I’m sure most of you thought I’d written my last blog when I left the Race. Well, the pretty “wrapped up with a bow” side of me says, “nope! Not until I’m securely transitioned to Spain” – even though that means the same “wrapped up with a bow” side of me squirms at the prospect of showing more unorganized mess.
I’ve been back in the states for three months. As you saw in THIS announcement, The Father has seemed to make pretty clear that Barcelona is the next move – a move He has confirmed by shutting absolutely everything else down. I say that with a grin because I know the way He works (to an infinitesimally tiny degree.) He loves to put me in these places where I’m at an absolute standstill, makes me wait a minute, then goes “ready? Ok, now let’s go.” That seems to be what He’s doing now.
I’ve been in my heart-home, Nazareth, Pennsylvania, for two months now, and The Father is drawing a close to that season – with not another one in sight. The plan was to be here working my very high paying nanny job (which I hated, but who cares) live with my perfect family (which felt a little different now because it’s a different season, but who cares) and then leave January 9th for this teaching job (which I didn’t really want, but who cares) and live in Spain until I started grad school in September. In the meantime I was here with my heart happy and content (kinda) with this awesome, great-paying job to save for Spain (sorta) and I’d move there, get plugged in with Hillsong, go to grad school, start working to fight poverty, marry a gorgeous Spaniard, start a world-changing nonprofit to help impoverished children, and everything would be perfect.
Can I get an amen from someone who didn’t have life turn out the way they planned?
The first step was getting accepted to this “perfect” teaching program that checked all the boxes. I did get accepted and I was just waiting for a placement and my visa. A few weeks ago they emailed me back and told me there were no placements available – thus shooting my perfect plan to be with kids, get experience, live with a host family, brush up on my Spanish, grow accustomed to the Spanish accent, make some money, be in my church, settle into the city, apply to grad school, oh, and have a visa, right in the face. Who cares that I didn’t really want to do it, I was ridiculously qualified (thanks, World Race) it made sense, and it fit, so full speed ahead, right? No. So then I started going full-steam ahead into au pairing. That checked most of the same boxes and also made a lot of sense. Then God said, really, really clearly: “stop trying to make an Ishmael out of my Isaac.” Oh. And just in case that wasn’t clear enough, I listened to a podcast that same day by my favorite pastor (Hillsong Buenos Aires’s Chris Mendez) talking about what? In addition to a bunch of other life changing stuff, not making Ishmael’s out of God’s Isaac’s. (“Progressing Through the Storm.” Amazing. Look it up.) THEN He led me to an all out fast of all things research-about-Spain. During that week I got told my family up here is moving, so I had about two weeks until I needed to go so they could flip the house – a change as abrupt as for them as it was for me – meaning leaving my sense of belonging, the family I adore, my job, my comfort… all the things. I go from a life all planned out to now suddenly having to move back to a place with no job or belonging or purpose, or even my family because my parents are going on a trip most of the time I’m back. To where, you might ask? Amongst other places, BARCELONA. Yay for a life that feels like it’s falling apart.
I keep coming upon the expression that everything falling apart might just be everything falling together. I want Him to take me deeper, I want intimacy with Him even more now that I’m off the Race, and then He puts me in a place requiring trust and I start to freak out. In that same podcast, Chris says “Often times God gives us direction without detail and it’s on the journey that our faith works the detail out.”
In case I didn’t learn from my first time around with my journey to the World Race anyway, yo girl needed that.
It’s also December, in case y’all haven’t noticed, and thus the beginning of Advent season. (Advent literally means, “the arrival of a notable person, thing, or event.” Thanks m-w.) Liturgies have begun to hold so much more meaning to me as I’ve gotten old, and there’s something about leaning into the expectancy of the Christmas season with joy and hope and intentionality that’s really ringing deeply with me this year. He’s making pretty clear that He’s telling me to wait; to stop trying to achieve this dream on my own and let Him provide the exceedingly, abundantly more that only HE is capable of. (For the reminder on this, my friend and raised-up squad leader Paige Harris wrote a killer blog that you all should read. Find it HERE.) But if I can achieve the dream on my own it’s not big enough; and I’d only get in His way. I just need to lean into Him with the same hopeful expectancy as we do for Christmas, trust my dreams to His heart, and adjust my posture in waiting for His timing for my life in the same way.
There’s a whole lot of physics behind archery that I don’t understand, but what I do understand is that the arrow has to be drawn back and held before it can be shot, and the further back it’s drawn the faster it will fly, therefore the more impact it will have when released. I’m feeling like an arrow right now. Placed on the string, drawn back, held as He aims, and Spain will be the release and flying into the fullness of all He’s promised in this next chapter. There is loss here; deep loss. This is the permanent closing of the richest and most fulfilling season of my life. This place and these people became the home and family I didn’t know I needed. He used them to deepen me and rough some edges off of me and pour things into me that made me more like Jesus than any thing or event ever has. This is goodbye to my best season and all the preparation and purpose and depth I’ve found here, and it’s going back to a place that is uncomfortably familiar, and where I was the worst version of myself the longest. It’s going somewhere with no end date, just a promise, and a hope that He who promised is faithful and that if He could bring me something this good, why would this next season be anything less? It’s a period of in-between-seasons of singing His praise, holding onto His promises, trusting His heart and His intentions, and enjoying the gift of rest and time with it’s my family before He takes me on. And if the way you end one season is the way you start another, I refuse to end this season in anything less than worship.
Hillsong finally released a Christmas album this year (it’s called “The Peace Project.” Look it up.) And my favorite song on that album has been the anthem of this season of waiting. It’s appropriately called “Seasons” and discusses the beautiful parallels in which nature reflects His actions, but the bridge is as follows:
I can see the promise, I can see the future
You’re the God of seasons, I’m just in the winter.
If all I know of harvest is that it’s worth my patience
Then if you’re not done working, God I’m not done waiting.
You can see the promise, even in the winter
Cause You’re the God of Greatness, even in a manger.
If all I know of seasons is that You take your time,
You could’ve saved us in a second, instead You sent a child.
Though the winter is long even richer the harvest it brings. I believe that my season will come. I’ll keep you posted on His faithfulness.
