I was a little bummed but actually, I'm really happy...

I love you, Lord, my Rock, my Redeemer. My soul clings to you, my lips praise you. I am a servant desperate for you. My heart desires you, my God. I consecrate all that I am to you."

I wrote this prayer a couple of days ago at the end of a fast that was an amazing time with God. I don't know how all of this works. How do I know that I have communed with the maker of the universe? Here I am in my apartment in Arvada and I am having this intimate time with the God of everything??? If I think about it much at all, I cannot even begin to wrap my mind around the idea and it all becomes befuddled in my desire to understand. I think I would like to suffice it to say that there are things you just know at your deepest core. When you really know and experience someone's love for you, when you know that you love someone deeply, when you know someone has just really listened to your heart. It is like this with God. Beyond explaining and yet you know. Maybe the greatest proof of all is that you can't explain it, because things that can be explained can be explained away and yet this...it is so much deeper and it is the most real thing I know. I'm so glad.

So tonight as I blog, I am sitting out on the deck of my apartment house. I have been moved in since the middle of June and I absolutely love it here. It is exactly what I needed. It's the upstairs level apartment of a 2 story house in a nice neighborhood. It backs up to a field, so it is peaceful. I have 2 bedrooms, a beautiful kitchen, huge windows through the whole house, a sunroom that leads out to a huge deck with a view. Except for the bat I just heard, it's perfect! :) It's pretty dark out here except for the light of my computer screen and the moon. The temp is so mild and the crickets are going crazy. I feel blessed. I am blessed.

Earlier tonight, I went to Wal-Mart and ended up feeling pretty depressed. Actually, I think I always feel that way there. I think it's the fact that I know I'm going to buy "stuff" (that fact alone should make everyone depressed!), spend money I don't want to, be surrounded by strangers and generally these days, I get to feeling pretty lonely when I go out on my own. It's not anything new, but it's just more accute. At the height of my bummed-ness I saw Kurt Vogt from church and we chatted, so that was nice to be connected.

About the accuteness: It's like this symptom of something to come. The more the ache, the more the relief. I think change is coming. I am happy sitting on my deck alone, but I'll rejoice when I can invite someone along on this journey, and be part of theirs, too. I feel like it could almost be time, but In the space in between now and then, I feel that I'm doing exactly what I should be, not just sitting around wishing. There is so much peace in that alone.

So, tonight, I am enjoying my surroundings, being honest with my feelings, thankful for the weekend to hang out with my sister and her boys, celebrate my dad and brother's birthday, thankful for God's provision and grateful to be alive right here and now.

Maybe that's all I need to say for now.

Love hurts, heals, hopes

I took this picture on the way up to Nebraska...the most amazing rainbow I've ever seen in my life and it was 100 times more brilliant in person...it speaks to me of hope...

I'm trying to process this day in my life...

*My job rips my heart up and down, inside and out and every which way. Sometimes I love it so much I hate it.

One of our girls left today after her crack addicted mom called and said "We're moving to Mississippi. Pack your bags and be ready to go". All this girl wants is her mom to want her and to take care of her like she did before she was a crack head. She just wants to be with her family even if that means she gets hurt. She's like a little girl, but she's now a mom at 16 and I wonder how do you reconcile those two? It was just 2 days ago that I took her and her little baby to see the fireworks show and we talked and walked and laughed and ate sonic together and she asked my opinion on tough life questions and we prayed together. She just barely gets the start to a different life and her mom rips it right out of her hands. I just don't get it. I wanted to see her smiling face on graduation day and now she's headed to what?

*One of the other moms let her 17 month old go with the dad for the first time- a weekend visit. It was almost too much for her to handle. He came and picked her up this morning and as soon as she handed her off to him, the baby just froze as if to say, "I don't know what's going on, but I know I don't like it." As he turned to go, the baby lunged for me, full arms stretched out trying to get out of his arms and into mine and I felt like my heart cracked in two and fell onto the floor. This was 1/2 hour after being told that the other resident was leaving to Mississippi. I'm just sick to my stomach and my heart.

* yesterday, we celebrated the new life of yet another of our residents giving birth to her second baby in a year. Her daughter turned 1 last monday and she delivered daughter #2 yesterday. A beautiful girl, so perfect in every way. New life, new love, new hope. Maybe this is what keeps me going. It has to, it just has to.

A random memory from the past...

Tonight I took a personality profile that asked all those same questions about your interests and what word describes you best, etc...it brought back this connection to a strange memory...

In College in Chadron, Nebraska, every year around Valentine's Day, the campus activities board would do a "love match test" for $1.00. They would give you a fill in the bubble test with all sorts of questions, you would turn it it and it would be matched up with those who best fit as your match through similarities and commonality. Well, a lot of people did this just for fun and so I filled one out my freshman year. Well, I got back the results (8 guys, I think) There were two of these guys who now stand out to me very well (I didn't know either of them at that time). Several years later, one ended up marrying my best friend and the other one married my cousin (my very close friend as well)...

Isn't that weird?