joy moments.

As I recently worked my way through the book One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp, my mentality began to shift.  She talked about enjoying moments.

Over the course of a year, she made a list of one thousand things that she experienced that she saw as blessings, as gifts, as graces from the Lord.  She writes about how seeing those "grace moments" brought her to a place of thanksgiving - of remembrance of all the things God does, the things he brings us through and all of the little things he gives to us to bring us joy, if only we notice them.

I, too, have begun a list.  It is far from complete, but it has changed me.

This week has been full of those grace moments.  A trip to Kansas City brought many of them, as I was able to see so many people who I dearly love.  The face of a girl who experiences freedom for the first time.  The arm of a girl once covered with scabs, now healed.  A childlike excitement where there used to be apathy.  The face of a baby, looking so much like the parents and so full of innocence.  Returning to a place where I had grown roots, sitting in remembrance of the time spent.  Coming back to Saint Louis and going to Trader Joe's, my favorite, where I haven't visited in months.  Buying the dried mango I so enjoy.  Drinking a latte with someone who had never drank a proper one before.  Engaging conversation, discovery.  Live music that wouldn't be right if it wasn't a little off-pitch.

These things exist in our everyday, too.  In the mundane we can see them if we are thankful to God for the small moments that pique our attention, draw our eyes and our ears.  Let us pray that our eyes will be sensitive to these things, so we can forever be in a mindset of thankfulness for the joy moments.

vikings no more.

In the spirit of celebrating newness, wherever God reveals it..

I felt inspired to change the background and color scheme of this blog.  Someday I may change the title - I think I stopped liking it only weeks after I started writing it.  Anyway, you are all now free from the Vikings colors glaring at you every time you click on my blog (I know that's what you all thought about when you saw the purple and yellow together!  Well, at least all the Packer fans :)).

Easter.

Tonight at church we celebrated Easter.

Yes, I realize it's August, months after Easter happens on the calendar.  But that's exactly why we celebrated it.  Easter cannot be a day on a calendar.  It cannot just be the day that we have a big family meal and dress in pastels while running around the yard searching for sugar-filled pieces of egg-shaped plastic.  No, it must be more.

Luke 24 talks of the women who came to bring spices to the once-sealed tomb finding it open and empty.  It speaks of the men in dazzling apparel - breathtaking, I'm sure.  They tell the women that Jesus rose, like he said he would.  And, don't miss this, they remembered his words.  They remembered the words of their risen Savior and immediately went out and shared their excitement.  This remembrance brought thankfulness, their thankfulness added to their faith, and then they had joy and they worshiped.

Remembrance brings us to worship.

Not only on Easter Sunday - but Easter every day.  Walter Brueggemann in one of his prayer books asks the Lord to "Easter us with your newness."  And he will.  The empty tomb made a place of death into one of new life.  Let us never forget.

We all took communion, and in the breaking of the soft loaves, we remembered.

We should always remember.

blessings. possibilities.

Starting a life in a new place is challenging.  It means developing new routines, discovering new places, learning the roads, and most challenging of all... meeting new people.

I have spent the last six weeks figuring out where things are, moving and then moving again, unpacking, settling.  Decorating comes next, and I am in awe of God's provision.  Pieces of furniture come from all different directions for free and for blessing.  Fabric for curtains comes in sheets with beautiful patterns, and is used in abundance.  People from other areas of my life showing up in random places, reentering.  Blessings.

Matthias' Lot is the name of the church I started attending.  It meets on Wednesday nights instead .  Soon, I will be able to be more involved there, as I was able to meet some of the leadership last week.  I am grateful to know people there.

I occasionally get to go into the city to volunteer at different neighborhood events for my job.  Sure, my role is more supervising and facilitating the volunteer work of our residents, but it is ministry just the same.  Seeing, and partnering with, the work of urban ministries and churches in this city, serving thousands of people things important to their future daily lives - it serves as a great reminder that my work in the city is not over simply because I no longer live in an urban area.  I can still spread God's heart for the city no matter where I am, and I can still serve.

These adjustments make things different.  While I realize that living in a new place and doing a new job will inevitably change the way you do life, I am still astounded by its reality.  There is a stark difference between the ways I have lived in the past and the way that I can live now - a new sense of freedom with my time and energy compels me to use my time well.  To spend it maintaining relationships far away, building new relationships here, learning new things, taking some graduate-level courses, reading the stack of must-reads that have laid untouched on my bookshelf for years, cooking new things, starting (and finishing) projects (thank you Pinterest!), and a never-ending list of others.

To end, I just want to share a verse that I've been dwelling on:

I'm asking God for one thing,
only one thing;
To live with him in his house
my whole life long.
I'll contemplate his beauty;
I'll study at his feet

That's the only quiet, secure place
in a noisy world.
Psalm 37:4-5

alone.

As an introvert, I often choose to be alone.  Don't get me wrong, I love being with people, but sometimes I need time to myself to recoup a bit.  I'm sure some of you can relate.

These past few weeks, however, I have found myself alone not by choice, but because I don't know anyone here in Saint Louis to be with.  Sure, there are a few people here who I spend time with - my roommate, Jen, and Crystal whose home we are currently invading.  But there is a great deal of my time spent pointless and alone.

The sense of being alone by circumstance rather than by choice - it is profound.  It is a sort of deep ache to be with people who are familiar, people who I know, people who know me.

And even here, the Lord meets us.  In my crying out for a friend, He brought me to a church where a familiar face from college found me.  A few hours of tea and good conversation after church filled this deep need that I have felt for several weeks.  The Lord provides in ways that we can not predict.  I am thankful.

transition.

Yesterday I bought groceries.  Real, I-have-a-kitchen-and-a-life-of-my-own groceries.

Over the last 16 months, I became accustomed to either eating whatever is already prepared or scrounging through leftovers in a commercial kitchen that feeds 70+ people every meal or getting take-out.  It gets tiring.

A lunch of fresh peppers and carrots with spinach and artichoke hummus, with a side of blueberries?  It tasted like freedom.  Cheesy, I know, but somehow our experiences are tied to the tastes by which they are accompanied.  This season will be one of raw foods and iced coffee, and I am excited to explore it.

Transitions are complicated, aren't they?  There is a strange mix of sadness, grieving even, over what was left behind, and an excitement for what is to come.

I start my new job this Friday.  On the 20th, I can move into my new place - it's a garden studio with an open floorplan.  It has a back deck and a yard, an artist's touch, and the feel of an island home.  Then I can settle into a life here that is quiet.  For it is in quietness that we hear the Lord's voice, is it not?

moving on.

"Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end."

These words are all too true.

Sunday, March 6th of 2011, I arrived at Shelterwood in Independence, Missouri with wide eyes and without a clue.  I could not even fathom what the next 15 months would hold.  I have fallen in love with these girls and this place, my coworkers and my friends.  I have broken up fights, mediated countless conflicts, and given consequences for everything from cussing out staff members to pooping in trash cans.  I have taken girls out for ice cream, gone to concerts, painted pottery, had photo shoots, and stuffed a dryer and a lounge chair in the back of a van.  I have run through the woods searching for runaways, walked alongside the highway after them, and I have taken girls to the emergency room.  I have cried with them under their beds and laughed with them until we could no longer stand; I've been so frustrated with them that I've had to walk away and have felt profound joy by their presence in my life.  Their choices are sometimes crushing, but the victories are then celebrated all the more.

And with those victories, and even the steps backwards, came growth.  It resulted in the restoration of families; of girls coming closer to the Lord.  It was all worth it.

But, as the cheesy phrase goes: "All good things must come to an end."
This is mine.

July 1st will be my last day working at Shelterwood.
God has graciously and obviously, without my pursuit, opened a door for me at Mercy Ministries in St. Louis as a Weekend Residential Assistant.
I am excited.

And I am sad.
Sad at the thought of leaving so many things that I love.
Yet I anticipate the newness.

St. Louis will be new.  My schedule will be vastly different.  My roots will have to start growing again.  My friends will be non-existent.  And my work will be another challenge, but a more stable one.

Mercy Ministries has been on my radar for years now, brought to my attention by a girl I knew who was at her bitterly broken end.  She applied to be a resident at Mercy and has come out completely healed, restored, and in right relationship with God and others.  In fact, she is getting married this summer (congrats, Mandie!).  Seeing her healed, and others I have met since then, I knew I wanted to be a part of that ministry.  Here that dream comes true.

And every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.