What are the reasons people (individuals) do not matter (to society)?
1. Because they are homeless.
2. Because they are poor.
3. Because they are obese.
4. Because they are ugly.
5. Because they don't believe they deserve to matter.
Why do people (individuals) matter?
1. Because people think the individual does.
Or
2. Because the individual thinks they do.
Why do I matter.
Because people matter.
Because I am people.
I am a person.
So I matter.
Why do people matter?
Why, do, people, matter?
Why?
Because they do.
…
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I don't believe there is one path chosen for us. I don't believe there is one path that is the best. I believe we choose every step. That God simply loves us. That he is pleased with us. That no matter what decision we make "good" or "bad" God steps with us. I believe he knows our pain better than we know it ourselves. That He cries for us and with us. That he is the first to sit down with us and just sit for a while. That he just wants to be with us.
How could someone who loves us so much have a designated path for us that he doesn't give us the directions for. There isn't a wrong path…
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When you decide to serve God, you trust him to take care of you. Don't you? What if he doesn't. Not how you you expected him to. Not how you trusted him to. That's been my experience serving God in Bulgaria. Many times it didn't feel like God was taking care of me. I felt no love. I felt only pain. Pain that didn't have a sensible answer or reason. Maybe God didn't cause the pain, but he didn't stop me from feeling it.
I've come to understand that pain isn't the enemy. It just feels like it is.
Pain can be a door, if you are willing to open it.
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June 19, 2019
So this last Sunday, Penacost Sunday, I was battling within myself. A week prior I had been asked to share my story with a small group and so I had been thinking it through and trying to decide how much to include. This had caused me a great deal of stress and so that week many things had reminded me of my story and set off a chain reaction of me thinking through my personal trauma. This had reached a fever pitch by Penacost Sunday. I was so torn between the freedom of giving my story to Christ and the fear and shame of telling my story to people I barely knew. During the…
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June 18, 2019
Feeling loved and safe is, and always has been, my number one priority. Feeling disapproval equated to not being safe and therefore needed to be avoided at all costs.
It was explained over and over to me in Church that I could not earn God’s love. The only way I was comfortable receiving love was through earning it. So hearing that I couldn’t earn God’s love was not comforting. I couldn’t accept any free love because it wasn’t dependable. God was like a parent who obviously loves their child, but is never pleased with them. Never being enough and not being able to do anything…
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