Thankfulness.

I just spent about thirty minutes trying to type up something good. I don't have any ounce of eloquence in me at this moment, but I do really want to write. Tonight I'm thankful for God's sovereignty and faithfulness to us and I'm happy to be at rest in that. I've been a Christian for about five years and words like sovereignty and faithfulness and love and grace and mercy used to always just be words on a page to me. I guess that's what studying the Bible just to be a know-it-all can do to you. I'd also never really gone through something with God so that words like these came to life for me. 

Months ago during a really dark time in my life, I remember reading articles about Mother Teresa and how she never felt the presence of God once she started tending to the poor, dying and destitute, and how she was pretty much always in constant Spiritual agony. I always admired her so much more after that. I'll let you find and read the articles for yourself if you're interested in them, but I will say that though what I read that night was really heavy, depressing and dark, I went to sleep trusting in God's presence without really feeling it. I know that sounds weird, but I think it had a lot more to do with having faith that God wanted me rather than relying on the feeling. I remember going to sleep thankful that in the midst of all of my sinfulness, in the middle of the most turmoil and darkness that I'd ever faced in my life, He was still there, whether or not I heard Him or felt Him. He was always the little bit of light that I held onto in the darkness (and now in hindsight I see that so clearly). I went to sleep that night thankful that I could be more broken than I'd ever been and still be perfectly and unconditionally loved. That I could be ridiculously flawed and ugly from my sin and still be wanted and accepted. And when I suddenly lost all that I wanted and was pushed by God's love for me to do things that I had fought for so long, words like faithfulness and love and grace and mercy finally came to life. 

Here's some photos of a really good friend and I from a couple of days ago. We spent the day being 12-year-olds and taking photos of each other and other things. I found a set of bones and a cicada molt, as well as played in the fountain downtown, so it was a fun day. I'm thankful to feel alive again. I'm thankful for deep friendships with people who aren't exactly like me. I'm thankful that God loves me and chases after me in every condition. I'm thankful for His Word and thankful that I've gotten to a place where I'm beginning to delight in it. I'm thankful for the overwhelming amount of healing that I've been going through. I'm thankful for the past, no matter how dark it is or how hard it was to go through. I'm thankful that God is beginning to satisfy me and comfort me like no other. I'm thankful that He's showing me who He really is...who I really am. He's genuinely becoming the joy of my life. Finally. 

Awkward picture. Whatever. 

These are just funny to me because never do I lay in the grass
of a courtyard staring at a flower. I'm also one awkward little lassy.

Trying to become okay with my body and the fact that I'm not
as tiny as I've always dreamed of being. Trying to find peace in
the fact that my value doesn't come from my body and that it
was never made to be used as something to impress people with.
It's just a vessel.

She's crazy beautiful in every way possible.