and the sound of sweet, unexpected rain outside my window. My mind is swirling with thoughts of to-do lists and homework and reflections on the last few days.
My life has drastically changed in the last four months. Some in big ways, like moving to Tennessee for three months and my plans after college, but mostly in somewhat little ways, like stirrings that the Lord has placed in my heart and growth in many areas of life. It feels like I'm caught up in a whirlwind, yet simultaneously, I feel an abundance of peace.
One of the hardest things about coming home from anything - camp, a mission trip, an internship - is the difficulty in describing moments that no one else saw and no one else felt. Trying to express all the tiny experiences and the great big ones, yet not being able to put words to the emotions you felt in your heart. It's a strange thing, when things you are overflowing with passion about are not shared by those around you. Not that they don't care, far from that, but because they just weren't there.
Unfortunately, when that has happened in the past, I've watched myself lose the passion and forget the feelings that I felt so strongly because I became discouraged and felt lonely in my feelings. Despite the intensity of my emotions, they fell way to thoughts of discouragement that no one else "got it" and what I felt wasn't enough to be used by the Lord to invoke a passion or desire in someone's life.
Coming home after living in another state, over 950 miles away, I felt those same feelings but 1,000x stronger. The countless things I had learned during my internship on our role in caring for the orphan, the things the Lord showed me about learning to let go and trusting His heart for me, and even the small things, like overcoming my worry of the future and being in a place where I didn't know a soul. These are only a small part of all I experienced in those three months, and being able to articulate that has been hard. Yet this time, it's been different than it has in the past. I came home with the same passion that I have many times before when the Lord has spoken to me about things, but instead of quickly becoming discouraged that no one truly feels all that the Lord has done in those three months, He's given me such peace in reminding me that no one will fully comprehend, yet some things were meant just for me.
Those busy days in the office, those prayers late at night, and those quiet minutes sitting outside were moments the Lord orchestrated for me. I often find myself understanding God's love for the nations, yet finding it difficult to grasp the love He has for me. "For God so loved the world...", yes, but "For God so loved me..." as well. Our God is a personal God. He delights in our awe and joy towards Him and is ever so faithful to cause moments that invoke that awe and joy.
For those who know me, sunsets are one of my favorite things in the whole wide world (my camera roll could prove that). Fortunately, I live in a place that I'm convinced has the best ones. When I was in Tennessee this summer, I said so many times how much I missed west Texas sunsets and how much I wanted a killer sunset. The consistency of a sunset day after day always reminds me of the Lord's faithfulness and it amazes me that He is so creative to make an entirely new one every day. On the day I moved from Columbia to Nashville, with only a few weeks left of my internship, there was one of the prettiest sunsets I have ever seen. It sounds small and insignificant, but it's such a reminder that the Lord cares for even the smallest whispers of our hearts, and He takes joy in the things we find delight in.
Another thing I said this summer was, "I wish all of my friends could be together in one place!" Having friends from two entirely different places is a sweet, but strange thing as it often feels like you're in two different worlds. I wanted nothing more than all the people I loved from my home town to be with the people that I had grown to love in the new place I was living. Fast forward to last night, and minus a few people absent, that became a reality. Some friends from Nashville were asked to play at an event in San Angelo, and several of my best friends from home were able to come. It was the craziest things to have what I felt were two different worlds collide, yet it was so special to be in one place with so many people that I love.
God is a good Father.
He does not say "no" only because He can. He not only knows the smallest desires of our hearts, but He cares for them. So often I get this idea in my head that although everything is used by God for His plan, He does not just do things dutifully, with a task-oriented mindset.
He orchestrates tiny things like arranging the clouds and light to create a sunset, and He orchestrates the bigger things like friends driving 14 hours from Nashville to play a concert in my home town and getting to meet my friends from San Angelo. He cares for every thought, every prayer, every hope.
So many things in my life are changing, but I'm grateful for a God whose character is one of overwhelming love and immense faithfulness. He is as constant in the small things, like needed rain and quiet moments, as He is in the big things. If God so cares for the smallest details of my life, how much more will He care for the largest ones?
"Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord; his going out is sure as the dawn; he will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth." | Hosea 6:3
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