Here I am, Send Me.

It is the cutting of the soul, the sharpening of the mind, the molding of the heart. This is what Jesus' Word has done to me. It breaks me and humbles me. But lately I've felt myself distant from the Word, experiencing a kind of spiritual drought. I have just begun my freshman year of college, have a career in view and I am surrounded by wonderful friends and family. Yet, with the world seemingly at my fingertips, with everything I could ever possibly want, something was lacking.

In the evenings, I try always to have "Jesus time." It is a sanctified, happy time for me, consisting of my "Jesus" playlist on Spotify, my big ESV bible and a crisp new sheet in my devotional journal. I am hungry, I thirst for truth.

But these past months I have been parched.

I have been living for myself, my own values and my own ideals. I have been caught up in the display, the idea of a Christian, falling short and feeling incapable of the cross.

Pictures of seemingly happy, granola/hipster, beautiful God-loving girls on social media made me rethink and analyze my life. I wasn't doing "enough," I told myself. I was quick to point out my inconsistencies and my short comings.

She went on 8 missions trips, I've only been on two; she has more bible verses on her Facebook wall...what if people think I'm not serious about my faith? What if I'm no different from almost every other nineteen year-old girl? What has Christ really done for me?

Stop.

"Enough"? Will we ever do enough? When will we ever be enough? Never. Grace is an invalid, unnecessary thing if we could somehow do all the good works, and claim the prize of eternal bliss with God because of what we've done.  God sees you as a broken, incapable human being, dead in sin, (Ephesians 2) unwilling to call out to Him, or choose Him on your own. (John 15:16, Ephesians 1:3-14, 2 Timothy 2:10) The gospel has never been because of anything we can do. This story, it's not about us, it's about Him. Giving ourselves any credit lessens His power, and gives us a tad bit of the glory that He completely and fully deserves.

Because of this, my lifestyle is then out of thankfulness and obedience. God has not called me to be lukewarm, and live a mediocre lifestyle. But this doesn't mean I have to go drastic measures. I don't have to climb mountains and cross valleys to worship him. God challenges us in all sorts of ways, He is revealed in many different avenues. Each individual's relationship with God is not determined by the magnificence of their elaborate Christian lifestyle. It is the heart, but it is also the willingness. But that willingness means self sacrifice, the laying down of self. Dietrich Bonhoeffer states this self sacrifice as it is: "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die."

Christianity is not something that is beautiful and easy all the time. And this is where my faith fell short. I was too busy being focused on the beauty, but when pain struck I was confused and felt further from God--when His very intentions were to bring me closer.

Francis Chan says it best:

“It is true that God may have called you to be exactly where you are. But, it is absolutely vital to grasp that he didn’t call you there so you could settle in and live your life in comfort and superficial peace.”

Being a true Christian means meeting life head on, whether messy or beautiful. It is grasping the idea that this earth is not our home, so until we arrive home we will be restless and wandering. And, some days, it may feel like we are wandering a little more.

But we must seek God in all. If we seek Him only when are desperate, He may keep us in desperate circumstances, until we learn to lean completely, wholly on Him.

The beauty of Christianity is its internal nature, what it does to our hearts, next transforming our lives. But our social media isn't a resume for our Christian walk. Of course it can be an asset, a good display--but for me it had become a selfish platform. I'm not at all condemning social media and I use it probably more than I should. It just shouldn't be the source of you Christian walk that validates you.

However, if you find yourself uncomfortable, sad, depressed and comparing your lifestyle to others and feeling discontent, this is the Holy Spirit's groundwork. Jesus is teaching you to lean on Him alone, and sometimes he strips away our earthly joys to focus on a more permanent everlasting joy. Yet we can only grasp at this now. We can only imagine, but one day we will behold Him face to face. (1 Corinthians 13:12)

This is the journey, this is the beauty of Christianity. But in order to be filled, we must first be empty.

I linked my distance from Christ as my reluctance to fully rely on Him in every circumstance, both the highs and lows. I ignored pain and didn't let it take its full effect. I looked at sadness as a parasite, not an opportunity. It is easy to throw my hands up and praise him when the days are good, but when the days are bad they should extend even higher. But we should be so seeking the Lord, so steadfast in Him that nothing that happens can shift our steady gaze.

It is ridiculous to think God could possibly have any limits. He has so much work to do in each of our lives and he is not near finished yet. Christianity is the journey, the life long quest to become more like Christ. This means the giving of the self, because Christ gave himself, the ultimate example. And giving hurts, giving is inconvenient. But it is also rewarding, and fruitful.

In all this, we should have one goal. One like Elisabeth Ellior writes about in her book: Through Gates of Splendor. 

"I have one desire now, to live a life of reckless abandon for the Lord, putting all my energy and strength into it." -Elisabeth Elliot

This reckless abandon, this life Elisabeth Elliot portrays is described as "reckless," because being a Christian is reckless. Being a Christian is dangerous. It is living out of our comfort zones. It is picking up your cross, leaving all selfish ambitions behind, it is the complete giving and surrender of self.

However, giving up of the self seems impossible sometimes in a world of hurt. There's the pain, the sufferings, the tribulations that run us dry, make us seem incapable. However, these are all things that point, and paint the picture for us of our beautiful savior. He fills in our cracks, our broken pieces, he makes us whole. As C.S. Lewis puts it in his book Mere Christianity, there are two options:

"Give up yourself and you will loose your real self. Loose your life and you will save it. Submit to death, death of your ambitions. Submit with every fiber of your being, and you will find eternal life. Keep back nothing. Look for yourself and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look to Chrsit, and you will find Him, and with Him, everything else thrown in."

But God didn't intend to leave us in the dark. He is beside us, spurring us on in the gentlest of ways, guiding us in love. And he wants all of you, he asks nothing but yourself. So pick up your cross. Follow, don't hesitate.  Keep following, keep trusting, keep giving.

This is the job, the life long duty of a Christian. Listen for His call, and be willing to drop everything. Cry out to Him, He listens. Eternity is around the corner. Have a face so fixed on Him that you are willing to confront anything. Because with Christ you are a conqueror, you are brave. You are an eternal creature in an passing, ever dimming world.

You cannot conform your will to the will of God by just simply desiring to. It takes action. So come, live! To death with all your selfish ambitions, because instead you will find life. And when you find it, whatever, wherever this world takes you, whatever God asks of you, you will be able to say with all trust and confidence,

Here I am Lord, send me.

Trophies of His Grace

I stand now, astonished, amazed. When I thought I was drowning, He was cleansing. I was so underserving, but God was so relentless. In the darkest year of my life, He had a valuable lesson He wanted to teach me. He broke me to be rebuilt by Him.

No one can prepare you for your first heartbreak. It shakes the temporal nature of this world, it accentuates the dust, the reality of death, the reality of the idea of "loosing."

I'm about to get really real and raw right now. I was really hurt last summer. And I swore I would leave this heartbreak in the past, and never talk about it, but truth is reader, there's beauty, much beauty in it. Because with God, there is this thing called redemption.

"Heartache" is no exaggerated term. My heart ached. It is a vacant empty feeling, like a hole in your chest. People told me that heartbreak was more than a mental thing; it takes a toll on your emotions in a way that I didn’t know was possible. And reader, some days it was so easy for me to give up, asking, "God why me?" But then again I remembered who I was asking. So I was "not to become weary in doing good, for at the proper time, I would reap the harvest if I didn't give up." (Galatians 6:9) But the harvest was more beautiful than I expected. In fact, God showed me a garden of promises. Never ending love. The weeds of brokenness and darkness were being reaped into life.

Corrie Ten Boom, a true woman of the faith, wrote in her book, The Hiding Place, a quote that has changed my whole perspective on love. She writes:

“Do you know what hurts so very much? It’s love. Love is the strongest force in the world, and when it’s blocked it means pain. There are two things we can do when this happens. We can kill that love so that it stops hurting. But then of course, part of us dies, too. Or we can ask God to open up another route for that love to travel.”

This was no easy task. I would not just ignore this “blocked love.” I realized, like Corrie Ten Boom, that this was in fact a perfect route for perfect and holy love to travel. I dug my heals in the word, prayed, and cried. This was my battleground. This was God saying, "Hannah, I wasn't at the center of your life. And that needs to change." He was slowly and painfully piecing me back together.

My constant prayer mimicked the hymn "Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus." I asked, I pleaded for my unsteady, unstable gaze to be fixed upon Him.

Such sweet simple words:

"Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face. And all the things on earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and grace."

I sang it again and again in my head.

Before all of this, my best friend Amy texted me one morning," If you are not completely focused on God, completely sold out on Him, then He will take away whatever it is that is distracting you." That day, the morning of the text, my relationship with this guy was over. Looking back, I get literal chills. Because God did just that. He took away what took me away from him.

It's been a year, a year and three months. And now I know exactly why God let me experience such a cruel heartbreak. I extend my hands and my heart, and I allow God's grace to sink into my very bones. I want to cry out in joy and thankfulness. And even on days when I struggle, I still thank Him. Life is this crazy adventure, and there is beauty, heartbreak, both depths and heights, and God is in it all. I see him so clearly in everything. In the golden sunrises, in people, in the stars, and even in the mornings when my body won't get out of bed. I see Him in the way the moon lights up the mountains, in the way the waves crash upon the shore. I see him in everything. He has made beauty from ashes. He has turned my mourning into a song. (Psalm 30:11)

Time and tenderness have torn down and rebuilt my walls. Love and forgiveness have reshaped my heart and mind. Jesus has restored me. I experienced an earthly heartbreak, but experienced true love firsthand. He broke me to be rebuilt by Him. And His love is far greater than anything I've felt or experienced. And no, His is not the tender kiss or the grasp of a hand. But by one torn and afflicted, put on a wooden cross. The kind that shouts above my wrongdoings, and triumphs over my broken heart.

All along, even when I felt empty, He was filling me up. HE was preparing me to surrender to an even greater love. Love itself. The God of the universe was telling me that I was looking in all the wrong places. CALL to me, He said, and I will answer.  (Jeremiah 33:3) In every dark corner, in every valley, He promised to be there. And He was. Pursuing an earthly love showed me that earthly love is never, never the end goal. Happiness, true happiness is encompassed in an eternal mindset, the glance towards heaven. A heart residing in the everlasting lover, who's love is unconditional, unfathomable, and forever.

Here are some of the most beautiful words ever written:  "We must accept the idea that heartbreaks and hurdles are trophies of His Grace rather than secrets to be buried." This. This is the true calling of the heartbroken. To accept. To shout, to claim God's love over their own brokenness, a love that is lasting and permanent.

What now? To all the girls like me, who have been heartbroken, you have had an opportunity. No it is not a mistake. God can use you. You are more aware, you are more cautious. You know what it is like to be hurt, but now you know what it's like to be known and sought after by God. And choosing that great, great love of your father over your brokenness has become a beautiful channel to let His mercies flow. Heartbreak is a canvas. It is a way for hope and redemption to be shown. It is the breaking down of the self. The realization of the dependence on Christ, the need for His strength. It is the molding and shaping of a heart directed towards Him.

So it is possible to love someone again?

Yes, yes, and yes!!  It would be ridiculous to assume that your mistakes make you "damaged goods" or no longer worthy of a man's love. Christ looks at you, the sinner that you are, but takes you. Completely. All of you, as you are. If someone isn't willing to look past your mistakes, ask yourself if they really know who Christ is.

You are a treasure. You were died for, and that will never change. One day, when you look someone in the eyes and say, “I do,” it will not be because you have had a perfect and pure past. No, not because you are blemish free, and no not because you are completely and wholly loving all the time. It is because you are worthy. Though stained, you were washed. Though broken, you were healed. It is because you have been bought with a price. And that perfect picture of love displayed by Christ will one day be reflected by a man standing in front of you.  He will not be able to love you perfectly, but he will mirror Christ's love for you as best as he can. And granted there will be dark and hard days ahead, but the two of you share a universal need for a greater love in your life. It will point, shape and direct you both. It will grow you, humble you, and show you to lean on Him alone. And that? That is a true love worth finding.

But until then, your calling is to keep chasing Christ. Fully, wholly. This beautiful world, this beautiful life—is His gift to you and me. And I am firm believer, that everything happens for a reason. I leave you with this: “To think you can be loved by God without being changed by Him, is to think you can jump into the oceans and not get wet. To really love Him, you must understand that your life is going to be wrecked by Him, and built again into something beautiful, something lasting.”

To be wrecked by God, is one of the most beautiful things my soul has encountered. I’ve learned to really love, and that love has showed me that there are second chances, and new tomorrows. He has changed me, and showed me what I want from life now. Because of this wreckage, I know what it is like to turn around and make messy beautiful.

Heartbreak is surrender, not defeat. It is saying, "Yes Lord. Take these empty hands and use them for you." And you will see, that even in the lowest of lowest,

He will be exalted.

His.

It is a rare thing: a love so selfless, so ravishing that it consumes our very being. This is what Jesus' love at work in our lives looks like. It is not often that we can behold such a selfless, ravishing love like Jesus's in this life. Most often it fails, disappoints, and leaves an un-sasitifed hunger in the stomach that can't be satiated. But that of Jesus--this love defies all others. It is lasting, eternal, unworthy of all other earthly loves. It is a love so great, displayed on wooden beams, afflicted and smitten for our sins. It is the mere grace and mercy of our Lord, not anything we can do. It is written on every flower, every skyline, and evident in every breath we take. God's love is infinite.

How often we loose the gravity of this! Our souls become weary, and we loose our sense of rest. In my numerous and feeble attempts of life on my own, I have discovered that  failed attempts at love show the necessity for a love that demands greater. And God is a jealous God and shows nothing suffices other than His love. He uses our heartbreaks and failures to redirect our paths. He invades our lives and comfort zones to show us that we are not living for Him. And in moments fading like the sun, we find that we are but weak on our own.

How do we go about this life not transfixed? We are often bored and limit ourselves to the drab duties of our day-to-day lives, when the love of God could be dangling from our lips. We are still satisfied with mediocrity when God's death makes us alive. Alive. The one who put the stars in place has left it open for us to worship Him. Christ is here! He wants all of you, your doubts, fears, and dreams. We allow our weary bones to take refuge in other things, and won't allow our mouths to cry out, "Father!" because we don't acknowledge our need for Him. But in Him is life. In Him is possession. We are His.

And just to demonstrate this great love, He came to earth and became man. Sacrificed and humbled himself down to the level of humanity. Hungered, thirsted, cried, walked and lived like us. (Philippians 2:8, John 1:14, John 6:38) Then He bore what was rightfully ours on a cross, pouring out all His love for us. And with the words "It is finished!" he cried out in final anguish. The ability to run broken, to Jesus's saving grace fromm that moment is now unhindered. It had been paid in full in that moment. The debt mankind owed is eliminated.

We raise our empty hands, and allow Christ to fill us completely. The weight of your sin was on His bloody shoulders and on those bloody beams. And he did this because he loved us. Our finite humans minds cannot comprehend this kind of love. But we believe, and we trust, because this grace is irresistible, and we are now His.

But how does this truth transform? Jesus died for the past, present, and future. He died for a relationship with you. Joy should overflow within you so that you can't help but rejoice. But lo, sin. It taints the world, steals joy, disappoints and hurts. We refuse to look towards the King and instead dwell on our mistakes and failures. We often forget that He has put us in every season for His purpose.

Yet even with this purpose, we so often we still find ourselves in the position of the "weary soul." We cry out in distress and try every avenue to channel our pain but God. And this is why we are hurting. (Jeremiah 31:25) Because we were made for Him and nothing else. He fills the void He created. As our King, He made us to worship Him and only find contentment in Him. And some days it may feel like we are going nowhere, but take heart. Because "I know that everyday the Lord is dancing over me, turning my feeble steps into a mighty march for His glory." And in our weakest moment, God shouts over our weary bones, "I have overcome!" (John 16:33)

 God wants us to seek joy in our place in His story. Charles Swindoll wrote once: "The devil, darkness and death may swagger and boast, but the pangs of life will sting for a little longer, but don't worry; the forces of evil are breathing their last. Not to worry...He is RISEN!"

Because of this truth, God is challenging us to be remarkable. He is preparing us for this new life. Through our trials we come out as stronger, braver and bolder. (Romans 5:4) Seeking God doesn't promise a primrose path. But it's through the journey that makes us who we will become.

So take heart. Your life has purpose, direction, fulfillment, even when everything seems to be going wrong because you are His, and you are His forevermore. What comfort. What joy.

Like Job, even when we've experienced every possible kind of hurt, we still have this assurance, because we are not our own. "I know that my redeemer lives, and in the end He will stand on the earth." (Job 19:25)

"Because weeping my tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning." (Psalm 30:5)

So when I am overwhelmed by joy Lord, be there. When I am low and weary of heart be there. You have brought me through trials I never thought I'd overcome. You taught me that YOU are love. Yearning for something all these years--it's led to you. You kept my head above water when my body begged to sink. What a joy it has been to see your love following me through every dark corner, and with every sunrise a new opportunity. This kind of faithfulness, through the good and the bad, reminds me why following a God like you is so rewarding.

I am not on my own. Seeing Jesus in my life gives me confidence that I've never had before. It transfixes me. It leaves me in awe. That the sustainer of this universe would come down in human form so he could have my heart. This. This gives me reason to dance. To live, pray, laugh and love.

So on hard days, don't give up. And on harder days, press on. Because He is preparing you to be remarkable. Wave after wave, storm after storm, He is constant. He loves you. He hurts when you hurt, he rejoices when you rejoice. But most of all, He loves you with an earth shaking love that only you can claim. So when days tarry on, take heart. Jesus has made himself available. He is forgiving, and you are forgiven. He died to talk with you, be with you, and lead you.

He is all knowing and all loving. He is one man, one act of love. And you are cherished, sought after, and irrevocably

His.