Out of the Sheepfold

Have I mentioned before that I love journaling?

Okay, whew. Just making sure.

Well, today is one of those days when I'm reminded why I love journaling so much. I love being able to look back and see how God worked by seeing words I penned at an earlier stage of life.

This week, Ryan and I started a new devo book for our morning quiet time together. I picked David: 90 Days with a Heart Like His (Beth Moore) from our shelf and we dove in to study the life of King David. I didn't realize, until we opened it, that I had actually started working through this book several years ago, and for whatever reason, I never finished it. But I'd not only read the first half, I'd also journaled in it. So I'm really looking forward to peeking into a whole different season and seeing what God was doing then and how He has worked since then.

And that is why I bring you Exhibit A.(a.k.a. Day One from the study.)

Before I tell you what I wrote, I probably should tell you a Bekah-quirk you may not know. I don't know that I've ever talked about it publicly before, because until recently I've always worked with a team of people and didn't want to look like I wasn't a team player by divulging this weirdness about myself.

When I worked office jobs, I really struggled when new people came on staff. I mean really, legitimately struggled. Even if the people coming in were good, likeable people, I was always, always intimidated by them. I feared they might hate me or be hard to get along with or rush in with all their new ideas and change everything about my nice, neat little world. I think part of the reason this was so hard was that back then, work was my family. I didn't have a husband or kids, so these people were it for me. I spent more hours with them than anyone else, and if things went well, that was great. But if things didn't go well, I didn't have anything better to go home to. Does that make sense?

I tried really hard to keep an open mind anytime new hires joined the team, but I just melted (and not in a good way) inside, because it was hard to reframe my family over and over again. Fortunately, the people I worked with were almost always extraordinarily wonderful, and I'd shake my head at my fears and realize once again, they were unfounded. But you know what? Sometimes it wasn't a match for me. Sometimes the people I worked with were hard to get along with. Sometimes our personalities didn't match. Sometimes they really did "come in like gangbusters" as my mom says, and shake up everything. Sometimes I really did go home in tears every. single. day. because work wrecked me. Or the people of work wrecked me.

On day one of my first go-around with the David devo, I was apparently still working in Financial Aid. (I didn't date the journaling, so I don't know exactly when I wrote this.) But Beth had written in that first day's devotion, "Have you ever felt like the youngest son, the consummate 'little brother?'...Sometime, somewhere, you've probably been treated as if you didn't exist, weren't wanted, didn't matter." (p. 4)

And I wrote in the journaling section:

I've been snowed under by the new people at work. I feel like I have nothing to offer in light of their enthusiasm and innovative ideas. I'm sure that the bulk of my issue is my fault and not their intention. Until the three new ones came in all at once, I felt like I had a place. Now I feel in the way and like I drag everyone else down. 

I don't feel like this is my forever job. It's just where I am for now. But it doesn't mean I have to hide in the corner of the sheepfold there. I can become a transformed woman - perhaps even by the way You use the people who are there - the very ones I resist. You find me worth using, and that comforts me. I know I'm on the journey of being 'in the making' and part of it just requires being summoned from the corner of the fold where I feel tossed and forgotten. I want to look like You. I want to be the daughter You can use and see success in. 

I don't know how long it was after I wrote this that indeed, I was summoned from the corner of the sheepfold and moved to a new job where I had the chance to thrive in ways I couldn't in the land of math. BUT!!! God used the people and the experiences of those eleven years of Financial Aid to shape me into the woman I needed to be to work in radio. And then He took the people and experiences of the four years I spent there to shape me into the woman I needed to be for my work now.


I've learned to see He's always working. Even when I feel thrown in the corner, inferior, and out of place. He's molding and shaping even those seasons. And when I move to a new place in His plan, I can see a bit more easily how the last place served as a training ground. It did for David. That shepherding job prepared him for what God had ahead. And the same (minus the sheep, of course) is true for me - and for you!

The Saturday Six

One.

If you're feeling a little bit forgotten - even by God - read this post by my new friend, Jessica. God is in the details. ALL the details. Even your details, and her reminder here is gentle and encouraging!

Two.

A very honest article on beauty. Such a hard topic to address honestly, because none of us want to admit that it bothers us as much as it probably does. I just appreciated her words, including these: "There is no perfection in true beauty—there is only redemption. It’s black and white, the paradox of loving my imperfections. It’s when I throw my shame aside and slip on my broken boots."

Three.

Ryan's Valentine's gift to me was this beautiful handmade sign from the Etsy Shop Wildwood Home Studio. The shop owner lives here in Indiana, and she uses reclaimed wood to make the signs. Ryan ordered this sign custom-made to go with my Surrender Cross from RAD JOY, and it is just so perfect. Ryan said the shop owner was great to work with and he highly recommended her! I adore the quality of the sign and the fact that it has a history!   

Four.

I guess in some ways, this post goes along with the theme of the first link up here in the list, but I guess sometimes when a similar theme keeps popping up, it's for a reason. If you're struggling because you feel like God is only all about the BIG stuff and life seems very small, take an encouraging read here.

Five.

 Hey Rachel in North Dakota? I saw your mind blown comment from the Shuffle about the clean eating queso and mozzarella sticks, so I wanted to share with you (and anyone else whose mind was also blown) the links to those recipes. They both came from the Dashing Dish website, and if you've hung out here very long, you know I LOVE ME SOME DASHING DISH RECIPES! Now, some of her recipes are exclusive for members, and the queso is in that group, but I totally assure you the monthly membership is worth the price. We eat so many recipes from this site and I adore Katie and her ministry. So here's the recipe to the queso (quick tip: we did not find that this reheats well as a leftover. Next time I make it, I'll just make half a recipe because that's all we could eat in one meal). I have not tried this recipe, but she has a clean eating white queso recipe here...and it's not a membership recipe, so anyone can see it. The skinny crispy mozzarella sticks are not a member recipe either, so you can view it without a membership!

Six.

Source

I had seen some teasers online about a new book called Fear Fighting by Kelly Balarie, and since fear is something I struggle with way more than I should, I decided this would be a good one for me to read and review.


Here's the thing about fear. It is a big, bad, suffocating monster that cannot be cured through reading a book. I will tell you that and Kelly will tell you that. In fact, in the afterword of the book, she says, "I don't know your timeline, but I do know that God wants to handle these two words (ahem: set free) one-on-one, hand-in-hand, and in conscious partnership with you. He reserves the right to decide when 'set free' is achieved." And it's true. You can't read this book and find the magic formula for ditching fear once and for all. But you can read the book to find two really important things: a friend who genuinely understands how you feel in your fear, and some suggestions for how to attack the moments of fear that can stem from so many different sources.

Fear Fighting is the kind of book I imagine myself going back to on multiple occasions, to find the specific chapter to accompany my present fear, and reacquainting myself with the ideas in that chapter. Whether your fear comes from the need to be in control, a desire to please everyone in your path, worry, comparing yourself to everyone around you, the unknown, rejection (real or imagined), or the resurgence of your own past, Kelly has Scripture-based suggestions to help you combat what Satan intends to use to thwart you.

She shares honest, vulnerable stories from the span of her own life - times when fear has bested her and times when she's overcome through the power of the Spirit. She offers Scripture to speak against the fear, and at the conclusion of every chapter, she offers some specific take-away thoughts and challenges.

Fear may be a life-long battle for you. That's very possible. But its dominance can lessen over time if you're willing to let God step in and teach you how to lean on Him instead of into the fear.

People who don't struggle with fear (ohhhh how fortunate!!) don't always understand how debilitating and discouraging it can be, so to have a friend who does get it and is willing to offer the hope that has worked for her in a spirit of compassion is such a gift!

* Baker Books provided me with a copy of this book at no charge. Opinions are my own. *

Detail Work

This week is a pivotal one in Shafferland. A "versary" of sorts, though I will refrain from commemorating it with chalkboards and parties. One year ago this week - Saturday if you like exact calendar dates - Ryan and I stepped foot in this home for the first time.

I was looking back at our moving scrapbook this week, because of course there is a whole scrapbook dedicated to this adventure, and the story still gives me great chills.

According to my record keeping, it was a year ago earlier this week when I had stumbled upon a house that had just come on the market and was so darling in every possible way. I called our agent immediately and scheduled a showing.

And then came January 22nd. A year ago this past Sunday. She called to say the darling-in-every-possible-way house was already off the market. Someone got there before we did and just straight up bought the thing. Per my scrapbook "I cried very bitterly for an entire day," and you know what? I remember that. I cried until I almost made myself sick. I had a raging headache for the whole next day, I could not be consoled - even with treats - and I was ready to call the whole house hunting thing off because I could not handle more disappointment like that.

Ryan and I talked about that day just this week. I told him as much as I love this house, I'm still a little mad that one was grabbed away from us before we could even look at it.

His wise response?

"Hey. It was the best thing. The details happened just as they were supposed to. God knew."

God knew indeed. God knew I needed a smart husband to keep me grounded when my creative writer brain gets away from me.

God knew I needed a day of grieving, too. I took it (clearly!!!) and the next day pulled out my laptop and started looking again. Ryan and I looked together and that's how we found this house. I was surprised he wanted to see it at all, because I thought a couple of things about it were deal-breakers for him, but he said he wanted to look, so I made the appointment and one year ago this Saturday, we pulled up in the driveway for the first time.

And as I wrote in the scrapbook, "I had looked at the interior pictures online, but I wasn't blown away by anything. But the moment I stepped on that porch, I inexplicably felt at home." (Now do you see why it's important to me that the porch is cute and cozy? It's where I first felt at home!

"We spent about a half hour walking through the house and found that it was in impeccable shape. The owners had lived there ever since it was first built. Even though it wasn't our dream floor plan, it was a darling, well-loved, well-constructed, well-maintained home. We could find no fault with it whatsoever."

We had another house lined up to see in a couple of days, but before we got there, that one sold too. Again. God knew.

This house was the only one we ever looked at. We made an offer five days after we walked through it, and we sat back to see how God would move.

The whole scrapbook is a beautifully woven testament to God's detail work. The buying of one house, the selling of another, the confirmation of prices offered and accepted...all of it was not a moment too early or late.

I know Ryan's right. As much as I would have loved to see that darling house I first fell in love with, God knew (for reasons I may never understand) that it was not our home. As bitterly disappointing as it was to never see it at all, I'm sure it was better than seeing it, loving it, and then walking away later. God was clear in the opening and closing of doors. This house? Wide open. All other houses? Firmly closed.

No questions. No room for doubt. Just a clear path up the sidewalk to our new home. (Which, by the way, I do love so so much.)

That season was a sweaty one for me. Trusting and waiting and watching nervously from the back row are not my most favorite things. But I sat and wrote down every single step in great detail as it happened. For me, that book is more than a fat scrapbook of moving fun. It's a chronicle of how God grew our faith, one detail at a time.

He's in the detail work. Even when the details seem harsh or unfair, He's in them, weaving future details we cannot even possibly fathom right now. 

Because ONE Matters

We started up our Bible study again last night. The first meeting of 2017 found all of us gathered around a kitchen island, drinking coffee, trying tiramisu, and sampling a {very delicious} cheeseball. And then we gathered in the living room to break open An Unexplainable Life and look again at the book of Acts and the life of the early church.

I don't know what it was like weather-wise in your world yesterday, but it was just cold, windy, rainy, nastiness here. It was tempting to crawl under a blanket and just stay home, but when you lead the Bible study, you can't exactly do that, so I went, and I'm sure glad I did. Isn't it just how it usually goes when God brings the biggest blessings out of the nights when you are most tempted to skip?

We studied Acts 8, which includes the account of Philip taking a bit of a detour and finding the Ethiopian Eunuch who was struggling to understand the words he studied as he read his scrolls.

Out of all the accounts that are shared in Scripture - which are not plentiful, if you stop and think about how many actually occurred - this one made it into the pages. This one moment in time when one man took a significant geographical detour and ended up running into one other man who needed to have an explanation of the Gospel. He had the words in front of him but he didn't understand them.

You know why I love this so much? (And this is what we talked about at Bible study last night.) We're conditioned to believe our efforts matter most when they touch a HUGE group. How can we change the world? How can we impact the greatest number of people at one time? And somehow that teaches us (intentionally or unintentionally) that if we're not doing the biggest and the best, we're not mattering at all.

And yet right here in the middle of the Bible itself is this story of ONE PERSON ministering to ONE PERSON and from that, God did huge things.

It's hard to be content with little, isn't it? But little matters just as much as big. And sometimes it matters more than big.

This blog isn't a big blog. I've been here ten years, and I don't have ten thousand readers a day. And I know some people popped on the blogging scene last month and already have a far more "successful" outcome than I do. But it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because I trust God to bring the people to this little page every day that need to see it. And if my job right now isn't to have a big blog, I need to be content with the small page He's allowed me, and be faithful to do my job here every day, knowing that each one who reads here matters.

Maybe your world is filled with small too: small churches, small classes, small book sales, small interest in whatever matters most to you. And maybe you've been conditioned to believe that small = failure. But it doesn't. One matters when God's running the show. And perhaps He has put you on a whole detour right now for the sake of ONE.

Be faithful to your one (or two or three).

After all - if you were the one, wouldn't you want to matter too?

Perspective

I decided many months ago that I wanted to write the Shafferland story. I think I was driven to make sure our story was committed to paper in case either one of us ended up forgetting who we were and how we lived. {Yes. Too much Notebook.}

I wrote the story of our first year a while ago and immediately launched into preserving the second year, but then life began to happen and I stopped writing. For some reason, this week, the writing bug bit {HARD} again, and I've been sneaking to the computer every spare minute to relive year two through blog posts, journal entries, and scrapbook pages so I can transcribe the story for posterity.

People, this is why I'm such an advocate for scrapbooking and journaling. So many things were hidden in those pages that I'd forgotten. I remembered much, but I'd forgotten much, too. Feelings and prayers, Scriptures and quotes, ups and downs, the funny and the heartbreaking - they were all waiting for me in words and pictures.

The particular part of our story I'm writing right now is exhausting me as I relive it. In no particular order, here were some of our obstacles in our second season:

* Double commuting
* Polar vortex
* Job stresses
* Double home ownership
* Low self-esteem {okay that one was just me}
* Plumbing replacement

Daunting enough in list form. But each point carried sub-points that added about 150 pounds of emotional weight to each of us.

Job stresses weren't just "job stresses." They were weights that made Ryan hold his breath to see if his very job would hold and weights that sent me home sobbing every. single. day.

Double home ownership wasn't just about the inconvenience of owning two homes. It was about drowning beneath betrayal from people who had committed to buying Ryan's old house and then moved out instead, leaving us not only stuck with a house, but spending spare dollars we didn't have to repair damages they left.

It was all-consuming. So many questions. So many decisions. So much unknown. So much hurt.

As I sorted through the pages of my journal, I stopped cold on these words, written on February 23, 2014:

Bring the right people for the {Greentown} house and bring the right house for us. Give us direction about where we should go. Bring us HOME.

Of course in my mind, all this bringing and giving would happen in short, orderly fashion. Isn't that ultimately the hope of all our prayer requests when we utter them?

In reality, it would be five more months before we received an offer on Ryan's house, and it would be another 141 days {five months, roughly} before we signed the house over to its new owner. But in that long, daunting, ten-month span, God would indeed answer the cry of my heart: the right people bought the house. We still smile when we drive by and see how they continue to make it their own. We are grateful it can bless them, and we are simultaneously grateful to be out from under the deep stress of owning two homes.

And in fact, exactly two years after I wrote this prayer in my journal {two years TO THE DAY}, we received word that the appraisal on our new house, our now house, was complete. And in less than one month from that day, we would own the house and be mid-renovation already.

In those two years, God did bring the right house. He did give us direction. He was lining up the buyer for the house we had shared the first few years of our marriage. He'd freed me to be a stay-at-home wife.

It wasn't short or orderly, but it was complete.

This is why I love to journal. I have, as Ann-Voskamp wrote in The Broken Way, "God-Amnesia." I forget what I know to be true. I lose sight of the journey we've walked together. I need to be reminded of His faithfulness - not just in the ANSWERS, but in the journey that LEADS to the answers. The journey matters as much, if not more, than the answers.

I sit here today, grateful for that hard year we lived. I'm not sure how we survived it with smiles on our faces, as I look back over the consistent crushing blows of that year. But we did survive it, and we are stronger and more unified as a couple and in our faith today than we were before the year began.

I'm also profoundly grateful for the answers. They came slowly, but God was faithful in the journey. 

Thoughts from My Heart Today

If you missed yesterday's post, there are a host of pictures to go along with the start of podcast stories today. We toured Tippecanoe county, Ryan got to meet a llama, and we were utterly confused by some hiking trails. Lots of good stuff in this week's Spill the Beans!

Click here to listen.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I went to the eye doctor and found out I have 20/15 vision. I have actually declared myself to have 20/12 vision, which I know is not even a thing, but I could read half the 20/10 line on the chart, so I figured I should get extra points for being better than 20/15 and settled for the happy medium of 20/12.

And this is why I'm not an eye doctor.

Well. Among many other reasons.

Anyway, I've always had great vision, much to the dismay of my sisters, who did not inherit this gene, and until Ryan made me go to the eye doctor last year, I'd never been. I'd had my vision checked in the free checks at school and the BMV, but that was the closest I'd ever gotten to an eye doctor.

Fortunately we're friends with our optometrist, so my ridiculous overkill in giggling to compensate for the nervousness of someone messing with my eyes is not quite as embarrassing. He's used to my quirks.

So he told me this year that my vision was amazing, and he went on to say that whenever my vision did slack off to being the perfect 20/20, I would actually feel like it was terrible and I needed glasses. Isn't that weird? Perfect vision that feels like a blurry mess because I've enjoyed a better-than-perfect state for so long.

I revisited this story with Ryan a few days ago {because he likes to pick on me and call me "Miss 20/12" anytime I see something before he does} and asked him if he thought they made glasses for people with 20/20 vision. After all, if perfection feels imperfect, what's a girl to do when she gets there?

And then of course, it had to translate into a spiritual application in my mind, because that's how my brain works.

But seriously!

1 Peter 1:15-16 (NIV) says, "Just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do, for it is written: 'Be holy, because I am holy.'"

I remember reading some article years ago that talked about people who were supposed to find counterfeit money didn't actually study counterfeit money to learn what it looked like. They studied real money so that anything that was less than the real deal was obviously counterfeit.

The point of the article was that in order to be more like Christ, you don't focus on what's happening around you in the world and try to figure out how to do better than that. You study Christ and work to become more like Him.

And that's what I thought of with this vision thing. Isn't the goal to keep maturing more and more so that what may have once looked like the height of holy to me might actually be just the start? And not just for me, but for all of us? That we can continue to become more and more like Christ?

There's always learning and growing to do. There are always improvements to make. And I hope to keep pushing to be better than my best - which I know can only ever be done through Him.

This is what I'm learning. Well. This and I shouldn't pursue a degree in optometry.

Press on, my friends!!!

Front Row Seats

Hands down, the biggest blessing of this past weekend was feeling like I had a front row seat to watch God at work in the lives of these new friends of mine.

There's something very different about speaking at a retreat vs. speaking at a dinner or church service. When I speak at a one-time event like a dinner, I come in, speak, exchange pleasantries with people, and go home. I know God takes the words and uses them however He wants to, and they are no more or less effective because of the amount of time I spend there. But to speak at a retreat is to live among the people for a couple of days. It offers the chance to sit and have conversations between sessions and {my favorite part} to watch the very beginnings of what God is doing in the lives in front of me.

By the time I spoke at the fourth session this weekend, I looked out and didn't just see faces. I saw stories. I could look at some of the faces and have a bit of an idea of the person they represented. I loved that.

We met in a conference hall that did not have air conditioning. So the first night, we sat sandwiched between the tiniest army of box and oscillating fans {and we fanned ourselves with the stapled weekend programs}.

We propped open doors and tried to get a good cross-breeze going, and I stood at the back of the room while the worship team set the tone for the sessions.

I stood at the back worshiping with the women and hanging onto the little wooden cross Ryan loaned to me for the weekend. {He received this cross when he spoke at his retreat earlier this year, and it's extremely meaningful to him, so to have it on loan was a huge deal for me and I cannot tell you how many times throughout the weekend I checked to make sure I did not lose it!}

I can't tell you how many weeks I spent preparing for these sessions. How much prayer went into the words I said and over the ladies listening. It's a massive responsibility to teach in any capacity, I believe. I wanted to make sure my words were true and filled with Him. And I prayed that for anything I said that was stupid or wrong, His Spirit would convict me and His grace would correct my missteps.

The ladies were so gracious. You can speak all the truth in the world, but if the hearers are not interested in truly listening and applying, it doesn't matter. And it seemed this group was ready to truly hear and apply. It was such a blessing to witness!

I can't tell you enough how passionate I was over the topic I presented this weekend, and I was just so thrilled to hear from the ladies how God was beginning to work in them, call them to greater things, and teach them what He needed them to know.

The weekend was just a giant privilege, and I'm so thankful to be entrusted with the opportunity. These ladies were such a blessing. I'm grateful.

Thanks for allowing me to serve you!!

The Birth of a Book

I feel like I haven't told you a single cohesive story this week. I've been all over the place, but I love you for hanging on for the blog ride and sticking with me until Friday!

Earlier this week, I told you our exciting news...I have a new book that's been released!

This book surprised most of you. Most didn't know I had something new in the works. I didn't hide it from you on purpose. It was a project that came up quickly and for a little bit, I wasn't sure it would be done on time. {On time being before the retreats I'm speaking at, and the first one starts today.}

Authors often refer to their books as their children, because they labor over them, celebrate their births, and set them free to see what they do in the lives of those they encounter. Since we don't have kids, I think my books feel even more like children. These words are what I live to do. They are my contribution to this world.

And that's why Be Still deserves a birth story post, I think.

The story part of this book was born ten years ago, when God took me on a journey with Him. A journey of visiting the prayer chapel on the campus where I worked. Over the course of seven weeks, I learned lessons that served me then, but they continue to serve me now.

Thanks to the prodding of my friend Marie {to whom the book is dedicated}, I wrote the story, all those many years ago, but I never did anything with it - well, other than hole punch it and shelve it.

Six years ago, in the desert days, God taught me a valuable lesson about being still, and knowing that He is God.

He taught me the purpose of the comma in that verse: Be still, and know that I am God. {Psalm 46:10}
 

Earlier this year, I was invited to speak at a women's retreat, and the planning committee told me they'd toyed with the topic of Be Still.

I started praying, digging, writing...and God prompted me to not just write a retreat, but to write a book to go with it. A book that offers an extension of the lessons I learned ten years earlier in a tiny prayer chapel.

And so the decade long gestation period of this theme gave way to the labor pains of a book. I pulled out the manuscript and began to tweak it. I began to relive the lessons of the prayer chapel and write new pieces that showed how God used the lessons of ten years ago to speak into my now and my future.

Labor went quickly...almost too quickly. The OCD in me clawed against the timing, aching for more opportunities for slow combing through the pages, searching for mistakes or things to say differently. I don't like to rush. I like to savor. But the time had come for the message to be shared, and what felt like a rush was really right on time.

A week ago today, on our 45th monthiversary, the doorbell rang.

I tried to wait until Ryan came home at lunch, but about 30 seconds later...

The first shipment. The reserve to share with the ladies at the first of the two Be Still retreats for this fall.

The book in flesh.

No longer an "ultrasound" of a cover on a screen. Real paper and shiny cover, held in my hands.

I tried to wait until Ryan came home for lunch, but about five minutes later, I couldn't wait anymore, and I went to work. I literally ran inside the building, bursting for him to see the baby.

And eventually, he did come home for lunch. :)

And he was home the next morning, too.

So yes, it's true. Just like a proud mom, I run around taking pictures of the book, wherever I can.

My friends are blessing me, ordering their own copies and sending me pictures:

It's terrifying and exciting all at once. I wonder where this little guy will go and what he will do with his life. I pray over him and his influence. I pray for God to use him and make him something special to anyone who picks him up.

It's no less special the second time around. I remember six years ago, when I did this the first time {Story told here and here.} I was a proud mom of that book too, though struggling in the blackest part of the desert. That book was a light in a bleak year.

This book is an entirely different journey, but one just as beautiful.

If you'd like a copy of your own, and you're local, let me know and I can get one to you! If you're not local or you just want it ASAP, here is the link to Be Still on Amazon!

One Year Later...

The date on the calendar this coming Sunday will mark one year since I left WBCL for the last time. One whole year, you guys. I truly cannot believe all that has taken place over this last calendar year. Proof that God really does abundantly above and beyond all we could ask or imagine.

This was a scary day. I was about to voluntarily {and obediently to the Lord} walk away from the job I dearly loved and had grown to be good at, and I had no idea what would be in front of me when the alarm went off the next morning...or the morning after that...or the morning after that.

But you know what's so great?

God knew. He knew all that would be ahead of us, and He knew I needed to be at home, free to handle all the details. {Details known only to Him.}

One. 

Even though it was not the predominant theme of the year, Ryan and I did get to actually rest some this year. I am not sure that people understood how very little rest we had enjoyed since getting married. Double commutes with jobs in health care and radio did not afford much down time. My being home to handle some of the day-to-day tasks gave us more time {even if not a LOT of time} to rest. I cherish it.

Two.

I spent many of the early weeks combing through every square inch of our house and purging all the boxes and truckloads of things we didn't need anymore. It was another task that had piled up since our wedding, and to finally be able to look through it all and weed out the excess was a blessing. It was freeing to simplify, and because I had the time to do so, I was able to sort, price, and arrange everything for a huge garage sale. We made enough money from that sale to pay for our vacation last fall. I was so thankful to be able to contribute that way!

Three.

 In the four years I worked at WBCL, I had time to read about four books. And all of them were work-related. Since leaving the station, I have had the privilege of reading a book every week, and it has been a delight to me. I love learning and honing my own writing craft through reading the words of others!

Four.

 Another thing I didn't have time to do while working? Write. I could blog, but I didn't have time for anything beyond that. In the year that I have been off work, I have written an entire book manuscript and am working to publish it. And the ideas for more that swirl in my head tell me I need to keep doing what I'm doing!

Five.

 We trained for and ran a race, which is something I would love to do again, but it was the first time we'd made time for this since we got married.

Six.

 Though we are still learning to have more time for this, we loved being able to actually have a little more time to spend with friends this year. Dinners and parties here and there, connecting and reconnecting in ways we never had time to do before!

Seven.

 We started serving more together at church - as greeters and coffee makers. We found areas where we can serve TOGETHER, and it was freeing to have the time to make those commitments!

Eight.

 In the spirit of serving together, we also hosted our first small group in our home, a group formed through our church. We led the group for six weeks and loved sharing with them every week. We are looking to lead another group starting this fall, because we loved the chance to do this before!

Nine.

 We missed radio, so we started our own podcast, now over 30 episodes strong, where we banter about life, tell funny stories, and share what we're learning from the Lord! This has been one of the biggest delights of our year!

Ten.

Perhaps the most unexpected change of the year was our move! I have no idea how people who work full time ever manage to sort, purge, pack, move, unpack, and settle! That was a lot of work and consumed a considerable amount of hours. But I was so thankful that I had the time in my schedule to do all that. With the exception of a few attic and garage items, I packed our entire house myself {with my OCD planner in tow} and did the lion's share of the painting, unpacking, and settling at our new place. Oh how we love being settled in our new home!

Eleven.

 The freedom in my schedule has also given me the freedom to add more speaking to my work, and I have loved preparing and sharing with women in different groups. I have also loved it that Ryan gets to accompany me to almost all the engagements. Looking forward to much more of this in the months to come!

Twelve.

And the biggest change? Losing almost 30 pounds in the last six months and feeling better than I ever have in my whole life. Our switch to a clean eating lifestyle with much more exercise has been really good for both of us.

All these things have happened in the last year, and I am profoundly grateful for God's provision for us in allowing me to stay home and manage these things. What a busy, full year, and while I do miss my friends at the station, and I miss being able to share like I did on the air, I adore being home, serving Ryan, writing, investing in friendships, investing in our marriage, and being free to be used by the Lord in ways I hadn't been able to for the last four years!

Astonishing Joy

If you heard the podcast yesterday, you already heard Ryan's attempts to say the phrase "astonishingly joyful" - and you know how that went. If you did not hear it, it's worth waiting for just that very part. I'm still cracking up.

Today I want you to meet the woman of astonishing joy behind that particular segment. {And one who I am quite confident would have thoroughly enjoyed hearing the aforementioned attempts.}

Source

Her name is Crystal Blake, and not so many days ago, she received the ultimate astonishing joy of meeting Jesus face to Face.

I met Crystal in 1996 when we shared a writing class {and a set of books}. She was about to graduate from college. I was brand new to college. And somehow, in a trail of pre-social-media correspondence, we never lost touch.

That writing class we took together was the most intimidating writing class I ever took. I was mixed in with a handful of newbies like me and a handful of college veterans who were confident in themselves and ready to take on the world. Crystal was a consistent smiling face in class, quiet in her writing offerings, but sure of her words.

I specifically remember the day our professor held a poetry reading after we did a section on poetry. You should know that I am terrible at poetry. I can't even do Roses are Red poems. To have to craft such writing and then read it out loud in a public setting probably set off the first of the gallbladder attacks that plagued me for the next couple of decades. I slunk to the front of the room, read my words, all crimson-faced, and scurried back to my seat as soon as I could. Crystal walked to the front, stood in front of her classmates and her husband and read a poem she had written about him. She beamed. He beamed. And I wondered what it would be like to be loved so fiercely that you could read a poem right out loud in front of your husband without mortification.

I think that's when I knew I wanted to be Crystal's friend and could hardly believe it when I actually managed to keep her as a friend through email.

She was a true friend. And by that, I mean she wasn't afraid to challenge me with hard-to-read words if she knew my soul needed that challenge. I still have an email she wrote me probably close to fifteen years ago, when she honestly answered my questions about some problem areas in my life. She had the courage to say words to me that my other friends glossed right over, citing reasons of not wanting to stir the pot.

I think that's when I knew Crystal was the right kind of friend: she would challenge me even if it wasn't comfortable for either of us.

Crystal and Matt left for the mission field and along the way, I started leading a Bible study at my church. I mentioned it in an email and she mentioned back that she sorely missed such opportunities where she lived. Nothing existed like that in her area unless she were to lead it, and she missed being able to learn and be encouraged in faith by other Christian women.

I saw no reason why she couldn't be part of our study. I mean she was only overseas, and we were only stateside. What could stand in the way? So every week, after I taught the Bible study, I would write out notes, add the prayer requests, and email them to her. She would send along her thoughts on that week's lesson, prayer requests of her own, and I would deliver them to the group. Week after week, month after month, she "came to Bible study" via email. One Christmas, we even gathered around a good old fashioned VHS video camera to record a special greeting to her and mailed a big box of presents to her.

And then, six and a half years ago, when she was thirty-five, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. I had never known a woman in her thirties who found out she had cancer. {I knew it happened. I just hadn't known any myself.}

She fought. And that glorious word...remission.

It was in that season that I saw Crystal for the last time. She was back on US soil and had sent a message to let me know she'd be at the church near my house, along with Matt, sharing about their work. {It's the church we now attend, but this was before there even was a "we" in my life, and before I attended there.} I went to the church, listened to them talk, and after the service ended, I got a nice long hug and stood around chatting...and chatting...and chatting.

I don't know which of us suggested it, but somehow we decided we were going to go out for dessert and more talking. I drove us to Steak n Shake and we ate and talked for a long while.

I think that's when I knew everyone should have an impromptu dessert/coffee friend like Crystal. Someone you can not see for a long time and pick up like you talked yesterday.

Matt thanked me, when I dropped her off at the house where they were staying, for taking time to do girl-talk with her. He said she thrived on that and it blessed him to see her get to enjoy it.

And from then on, our messages were ferried back and forth on Facebook, sharing and praying and encouraging. We exchanged Christmas cards every year, and on May 16th this year, she sent me a message to let me know she'd received our change of address card, but she had a change of address I missed, and she wanted me to have the new information.

She congratulated me on the new home and I sent a quick reply about the multiple answers to prayer we had enjoyed in the transition of our homes. Her final words to me were "Those ARE multiple answers to prayer!"

And in less than one month, she would have her ultimate answer to prayer. Yet on that day, when she probably felt far worse than I could ever know, she smiled and celebrated with me that we got a new house.

That was Crystal. Always filled with quiet, astonishing joy. That's how someone described her after her death. I think her life deserves to be chronicled in a book - and somewhere in the title, those words should appear: "astonishing joy."

Was I her closest friend? I was not. So many people were honored to be close personal friends, and with my words today, I in no way want to imply that I was the best and the closest. But I am honored that I had the privilege of being her friend, of experiencing her astonishing joy firsthand, and learning more about the deep love between Jesus and one of his daughters by watching it lived out in real time in the life, smile, and quiet confidence of Crystal Blake.

If you didn't know her, I wish you could have. A treasure of a woman. A beautiful believer whose faith has been made sight.

And in her own words...watch this.