I have been home from my race a year and half now. When I first got home I was clueless about what I was going to do and where I would end up. I didn’t have a car, a house to come home to, or a plan to implement. I just walked into my small world in Ashland City, TN and hoped something good would happen. I was home to celebrate my brother’s wedding and found myself sleeping at my parents house throughout the week and at my pastor’s house on the weekends. I drove my pastor’s truck for a while and got to see the last leg of the super expensive gas prices. I worked a job I said I wouldn’t go back to because I wanted to move forward, not stay in the same place. I ran into the “no one is hiring” and “everyone is getting laid off” but I still had a job. And at this point I was living with my grandparents and borrowing one of their cars…so I had everything I needed…a job, a house, a car, a church. Sure it wasn’t what I was aiming for but I was taken care of.
Within a few weeks of being home I got asked on a date by one of the pastor’s at my church. I couldn’t believe it! After 10 days of talking and dating him I knew I was going to marry him. This was something I did not expect. I remember being in South Africa talking with my team about how I thought I would never get married and this scared me because I wanted it so badly. I wanted someone to live my life with. Little did I know God has it planned out for me just a few months down the road.
Though this was good my first year being home was hell. I can’t fully explain it. I was on a downward spiral of habitual and heart-wrenching sin. I have never before felt so displaced, so distant, so lifeless. I felt as if the my soul was being sucked of life, of any good thing. I was discouraged and unable to move myself towards God. “Transition” as we call it was not going to left it’s finger from me. I was worried I was stuck there.
By God’s grace all these things came to a sudden halt. There was nothing in myself that moved my heart and soul to healing and renewal. Nothing which I did that brought about change or freedom. Not even time had a play in this. I was in the shadows and God shown His light over my life and brought me back to Himself. HE, He did it all. He breathes breath into us, He calls us to Himself, He gives us freedom, He paid the price, He does what we cannot ever do…He saves! We have nothing without Him and can do nothing without Him. What a precious gift we have in Jesus…that He would call us to Himself and make us His children.
So where is my life now? What am I doing? I am living with my husband, Ben, with our dog, Ellie, and our cat, Panta in Nashville. I am still working the same job and still don’t have a vehicle (my husband and I share). I am working with the k-5th graders at our church on Sunday mornings. I have accountability and prayer and book study with a friend once a week. I help my husband with anything he needs, I serve him and love him. I am pouring into high school students, friends and family who need Jesus or just need to be discipled and grow in their relationship and life with God. I am heading up a trip to Guinea this fall with trusted friends and taking my husband along as his first foreign mission trip.
We, as a family, are trusting in God to be our provider. We, by His grace, are being moved towards Him. We are more passionate, more loving, more gentle, more willing to do what He asks and have softer, more humble hearts to be face down and admit we are wrong. Then lifting all things to Him for His glory and fame.
Aren’t we glad we serve a God who will never fail, never be threatened, and who deserves all the praises of His people?
