....

"Come away and rest."

I was truly ignorant on what a sabbatical meant but after coming through to the end, my heart swells and tears pool thinking about His love for me. It was in that year and a half of sabbatical that God showed me my passions. He brought healing to relationships and gave me space to dream. I'm not a natural dreamer, but as I tore down the walls of why I couldn't dream, they came. Some of them were small, like having one of my photos published in a magazine, and others were big, like traveling the world with my camera and telling the stories. I know dreams are just dreams. They're not necessarily goals and just because you dream them, doesn't mean they will happen. But God, in His incredible, relentless love for me, allowed them to happen.


Within a few months, my blog was published in Artful Blogging and I was asked to go to India and use photography to tell the stories of girls rescued out of prostitution. I was blown away to see dreams coming true right before my eyes, and all I could say was, "Thank you, Jesus."

As I've come out of sabbatical, I've realized that the kids in Africa were taken care of despite me stepping away (smile) and that the dreaming and understanding more of how I'm wired and what my passions are, are all helping me to be more effective now. He sees the bigger picture, and it's His love for us that drives Him to pursue our highest good. For me, it was admitting that I needed to rest...

This month I have asked some of my fellow bloggers to join me here at The Little Missionary Girl All Grown Up to share how they have seen the Relentless Love of the Father in their lives in moments of brokenness, heartache, and valley-of-shadow moments. This post is the 7th in the series of that exploration into the passion of the Father for us

across miles, across personalities, across hearts that are His.

To read more of the posts, click here and here.