Thursday, August 28, 2014

Understanding the Incomprehensible

Do you ever wish that you understood everything. I do. All the time. My brain is filled with useless facts and random trivia that only really seem to really help me when I watch game shows like Jeopardy with my father. I love learning new things, exploring new things, and having a random fact for every occasion. I will read anything I can get my hands on, and actually enjoy watching science and math videos on YouTube (although the majority of my YouTube viewing still consists of a mixture of cat videos and people falling off things). I have this hunger deep within me to know; to attain knowledge.

The funny thing about this is that I will never be able to know everything. It really is like Socrates said "The more you know, the more you realize you know nothing." The more of an understanding you have in something, the more you understand the depth of what you do not know. The world is so full of things to know, when you realize that you will never be able to understand everything, it kind of blows your mind.

I was thinking about that insurmountable amount of knowledge today, and how God created the world. When I look at the world, I see God. I see him in the trees, in the mountains and in the fields. He is everywhere. His name written on everything proudly like when an artist signs his artwork. I believe that God created this world to give us a better understanding of who he is and the depth he has to him. The depth of the world and everything in it alludes to the even greater depth that God has to him. The more I seek Him, the more I find Him. And the more that I find and understand Him the more that I realize I have so much more to learn, and that I will never fully understand Him at all.

People I've talked to seem to get frustrated with this. They want to understand every little thing about Him. They seem perturbed at, rather than interested in, someone they will never fully comprehend. I've thought long and hard about this point. Should it worry me that I will never understand the God I worship? Should it frustrate me? Should I be worried if it doesn't? Does accepting that I will never understand make me a naïve person? Thinking hard about this I've decided that if I understood everything about who he is, I would get bored. Where is the fun in understanding everything. Life without the mystery would just be misery. Sure there would be satisfaction for the first little while, but like the finished puzzle or the solved riddle, you put it aside to pursue and conquer the next great thing.

Like a regular relationship, you can never fully know a person. You learn new things about the people you are around the more you spend time with them. The more you know them, the more you realize you want to know more. You can never fully know a person though. They have depth, and that is what makes the relationship worth while. I don't enjoy shallow relationships. I would much rather sit down for coffee with one person than go to a crowded party. I value important conversations, not casual chatter. If you don't have depth, how can someone have a deep relationship with you? If the God I worship was comprehendible, and I knew everything about Him, I think having a relationship with Him would be pretty lame. Mystery is intriguing. We as humans are wired for discovery. That's why we buy that damnable mystery gum flavour; we wanna know what the heck it is!

I don't think it's naïve of me to accept that I will never fully understand God. It's actually kind of liberating. It takes off the pressure and allows me to enjoy the natural discovery that comes from a deep relationship. It's also amazing because I never get bored. I always desire to know more and there will always be more to find. I mean, to put it bluntly, if i knew everything about God, would he really be worthy of my worship? I don't think so.

I've come to a point where I don't worry about understanding the incomprehensible. I know the important things. I know He loves unashamedly. I know He is merciful and full of abounding grace. I know He is beautiful. And I know that He is worth getting to know deeper and deeper.

leave a comment
Monday, July 14, 2014

Time

When I was back in my university photography class, we were allowed to do our final project on anything that we wanted. For some reason, I have always been fascinated with the concept of time. Each second holds something different. Whether it’s the changing colours of a sunset, the wind moving the leaves in the trees, or the gradual growth of a small child, each moment is precious and different and magical. I took over 3000 pictures for this single project to display this point; that each moment holds something new. In this world, we are constantly surrounded by change. We are living and growing amidst the birth of new life, and the passing of the old. New things physical, emotional and spiritual are constantly springing to life.

The danger of this is that when a moment is gone, you can never grab it again. Once that time, place, and those circumstances pass, you will never see them again. It creates a beautiful and painful picture of how powerless we are against time. There is nothing we can do to halt the changes around us. We are incapable of stopping time, or hitting the fast forward button. We can’t erase the past.  This possibility of loss or the creation of pain makes this life so much more powerful. You can’t have the beautiful moments without the broken ones. You will never be able to recognize the joyous seconds without the ones filled with sadness.

Something that I love about life is that God didn’t stop creating when the world was finished. With each breath we inhale, the new life springs forth into existence. Each time we blink, the world around us has changed. Nothing will ever be the same as the previous moment that has passed. God is also beyond time. He is, he was, and will be all at once. Trying to wrap your head around that is hard, but I like to see it as each moment, every breath and all circumstances are filled with Him. They are saturated. They are full. It says in the bible that we cannot go anywhere without the presence of God. We can’t escape him because He is alive and moving in each beat of our hearts.


Because God is in every moment, He can MAKE every moment beautiful. Even in the broken ones, the ones we would like to forget, the ones we try to shove under the matt and leave behind; He’s in them. Because He is in every moment there is beauty in each one, and He can take the pain out of them. He can’t change what happened TO you, but he can change what the moment MEANS to you. He can give wisdom and clarity. I think that true beauty comes from recognizing those moments that are filled with the presence of God. The moments where I can see his hands moving; where I can see his goodness and his glory. He can enable you to see the growth and the life that is born out of those moments. He gives us the chance to make each moment a beautiful one. Once I discovered this, it made my joy so much harder to break. It made me appreciate every breath that I’d been given. Each moment is a gift from God that I don’t deserve. The time that I’ve been given is precious and valuable and every second is an opportunity to know my God so much better then I already do.  

leave a comment
Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Wandering Feet

I have the feet of a wanderer.
When I was young my feet always swept me away this way and that.
As I have grown, so have my wandering feet.
Curiosity consumes my mind and a passion for exploring drives my steps.
My eyes crave new sights; new wonders to rest their gaze upon.
My hands desire to grasp new adventures. New train tickets, new currencies, new and unknown treasures.
My heart is always ready. New rooms have been prepared for wonderful new faces and cultures to mingle together with old experiences.
Breathing new air energizes my soul and each new step brings life to my smile.
My feet never seem to know where they are going, but they guide me with a determined purpose.
It doesn’t matter whether I explore under the fresh green canopy of the woods or surrounded by the blinking pulsing lights of a city. My feet have no preference or prejudice. 
That is not their nature. 
Their nature is to take me to new unknown places; to allow me to experience new mysteries.


All hope is lost on them and me because of them. 
They have turned me into a hopeless wanderer.

leave a comment
Sunday, April 13, 2014

Healer

Most people who have known me for any length of time will know that I have an awful back. It's the first place that seems to get hurt whenever I am doing anything. It's also where I carry my stress, so under high stress situations it's the first thing that seems to get hit. So needless to say, while helping to staff this first DTS in Florida my back has been put through the ringer.

On one of my last days in Florida, I was blessed by a free trip to the chiropractor. I had been praying for the chance to go to one because I REALLY needed an appointment. My last one had been about a year ago, and was thankful beyond words that I got a free one. It also came with a side of electroshock and heat therapy and massage afterwards. It was so amazing! I left feeling much better. My back was still feeling weak, but everything felt like it was put back into place; my muscles just had to get used to what my back was like now. I was over the moon!

And then I traveled...

I love to be prepared for anything when I go somewhere. People may refer to this unjustly as "Overpacking", but I see it more like "What if I really want this sweater... and it gets cold... and I hate all my other ones that day! AND I can't forget [insert anything really] either."

...alright, so I'm an over packer and my bags were overweight. Maintaining 2 checked bags and 2 carry-ons is hard enough when they weigh what they are supposed to let alone when you are going back to Germany and you really don't want to leave anything behind. It's also hard when you've become such an effective packer and seem to fit everything into the suitcase without any issues. It would be nice that if your bag was overweight nothing else fit inside it. It just makes me cross that I can fit everything in nice and neat, but I cant bring it because it weighs too much. The combination of these bags, my seat on my longest plane ride not reclining, and the previous state of my back meant that by the time I got back to Herrnhut, my back was doing more than complaining a little bit.

I arrived back to Herrnhut on Sunday, and by Tuesday it was really hard to manoeuvre. My lower back was super tense and painful and my upper back was littered with knots. As I was walking to the castle I managed to stay true to my clumsy character and tripped over a low chain. I jump over it almost every day I walk to the castle, but not successfully this time. I managed to catch myself with one hand on the cobblestones and the foot that was stuck on the chain. This position wasn't good for my cellphone which was in my hand and proceeded to get a cracked screen, nor my back which seemed to take the brunt of this fall. Yup... I was broken. I walked to the base, adrenaline pumping from embarrassment because I managed to fall in front of a bunch of German highschool kids (of course!). I didn't really realize how much it had hurt until we sat down for lecture. As soon as the first lecture was over, I went and got a massage from Maddie. Basically whenever she would touch my lower back I would cringe and flinch. My face was apparently pretty priceless to onlookers. It hadn't been this bad in a while. It felt like it did just before I threw out my back at Pines two years ago.

The rest of Tuesday was a struggle, and waking up Wednesday was awful. I couldn't bend over at all. I was tired, and fed up. How was I going to lead an outreach if I was in this much pain. I wouldn't last the airplane ride to Asia let alone be able to function for 2 months there! I walked to the base and into base worship in a great deal of discomfort. I decided to put all of that aside though and worship because God was still good. More than half way through the worship set it was getting pretty unbearable. It was really hard to even stand. Then I got a revolutionary idea... I've seen healing and I've prayed healing for others. Why shouldn't I be able to heal myself? So I started praying healing for my back while everyone was singing. I tried to bend over, but nothing was better. I still couldn't bend at all. I came to the conclusion that someone leading the worship set would just have to feel that they need a time of prayer for healing. It happens every once and a while where during worship we stop and pray for people with injuries or who are sick. I decided that if praying for myself wasn't working then we would just have to have a time where other people could pray because I knew that God knew that I needed to be better.

When the worship leader said that he felt like God wanted to heal people, I was still surprised. It's funny how God can still shock you even when you expect something to happen. He said that he felt that God really wanted to heal people and that we weren't even going to have to pray for them; that they would just be healed right then and there. I looked at him (I was within the first few rows) and I guess my face must have registered my surprise. He said that we should test whatever was hurting before and see if it got healed. And so I bent over! I didn't have any pain and I could get back up into an upright position without cringing or stifling a cry... And then I started crying. And smiling. Then he asked us all to raise our hands if we received healing. You had better believe that my hand shot up like a rocket!

Can I just say that my God is good. (Well I guess I can, this IS my blog after all...) I have never experienced healing so instantaneous before. The pain was there, and then it was gone. Like at the snap of my fingers gone. I know that God's really got my back, literally and figuratively. Outreach is coming, much faster than I can really mentally prepare for. I'm not entirely sure what to expect, other than this; God is going to come through and he will really hold us in the palm of His hand the entire time. We are going to see and do amazing things. I don't have to worry because He's got us. He has our backs. 

2 comments
Tuesday, January 21, 2014

The Power of Words

The other day I got lost in a bookstore. There were so many books. Books from the floor to the ceiling. Old books, new books, well loved and dusty books alike. I started to think about the contents of their pages. Each book is formed by the same principle of putting together a combination of 26 letters into words, and then those words into sentences. Those sentences form into ideas, and from there anything is possible. You can write about anything. Words are so mighty. Humans crave stories and words give us the power to create new worlds and the ability to bring our ideas to life. To boldly forge opinions and express them to others. I was amazed in the bookstore by the shear volume of the words and ideas. The amount of stories, theories, biographies and scientific findings. These words, when read, allow us to unlock things, learn, and grow.

The power of the written word is however eclipsed by the power of words that are spoken to us. We have the choice to read the words that are in books, or not to. However, what we can't control are the words that people use when speaking with us. We can not control what they call us. People can use words for amazing things. For freedom, praise, and encouragement. This same power can be used to destroy as well though. Words are often used to cause anguish: to dishearten and condemn. When we speak these words out over people, we have no idea the harm that we are doing to them. The power that we have just with the words that leave our lips is astonishing.

The beautiful thing though is that the God of the universe speaks words over us too. Words of life from the depths of who he is, strait to the core of who we are. He doesn't call us what the world calls us. His words bring out the best in us. They draw out who we were created to be. They bring out our true beauty. They make us stronger and braver. They make us come to life. He is the one who spoke life into being. He spoke and there was light. He spoke and the waters formed into seas. He spoke and it was. The words on his lips are like water to dry land. They are the blood in our veins and the beat of our heart; they bring life to us.

God being the gentleman that He his, doesn't force His words on us. He gives us the choice to believe and listen to what He is speaking over us. The world calls things that are really easy to believe. That we aren't good enough. That we will never amount to anything. That we are too much, unworthy, or even a lost cause. It is so easy to listen to these words and to tune out what God is speaking over us. However, once we truly learn to embrace who we are, and absorb what he speaks over us, It's like we are living for the first time. He makes us come alive.

I've struggled for a long time truly believing that what God speaks over me is truth. I know that He thinks more good things about me than the grains of sand, but it was much easier to believe the things that the world was telling me I was. The closer I grow to God though, the more my heart opens and allows more of His words to spill in. Each day it's like I get to breath for the first time. I get a glimpse of who God sees when he looks at me and I am astonished. He looks at us with such love and belief it's breathtaking.

God has given this power to us too. To speak these same words of life over others and call them to be the people that He knows they can be. To fill their hearts with His love and their heads with who they really are. My goal is to create life with words. To help people embrace the words that God has for them and understand who He has called them to be.

1 comment
Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Within Reach.

Sometimes all you need for a perspective change is to ask for one.

Yesterday during staff training we were discussing outreach. For those of you who aren’t familiar with YWAMer lingo, “Outreach” basically refers to a missions trip. Generally these “outreaches” are 10 weeks long and are done while apart of a Discipleship Training School or a secondary school. They don’t have to be with a school – staff can plan their own – but generally they are done with students and have staff as leaders. Before the school starts, staff members pray and ask where they should go. They then begin to plan, organize and pray for the outreach they will be leading.  Students find out all the locations later (towards the middle of their lecture phase) and pray about which one they should join.

Outreach is a scary concept for me. By leading one, I will be in charge of a group of people in a foreign country. Utterly terrifying. The concept seemed a little foreign to my heart too. I am by no means saying that I am not passionate about what I do. I love being in YWAM and getting to disciple youth is amazing and life giving for me. I love people, and want to see everyone come to know Jesus, but sometimes it takes longer for your heart to understand things than your brain. This was my heart for outreach. Hesitant. Apprehensive. Wary. I know the power of outreach – I had an awesome time in Asia last year – but sitting there in the living room yesterday, my heart wasn’t breaking for the lost. My head knew that it was sad, and that Jesus desires these people, but my heart was lagging.

Right before we were about to begin the first prayer session for Outreach, Cory (one of our base leaders who is visiting us here in Florida) felt like she needed to say something. She talked to us about how Outreach used to be hard for her and that she needed to ask God to open her heart more. There used to be a disconnect between her heart and her head. She needed her heart to understand His heart for the people. I didn’t realize that was what was happening to me until she voiced that. She said that if we felt that way too, then we should ask for God to help us in that area.

I was terrified. Did I really want to ask God what his heart was for this? I knew it would be painful. But because it was painful to him, I knew that it was important. But as the prayer time began, I “casually” avoided asking him for his perspective on outreach. I started off by asking him where I should go. I jotted some things down in my notebook, but everything felt superficial. When I pray I like to write it down. When I really hear God, words just seem to flow from my head to my hand and onto the page. But this was like pulling teeth; slow and painful. Then I wrote down “Dream huge. Don’t be afraid”, and that reminded me of the new years resolution that I made. I resolved to be brave. To take risks. I then realized that this was a place where I needed bravery.  So I asked him. What I felt in the next 24 minutes was gut-wrenching and beautiful. 

I got a picture of Jesus. He was standing close to someone. I couldn’t tell who they were, but that was irrelevant. What was relevant was how he felt for this person. He was reaching out and His fingertips mere millimeters from this person. But despite how hard he reached, he couldn’t touch them. The desire he felt for this person was painful. He wanted so badly to reach out and embrace them, but he couldn’t. They needed to come the rest of the way to Him. He needed their permission. They needed to say yes to Him. Once they did, he could embrace them. He could fix them. He could comfort them in His strong arms. The pain and righteous frustration was so unfair. So close and yet so far. “How gloriously unfair,” I wrote “to sit and watch on the sides as people you love, so close to your grasp, sink in to depression, pain and desperation. How heart wrenching to have the keys but to not be allowed to open the door without permission. To have to wait and hope that one day, they will allow you to open that door.” I then continued to write, “But how beautiful is the one who waits. How amazing he is to not give up, but to endure that pain out of a crazy loving hope. This is love. This is dedication. This is pursuit. This is the God I serve. Who else would just sit and wait for us. To hope and hurt for us. To allow us such freedom that it would cause him this pain. To feel the breadth of every emotion and yet bear it all out of love. So close, and yet not close enough. What anticipation. What longing. What level of desire would pin him there. What a God of ferocity and devotion to endure the pain of waiting and not give up.”

God knows all people by name. He is calling for them with outstretched arms. He is so close to them, and all they have to do is say yes. This is the purpose behind Outreach: to introduce them to the God who desires them above all else. What a privilege it is to help them cross those last few millimeters. To be entrusted with this is such an honor. My heart was so full after that session. I was almost in tears the entire time. To get a glimpse of that was so powerful. To feel so trapped in love. Frozen and unable to move because of His devotion to us. It gave me a completely different outlook on outreach and people. He views everyone who doesn’t know him like this. Wow.

I serve such a beautiful God. He is so real and loving. His pursuit is so inspiring. Outreach may still scare me, but now I can say that my heart feels full of excitement for it. Everyone deserves to feel the love of the One who waits with such devotion. 

leave a comment
Friday, January 3, 2014

Looking Backwards then Forwards

I started last year in Surkhet, Nepal. I was in the midst of an amazing adventure, but the adventure didn't end there. My entire year of 2013 can be classified as one big adventure. I have been on more planes in this past year than I think I have my whole life. I have seen so many amazing things, and met so many beautiful people. I was a Program Assistant at Pines and moved to Germany. I got to give my mom the shock of her life, see two of my best friends get married and the other welcome new life into the world. I've made friends all over the world and been challenged the most spiritually this year than any other. I got to end this year back in Canada, surrounded by amazing friends. Those two weeks were the proverbial cherry on top of a wonderful year.

Here's the part of the post where I "declare" my New Years resolution. Usually people make resolutions that are fairly specific or cheesy. This year I'm going a bit vague... and hopefully not cheesy! This year, I am resolving to be brave. I have a God who is huge. He is in control. He has a plan. I am a person who worries and gets anxious pretty easily (although I'm also really good at hiding it), so this year I've resolved not to worry. I'm going to take steps of faith and trust more. I'm going to not be scared, but share how I'm feeling and what I want. I'm going to swallow fear and skip forward filled with joy. I'm going to embrace every opportunity and get the most out of this year. 

Watch out 2014. This is going to be fun ;)

3 comments