"I got a hangover,
I've been drinking too much for sure
I got a hangover,
I got an empty cup
Pour me some more
So I can go until I blow up,
And I can drink until I throw up,
And I don't ever ever want to grow up,
I wanna keep it going...."

"There's a stranger in my bed,
There's a pounding my head
Glitter all over the room
Pink flamingos in the pool
I smell like a minibar...
Pictures of last night
Ended up online
I'm screwed
Oh well
It's a blacked out blur
But I'm pretty sure it ruled"

"Lately I've been stuck imagining
What I wanna do and what I really think,
Time to blow out
Be a little inappropriate
'Cause I know that everybody's thinkin' it
When the lights out
Shame on me
To need release
Uncontrollably
I wanna go all the way
Taking out my freak tonight
I wanna show
All the dirt
I got running through my mind..."

Not typically what I post, is it? Yet this is the crap (sorry, but I am calling it what it is) that is being shoved down the throats of kids/teens/young adults everyday.

Maybe I am just more exposed and more aware living in a place where nothing coming from America gets edited. But I have been shocked and appalled at the absolute TRASH our country produces. And it disgusts me when I hear it being played here.

It makes me sad. Sad, because purity and good choices are difficult to make without music that SCREAMS, "Who cares... sleep around. It's so common, I'm singing about it. Drinking until you pass out and throw up? Fun...so fun in fact, I want to write a song about the puke coming out of my mouth right now."

I'll be the first to say that I love music. But I don't like being lied to, no matter how prettily Rihanna makes it sound. And I don't like people lying to my friends, my students, and my loved ones. It angers me to hear the message that "your life only affects you" and "your choices only impact you...so if it's fun in the moment, and makes you feel happy for a while, do whatever you want." It's a lie. Your sin breaks people's heart. It crushes them. It burdens them. It clouds their thoughts and keeps them awake all night. It makes people who love you feel physically sick. It destroys families. It destroys futures. And it's never worth it.

If you listen to this stuff, I'm not judging you.
I'm just sick of you being lied to.
Because you were made for so much more than that...

Reflections...

Today I taught in Portuguese for the second time.

It's about twenty minutes before I had to teach that I was overwhelmed with the thought, "How on earth did I wind up here? In Portugal... about to teach in a language that I am nowhere near mastering?"

For the most part, I am very comfortable with life here. What was once overwhelming and a mystery is now normal. But there are still those moments... moments when I am struck with how vastly different my life is right now. When I talk with friends back home and hear how they spend their time... or what they are up to, I feel a twinge of wistfulness, knowing that used to be my life too. But God pulled me away.

He took me away from an independent life filled with incredible friendships. He made me dependent. He broke me. He taught me how to make new friends in a new culture when I barely knew the language. He pushed me at times harder than I thought bearable, but showed me He is all the time faithful. He's taught me the meaning of flexibility in a way I never though possible.

On New Year's day I did something I don't normally do, but fully intend to make a habit. I took my journal and my Bible and went to a cafe. I spent the afternoon pouring through the last year of my life. I read with surprise and a smile of remembrance the highs that I had experienced in 2011. My eyes welled with tears as I recalled the pain in the lows I'd journeyed through. As I poured through my prayers from 2011 I was amazed: how quickly I had forgotten what God brought me through.

Right now I love my life here in Portugal. And because I am so fulfilled and happy, it was easy for me to forget that there were moments when I begged the Lord to show me just one reason why He led me here. There were many days where I told the Lord, "I cannot do this. I will never fit here. You picked the wrong person." I forgot the tears I cried because I was overwhelmed with the loss of my friends. I no longer remembered how frustrating it was to feel like I would never be able to say anything more than, "Hi, how are you?" in Portuguese. I saw prayer after prayer begging the Lord to help me be able to communicate because I was desperate for friendships. In the past year, God led me through months and months of discomfort and frustration. And at the end of that long journey, He brought me here... to a time in my life that I absolutely love. And as I sat down to write out a prayer, my thoughts kept coming back to such a simple truth:

"Though sorrow may last for a night, joy comes in the morning."

Every difficult time God has brought me through has been temporary. The light affliction I experience is "but for a moment" and is always accomplishing a far more important purpose.

I stared at my journal... 2012.

As I saw the year written on the page, I realized once again that in five months God is going to take me back home. I am going to once again be uncomfortable. My heart is once again going to feel like it is breaking. My heart is going to long to hear Portuguese. I am going to be IMMENSELY grieved to walk away from my church and friends here. And even as I even begin to write this, I can't imagine how I'm going to ever feel fulfilled and happy there...

"But joy will come in the morning..."


There will be tears. Many, I'm afraid.
But joy will come.
He will restore. He will show me once again that the plan He has will bring more joy than I ever thought imaginable. And He will overwhelm me once again with how well He knows my heart, and what I need to look more like Him.

And through the entire journey, He'll always be faithful.

When God orders your steps...

Mid-afternoon today I nearly lost it. What had been tremendous peace in the midst of my seemingly uncertain future was suddenly removed. Something that I normally accept with understanding became an indicator that everything I was doing was probably a mistake. All day long I kept thinking, "What is my problem? Why am I all the sudden flipping out over this? I was fine 24 hours ago."

Suddenly I knew what I needed to do, "Walking sounds good. A long walk. To clear my head and pray. And I'm not coming home until I have peace and have gotten to the root of my problem."

So, I went home, changed, and headed to the park.

And walked.

And walked.

Walked some more.

Prayed some more.

More walking.

More praying.

I passed a cute puppy.
I smiled at the owner.

I decided I was just going to have to go home and get in the Word. As I headed to my car, I stopped. For no apparent reason I decided I would go sit on a park bench (which, is not something I normally do after walking in the park).

I walked to the bench and sat.

I started praying, and then I saw the man with the cute dog walk to the bench furthest away from me. He spoke harshly to his dog. He began to order the TINY puppy to jump up on the bench. The poor, helpless puppy tried unsuccessfully many times. I kept thinking it was so cruel of the man to make this little puppy jump and fail. Why wouldn't he just lift it up? Finally the man himself stood on top of the bench. He began beckoning the puppy to try again. You could almost read the frustration on the puppy's face. I thought, "How cruel! He already knows that the puppy can't do it. Why is he torturing him?" Before I could finish my last thought the puppy jumped and secured a spot on top of the bench.

I sat watching this whole display and started fighting back tears. Because I got it. My perspective of my Master was off. I, like the puppy, was feeling like my Master was asking me to do something I simply was not capable of doing. All during my walk, I kept saying, "God, I just can't. I must not be capable of this. You must not have made me for this." But what He reminded me was that He himself was not asking me to do anything that He hasn't already done. And if He can do it, He can provide the ability, strength, and grace I need to do it.

I watched the puppy's master play with him on the bench and encourage him. They both jumped down, and then he led the puppy to another bench. This time, the master stood on the ground. He encouraged the puppy to try again. Without hesitation it jumped onto the bench.

"Ok... I get it, Lord. You've been on top of my bench. And because You are there and have been there, I can do it."

Lesson learned. Peace overwhelmed my heart. And I thought my day was done.

But the puppy started coming to my bench. It stopped. I smiled up at the owner (and hoped against all hope he didn't see my eyes were filled with tears over the minor accomplishment his dog just made). I told the owner I thought his puppy was cute (it was about the only Portuguese phrase that came to me).

I had no intention of moving the conversation past that point. But somehow thirty minutes later we were in a deep discussion about what the true meaning of the Bible is, what a personal relationship with Christ meant, and the reason for man's existence.

I invited him to come to my church. He said he hoped we'd meet up again someday at the park. I shook Ruben's hand and headed to my car.

"Lord... what was that? You didn't bring me here because I needed to get to the bottom of why I was suddenly frustrated. You frustrated my plans momentarily to get me to the park to sit on a bench to watch a puppy that would remind me of who You are and then open the door to share You with a 20-something Portuguese policeman who thinks being good is enough to get him to heaven. You just ordered my steps, didn't You?"

O, Lord--Order my steps to be light in the dark. And do whatever You need to in my heart and life to get me to be where I am needed. Use me.

My God will provide....

When I finally realized I had all the funds I needed to spend the next two years of my life in Portugal, I was stunned. It's one thing to think God is leading and opening a door for me...it was a completely different thing to see Him say, "Yes." or more like "YES!"

From my perspective, all my funds were raised (a large portion of them being already collected), and money would no longer be a concern. Little did I know that the dollar's value would soon plummet, insurance costs would increase, monthly needs would increase, and monthly supporters would forget.

As I began looking over finances, numbers were discouraging. Yes, I would stay regardless, but how on earth would I do it? The longer I looked at the numbers, the more I realized that during the month of May it was possible that I would barely have money for gas and food, let alone rent, and all the other expenses...

I debated for a long time what I should do. I did communicate with my home church about the needs, but no changes were made. So I decided I'd just pray. Pray that somehow, God would remind monthly givers of their commitment... that God would supply the lacking funds even IF all my monthly supporters gave... and that in the end, He'd get me through in a way that would again show me this was His idea from the beginning, not mine.

Fast forward to the month of December. I stopped logging into my account at ABWE. It was a constant reminder that I didn't want to see. But, one day... the day of reckoning, I decided I needed to really figure it out. As I logged in I noticed a large increase in my support account. When I checked into it, I was shocked. Sitting in my account was exactly enough to cover me for the month of May.

It should go without saying that God will provide for all my needs. And yet, some days, when the numbers are tight, or when they come out with a negative sign in front of them, it's hard to remember. Here's what I'm learning...

It would have been really easy for God to have brought all that money in from the beginning. He knew the increases were coming. He wasn't surprised... So why didn't He?
Because He knows and loves me. He knew I would be mentally freaking out about how to find a job after this.... or what I would do if I can't find a job when I come home. And He knew that I needed a reminder that God provides. He provided for me in May, He'll provide for me in June, July, and every month after that.

Right now God is asking me to walk very blindly into something I am totally and completely new at. It's terrifying. Yet, seeing that God cares for ALL my needs, watching Him do this for me again reminds me that He is concerned about my heart. Whatever the outcome, He cares more that I look like Him at the end of it. So I don't need to rush ahead and worry about the outcome, I simply need to walk by faith trusting that God is providing what I need at this moment.

He's so good. He doesn't just provide. He uses His provision to humble, to remind, to restore, and to refresh.

Thank you, Lord, for a providing not just money, but a reminder I so desperately needed.

A well built fortress...

I've really tried to blog lately. Countless times I've logged in, started to try to put my thoughts into an entry...and felt far too exposed or bare...and quickly deleted my thoughts to maintain a privacy that for some reason feels necessary right now. And to be quite honest, I haven't even decided if this will make it to a post...

God has been teaching me so much lately. And so much of it, I'd rather learn another way. He's confronted me with how I have tried for so long to guard against any type of hurt that I could. When the possibility for it arises, I flee. I say, "no." I run. I try my hardest to protect what seems so important to me, refusing to trust that God could use hurt for my good. I somehow have justified that I could trust God, but never anyone else...and that that was Biblical, because the Bible says, "guard your heart..." I took this verse to an extreme and began to use it as a right to build an impossible defense system to keep people from penetrating to the deepest parts of my heart. Mainly, because I was afraid.

Afraid to allow people to see ME...and reject ME.
Afraid that if I didn't...my heart would be broken.

But what God is showing me little by little is that what I have offered in return to people is not love. Because love is risky. Love is messy. And to truly love is always to hurt.

And I have sat, eyes wet with tears, asking God if I could really do it. Could I really open my heart up? Could I be that? And be okay if I was broken, hurt, and rejected?

And He has answered...
"Do you trust me? Do you take me at my Word? Because I have already told you I work all things for your good? Remember, I said that nothing could separate you from my love. Not even hurt. Not even rejection. My love would restore. My love would heal. My love would. I gave my Son for you. Won't you trust me with the heart I created and redeemed? Won't you love like me? Because I want your heart to look like mine...and that means you must love. Willingly. Sacrificially. And recklessly."

So I'm trying...little by little to tear it down. But I need God to pull a Jericho to make this thing come crashing down. Patterns and habits are not easily broken. I'm just begging God to help me. Little by little...step by step...

He washed my eyes with tears that I might see,
The broken heart I had was good for me;
He tore it all apart and looked inside,
He found it full of fear and foolish pride.
He swept away the things that made me blind,
And then I saw the clouds were silver lined;
And now I understand 'twas best for me,
He washed my eyes with tears that I might see.

He washed my eyes with tears that I might see,
The glory of Himself revealed to me;
I did not know that He had wounded hands,
I saw the blood He spilt upon the sands.
I saw the marks of shame and wept and cried,
He was my substitute for me He died;
And now I'm glad He came so tenderly
And washed my eyes with tears that I might see.

By Ira Stanphill

Ran across this poem and loved it...

Decipher this...

Lately I can't write on this blog. It takes too much work...and this will most likely be the last for a while.
My heart can't be deciphered into words...let alone words that sound coherent and captivate a reader.

But let me make a lame attempt.

I guess lately I'm learning that just because God has always done something one way doesn't mean He will continue to work that way in the future. I've found with several things in my life that I have assumed that God would never answer according to what I desired...because history has proved from my past that He never has. Therefore I assumed He never would. So somewhere, somehow I did the most obvious and most reasonable thing I could think of: I shut down those desires. I removed hope. I stopped asking. I said, "no" to my heart. Because hearing Him say it repeatedly was far too painful.

And somewhere in the past six months, God undid me. He whispered to my heart that trying to control my life was useless. He showed me that deep within those desires could never die, no matter how hard I tried to suffocate them by refusing to waste my breath praying for them. He broke me. He showed me that I couldn't master my heart. I couldn't lead it and control it.

And in complete brokenness... I started asking God to work, against everything my heart told me.
And now... as I see Him gradually beginning to work, I can't understand it. It makes no sense to me. He isn't supposed to do this. He was supposed to say, "no." And every little "yes" that He gives terrifies me. It undoes me. Because I don't know how to walk this road. I don't know how to handle a hope I've crushed being restored. I keep waiting for Him to do it. To rip it away. To tell me, "no, never..." I keep waiting for disappointment. It's what I know.

But it hasn't come...

And I've realized I understand very little of trust and very little of God's love.
Regardless of what God does, this is the journey of trust I know He wants me to walk through. Am I willing to risk stepping out in faith? Am I ready to trust Him with what I value more than anything else in life?

So... that's as much as I can get into words tonight... although, I'm not sure if those words even made sense...But it's as good as it's going to get tonight.