I know that you can, but I'm not sure that you will (on my behalf).
I know that you can…
I say this to God
Because I have plenty of belief for a mountain to get tossed in the sea.
I say this to people.
Because if anyone can see the gold in a person, I can.
…but I’m not sure you will…
I say this to God.
Because I don’t know how to trust when I see such varied outcomes when we pray.
I say this to people.
As I watch them choose less than their best and scroll on their phones and forget to show up.
…on my behalf.
** whispers to God
** whispers to people
Because I am scared that you won’t show up for me when it matters most.
Assuming I know what’s best.
Making it about me.
Forcing my needs, my agenda.
If I don’t, maybe I’ll be forgotten.
Believing I’ll crumble without the outcome I want.
Maybe I’m not making the most perfect request.
Because if all things work together for the good
then if this hits the ground,
I have to accept it
on this side of our more perfect home.
But I don’t know how to find the most perfect request.
I can’t craft the right prayer,
I always fail at asking for what I actually need
I see my own ache and that’s it.
In fact if this cup could pass from my lips…
If your will is the flood
then I will build until I have a boat ready
And I will not grip the ground I know
But agree to float towards a higher home
Not looking back but looking for the olive branch
bringing peace
and more proof that you can and
you will
and your will
will be had.
My behalf
will be held
and I’ll hold
them also
with grace
and belief
that their best
is the best
that they’re giving today
and my gift is
the breath
and the breadth
of belief.
Dear Last-Half-of-Your-20-Somethings...
Jennie Allen posted this quote to her Instagram:
20s are for discovering it
30s are for honing it…
What a relief.
If you talk to college students (and this was me also…) some feel that by 21 they need to have found it, honed it, and be engaged to someone is currently killing it.
Yikes.
Not even possible.
So…
On the last day of my 20s, here’s what I would say to me in the back half of my 20s.
Hey you sweet lil 25-year-old,
How are your nails? Cuticles need help?
Go ‘head and get that manicure, you’ll feel better about it all.
Be gentle with yourself.
There are 4,365 things that another woman (or an Instagram ad) will try to convince you to spend $30 on that will improve your self-care routine.
Better face wash.
Wax strips.
A supplement.
A hair mask.
Just be choosy, babe.
You’re not going to get back your 10th-grade-cross-country-body back. Probably ever.
You know what’s free?
Looking at yourself with kinder eyes.
The world is legit scary…
Remember how fearless you were back in high school?
Your courage didn’t decrease since then, you just found out that there is unspeakable sadness and horrifying injustice running rampant.
If you don’t manage that fear, it could overwhelm you at times (and still might).
When you feel like you can’t just one more second of anxiety, take it to the Father, and then read this quote:
“You are one in whom Christ delights
& dwells & you live in the strong
and unshakable kingdom of God.”
…so keep finding reasons to celebrate.
You’ll drive a LOT of miles to weddings, showers, birthdays…
Your people from college are spreading out. You’ll get invited to stuff that’s 3 hours away. Just go. Keep investing.
You won’t regret celebration mileage.
Don’t get stuck…
You are about to discover a hundred more things you’re good at.
And a hundred tasks you don’t enjoy.
You’re about to see things in yourself that will make you say
“I could work a lot of different jobs and do pretty well, I think.”
You’ll see your gifts clarify and then
have
a big
identity crisis
trying to plan out the next steps.
…you could work a few different kinds of jobs.
When you find this ^ out about yourself you’ll feel further than ever from
finding your magic,
finding your one big thing,
finding your success.
But actually, you’re closer than ever.
Now you’re discovering that the truest you isn’t defined by a gifting and a job title.
The truest you brings a particular flavor to
every single team.
Every single dinner with friends.
Every single wedding day,
photoshoot,
staff meeting,
zoom call.
Some people stop right here and spend the whole rest of their lives chasing that one job that will match, honor, recognize, pay for, and bring out their strengths.
But you’re not like them.
Here’s where you find that the real fulfillment is in laying down your gifts, receiving the season (job) that you’re in, and bringing your WHOLE SELF TO THE TABLE in service of the people around you.
Here’s where you let go of what you’re going to do next…
That will come. Just stay curious. Keep learning.
Jobs will come and go and not be all they were cracked up to be in the interview.
…and start deciding who you’re going to be.
But you?
You will lay every gift, every weird job (even/especially waitressing) at the feet of Jesus and say
“the lines
have fallen
for me in pleasant places”
…so THANK YOU Lord for this step in the journey.
May my gifts be used
not for money or satisfaction
or glory,
but to help others long for our truer
brighter
home,
and bring glory to you and you alone, Oh Lord.
And I believe that this is your heart also, so I trust that you will bring this to pass, and I do not need to control
apply
market myself
persuade
or network
my way into any job
any promotion
any room
because you are able to make all things work together, and your timing is (often frustrating but...)
so so good.
The last half of your 20s is when you find out…
…that the joy is found not in climbing UP the ladder,
but in climbing down to hold the ladder for others.
And hopefully in your 30s, you’ll get good or even decent at this.
…that there is more listening to be done.
Listening to yourself.
When you find the Enneagram or the Strengths Finder or the Myers Briggs, linger there and listen to it. Let it offend your weaknesses, so you learn how you’re most likely to injure others.
Let the listening to your own tendencies be a place of growth for you.
Listen to others.
Seriously, sweet verbal one, just stop talking sometimes and see what happens.
Listen to God.
He’s whispering to you all the time. Every moment. If you can’t hear, then remember it’s hard to hear a whispering friend from across a crowded room when you’re staring at your phone.
And that you belong here.
Even the parts of you that you don’t love need to be invited to the table and given a voice because they’re part of what make you YOU and when we let ourselves belong, it’s like coming home at the end of a work day and taking your bra off. It’s like the first bite of Annie’s mac and cheese. It’s like the first step in a new pair of TJ Maxx slippers, when you stop stiff-arming the parts of you that you don’t just adore.
The discovering you do in your 20s? It means coming home to yourself, sweetheart.
He Doesn't Wait For Us
If I just had a day between work and break to get it together.
The work week before a holiday is just busier and harder and extra and double-time to get it all done in preparation.
I just need a day between the end of work and the start of a festive holiday with family to - oh, I dunno - sweep my house, wash my jeans and run to Kroger. Forget decorating for fall. Who has time for all that?!
And I probably won't get it all done and I'll have to enter family time with half a list on my desk and have my mind somewhere else.
But this year I want Thanksgiving to change me.
There's no other holiday that's more about the inside of our truest selves.
Nothing more about inside work.
Maybe I don't want a second to sweep my house as much as I'm desperate for a minute to turn on a lamp in my soul and sweep the dust off the piles of unprocessed ache and joy and find in the process some gratitude to bring to the table this year.
Frustrated and unsure where to get a good heart for the events of this week, I check a few more things off my to-do list.
And then I power walk to the mailbox to pickup my order of cleaning supplies and hear leaves crunching under my feet.
A wise friend told me: fall is the season of things dying to make room for new life. And then I think about the seasons.
Fall: death
Winter: burial
Spring: resurrection
Summer: growth
How odd for this sweet holiday to coincide with a season of things starting to die all around. No one wants to talk about death. No one feels warm and thankful about death.
Then, sweetly, gently I hear that small voice that is always quieter than the rest. Hearing that voice feels like scattered laundry suddenly clean and sorted inside my mind, like being mentally sorted and gathered.
Thanksgiving isn't about arriving at a good spot and praising for the calm of the harbor.
Thanksgiving is about standing in the swirl of things falling to the ground. Falling apart. Half-processed, half-finished, maybe only half-alive. Thanksgiving is a spot on the calendar, like an invitation to a place that stays closed inside your own soul, to accept the dying of old things, to welcome the process of putting to death our own fears. Thanksgiving is an invitation to sit so still and watch with gratitude as things fall off of us.
So maybe this week you'll look around and all you can see is yourself standing in pile of things that are being taken away, a crunchy pile of dull aches.
I want to strike a match in the coldest corner of your heart because something is coming.
Burial.
New life.
Growth.
Lift up your chin.
There will be new life.
Kneel down in your pile of dried and un-met expectations. There's something underneath the leaves. Underneath the soil. It may get a little colder out here before we see it, but that doesn't mean it isn't there. Underneath your shoes, the dead leaves, the cold ground, something is getting ready to grow. And God has already started to water it, to make room for it in the world by clearing out all these old leaves.
Stay right here with me, in your pile of unfinished, and rejoice because we have this hope.
Thanksgiving week finds me in a place I didn't expect to stand: instead of choosing to rise above areas of frustration in order to celebrate, I'm celebrating in the middle of them.
I'm giving my achy parts a moment to speak to my soul about what might be ahead & I'm choosing to hold onto gratitude for that. I'm giving those un-sewn-up parts a voice so I can listen and rejoice for how they are still shaping me.
And now I don't even want to go back inside the house. My cleaning supplies haven't been delivered yet, but I might check the box a few more times for the sake of crunchy leaves.
Now I understand.
Thanksgiving is an opportunity to give thanks right in the middle of everything falling. Falling apart, falling into place.
It's a chance to see further than our own feet and turn our attention fully towards thankfulness with recognition of the heavy things. Thanksgiving takes the power out of the hands of our circumstances and says: I will rejoice here.
Our Christ used death, the most final thing we know about life, to show us that death is never the end. Death is part of the process of resurrection.
His death is where we find our deepest Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving celebration is most complete when we decide that even just for one day this year, we'll look at every part of our souls and ourselves with a grateful heart.
God doesn't wait till we have it together to bring new growth.
Maybe we shouldn't wait for the completion of that new growth to get really, really thankful.
Photo Credits: Joel Henson // Seen In Stereo Photography
If you read this and said, "Yep, relate to that!" There's more where it came from and extra goodies too in my weekly emails. They launched this week, so you're not even late to the party yet! Get in here:
I believe in the person that you are, deepest down.
xoxo,
Elena
You might also be into:
