This is the coolest ministry I have ever heard of. I receive their email updates and they change my life every time and inspire and stir me at the CORE of my soul! Every email is signed like this: "Until heaven is crowded", and it really makes me think. That's how I want to live and how I want to sign all of my actions, seasons of life, motives and life as a whole.

I haven't felt soooo myself in a long long time. God is doing some deep healing work in me. It's not all clear, and circumstances aren't the loveliest, but I feel like I'm coming home, ya know? Coming home to a lot of things. Simplifying. Being true to who God made me to be. Letting go of things that don't belong to me. Remembering where I came from and who I've been. Visiting the past. Loving what I was made to love. Seeing more clearly who I'm becoming and who God wants me to be. Embracing the present and the beautiful future. Letting go of pretense. Embracing the tiny sweet things in life. Looking to God and to eternity for direction. Seeing who I am in Him. Dreaming again. Loving again. Letting go of judgment. Letting go of control.

All of these works are so in progress. And pain is still a companion, but an appreciated one. Pain seems to serve as a trusty pair of eyeglasses. When you naturally see things a little unclear, pain brings things into proper focus. No one wants to hassle wearing glasses on their face everyday, but its always a worthy trade-off for clear vision.

Anyway, God is with me. I am VERY imperfect, quite broken, yet quite whole and well! Being made more like Jesus. I am so free. So free to be so weak and imperfect. So free to respond to the work of my savior in the world and in myself. So free to rest in His righteousness and His sanctification. Free to embrace and rejoice in His healing and His power over every competing master, and false lover in my life.

I just have this outside hope and joy invading me. It's not from within. Trust me, I've been looking and if it were from within I would have found it by now. It is truly from without. In the midst of daily tasks, sadness, failure, sin, frustration, apathy...hope keeps finding me. It looks me square in the eyes and then to my surprise, it lurches toward me and hugs me tight with a hearty laugh. I suddenly find myself with not only hope in my arms, but excitement and joy! My whole disposition is turned on its head; I'm happy, smiling and hopeful. And its steady -- not fleeting. All while I'm washing dishes at work, driving, doing homework, or checking out at the grocery stores. Days and weeks later... its still with me. Subtle, quite, sometimes under a little pile of clothes, but it's here. It's rooted in truth... and I actually believe it; I actually believe Gods going to make good on His word. Its this grace that's following me; this otherly, powerful grace. I'm being stretched; my weakness, my wrongness is all being confronted and kicked out.. and I like it. I want it to happen and I'm going to keep letting it happen! I'm going to celebrate it and I'm going to keep bragging on my WONDERFUL POWERFUL God. He wins, ok?!

Anyway, in a simple, unexplainable, but very real way, I just feel myself again. I don't know when I stopped feeling that way, but I'm on my way back home (whatever that means) and I'm headed somewhere real good. I'm losing myself and finding God. I'm loosing myself and thus finding my(true)self all the more! Gods kingdom is marvelous, backward, perfect, is coming, is here.

May freedom always be my song and may I share it with others.

Remembering Gods faithfulness in the past shouldn't make us feel like he's neglecting us now. It should remind us of his unchanging faithful character that remains now. It should inspire hope and gratefulness for the now.

Living at home and being a college student is harder and more distracting than dorm life on campus. I am thankful for my family, but 5 years later they still don't understand that I cant sit and talk when I'm trying to finish a paper due in an hour and a half, or that I actually need lights on (they keep turning off all the surrounding lights around me) because I'm running off no sleep and trying to work in an environment that is simulating.

Excuse the bratty rant.

"For me, the only place I feel like I truly belong is in the presence of the Lord. Face to face with the Father. "

It's not where... it's what; it's Who.

"Instead of trying to find where I belong, I should instead try to find Kingdom, because that's where I will find my home. "

I've seen my family display a lot of what family isn't. I love when I see them display what family is.