These days, happiness looks like sunglasses on and windows down
Like talking to the person I love until 3am
Like a whole day off to read for pleasure

These days, happiness feels like clean sheets
Like the sun on my back for the first time in months
Like a fresh suit that fits just right

These days, happiness sounds like birds chirping at the start of the morning
Like blasting Mahler in an open atrium
Like the one who holds my heart whispering “I love you” in my ear

These days, happiness seems like it will never fade
Like even when things are hard, it will always be stronger
Like a breath of fresh air that makes me feel alive for the first time

These days, happiness looks like fruitful conversations
Like making big gestures to communicate how I feel
Like celebrating the beauty that overwhelms me

These days, happiness feels like I can’t contain it for just myself
Like God is calling me to freedom and a clearer calling and identity
Like truth in a way I’ve never known

These days, happiness is overflowing out of my heart into everything I am
It is God-given and I praise God for that every single day
It is bound to proliferate

I finished my first year of seminary yesterday! But I am far from done. So I decided to write about it to help process through all of the ways I have grown and all the ways in which I am far from done.

 
I have grown so much in the last year
I have been so challenged in the last year
I have learned so much in the last year
But I am not done

I asked a lot of questions
I played a lot music
I read A LOT of books
But I am not done

I learned to embrace
I learned to search
I learned to love again (or maybe for the first time)
But I am not done

I heard new voices
I witnessed God healing hearts of stone
I experienced real community
But I am not done

I acknowledged more of my calling and my identity in Christ
I acknowledged more of my own ability
I acknowledged more of the reward that comes from risk
But I am not done

I failed
I struggled
I battled
But I am not done

I see more beauty in the world than I ever knew existed
I feel more keenly than I ever have before
I love and I am loved more deeply than I ever thought possible
So I am not done

I am not done because I refuse to be idle
I am not done because I believe in change and redemption and hope
I am not done because my God still has reconciling and liberating work to do
I am far from done.

I believe in a God of big gestures. Giving blind sight. Making the lame walk. Pushing political boundaries to make a statement about love and inclusion. Raising the dead. And I believe that is both a beautiful and a necessary thing. Because we as human beings need grand things to catch our attention. God knows this about us because we were specifically created this way; God loves us still; and God provides even in our own shortcomings or distractions or whatever you’d like to call it.

This season of my life has been a process of me growing in confidence to make big gestures. In my experience, these gestures are helpful both for me to gain courage and for those around me to feel the love I have for them. These gestures look like taking time to write a letter to someone who has impacted my life. It looks like staying up later than planned because a friend needs to process. It looks like sharing my story and my feelings with people even when I don’t know how it will be received. It looks like leaving campus for the sole purpose of buying flowers for someone special. And yet I’ve been surprised that these gestures don’t feel like work or stress or a burden in any way because I believe in the importance and the value in the sentiment they are trying to communicate.

It is important for me to name that my inspiration for writing today came from a gesture from the young child of a dear friend. She was so excited to be at her first ever concert, a seminary gospel choir concert to close out the semester. Never have I seen so much energy and so much abandon in praise of our God. She danced and clapped until she was so tired she couldn’t keep her eyes open. As I also felt the music and clapped my hands, I tried to remember the last time I gave that much to God. I started to stretch examples in my life to try to find anything that might match this little girl’s praise. I told myself, “I left everything I know to come to seminary and learn to serve God.” Or “I’ve been going to first hour and church every Sunday, despite my complicated schedule.” Or “I didn’t tear down that person’s theology when I easily could have (and could have to protect my own heart).” But I stopped myself. I shouldn’t be searching for excuses or vague examples. I should pursue more substantial gestures as the least I can do for the God who gives me breath in the morning, who protects and fills my heart through all of my endeavors, and who extends me love and grace each and every day.

My prayer is that my gestures only get bigger. That I wouldn’t be afraid to step out or step up. That I wouldn’t hold back my love or care for anyone, regardless of who they are or how they treat me. And that through everything, my gestures would bring more of the light of God into the world.

Christian. Woman. Daughter. Sister. Friend. Student. Employee. Musician. Writer. Thinker. Question-asker.

These are a few ways in which I identify. These are pieces of me that are important enough to shape me or shape my schedule. Though recently, these have not been the first words that I use to describe myself. Exhausted. Distracted. Fragmented. In-between. Unfortunately, these words have taken over more of me than I would like. I fully acknowledge my own agency in feeling these ways and using these ways to characterize myself, but some days your fatigue takes over – and there have been more of those days than others recently.

The last few months have been an incredible journey of questioning. For those of you who know me, you know I ask questions all the time. And I ask a lot of them. So for me to qualify this season of life with the word “questioning,” you know it’s been pretty intense. I knew something big like this was coming when God put the word “pursue” on my heart for the year 2018, but I had NO IDEA this is what God had in mind. In the midst of it being pure craziness and completely life-altering, it has been absolutely amazing. I know more about myself, I feel more affirmed, and I am closer to God than I ever have been before in all of my life. At the same time, I have learned that with great affirmation and excitement comes great exhaustion. Re-insert words here from above like distracted, fragmented, and even unsure and overwhelmed. All of this back and forth along with excitement and confusion and everything in between brings a certain kind of wrestling that leaves you like Jacob: limping away from an intense encounter with God, sore but somehow slightly justified from your pursuits, trying to heal enough to keep moving for tomorrow.

It’s this illustration that inspires me to write today. Not to tell you that I am tired, because you can figure that out from the additional redness in my eyes and the growing count of gray hairs on my head. Rather I want to declare that I, too, will not let God go. I will not let tiredness or doubt or imposter syndrome or anything else take over my identity. I am called to serve in love the God who created the universe. End of story. I will wrestle with that calling and that love no matter the other battles or distractions happening. I will not let it go because it is fully and completely who I am.

God, I pray you will sustain me and lead me in my wrestling. Remind me that your loving arms are wrapped around me even when I can’t feel them or understand why they’re there. My identity and my life lies with you, and for that I am eternally grateful. In praise and honor and service, amen.

I’ve gone through a series of seasons in my life of wearing different rings. Different symbols of what was important to me mixed with fascinating designs and styles. Though I am a person who likes/craves consistency, I have changed my combination of the rings I wear over the years. That is until about two years ago. Two years ago, my perspective on what I needed to be visually reminded of daily solidified and I have worn the same two rings ever since. Because I am in my first year of seminary (which is highly deconstructive and encourages a total breakdown of everything you know in order to help you establish who you really are and what you believe), I’ve been in a state of reflection and I’ve needed to fall back on my two rings and what they stand for. I decided to write these things down today in hopes that it may help others through their current season as well.

On my right ring finger, I wear my Furman class ring. I wear it as a reminder of where I come from. A reminder of a place that more fully opened my mind to who it is that God is calling me to be. A reminder of all of the lessons I learned in those four years: good, bad, ugly, and beautiful. A reminder that I know how to work hard; I know how to push through barriers to become a more educated, loving, engaged human being; I know how to honor the privileges I’ve been awarded through my work. Most importantly, I wear this ring as a reminder that I am always growing, always learning, always becoming who I was intended to be. I can look at this ring every day and be reminded of that.

On my left pointer finger, I wear a solid band with a cross etched on it. This ring is a reminder of why I am here. I need to be reminded every day of the incredible design that has gone into saving my life, which included the sacrifice on a cross and includes a call for me to honor that with every thought and action. I need to be reminded every day that the Creator of the universe chases after me, desires a relationship with me, and loves me so much. I certainly need to be reminded every single day that God works dialectically. God uses our weakness to display strength; God turns failure into beauty; God died to bring each and every one of us life. Therefore, I am reminded every day that I am taken care of, I am sought after, I am loved, and I am enough. I can look at this ring every day and be reminded of that.

So no matter your choice of jewelry or how you engage your reminders, I pray today you can be reminded of what matters. I pray you can remember where you came from and be thankful for each of those steps along the way. I pray you can rejoice in all that you are and all that you contribute to this world. I pray you can discover a way to connect to our Creator every moment of every day. And most importantly, I pray you can find hope in the small things because God gave those to us, too.

In this strange season of celebrating the lightheartedness of Valentine’s Day with the depth of Lent, I found myself continually coming back to a similar prayer. So in case you also need to sort out your feelings in this time, here it is.

God of light and God of heavy,

For the seasons in which I do not know how to feel, I am still called to give you praise.

I give you praise for the exciting new discoveries and the things in each day that give me life. I give you praise for cold days accompanied by sunshine because they remind me where warmth in my life comes from. That warmth is you. I give you praise for the opportunities and spaces that allow me to press further into who I am and who you are calling me to be.

All the while, I give you praise for the new challenges and truths in my life that may be hard to wrestle with or even accept. I give you praise for the days full of worry and anxiety and the utter overwhelming times of too much work and not enough time. I give you praise for the exhausting and obnoxious sleepless nights. I praise you for these hard things because you are with me in those times just as much as you are in every other moment.

God, you are closer to me than my very own breath. You don’t leave me when I abandon you for my own interests or when I fail time after time or when I take credit for the amazing things only you could do. You love me despite my brokenness. And it is through this truth that I can reconcile this obscure season of valentines and ashes. I know with every fiber in my being that you are here in all seasons, gently leading me and calling me closer to you, for no other reason than you love me.

So I will praise you. And I will chase after you. And I will serve you and your creation with all that I have. I will have the difficult conversations. I will celebrate the beauty of the life you’ve given me. I will stand up for justice and love and mercy. I will pursue your call with overwhelming joy and unceasing delight. I will rejoice in the light and the heavy. Because you taught me how.

I pray all of this in the name of the one who came to save for the sake of love,

Amen.

I’ve had this blank page open on my desk for hours. One of those “I know I have to write but I don’t know what to say” experiences. Maybe it’s frustrating because when I last wrote about Reverend Tom Collins in November the words came so easily. Maybe it’s heartbreaking because our last conversation just two weeks ago was so inspiring that his words will forever be imprinted on my heart. Maybe it’s difficult because I know he impacted so many other lives more deeply than my own that anything I have to say feels inadequate. But nevertheless, when a man like Reverend Tom Collins passes away, you fight through the writer’s block to get the words out.

As someone who was (and still is) so unbelievably naive and inexperienced in this whole theological/ministerial pursuit, the people who inspired me to be here do not have world renowned names. It was small university chaplains and high school small group leaders and supportive congregation members who helped me get here. And on that list is my grandmother’s small town, retirement community pastor, Mr. Collins. We barely had two handfuls of interactions, but the combination of how he talked about the ministry he got to do and how he talked about me gave me the confidence to know that I can face any obstacle that may try to get in my way of pursuing this call. Most of you will never have known him, yet he is a substantial legend in my life.

When my grandmother called me to let me know that Mr. Collins had passed away, she informed me that he spent his last days telling people how grateful he was that I had made time for him on my short visit to see my grandmother over break. It’s funny because that is exactly the kind of man he was, always giving others credit, making himself lower so that God could be higher. It took very little effort for me to go chat with him two weeks ago. And I barely contributed because his words were always so much more powerful than my own. So to set the record straight that the difference and effort he made is more valuable than anything I said then or could say now, I’d like to share a piece of inspiration I gained the last time Mr. Collins and I spoke.

After reminiscing of his classes and professors at Princeton Seminary and emphasizing his frustration that he could no longer engage in his life’s calling to preach because of his health, Mr. Collins looked me square in the eye and said, “I didn’t know love until I met my wife, Leslie. And I didn’t know fulfillment until I went into ministry. I pray you will find the same.” So in the spirit of Reverend Tom Collins, I pray that you find love and fulfillment in your life, and that you will pursue those gifts until your very last breath.

When my body wakes up with stress at 3am most nights, after worrying through my own life, I tend to worry about the state of the world. Injustice. Intolerance. Violence. Hate. Corruption. At this point in our lives, we can’t help but go there. It’s frankly overwhelming. But sitting down and watching the Golden Globes last night gave me hope. For the first time in my life, I’m starting to see people using their privilege to send a message that the world can’t help but hear. People who aren’t afraid of pushback or judgment or consequence. Wear black. Use the Me Too hashtag. Tell a story. Listen to someone else’s story. I was getting emotional at the promise of actual change.

It was this experience that affirmed my word for 2018: pursue. I refuse to ignore my opportunity to use my privileges to make the world a better place. I don’t want to be afraid to act or speak. I will not waste the promise of this year for me or anyone else. So I will pursue. Pursue education. Pursue listening. Pursue challenge. Pursue health. Pursue the other. Pursue heart. And pursue my Savior with greater vigor than ever before. Because we shouldn’t ignore promise. We shouldn’t ignore people. We shouldn’t ignore our ability to make a difference. So I will pursue.

Many things about my first semester of seminary were hard. The whole idea of this semester is to break down everything you think you know so that you can appropriately build it all back up and be a great pastor/academic/Christian/person while you do it. In case you read that wrong, that’s an incredibly significant task. You might think the hardest part of that task is translating and exegeting ancient Hebrew texts. Or synthesizing all of your theology in an eight page systematic paper. Or learning the Old Testament so well you could name the book, speaker, addressee, and significance of ANY OT quote. Or staying awake for a 6:30-9:30pm church and state class. Or maybe even the fact that all of this is not only breaking down your academic perception of theology and religion, but also your personal faith and your career.

Those things are all hard. But they are not the hardest part. The hardest part of all I’ve been doing for the last six months can be summed up in my hardest exam question. It said something like this, “Describe and explain new learnings you have taken from this course that you might want to communicate to those whom you might lead in your ministry.  Explain how these learnings may be significant for the faith of the people with whom you will work.”

See my whole life has changed in the last six months. More than I could describe in an exam question or a blog post. I am a different person. In faith. In community. In heart. In service. In life. I am different. Hopefully more educated and cultured and passionate. But different nonetheless. I have been stretched and challenged and broken in so many new ways. I have wrestled and struggled and grown in so many new ways. I have read more and slept less than I think I have in my whole life. I have had conversations, both external and internal, that have greatly shaped the way I approach theology and ministry and life. How do you describe that in a one page essay in a three hour block of time when you also have seven pages of excruciatingly difficult Old Testament questions to tackle at the same time?

I think the answer is that you don’t. I’d like to think that my response was poetic and stimulating and somewhat coherent. But it’s not about my response on that test. It’s about living out what I’ve learned. It’s about pressing into the change I’ve experienced this semester and the change I will undoubtedly continue to experience for the next two and a half years and beyond. It’s about holding on to all of the excitement and tears and scars and joys these last six months have brought. It’s about making sure this theology I’m building shows up in my ministry, now and every single day from now on. So, if you thought you were going to get all of the answers to the most difficult questions by the end of this, that’s your own fault for thinking seminary gives you answers rather than more questions. Instead you can keep me accountable and watch how God has changed my life in just six months. Because I can’t go back. I am different. I can only move forward, no matter how difficult or exhausting or flat out overwhelming it may be. Because I am called. And I am changed.

I surprised my grandmother at church yesterday. But it turned out that the person who was most surprised was me. The elderly pastor of this church in a bustling retirement community surprised me in the best way. See, he has been struggling with a variety of health issues for over a year. In and out of hospitals, traveling all over to find doctors. Some days he doesn’t even have energy to get out of bed. But this pastor gets up every Sunday and preaches God’s Word. His sermon yesterday was so powerful nearly everyone in the room had tears in their eyes. He may need help because he does not have strength to do the rest of the liturgy, but he will get up there to preach until his dying breath.

When I grow up, I hope to have a ministry like Reverend Tom Collins. I hope I continue to love theology so much that I talk to young seminarians about it even when I don’t have breath. I hope God continues to give me sermons to preach even when I don’t have the energy to walk around the grocery store. I hope to find a denominational home that allows me to remain in my church because they respect my mind even when my body fails me. I hope I will always bring Bible studies and inspire projects that help the church to grow even if I won’t always be there. But most of all, when I grow up, I hope to continue to press into God’s call and serve God’s people until all life leaves my body. That’s the call I feel now and I pray it’s the call I will always have as I grow up.

I believe more emphasis should be made to our young people to pursue a career that they are passionate about, something that makes them feel so connected they cannot do anything else. That is how I feel about ministry. It’s frustrating, time-consuming, and annoyingly without answers – not to mention it’s a terrible pick up line in the dating world. But I cannot do anything else. So I will continue to go to school and work too hard at understanding theologians and church historians. I will continue to squeeze in as many challenging field education placements as I possibly can. I will continue to press into my personal faith and refuse to allow it to get lost along the way. I will do all of this because I am called by God to do this work and to do this work well, today and every day as I grow up.