Singleness: Finding Freedom

I have heard it all, and I am sure you have too. Singleness is a blessing. Single women don't need a man to complete them. If you don't do your part to find husband then you will never get married. Focus on becoming the kind of woman that a great guy would want to marry. Don't settle. Don't be too picky. God will bring the man along when the time is right. We need to find you a husband. God's got an awesome man out there for you. Don't think that there is only one right person -there is no such thing as soulmates.

As well meaning as I am sure that all this advice is meant to be, it actually doesn't help much. All the different messages are confusing. I am not saying that there is no wisdom in any of the advice given to single women. I'm just saying that from my current perspective, it isn't all that helpful to someone who already feels pressure to figure out the answer. At twenty-seven, I have had quite a bit of time to contemplate all this advice. Am I focusing too much on marriage? Am I not doing enough to find a husband? Am I not trusting God enough? Am I too picky? Is it just not the time yet? Is there something God is wanting me to do now, that I won't be able to do once married? Does God not think I am ready for marriage? Is my husband not ready for marriage? Does God want to show me something that can only come from being single? Is God just waiting for me to do something? Aren't I doing enough? How am I supposed to know what else to do? The questions never end. With as much advice as I have been given and as much time as I have had to contemplate, I still don't have the answer. But I have realized something. 

Each person's journey is unique.

There are probably a vast array of reasons why there are women who desire to be married, but find themselves still single. I can't tell you what my reason is, and I can't tell you what your reason is. I can tell you that God has not abandoned us. I can tell you that regardless of whether we ever marry or not, God has a purpose for our lives. I can tell you that God cares about the desires of our hearts. I can tell you that God does know the reason, and He is fully capable of handling it.

Sometimes we get so caught up in formulas and quick fixes. We think we can figure out the whys of life. We think that we have the answers. We compare our lives with other's around us. We forget that people's lives are unique. We forget that we aren't God. We forget that God is God and all good things are found in Him.

We forget that God has promised to work all things together for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28). 

You know what this means? It means that regardless of whether I am doing the right things to get married, God has promised He will work all that I do together for good. I have no idea what that will look like, but I can trust His promise. Though it is hard to remember this promise, I find freedom when I do.

 I find freedom from all the advice. I find freedom from all the expectations. I find freedom from myself.

I will continue to seek God's guidance for my life, follow Him where He leads, and trust Him to work out the rest. If you are single and find yourself burdened with advice, expectations, and questions, I hope you will find freedom in God's promise too. 

Created to Create

Are you ever going through life when suddenly inspiration wells up from what seems to be out of nowhere? At first it's like a little spark deep inside, but then it grows into something big and bright. Eventually it pushes its way outside and into the world. 

Usually when I feel that spark, I don't know what is coming. I feel excited and nervous about the possibilities of what is to come. Many times that spark turns into writing.  Sometimes it turns into a craft or project. And other times it becomes something much more abstract. The exciting part is, whatever is to come will be an extension of me. It will be creative. It will be beautiful, at least to me. The part that makes me nervous is the process of growing that spark into a bright light. Will it turn out? What will I do with it? Will I want to share this part of myself with others? Who will I share it with? Will it accurately represent me? I'm really not sure why it makes me nervous though. These little sparks never end somewhere bad. They are always so rewarding when nurtured to fruition. 

This evening I felt a spark. I wasn't sure what to do with it. I felt inspired by the idea of inspiration and creativity. I got to thinking about how beautiful it is that God created us to be creative beings. How creative must God be to have thought up you and me? Every person that ever has been, created unique. No two identical. Each a separate masterpiece. Each with their own creativity.

The Unveiling of My Purpose

As a twelve year old girl I decided that I wanted to be a business owner when I grew up. In pursuit of my dream I studied business in school, graduated, and went to work helping my dad with his business. That was a little over a year ago. What would follow is probably one of the hardest years of my life. But it has possibly been one of my most important years. 

When my dad offered me a job, I was eager to get started and excited for the experience. I was finally getting into the world of business fourteen years after my dream was birthed. 

After the initial excitement of a new job wore off, I started to realize that this was not going to be easy. I was out of my element in so many ways. Although I didn't know it at the time, mundane and routine work sucks the life out of me. Focusing on too many details for too long leaves me drained. Some people enjoy running a business full of risk and unknowns. I do not. It made me feel stressed constantly, and I have a serious aversion to stress (perhaps there is a lesson here). I sat alone in an office all day. And although I do work well alone, it is hard to be alone so much. Thankfully my family was near by or someone might have had to check me into a mental institution (do those even exist anymore?). 

I had ups and downs. Some days I resolved to put a smile on my face and do the work that was before me with enthusiasm. Other days, I did my work through tears and prayers of desperation. I wasn't sure why I was struggling with the job. My parents told me I was doing a great, but I felt like it was all wrong. I knew this was a trial and I knew there was a reason for it, but I had no idea just how big of a reason. On the days that I could remember to keep my focus on God, I asked Him to help me remain joyful through the trial. But I will admit that there were many days that I had a bad attitude. 

At some point I realized that I didn't feel like I was fulfilling my purpose in life. I knew what my purpose is here on earth as a child of God, but I didn't know how I was uniquely created to fulfill that purpose. I started to pray that God would show me what He created me, specifically, to do. Although I knew this job wasn't my long term destination, I felt I was to stay for the time being. And besides, I had no idea what I would want to do if I didn't stay. 

Life continued to move forward and I continued to have a lot of really hard days. But in the midst of the hard days, there were a few beautiful days. The beautiful days involved talking with my family about life's challenges, our relationships with each other, and the future. Some of my siblings would come out to the office and talk with me about their struggles. I loved pouring into their lives. More than a few times, several of my family members and I chatted about personalities, differences in personalities, and how to understand each other. And on a few occasions, I was the mediator between a disagreement. I felt so energized after these conversations. I felt like I had tapped into my strengths. I felt like I was helping people. I felt like I had purpose. 

That is when it hit me. 

This is what I was made for. This is why I am here now. 

I wasn't made to simply be a business woman. I was made to be a counselor, an encourager, a mediator, and a facilitator of healing. 

Going back to school for counseling had crossed my mind once before, but I quickly dismissed it after looking at how much it would cost and how long it would take. But this time, I knew. I didn't care how much it cost. I didn't care how long it would take. And I wasn't discouraged when I found out that it's one of the lower paying jobs that requires a masters degree. I knew that this is what I am supposed to do.

I had been all wrong about what I am made for. The things I thought I would love doing, I can't stand.  My vision for my life has completely changed. I don't know why I had that dream as a little girl, but I trust that there is a reason and someday God will reveal it to me. My future may involve owning a business, but it's not about that to me anymore. It's about what God created me for. God used this hard season to get me exactly where He want's me. 

Looking back now, I can see why God had me where he did for the last year. Without the experiences and the challenges I faced, I don't think I would have arrived where I am. There are still so many unknowns. I don't know what the future will look like. I don't know where I will be working next. I don't know how I am going to get through three and a half more years of school (the first round was pretty rough for me). I don't know how I am going to pay for school. But I have begun to understand who God created me to be. God answered my prayer and has pointed me towards my purpose.

The Making of Beauty

Humans. We are broken. We are a mess. We are hurting. But when God gets ahold of our hearts, something beautiful happens. He takes what was broken and restores it. He takes the mess and sorts it out. He takes our pain and turns it into joy. This is, The Making of Beauty. 

One of my favorite verses, and the inspiration for this blog, is Ecclesiastes 3:11. "He makes everything beautiful in its time." The fascinating part of this verse is the "in its time" part. This means that God has a time for each beautiful thing to be revealed. He doesn't do it all at once. We don't get to choose when it happens. 

There have been ugly parts of me that I have asked God to make beautiful, and sometimes He has done it quickly. But most of the time it has been very slow. Sometimes nothing seems to happen for a long time. Then one day a breakthrough happens and I look back and see all that God had been doing and how it is all coming together into a beautiful work of art. 

So what can we do when we come across something ugly within ourselves? 

We can seek Him 

We can trust Him 

We can follow Him

Seek Him

Seeking God is having a heart that is open to God. It is admitting our brokenness to Him, asking Him to change us, and then accepting His will for us. It is also seeking to know God's character. God is beauty. If we want to become beautiful, we need to know what beautiful looks like. 

Trust Him

Trusting God is giving our desire (in this case, to be changed) over to Him. It does not mean trusting that God will do what we want. It means trusting that He is working. It means trusting that He will do what is best with what we have given Him.  

Follow Him

We pray and pray for God to do something and often He responds by asking us to do something. Many times we stay in the same place because we want God to do something, but then we don't do what He ask us to do. I don't mean that God refuses to do things for us if we don't do things for Him. What I am saying is that sometimes God is waiting for us to take the fist step. One of the awesome things about God is He patiently waits for us. He continues to orchestrate things in our life to direct us to Him and His will for us. He keeps giving us opportunities until we get it.

I know sometimes I am a little slow. I don't always get it the first time. But that's ok. 

God loves me 

I am His

He is patient with me

He is working in me

The most beautiful thing about life is watching God take something ugly and make it into something beautiful. Many of the entries on this blog will be a place for me to record and share The Making of Beauty in my life.

The Making of Beauty: Friendships

Not too long ago I sat on my bed and between sobs I asked God why I couldn't make new friends. I wanted deep friendships. The kind of friends that you can text last minute and invite yourself over. The kind of friends that you share your deepest pain and struggles with. The kind of friends that you laugh with so hard you end up rolling on the floor in your own drool. Ok that's kind of gross, but you get the point.

It's not that I don't have close friends. Actually, I have several childhood friends that I consider to be my sisters. I am beyond spoiled by their friendship. But they no longer live near by and I longed for friends who are physically here. I had tried to make friends and had come to the conclusion that nobody else wanted to "do friendship" like I did. That somehow I was this weird, defected human that didn't enjoy shallow relationships and didn't have anything in common with another person on this planet.

A few weeks ago I was talking about my unique defect to a mentor when she suggested that I might consider taking a risk. That maybe I should settle for finding one thing in common with someone and see where it goes. I was skeptical that it could be this simple, but I was still intrigued by the idea. In true God style, He soon gave me an opportunity for action.

I found out that a girl from church eats Paleo AND lives down the road from me. That is two things in common. This had to be a sign. NOBODY eats Paleo and NOBODY lives near me. I decided now was my chance. I messaged her and asked if she would want to get together and cook sometime. After a few cooking adventures, we sat in her living room late one night and talked of blogging. We both had a desire to blog but had never taken the step to go public with it. I suggested that she should just go for it. I didn't actually think she would take my advice, nor did I expect that I would (looks like God might be cracking into my profectionism, but that will have to wait for another post on another day).

The next morning I received a text with a link to her blog. She did it! I was so surprised that she had went for it, and that fast too. I read her entry and God opened my eyes to the key to friendship. Through her blog, I got a window into her heart. I felt honored to see inside. I wanted to get to know her more. She became relatable. In that moment I realized that the key to making friends is not having everything in common, it is being vulnerable with each other.

That's what I had been missing. As I wallowed in my self-diagnosed defect, I closed myself off to people. Although I could open up at times, I was careful to avoid vulnerability. I couldn't let anyone see my defect, right? If I did, I would certainly never make friends. Wrong. All Wrong. It turns out that it is just the opposite. Our defects (or perceived defects) are what make us human. They make us relatable to other humans. They connect us to each other.

It has only been a few weeks and the beginnings of a beautiful friendship have developed. I am seeing friends all around me. Some that have been trying to be my friend all along, and some that I have not met yet. Now I am sounding all sappy, but I can't help it. I'm an idealistic, dreamer at heart.