fayetteville.

it's as close to home as i have ever felt. being in the town of fayetteville feels so right. always.

but i realize my days in Fayetteville are numbered, and i have no control over that number. i vow to enjoy this city more. and to love these people deeper. there is something special about the community that is here. i may not always have that, and i want to take full advantage of it while i can.

so, i am vowing to begin (and hopefully finish) this semester in love. and as i have had time to think about how to love, it's been hard because i have realized that this city and these people aren't mine. they have been given to me by God for a little while, but before i know it, they could be gone. i could be gone. how do you learn to love something and invest your time in it without letting it take the place of the Lord in your life. He still deserves the highest priority.

this semester is going to be good, i can already feel it. and not in a, "oh, i just came back from break where i went to a Christian conference and i'm so fired up!" kind of way. it's going to be good in a "i am excited to spend time with the Lord and during that time learn how to live the rest of my life" kind of way. my classes might be hard, but it'll work out. i'm taking perspectives. joining a Bible study. leading worship more. through all of this, i pray the Lord draws me close to himself and helps me to focus on him always....that i never become wrapped in everything that is going on, but that i constantly live to glorify Him.

in everything i do.

what if?

i am pretty confident that no one will ever be able to fully commit to something the Lord asks them to do with no fear whatsoever. the test will truly be if one is able to overcome those fears and go anyway. 

what if you were called to pack up and leave? what if all the plans you had ever made--big or small--were no longer at all relevant? would you have the strength to leave everyone you've ever known to begin your life in a new and completely unfamiliar place? 

i have always thought, sure, i'd be able to do that. but haven't put much effort into it past there. but i recently sat down to actually think through the weight of a decision like that and i was immediately in tears. 

the weight of the Lord's calling can be so much heavier than we could ever even think about bearing. 

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, "There are all kinds of love in this world but never the same love twice." Since i read this quote a few weeks ago, it has permeated by thoughts in several unexpected ways. i love my friends. but each in a completely different way and for completely different reasons. and these are still different than the ways i love my family and the work i do. and still different than the love i have recently felt for the country of England. it consumes my thoughts. my heart longs for relationships with the people. my feet long to walk along the cobblestone streets in town and the grassy paths of the country. it doesn't make much sense, but somehow i have fallen in love with a country i have never even considered for more than a few seconds. 

my home is not in a place, but with a vision. and it only makes sense that i would chase that vision. a vision that came not from my own mind for i could never have thought this up on my own. 

"There are far better things ahead than any we leave behind." - C.S. Lewis. and it is in this utterance that i find an ounce of hope. 

another year.

there are many things i could say in this post, but my hope is that this will hopefully not be as dull as a typical New Year's rambling and that in one way or another i will be able to pass along the things that have inspired me over the past couple of weeks.

"And since then, O Kings and Ladies, I have been wandering to find him and my happiness is so great that it even weakens me like a wound. And this is the marvel of marvels, that he called me Beloved, me who am but as a dog--"

i, like the speaker of these words, have spent my life falling short of all that the Lord has for me. but, i, too, have seen Him and have wandered after him for quite some time. and a wandering is truly all that it can be called. sometimes i think about how we are all here, not quite knowing what comes next, but somehow it comes anyway. as i wander around this earth, all i can hope is for my wandering heart to be bound to the Lord by His goodness. i have spent too great an amount of my time here on this earth in fear and in silence and in stillness. Charles deFoucauld said, "The one thing we owe absolutely to God is never to be afraid of anything." even if i am wandering, as long as i am connected and bound to the Lord's heart, what do i have to fear? Jesus told me to take heart, because he has already overcome any hardship of this world.

although i cannot yet tell where this year will take me, i do know one thing. my eyes will see places i have hardly even dreamed of. my heart will know love so much deeper than anything it does now. i will meet people who will change my life forever. i will see the Lord's plan continue take shape in my life. and i will not be afraid to go where i am sent for my heart longs for these places and these people whom i have not yet seen or met. adventures are out there just waiting to be had and i am here just waiting to be sent.

2013, i welcome you with open arms, a full heart, and a willing spirit.

busses and lamp posts.

i think i am going to finally succeed in making a habit of this whole blogging thing. 

last night i finished one (fictional) journey and began another (yet, still fictional). one ended in an abandoned bus in Alaska, and the second began in the backyard of a modest London home. during these two journeys, i have experienced American landscapes that many eyes (likely including my own) will never see and i have experienced worlds that no human will know in this lifetime, but that may be out there waiting on us.

it's amazing what words written by someone else can do for a person. through the past 400ish pages, i have learned a lot about myself. i have learned that i am capable of viewing the world in a different way than i used to. i have learned that i can appreciate the little things. i have learned that i am content to sit alone for a few hours. i have learned that what i want more than a lot of things is just to see things that few other people have seen-to have experiences in common with some but not all.

i think most of all i want to live a simpler, but somehow more profound life. and i will make it my own journey to get there.

come with me?

adventures.

lately i have seen the world through a different set of eyes than the ones i am used to. the music i hear sounds sweeter. the windows seem bigger. words on pages go deeper. the sights i see every day are prettier.

last week i sat in Fayetteville, a town i love with so much of my heart, and i watched my friends go, one-by-one, to their homes. in a time when i would have normally been lost, i let myself pick up a book. i sat in chairs and began to read the story of Chris McCandless (Into the Wild). and although i have not yet finished, i think i have been changed by it. so far two passages have stuck out to me more than the others (enough to underline in the library's copy of the book to ensure that everyone who read after me would not miss them).

"...I wanted movement and not a calm course of existence. I wanted excitement and danger and the chance to sacrifice myself for my love. I felt in myself a superabundance of energy which found no outlet in our quiet life." -Tolstoy

"So many people live with unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future." - Chris McCandless

i have been moved to see the excitement of a lifestyle of reckless abandonment. and not one where i graduate college, sell all my possessions to hitchhike around the country and (spoiler alert!) eventually die in the Alaskan wilderness. no, through these odd passages in this book, conversations with friends, and much prayer, my heart is being conditioned to the type of life where i can be content to live with little possessions and be willing to move whenever and wherever the Lord leads.

sure, tons of people have had this "vision," but i want to be different. i want it to catch fire and burn in my soul until the day that i die. i want to enjoy the things i have been given. to see them for what they are, but nothing more. i will enjoy the tea i drink, the music i listen to, and the books i read. but i will enjoy nothing more than the time i spend in fellowship with my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

so, as i have prayed so many times before, take this world. but, this time.... truly. take away my emotional and material attachment to this world. let me love people, and as i go on my way, give me Jesus.

two years ago if you had asked me to describe what i thought my fours years in college would look like...... i would have been totally wrong.

never would i have thought it would be a friday night and i would be in my bathroom, curling my hair, listening to a not-very-fitting Pandora station, getting ready for two very funny guys to pick up me and my roommate.

never would i have thought i would don all black, a foam six pack, and batman mask and go out into the world.

i never expected any of this, but i can say this: i am so glad that the Lord knows better. even in the midst of fun and seemingly petty events, he has a way of telling me that he knew. he knew all of this would happen. he knew how my life would look way better than i did. he knew the friends i needed.

HE KNEW.
and he still knows.
and he will always know.

thank You.

life calling.

i don't know mine (by the way, i am 100% content with that). all i am saying right now is that i can be certain i am not called to go into a scientific field of study.

after probably 8 or so total hours of research, i have written three sentences for my lab project. there's got to be a better way than this..........