a journey

This week has been quite the week. Last Saturday, I developed a strange rash on my neck and under my chin which I deemed an allergic reaction to a nickel necklace I borrowed a few days earlier. Starting on Sunday night, the rash started itching severely. I spent the next few days in and out of the campus health center. The campus doctor I saw was not very cooperative when trying to work with me on an effective solution. Not only did the creme she prescribed not seem to be helping, but just trying to apply the creme irritated the area and created an incredibly itchy sensation. I called the doctor around Tuesday to ask for an oral steroid solution but she denied my request, despite my desperation, and even recommended that I stop applying Benedryl creme which was the only thing that seemed to provide temporary relief. I don't remember a time in the past year I've been more in pain than in those few days. I was taking at least 2 Benedryl pills a day and applying an ice pack to the area more than several times a day. My housemates felt genuine compassion for me. Kaitlyn came back from the store on Tuesday with my 2 medicinal requests, along with a Freebirds burrito for my dinner, chocolate milk, and ice cream. Anna woke up early on Wednesday to take me to an outside clinic where I was finally prescribed oral steroids.

I think I cried more between Monday and Wednesday than I have all year long. My condition frustrated me beyond belief because not only was I in pain, but it was completely preventing me from engaging my schedule and carrying out my usual activities. I went to give a class presentation with my group on Tuesday with red, puffy eyes, having only halfheartedly rehearsed it twice. Also, I had a finance paper due Thursday but it seemed like every time I tried to sit down to work on it, the itchy sensation would flare up. I was so indignant that this condition was slowing me down. However, my resolved attempts to resist it would completely break down with every itchy episode, leading to a fresh flow of genuine tears of frustration. Even through my pain, I sensed the Lord's presence with me. Beth Moore's words from Passion kept echoing in my head: "if God did not see that it could be used for your equipping, He would have said 'no'". I had to believe that my discomfort had a purpose and I was desperate for God to show me His will through this circumstance.

I think God granted me a few nuggets of wisdom through all this. First, I'm realizing how little I actually depend on God on any given day. How little I legitimately acknowledge with my life and my attitude that I can't live or function without Him. Second, I had spent some time meditating on Mark 11:22-25 a few days before this incident and I wonder if God could be using my skin condition to test my belief in His promise, challenging me to believe that if I have the faith to believe that He can heal me, it will be done. Third, I'm learning that intimacy with Him is not a given, even in suffering. As much as I can know in my head that Jesus has felt my pain and even so much more, something different has to happen in my heart for me to actually find joy in that. It requires me to lift my eyes above my circumstances and actually want the Holy Spirit to change my heart. I'm becoming convinced that joy can only be a product of the Holy Spirit working in my heart, helping me to relate my suffering to the suffering of Jesus. In that, He is giving me a new understanding of Matthew 11:28-30. Lastly, I'm learning to cherish moments of peace. As soon as I woke up on Thursday morning, I realized that I didn't feel any sensation at all around my neck but knew it would come back once I started moving around. Without shifting my position at all, I intentionally thanked God for the gift of a moment of peace and relief.

Even now, I'm still not really well. The oral steroids have done a lot but the severe itching on my neck has only been reducing to a prickly sensation of sorts. The rash on my neck had started looking better but last night, I woke up in the middle of the night subconsciously scratching at it. Now, the area just looks bruised and I don't know if I delayed the healing. In addition, I've developed all these little red bumps in different places on my body and they keep cropping up. They don't itch very much but still feel irritated, especially when clothing rubs at them. They weren't there when I went to the clinic on Wednesday so I have no idea if they are related to the rash or not.

I wish I had a resolute, concluding statement to this post but I really don't. I want so badly to be back to normal and am asking God for it but for this moment God has said "no" and is asking me to say "hallelujah" back. I'm trusting Jesus to heal me and restore my skin but don't know when or through what method it will happen. In the meantime I will choose to sit among the ashes with Job and accept this trouble from the Lord, trusting that He will absolutely use it for His highest glory.

"'Have faith in God,' Jesus answered. 'I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the heart of the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. Therefore, I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours...'" Mark 11:22-24

Labels: faith

My lovely roommate Anna and I currently find ourselves doing our schoolwork together in quite the romantic setting, complete with dim lighting, pink carnations in the center of the table, sweet smelling candles, relaxing classical music, Passion hot tea, warm blankets, and our beloved stuffed animals sitting in our laps. I have tons of work to do in the next 1.5 weeks (2 of my classes are front loaded), but I'm thankful to have these little moments of quiet and rest, even if I do have to be writing my financial analysis paper at the same time. Needless to say, I'm greatly looking forward to the end of the month when a large bulk of my schoolwork this semester will be finished. Until then...

Happy Valentine's Day!

Labels: life, school

Ever since I moved into our house this past August, I noticed that my bedroom door hinge squeaks every time I shut or close the door. It's one of those things that irritated me at the beginning but I was too busy getting settled into the new semester and it seemed pointless to make a separate trip to the store for it. By the time I was in the groove of things, I was pretty used to the squeaking. That is, until this winter as I find myself opening and closing my door multiple times each morning as I attempt to balance getting ready for my day in the freezing bathroom and darting back into my warm cave (thank you, Sunbeam space heater) to 'recover.' The squeaking is much more noticeable when my housemates are still sleeping and it's dead silent in the house.

At the store today, I finally remembered to pick up a small bottle of WD-40 to see what I could do with the door. When I got home, I shook the bottle and sprayed a couple times on the top hinge as a starting point, assuming I'd have to test the door and spray multiple places before finding the source of the problem. After waiting a moment, I tested the door a few times and was startled at the result... absolute silence.

SO crazy! I continued testing it and sure enough, not a peep! I even dragged both my roommates (who have always been quite amused by the quirky nature of my door) upstairs to witness the incredible transformation. I can't believe that I endured 6 full months squeakiness from bedroom door and all it took was 1 spray from a little bottle to fix. A-MA-ZING - that's all I have to say.

Labels: life

You cannot be with people all of the time and have a ministry to people. The impact of your ministry to people will be in direct proportion to the time you spend away from people and with God.

Labels: faith, ministry

Last semester, I started volunteering one hour a week through a local non-profit that seeks to support the education system by providing mentors from the community to tutor and build relationships with students in certain public schools. The program I am a part of involves high school seniors and the effort is geared toward increasing students’ standardized test scores to meet a pre-determined “College Ready” benchmark. In short, we don’t want these students to have to waste a bunch of money taking remedial classes in college.

In my first few weeks, I met seniors Bethany, Paige, Jenny, and Briana and we started going through writing and reading exercises. Their capabilities and interest in the subject matter varied widely and even though their attendance was fairly sporadic, I was happy to think of them as my “regulars.” Writing was a struggle to get through for all of us – my kiddos didn’t enjoy putting forth the effort required for such a subjective subject and after all, who wants to sit down and write an essay in front of your tutor during your advisory when you could have easily have skipped the class? Yeah, exactly. Reading was better although I didn’t get to be as much a part of this process because I was blessed with such a tremendous amount of time off for Christmas break. I can only hope that the other tutors in my classroom provided good instruction for my girls.

With less than 3 weeks left before the next standardized testing opportunity, our group moved onto math today. As I grabbed the math binders from the bookshelf, one of the other tutors commented, “So you’re braving math today?” to which I happily responded, “Oh, I love math actually, Calculus was my favorite subject in high school!” As I walked to the back table, Bethany was waiting for me. Just as I thought it would be a one-on-one session, I noticed that Paige and Briana were sitting across the room. I tried to ignore the scowl I got from Briana (who has generally been the least interested participant) as I made them move to the back, all the while acting as enthusiastic as possible. A young man who I didn’t recognize was sitting a little ways off asked me if we were doing math. When I affirmed and invited him to the table, he shuffled over in his chair. I was thrilled to work with 4 students on my favorite subject. We worked through problems involving fraction conversions and operations, with all the students working at slightly different paces. All of my grade school training for these types of problems came back to me as I worked with them and I was able to demonstrate and teach certain processes and methods that worked well for me when I learned. At several points, I had the whole table smiling, and even laughing over my witty comments on their behavior (e.g. their tendency to whisper answers to each other when one of them was stuck). We worked all the way to the bell. Not surprisingly, Briana darted out as quickly as possible. Paige and Tyson actually stopped to quickly thank me before leaving. Bethany put her pencil down, thanked me as well and proudly declared, “Wow, I learned something new today!” My heart swelled with joy and pride. In that moment, I felt affirmed that every bit of my time spent with these students has been worth it. You know those times that God chooses to demonstrate His love in a very tangible way, by allowing you to see the fruit of your labor? For me, today was one of those days.

Labels: faith, life, ministry

My roommate and I were on speaker phone with Time Warner today, coordinating a time for a service technician to come over to fix our internet. After setting up our appointment, the customer service representative informed us of some standardized policies in place for that visit, one of which was “An adult must be present for the entirety of the visit.” With exactly the same thought in mind, Anna and I glanced at each other with expressions of minor panic. It took only half a second for our faces to soften into smiles with the realization:

We ARE adults. That is so weird.

Labels: life

On the way back from the Passion conference a few days ago, I jotted down 12 resolutions, one for each month, that I wanted to commit to this year. I haven't nailed down which resolutions will go with which month yet but here is the list:

1. Exercise everyday
2. Take a daily vitamin everyday
3. Read 2 chapters of the Bible everyday
4. Eat a piece of fruit everyday
5. Scrub and moisturize my feet everyday
6. Shower everyday
7. Write 5 things I'm thankful for everyday
8. Take a walk everyday
9. Take 4 full days Sabbaths in 1 month
10. Verbally encourage a different person everyday
11. Sign off of Facebook for a full month
12. Sing aloud to a worship song everyday

I will be sure to post an update with my thoughts as we go through the year.

Labels: life