Goodbyes are hard. Sometimes when you have to say goodbye it feels wrong and ugly and your heart feels like it is losing a piece. Sometimes saying goodbye can be one of the hardest things we ever have to do.
I have had to say a lot of goodbyes lately. A few weeks ago I said goodbye to one of my dearest friends, Lydia, who moved to work in full time missions in the Netherlands. This week I am saying goodbye to my family and friends for 11 months.
I have always had the desire to leave home and travel the world, to see what God has in store and experience life to the fullest. Goodbyes never scared me.
In the last two years God has brought the most incredible community of people into my life. Friends that are more than just a shallow dinner date, but a real beautiful, authentic group of people. For the first time in my life I have a group of people that will be hard to leave.
As my friends gathered to celebrate Lydia a few weeks ago, we laughed about times shared together. Over ice cream and brownies we encouraged each other and prayed for our sweet friend in her new season of life. As I looked around the room at this incredible group of people God has placed in my life, I realized that goodbyes could be beautiful.
The beauty in goodbyes is knowing that you have something you will miss. The beauty in goodbyes is appreciating the gift of the people around you and knowing that God put them there. The beauty in goodbyes is knowing that the people you are leaving cannot be replaced, but that God was faithful enough to bring them into your life and He will give you even greater friendships in the future.
The path that I feel God directing me toward involves a lot of goodbyes. I am dreading telling my family goodbye for 11 months and leaving the incredible friendships I have here. Even on the World Race I’m sure it will be incredibly hard to meet and love on people for a month and then leave not knowing if I will ever see them again.
But those goodbyes will still be beautiful because I will know that we have had a lasting impact on each other’s lives, even in a short span of time. My friend Lydia told me an older missionary once gave her the advice to keep your heart open. Keep letting people into your heart over and over even if you know you will eventually have to say goodbye because the goodbye is worth it. I would rather have a lifetime full of hard, meaningful, beautiful goodbyes than a life full of surface level friendships that are easy to leave.
These past few weeks have been full of goodbyes. Goodbyes to dear friends, incredible family and the place I have spent most of my life. But as difficult as those goodbyes are, they are beautiful because not only do I have something worth saying goodbye too, I have a full heart ready to be opened again.
