Hello all! This is a re-post from my newsletter from this past month, so if you recieve my newsletters, go ahead and skip this blog ;)
I've been in Berlin for almost 5 months now! It's been a crazy time of learning and growing and being humbled and stretched by the Lord! It's also been wayyy too long since I've written anything on my GoCorps blog, so here is some of what the Lord has been teaching me in the last month :)
Migraines are not a fun time. I think anyone who has ever had one can definitely agree with that. For me, I get nauseous, I get sweaty and feverish, I either lose my vision or am just incredibly sensitive to the light, and I basically can't look at anything until it goes away. This past weekend, I got a migraine for the first time in a couple of months. I was really frustrated that I got one, because I had a lot of things that needed to get done that day. And instead, I was being forced to spend the entire day in my room, with no movies, no books, not even a light on. Normally when I get a migraine, I just sleep the day away, but for some reason, that day, I couldn't even seem to do that.
A few days earlier, I had talked to a teammate about a Podcast that she really likes, so I decided that I'd give those a try, since I couldn't really do anything else. And in those Podcasts, God met me and reminded me in the way that only God can, of what I've been needing to hear this entire month.
This month was different for me than the others have been so far. Probably one of the biggest differences was having someone here from home. It was AWESOME to get to see her and to show her my life here, but it also reminded me of how much I miss Purdue, my friends, and feeling known. I got the privilege and blessing of having someone from home that I love and cherish come to visit me, but I was also just reminded of how nice it is to spend time with someone who grew up in a similar area, someone who I share memories with, someone who I've known for longer than a few months.
And that made me miss Indiana a lot.
But this Podcast brought me back. It was talking about feeling known in friendships and relationships. It's something everyone longs for, I think--for someone to know you completely, flaws and all, and for that person to still love you fully. But that's not possible. Even when we have the best of intentions, we cannot, on our own, show that love to others, even if we know every part of them.
As I'm hearing this, I was laughing to myself, thinking "Okay God. I know...even if I had already developed deep and close friendships here, they still wouldn't be what my heart really wants. You are the only person that can know me completely and still love me fully and perfectly. But it doesn't mean I'm not still lonely. And how am I supposed to spend time with you or be with you when I can't even get out of bed right now?"
So, that Podcast ended, and I started another one, because obviously I had nothing better to do...
The next Podcast was called "Loving Your Real Life" and it was discussing a book where a woman had taken a different aspect of her life each month and tried to find ways to "make it count" and to find joy and contentment with it, in the everyday. One of the topics she picked was Quiet. She talked about what it was like to realize that she filled so much of her life with unnecessary noise and with that, didn't give herself the chance to just BE with God.
Crap.
She's talking right to me. I have this whole day where I can't read, watch movies, eat, sleep, study or anything else. So what CAN I do? I can be with God. In the quiet, in the silence. Sitting with God and not DOING is definitely not something I'm good at. But I can look back on the events of that day and see how God was calling out for me to just sit with Him; I was too frustrated at myself for having a migraine, too busy trying to figure out how I could switch my schedule around, too busy trying to find something to DO, that I didn't listen to Him asking for me to just BE.
I've been missing home a lot lately and feeling kind of run down, like I was running out of steam. All God wanted me to do was take some time and be with Him. And it took allllll that for me to finally listen.
Thank God that He is so relentless in His pursuit of us. Thank God I can go to Him to find rest and refreshment even on days when my body is in physical pain. It doesn't mean I don't still feel lonely here at times, it doesn't mean I don't still get caught up in life. What it DOES mean though, is that God will meet us in ALL of those situations. Praise Him for that.