It's just been a bunch of stupid seasons

Let's just be honest: I've been waiting for the new year since August. I'm not one bit sad to bid farewell to 2013. This year has been the most challenging, difficult year of my (admittedly, fairly short) life. Although I will wake up, God willing, on January 1, 2014 in the exact same place in life as I was on December 31, 2013, there is just something significant about the New Year. I can't describe why, apart from the feeling that it is just a symbolic turning of the page.

Now, it's been quite a while since I last wrote on here. And that post was all about change and transition, and wondering where I will go and how I will serve God. I was hoping that by now I would have a better idea of where I would go.

NOPE.

I guess I have narrowed it down to a handful of cities, but I thought that I would have a more definite idea of where I would head off to by now. I'm definitely keeping Tuscaloosa and Birmingham in the mix, and I've added in Nashville, Atlanta, and somewhere along the gulf coast. Oh, and I have to find a job in one of these places. Because, ya know, life. And because it's, ya know, life, I might not end up in any of those places at all.

However muddled and indecisive I am about where to go (or not go, if I stick around Tuscaloosa), I am very excited to say I have gained clarity on how to better serve God. Truly, I can't even describe the feeling of God's infinite love, mercy, grace, and compassion. The Bible does a better job than I could. Maybe you should be reading it instead of this, ya bunch of heathens. (Just try to read that as a joke. I don't know if you're actually a heathen or not, and I would really rather believe you are not one.)

I teetered on a brink before, wondering how to give Him more of me without really wanting to go through with giving Him more. Then, when I was made to step off the edge, I saw that there was really not a cliff there at all. The circumstances that made me step off the precipice (I'm really just seeing how many different words I can use to say the same thing in this paragraph) were not fun at all. But by stepping off that point, I was forced to obey God or ignore God. And when I obeyed Him, He not only affirmed me, He ended up starting an entirely new season in my life.

Ya know, I will say it has always annoyed me when people talk about seasons of life. I don't have a good reason for why it has annoyed me. But it just has. "You're just going through a season." "It's just a season of change." "This season will end and a new season will begin."

There are only 4 seasons: winter, spring, summer, autumn, okay??



But there's truth in that. By the standard of that kind of season, I would split 2013 into two seasons. And when the second season began, I met new people. I read new things. I picked up a sport (okay, so I play tennis by my own rules, and very poorly, but it counts). I prayed. I decided to learn from the change rather than just wait out the change. A lot of this is just vague blabbering, I know.

Maybe picking up this blog again will be my resolution for the new year. Or maybe not. Hope y'all have a fabulous 2014!

I ain't got a fancy title for this

Alrighty, now it's time for some really amateur theological musings.

I have read some passages of Scripture recently that have wowed me in a new way, and they really got me thinking about how they can be applied in my life.

Numero uno - Numbers 9:15-23

Now this passage got me thinking about "setting out" and what that might entail for me. I'm a 22 year old graduate student. I'm smack dab in the middle of transition. I graduated high school, moved to college, finished college, moved home, and moved again to another college. I am halfway through a program that requires movement from one clinical placement to another, and I could be placed as far as an hour away for work any given semester. Movement, movement, movement. Now I am one year away from another transition: graduation and job hunting. But where will I go?

Now I know I have a year until then, and many things can change in a year. But that doesn't change the facts: to obey the Lord's commands about when and where to set out is very important. And it ain't always so clear to us now as it was to the Israelites back then.

"22 Whether the cloud stayed over the tabernacle for two days or a month or a year, the Israelites would remain in camp and not set out; but when it lifted, they would set out. 23 At the Lord's command they encamped, and at the Lord's command they set out. They obeyed the Lord's order, in accordance with his command through Moses." (Numbers 9:22-23)

Faith, obedience, and patience were all required to achieve this. Now there are times throughout their wanderings in the desert when the Israelites were not exactly known for these qualities (coughcough the golden calf cough). But still, just imagine! Imagine looking up and seeing the cloud that you know that God sent to guide you start to move. And collectively, everyone in camp obeys.

So then comes in the modern day application questions: Where is our cloud? How can modern Christians know when the Lord is telling us to pack up camp and go, and where do we go?

But God still leads. I know this, because even without a visible cloud hovering over my apartment building for the next year until I graduate and then moving on to hover over the next place I am to go, God's guidance is still evident! I have the Holy Spirit within me, my Bible before me, and prayer coming from me and from those who care for me. Guidance, guidance, guidance.


Numero dos - Luke 11:11-13

Now this is just a short snippet from a longer and absolutely beautiful passage on prayer. But I was specifically reminded of these verses after singing the words, "I'm so glad I'm a part of the family of God," from the hymn.

So take those words, and think about them. I am a part of the family of God. I have "known" this for years but for some reason never really explored my role in that. So what is my role? I am a daughter of the Heavenly Father. Just one of many (thankfully I have many beautiful sisters), but just as important in His eyes as all of His other daughters. And as a daughter, I have duties to fulfill. Among these many duties, I am expected and should desire to be obedient to my Father, dependent on my Father, and trusting in my Father. My Heavenly Father is the head of His family.

So, I am used to the daughter role. I've been one my whole life. I have an absolutely wonderful father and mother. As an unmarried, young female, I am pretty well acquainted with the duties I have to my parents. I trust them, I know I should obey them and I do try to, and I am dependent on them for many things. I am used to these roles.

How do I do this for my Heavenly Father, who really should be foremost in all my plans and actions? Prayer and a willingness to obey are a good way to start. Prayer is not designed to be a bad thing. Just check the reference (and its preceding verses)!

God is my Father - my Protector, my Provider, and my Encourager (among other things of course). He constantly, consistently fulfills these roles as my Father. And it is so humbling to know that this is true even when I do not fulfill my roles as His daughter. I can still come to Him in prayer, and He gives good things! Not "health and wealth" style. He gives truly good things.

A prime example of this is listed in the reference: the Holy Spirit. God gave me the Holy Spirit because I asked. He did not deny His daughter good things. He does not deny His children what is good.

Go to Him in prayer, and He knows what is good to give to you. He is the head of His family, and He leads it perfectly.

God is good. Amen.