A little while ago I got to go to Galveston Texas, and I got to meet some hearts set on fire by God. We ate way too much but we ate well, we hugged each other like long lost friends though we never met beforehand, and we laughed hard, but loved each other harder.
Adelyn, an enneagram seven, in need of words of affirmation and tons of adventure. I’m a daughter of the King and I’m fully known, fully heard, but not fully ready. Although I’m the outgoing and light hearted type, always looking for joy in the circumstance, nerves built up high prior to this trip. Before coming to Galveston, I questioned my next steps of traveling with a gap year program, The World Race, so much. I questioned the timing, the amount of time I’m choosing to give up, my family who I’m choosing to walk away from and the new family I’m choosing to walk into, but most of all I questioned myself. Am I qualified? Am I rooted in Christ, because that’s the only root pulling out and coming with me in this trip. Am I aware and ready to be humiliated and stripped down and humbled? Regardless of my worries, I ran in the airport, late as usual, with a fresh pair of pants having just changed after spilling chips and salsa on my sweats at 3am knowing that my questions were unanswered. But that’s the realization I saw on this trip. My unanswered questions are ok, because God isn’t going to give me the answers like I was asking for before. God never gives an itinerary of the future, He just asks for a simple yes that way he can make everything after the yes a wonderful surprise. And you know what, I think I like it better that way.
On the third day of the girls trip, I stepped in the shower after the beach as the only girl to make it out of the sun without having to rub sour cream all over my body from the devil of a burn. Speaking as a ginger, that made the list as one of my more proud moments. As I stood in the shower my eyes blurred with tears and my throat closed as I thought about living in foreign countries with these amazing new friends for nine months. My tears streamed like a river, my tears named themselves brokenness. As I looked up at the shower head my broken tears flowed alongside the water. Scared, I stood there wanting to go home. For the first time, reality set in on the journey I said yes to, with these girls, and with my heart. I thought a lot about why I felt so broken and at a loss for why I chose this uprooting adventure instead of college, but then I saw the simplicity of it. God knows my heart, and he knows that my worth lies not fully in Him, but in my surroundings, my friends, my family, my boyfriend, sports, popularity, and looks. You name it on this earth and my worth has camped in it at one time or another. I stopped crying in the shower abruptly, looked up and whispered a soft “thank you”. He knows and loves me so well that he’s willing and able to strip me of myself, strip me of my comforts, and strip me of my temptations now before I enter this new chapter of my life. I’m ready to close this chapter, with bittersweet cries and goodbyes, and enter this new chapter where my worth rests only in Him.
We experienced some amazing worship nights on the trip, and luckily there are some really beautiful voices in our squad of 30 to drown out voices like mine. The first day, we ran in the ocean fully clothed and celebrated this new found family, and on our way back from the beach the power went out leaving us in search of some matches and candles. Eating pizza on the roof, we caught up on the last 18 years of our lives, then worshiped in the dark living room with only the hue of a few melting candles on a plate. I found myself singing the lyrics “far be it from me to not believe, even when my eyes can’t see, and this mountain that’s in front of me, will be thrown into the midst of sea, so let go my soul and trust in him…and through it all, through it all, my eyes are on you, and through it all, through it all it is well, and it is well with me”. Tears streamed from my face as I put my trust in the truth of those lyrics. Through it all, it is well. Through graduating high school, and through squeezing friends and family one last time hoping the squeeze is hard enough to linger for 9 months. Through saying “see ya later” to high school sweethearts but knowing the right words probably should have been “goodbye”. Through it all, it is well. Because I know God’s heart beams goodness, and because I know that he uses hard things to make us grow. And the hard but real truth that I often resist. Change. Well change makes us grow as well. And growth is so good. Hard hugs are so good. It is good, and it is well. The song closed and a little later the lights flashed on and the power showed back up, but I know I will remember the special hue of the candles where I believe God peaked through because there’s no way he wasn’t in that room.
I am postponing college a year to say yes, and it may just be the best yes I’ve ever given. So cheers to uprooting, unplugging, and changing hearts to shine more like His, cause there’s no change better than that.
