coming home .

it's been several days since i have written . and i have so much to say but at the same time , struggle for the words and it's in those places i know i am not to write . 

i wait for the words to settle and rise in me . . . rather than my chasing them down . 

but , i figured it wouldn't hurt to check in . let you know i am home . safe . still very much here . 

the time and space i have been gifted with to travel , rest , stay , go , be , explore , settle in , and move has been such a welcomed grace . so peaceful .
and peace does not come easy for me . 
i am not good with or at rest . 

being still scares me . 
but not here . 

i thank you for following my journey . for being excited for me and all of what none of us even know it will entail . i am so looking forward to sharing it with you while also realizing what lies ahead of me , what i am already living in and experiencing now , is far beyond communicable . 

i thank you for the grace to ebb and flow in my postings . i have no formula , no schedule , no expectation . . . 

you will get words . sometimes many and sometimes few . 
you will get pictures . sometimes captioned and sometimes not . 

as much as this year is my year , let it be yours as well . take from it what you will , relate to it as you do . as you give me grace , i give the same to you . 
ask questions if you like , participate or observe . 
when life gets busy , come and rest . 

home is so many things .
in so many ways , home is where i have come .
and here is my hope for you . . that my coming home will be a catalyst to , in some form or fashion , a coming home for you too . 

and welcome home to you . 

craving to be seen .

i've always been a girl for simple things . sure i enjoy the occasional extravagance , but when it comes down to it , i prefer things in their simplest state - raw . pure . natural .

which is why it still works that glitter is my favorite color - glitter , in it's simplest form , is still glitter ;)

the days remaining before i move are down to single digits and as i think about packing , i continue to get more and more excited ; the list of reasons quickly expanding . 

road trips. i love road trips . i've done a handful in my life and people think i'm crazy for doing them ' alone ' . 

i have this secret though and my family will understand . . . i'm actually not going alone at all . i'm going with me ! and with all my heart , there is no one else i would rather have for company . 

my dad told me last night that people tune me out for survival . save your sighs and gasps . it's actually anything but offensive , really . as twisted as it may be - i take it as a compliment . 

we live life most closely with ourselves and of anybody that i could have gotten stuck with , i cringe to think that it might have been anyone but me . 

perhaps i'm building my case upholding the ' his statement is not offensive ' claim , and if not , keep following the blog , you'll understand in time ;)

i'm rambling . 

excitement . . . 

my mind has begun to fill my suitcases and while i am excited for what i'll be bringing with me , i'm excited about everything that i'm not taking with me .

as long as i have my ::

1 . bed . 

2 . stuffed animal bunny i've slept with since the day i was born .

3 . books , journals , stamps and stationary 

( okay i also hope i remember my prenatal gummies - they help my hair grow . i swear by them . right after the Bible )

everything else ? insignificant minor details .

i am excited for a simple wardrobe , a room lacking for all the extra clutter and decor .

i'll hit the road just me , Delilah ( my car ) , and Brenda ( i already named my reserved uhaul ) .

the seventeen or so hours are not wasted time and empty space . they are a journey , an adventure inside of , and leading to , an even greater one . 

as i pass through time and space , growing closer to there than here , i envision layers of myself being stripped away - all the extra , all the clutter , all the weights and burdens - ones i can name and ones i don't . 

i see myself arriving bare . raw . ready . 

vulnerability is typically a terrifying thing . . but you know what ? ? i have never been so ready , so wanting , so hungry to be exposed . 

all of my life , i've had this insatiable craving to be hidden 

and all of the sudden , there's this thrill inside of me restless and bursting to be seen . 

for everything there is a season , a time for every activity under the sun [ ecclesiastes 3 : 1 ]

this is my season 

speechless .

i believe with all my heart that The Lord is a romantic . it is not only what He says of Himself but also the reality i live with Him every day .  admittedly , there are days in which i fail to see the romance , but His grace and mercy , unbound by time , are ceaselessly faithful to eventually unveil my blinded eyes , overwhelming my heart and flooding me all the more .

i never didn't want to go to waco . i had actually been accepted into the school back in april but for the time being , disappointedly , i had turned it down . i didn't understand . i had applied several months in advance with confidence and what i believed to be confirmation to do so .   with the press of the ' submit ' button my wild imagination , paired with a cavernous time of waiting , took up quick residence and my dreams ran away with me .

i had plans .
big ones .
grandiose ones . . .[[ i have a theory about this later . hold on to this unfinished thought . ]]

fast forward . 

the call hadn't come yet but there was a sinking , unsettled feeling in my heart .
i wasn't going to waco . that confidence and confirmation had come up with a different conclusion ; an ending i wasn't so excited about but the one that came with peace .

the call came . obedience isn't always easy and or pain free . i turned it down leaving my application filed as ' no ' with an open invitation to be refiled as otherwise . [[ part two of soon to be mentioned theory . hold on to this one too ]]

when i am presented with my ' next steps options ' i worry and weigh and improvise the outcome of each situation . i am not a logistics person but i try to think through them . i fantasize myself in each scenario [ undoubtedly completely unrealistically ] and after all of this hard work , typically , come up with nothing . . besides more exasperation than i began with .

i've boiled it down to one question and am practicing coming to it more quickly , side stepping above mentioned exasperation . the question is this ::

which requires more faith . . in this case . . to stay or to go ??

in april , it was blatantly to stay .

fast forward . 

i , not so coincidentally , ended up at a prayer and worship night at a church an hour away that i had never been to . the service started , the Holy Spirit was invited , and oh did He move . i lost myself in Him , walking out of that place ninety minutes later in somewhat of a daze ; a fog ; it was as if i had come down from the clouds . i have yet to come up with an adequate description of what it was i was feeling but it was disorienting . it doesn't matter what it felt like though because i knew what it was . it was Him . His Presence .

He had found me and enveloped me as i sat alone among strangers in the most inconspicuous of places , where moments before i had sat in the parking lot debating whether or not to go in .

i journaled . i cried . i laughed . i sat still . i soaked it in and on the drive home i celebrated .

i was going to waco .

now , i know i'm not the only one thinking The Lord is looking a bit bipolar and indecisive right now . cue the soon to follow meltdown of  ' what am i doing?! i don't hear the lord (( how's that for discouragement and the pit of despair )) ?!  He's not supposed to change His mind ?! i don't deserve to go to waco ?! ' 

and the ever faithful inevitable finale of . . .
' IM GOING TO DIE '

baby fast forward.

a . i hear The Lord (( and so do you for that matter ))
b . He does not change His mind or contradict Himself .
c . deserve?  revisit grace . . moot point .  &
d . i'm obviously still alive so we won't even worry about addressing that one . . leave a comment if you have any questions there .


i think we can all agree that it is very obvious He is not the bipolar indecisive one and that those two qualities blatantly belong to me .

i was always going to waco .
[[ pause . go grab those two unfinished thoughts i left you with before ]]
this whole process was about exactly that . . the process . the journey . those grandiose dreams ? they had taken His hands off of the plan and went to work replacing them my own messy finger prints .
My Father loves to dream . He loves to dream even more than i do and is capable of even bigger ones than my imagination could ever even dare  . in His dreaming , He created me , and invited me along to do it with Him .
i got ahead of myself and started doing it without Him . what does that do ? it leaves Him out consequently shrinking and limiting my dreams which is unsatisfying to Him .
that romance ? i could have argued with you kicking , screaming , moping , and crying , that it just wasn't there the day i turned my acceptance down .
thankfully i didn't because that brings us to the ' eventually ' . the eventually is not on His part but mine , the grace is that He willingly sticks out the ' eventually ' anticipating that ' ohhhhhhhhh , thaat's what You were doing . ' moment with all the rosiness of my cheeks as they sheepishly blush in the humbling reappointing Him to the throne and getting my butt off of it .

I took waco from Him and all He wanted to do was give it to me . He wanted to give me a gift in all of it's fullness , in all of His glory , in all of His love .
He never changed His mind , but there was more going on than the decision of whether or not to go to Waco .
it wasn't right or wrong .
it wasn't life or death .

it was , every step of the way , every piece of the puzzle , every unfinished thought and moment of feeling forgotten , for the sake of sweeping me off my feet .

it is now those moments that felt forsaken that i look back and know i was ' most ' intimately and vulnerably seen .
provided for .
carried .
held .

this adventure is now the invitation it was always meant to be ,

 come away with me . . [ mark 6:31 ]

let me show you just how big i love you . 

He loves to see me speechless ,

and Lord knows He's the only one capable of getting me that way .