From Where We Stand

During a particularly sensitive time in our nation, emotions from Americans have been stemming from delight, hope, and expectation to despair, fear, frustration, and confusion.I sat on my living room couch with my roommate, streaming CNN’s coverage of the US election well into the early morning, London time. We both knew this election was a defining one for our country, so while we could not peel ourselves away from our computer screens, our hearts began to sink. With every minute, we watched our nation decide what the next four years were going to entail. When I woke up the following morning, I could not help but feel that a tidal wave ushered in what I could only gather as a world of difference. Though I did not know what that difference would look like or how it would precisely manifest itself, I felt its ominous weight upon me and upon the rest of my country from thousands of miles away. More than that, this was a complex sense of difference as some felt this change would altogether benefit our country and others felt this change would usher in years of oppression and discrimination that existed before, but went unnoticed or unacknowledged.I felt entirely homesick. I wanted to be with the rest of my country as we all were processing this change. I wanted to experience what everyone was feeling- all the polar and divisive emotions that fell on a spectrum that no single person could possibly experience. I wanted to embody each person’s thoughts and feelings- what they hoped for, what they envisioned, and equally what they feared, how they felt lost or displaced, and how their hearts were broken.It is important to recognize that the election panned out in vastly different interests of the American public. Like any election, some people were thrilled to have voted in their preferred candidate to the presidency, while others’ hopes were put to rest. But, unlike any election, the process that began over a year ago revealed some pressing and undeniable truths about the state of our country. We have seen news of hateful actions morph into repeated and not-so-shocking headlines. We have grown weary, and maybe insensitive, of the same stories that point out unresolved issues in our nation. But, while we may feel that we have been bombarded by a ceaseless flow of information about issues that we cannot possibly begin to tackle, at some point, the stories and testimonies became real. Some of us heard testimonies, personal and public, of hateful speech directed at people who share the same nationality as us. And so, we watched these stories shift from those of remote fiction from an unbridled media to stories from real people- our friends, our families, our neighbors.As I continued to process what these next four years would look like for our country, I looked for some form of hope I could grasp. I also looked for a point of action- something we could work towards, tactical things that we could work to change. I felt a weight upon my generation to act and to assure that freedom, compassion, understanding, equality, and peace would be the defining aspects of our country. But as I searched for answers and solutions, I began to realize that I was overlooking the source of it all.The following Sunday I attended church just like any other Sunday. But that afternoon, the Lord spoke to me so distinctly and purposefully. In revealing the desires of my heart, the condition of my heart was reoriented so that my worries were not founded on a wavering future, but that my hope rested in the constant and everlasting promise of our Heavenly Father. Tim Chaddick, our pastor, spoke on Revelation 5 and relayed his heart on what we should do in an age of uncertainty and how we should respond to the world’s need as the church. His reminder, that we must have a clearer understanding of our need, spoke truth and life into my heart. “We need a clearer understanding of our need,” he passionately affirmed, “because it keeps us from placing our hope in all the wrong things.” He continued to speak to this reoriented mindset by allowing us to imagine where we stand before the holy throne of our perfect Father. He asserted that the way we rid ourselves of self-righteousness and cultivate true humility is through realizing where we stand before a holy and mighty God: “When you see God for who He is- He’s perfect, He’s holy, He’s absolutely pure- you realize it doesn’t matter how you compare yourself to others . . . When you see yourself before God, you realize you are in need of mercy and you are in need of grace.”Positioning ourselves before the perfect love God allows us to realize that we are completely undeserving of that love, but wholly and comprehensively loved through his grace all the same. I believe that this reorientation is necessary in order for us to love and serve the world in the exact way that it needs us to. As followers of Christ, we must continually put ourselves before the throne in the light and love that Jesus has donned on us, so that through grace, we may be able to boldly declare and display the perfect love of God to a world that desperately needs it.In an uncertain present with an unpredictable future, the demand for us to more boldly represent and display Jesus’ love and grace amid a broken and needy world is now that much greater. But when we find ourselves in a position where we understand our brokenness, our faults and, equally, where we find unending love, acceptance, and freedom, we are able and empowered to answer the overwhelming burden of the world’s every need. As Nelson Mandela said, “For to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.” As followers of the One who paved the most gracious, humble, compassionate, and forgiving way for us, let us enhance the freedom of every single human being on this earth through the light, power, and unending love of Jesus.

It May be Best Unwritten

More often than not, I find myself reluctantly proclaiming my Millennial identity because, more often than not, I find there to be more criticism than praise regarding Millennial tendencies. But, as with any generation, while we fall behind in some areas, we gain speed in others. One of the benefits that I have seen develop in the midst of our generational timeline is the opportunistic world of technology. It seems now, more than ever before, technology has opened up a vastly more comprehensive arena for communication. Almost right before our eyes, we have seen how technology has harbored relationships that are distanced worlds apart or how it has allowed information about a remote people group, a distant political crisis, or a removed cultural tragedy to transcend national, cultural, and political boundaries. But, while we have seen so many positive consequences stem from technological efforts, we may also begin to realize how we have conformed to the patterns of technology. Throughout the development of our generation, technology has created an instant form of communication. With a simple push of button, we are able to trade our words, expressions, and thoughts with complete strangers. With the push of a button, we have the power to uplift one another, encourage one another, share in grief, sorrow, pain, joy, love, and celebration with one another. But, with the push of a button, we have the power to completely devastate the spirit of another person. With the push of a button, we can experience the immediate guilt of not being able to retract our words. With the single push of a button, we can paramountly affect someone else’s life.And while I have perused the Internet's various different layers, something has struck me: the way we are able to communicate with each other, with people we do not even know nor may ever meet, is a powerful indicator of the way that we treat one another. I often observe the comments section of articles, social media posts, and videos and have been shocked to see the way that people speak to one another. I find hatred in judgement, negativity in a better-than-thou repertoire, and unkindness in misunderstanding. I am not one to say that I have never harbored unkind, judgmental, or negative thoughts for someone else, but I have grown concerned about our nonchalant ability to use that negativity in the way that we speak to people over the Internet. While searching for a different way to use this communication, I have found that in order to begin to change the attitude of our opinions, we must be able to allow a flexibility in our perceptions of others through their social media outlets. Through social media, we are able to look into the lives of people we have never met before. We are also able to portray a story of ourselves that we wish people to see. But, we should realize that things are not always what they seem to be. We must believe that a mere creative outlet does not indicate or illustrate someone’s entire life. So, we should not allow our compassion and empathy for other people to remain hindered by the limitations of a simple Instagram filter, a 140-character count, or a mere status update. Instead of settling to accept the what appears to be on the surface, we must learn to dig deeper, to go beyond our conceptions of what others’ social media may lead us to believe. Another way we can learn to challenge our communication patterns through the Internet is to allow our grace to transcend technological boundaries. In order to examine our speech in this context, we may need to delve deeper into how our patterns of communication initially form. We learn the art of communication best in the context of those relationships that are closest to us. With our best friends, we learn the time and effort that it takes to get to know them, to foster deep relationships with them, and to sustain those relationships. We learn to ask the questions that will pierce through the layers of a person’s self-defenses. We learn to be there for them, to foster a sense of loyalty and trust. We learn to love them, to encourage all that they are, to empower and uplift them in all they wish to achieve, to love them through every mistake they have made and will continue to make, and to challenge them to see the things they may miss otherwise. We learn to understand every part of them. And as we continue to walk through life with them, we find ourselves loving them compassionately, unconditionally, and freely without even realizing it. In experiencing these true relationships, we do not have to convince ourselves to love our friends, rather, we instinctively love them. We love them selflessly without expecting anything in return. We love them fiercely, defending their integrity, their personhood, and their spirits. We love them compassionately, understanding all the experiences, events, tragedies, and triumphs that have shaped the person they have become. We love them empathetically, knowing the depths of their hearts, remembering their deepest secrets, and understanding their unspoken vulnerabilities. But, what if we started to extended this same compassion that we harbor for our closest friends to even strangers in our lives? What if we thought of that person that lies on the other end of the keyboard as someone’s best friend- a friend someone would defend till the end of time, a friend someone loves with all their heart, a friend someone compassionately and empathetically understands? What if our unbiased, color-blind, and compassionate love transcended the keyboard? How would that affect the way that we view one another on a human level? I believe that it starts when we begin to see that the compassion that we freely give to those we know best is the same compassion we should extend even to those we do not know, simply because their humanity deserves it. It continues when we use discernment in the power of our words, compassion in the tone of our voices, and empathy in the perception of those we may never know through the medium of the Internet. It grows when we see grace and compassion become our immediate responses. It expands further the more appalled we become by our own selfish, judgmental, unkind, and unforgiving thoughts and responses towards other people. You see, as we begin to change the way we communicate with one another through the Internet, we are ushering in a new wave of communication in which we account for the feelings of another person, a person we have never met nor may ever meet, above our own. So, let us bring forth this new wave of communication. Let our compassion be greater, let our empathy reach further, and let our kindness ring truer throughout the course of our comments and our messages towards one another. Let us become known as a generation that uses the vastly extensive Internet to bring messages of truth, hope, and courage to each other from all around the world.

The World Weeps

As of late, it seems that each new day begins with the news of a mass tragedy, tragedy involving racial and ideological differences and tensions. As we watch these tragedies take the lives of dear loved ones, as we stand confused and hopeless, and as we watch the world grow silent and displaced, we find ourselves wondering how the world could have gotten this dark. We weep and the world around us weeps. Our hearts are broken and torn; “Why is there such tragedy?” “How could someone do something like this?” Just over a month ago, a gunman opened fire on a nightclub in Orlando, Florida, killing nearly fifty people- a tragedy thrust in the year anniversary of another gunman who opened fire in a church in Charleston, North Carolina, killing nine people. Some weeks ago, two African American men were killed resulting from the action of police officers in Minnesota and Louisiana. Later on that week, five police officers were killed in the midst of a peaceful protest in Dallas, Texas. Following that tragedy, someone drove a truck into a crowd that was celebrating Bastille Day, killing more than eighty people. And still, just last week, three more police officers were killed in Baton Rouge. While the news of these endless tragedies ridden with injustice, oppression, darkness, and sorrow have become all too familiar, we still find ourselves burdened with heavy hearts, wondering if all hope is lost. Usually, I do not tend to single out a distinct group of people, but in light of these tragedies, I feel as though my voice can only carry to a group of people I identify with, empathize with, and know fully well: those who call themselves Christians. In this piece, I am directing my voice at Christians because it is the group with which I can use complete authority in my words. As a Christian, I believe that God has pursued us since the beginning of time, loving us and longing to make us right with him. Through this love, I believe that Jesus came to earth to redeem our hearts ridden with sin, hatred, malice, selfishness, deceit, and wickedness. I believe that he lived the perfect, holy, and blameless life that we could not live and that he died in our place so that we could live in perfect unity with our Heavenly Father. Because of this beautiful reconciliation, I have been given the powerful gift of a radical grace that I still cannot seem to make sense of, but a grace, nonetheless, that has freed me from the guilt and shame of my own sin. This grace, the gift of Jesus’ perfect life for me, has necessarily transformed the way I live. In my own life, it has freed me to be the person that I am- completely, incompletely, wholly, imperfectly, and transformatively. It has freed me to pursue his beautiful and perfect plan for my life, while empowering me to trust that God not only desires the best for me, but that he fully knows every incomparably and distinctly precise detail that makes up his best plan for me. This grace, though, has done infinitely more than just transform my own life; it has caused me to live in response to God’s unending love through the way that I treat other people. In basking in the grace of Jesus Christ, I have seen my judgmental attitude towards others transform into compassionate and empathetic understanding. I have seen instinctive unkindness give way to an outpouring of kindness, goodness, and grace. I have witnessed selfishness transfigure into selflessness and humility. I have experienced the weight of sin and what I idolized in longing for the acceptance and approval of others dissipate into the complete freedom found in the unparalleled love of our Heavenly Father. And as I have seen such a transformation in my own life, I cannot help but think of the immense power in the collectivity of this transformation, of the love and freedom donned in the Gospel in the lives of believers around the world. Christians, if we are living in the freedom of this radical love of God- this love that knows no bounds, that finds us in our darkest moments and deepest times of despair, and that pursues us even when our own sin seems too wicked to redeem- then our lives must reflect that. And if our own lives reflect the power of the freedom of Jesus Christ, then our actions towards others must necessarily reflect the incomparably great, powerful, and life-altering grace of God’s love for us through Jesus. And if our actions are necessarily reflecting that love, then our world must necessarily be transforming in the light, love, and goodness of Jesus Christ. Now, hear me in this, there is senseless tragedy that we will not be able to control or even fix. But, I am convinced that we are missing the mark in showing the world the goodness in the selfless and undeserving love that we have been given through the life and death of Jesus. I am convinced that relationships remain to be broken and incomplete because we neglect to fill them with the compassion, grace, and dignity that only the power and authority of Jesus through us can fill. I am convinced that we can be doing way more than we are doing to love on the world and to mend it as it weeps throughout every senseless tragedy, every mourning heart, and every broken, longing, and wandering soul. I am convinced that our world would resemble a lot more healing, inclusivity, and graciousness if we were truly showing this powerful, healing, and ever-satisfying love that requires no performance, repayment, or obligation in return. I believe that we would see an ongoing transformation in our neighborhoods, communities, schools, universities, and countries in the same way that we saw a transformation in ourselves through receiving the love and life of Christ. I believe that this love would would extend its power in repairing the brokenness ridden in the divides of oppression, discrimination, and separateness found in our countries and international communities. And I believe that this love would begin to find its roots in the people who live their lives in an authentic response to the way that Jesus has saved, redeemed, and love them, further spreading those roots to every corner, crack and crevice, every peak and valley, throughout the world. I cannot help but think that these individual transformations, this ongoing growth in the love that Jesus daily extends to us, will necessarily give way to a worldwide transformation. In light of these international, national, and local tragedies, I believe that we, as Christians, have been given the full authority in Christ to allow God to work through us to transform the world. By the life and power of Jesus, I believe that we would begin to see another human being, regardless of whether or not we knew them, in the luminosity that Christ sees them. I believe that we would begin to love complete strangers by the same incomparable and wholly undeserving love by which Christ loved us. I believe that we would be willing to sacrifice our prejudices, our biases, our sense of security, and our own perception of what is best for us for the good of even one other single life- knowing the depth by which Jesus offered his perfect life for each of us even when while we knew little of that sacrifice, expected little of an all-powerful God, and still continued to pursue fulfillment in anything else besides him. I believe that if we lived according to the love of Jesus that captivated our hearts, we would see our world begin to grow in that love and morph into a home that mends broken, deceitful, selfish, and wicked hearts to the perfect holy, gracious, kind, and ever-yielding heart of the One who saved us. Standing in the full power and authority of Jesus’ love for us, I believe that we will be enabled to challenge social structures, to defy and eradicate systemic racism, to mend brokenness and rectify wrongdoing, and to restore lives to the beautiful and perfect love of Christ. Christians, it is time to start spreading the love of Jesus to the world- a love that has freed us both individually and collectively to be the people intricately designed by our most loving Father. It is time for us to uphold the love that has radically saved us and wholly enabled us to pursue goodness, truth, justice, and peace in the name of Jesus. It is time to come together and to bring this world home to the freeing, gracious, and purely good love of Jesus. It is time to wholly and comprehensively comfort our weeping world. 

The [He]art of Adapting

The first night during my second trip to Uganda stands out like a vivid memory even today. I had planned this trip to fall directly after my study abroad experience in Cape Town came to an end. I would once again visit the place that captivated my heart before returning home to America, and I was ecstatic. But, before embarking on this second trip, the nerves of traveling alone settled in. I sat on the plane in a row by myself listening to the people behind me having a conversation about the trigger signs of danger in a developing country. “When you see a UN plane, you know that something is going down,” he said as I nervously looked out the window to a few UN planes sitting on the tarmac. I quietly got off the plane, trying to assume an outward confidence that seemed otherwise distant, if not altogether absent. I mustered my things, holding my passport in hand, sought out an ATM, and mulled over all the things that could possibly go wrong in getting myself through border security. But, the familiarity of the terminal- a place I had been before- swept away my nerves in an unspoken sense of assurance and security. I found my cab driver waiting for me with a smile and a warm welcome to a land I had wholeheartedly learned to love only a few months before. As he drove me to my hotel, he began to talk about his home, his family, and his work, and as he began to open up about his life, all my fears were seemingly gone. After settling in my room, I retreated to the common room where I sat with a cup of tea and reflected on my study abroad experience. My heart was full. In those moments, I felt the weight of the joy that those months in Cape Town provided me with. I felt all the growth of a woman experiencing a different culture, hearing the stories and understanding the lives of people with different upbringings. I felt the compassion that comes from lessons through experiences- experiences with people in a post-conflict society, experiences of personal growth, and experiences in overcoming previously ingrained fears and constructed dispositions. I felt reinforced in who I was and wholly different at the same time. I was humbled, reminiscent, joyful, and grateful. And I found myself in a place that, before my experience in Cape Town, equally transformed my life. In this hotel cafe, at that point in time, I was a different person than on my first trip to Uganda. I learned more, I experienced more, my heart was more torn, more broken, and more healed. I adapted. The funny thing about adapting is that we never get used to it. Since that night in Uganda, I have adapted to new circumstances, different situations, and new places ten times over. My heart grew in new beginnings, it was broken with new endings, and it healed again as I learned to move on. With each new beginning, I often find myself thinking, “I will never get used to this.” But, as time progresses, as I trust myself, and as I allow things to fall into place, I slowly and surely adapt to my surroundings. Usually, just when I grow comfortable with where I am, I am thrust into the cycle of adapting all over again. And, again, I find myself wondering, “I don’t want to get used to this again.” But, something beautiful happens each time. Each time I think I cannot adapt again, each time I think I am not capable of growing again, my strength is tested so I can prove myself stronger. My faith is tried so I can prove myself more faithful. My growth is expended so I can prove that my growth is ever-evolving. My compassion is stretched so I can prove that my heart is ever-reaching. My spirit is pressed so that I can see more clearly who I am. As we adapt, we expend part of who we are to the circumstances, people, and places around us. We grow more comfortable with who we are and where we are, and then we are propelled to adapt to a whole new situation, a whole new lot of people, and a whole new surrounding. And, each time we adapt, we are reminded of the process we underwent the time before. We remember how we overcame uncertainty, fear, sorrow, and pain. We remember the people who came alongside us, who quieted our racing thoughts, assured our uneasy spirits, and calmed our diffused emotions. We remember the purpose that was fulfilled in going through the process of adapting. We recall those special moments, those influential people, that we were able to share our lives with. And from these memories, we are reinforced in our purpose and we are empowered to adapt again. Then, when we welcome the process of adapting, we continually allow ourselves to grow to unparalleled destinies. As we adapt, we grow more into who we are, and as we continue to grow, we are more capable of offering that new growth to all those around us. We should continue to allow ourselves to adapt to new circumstances, new people, new places, and new situations because the world deserves all that each of our unique and individual spirits have to offer it. We should continue to adapt, trusting that these new circumstances equally shape us into who we are and use who we are in order to make the world a little bit better. So, let us continue to ever-adapt, using the strength we find in that process of adapting to propel us into giving all that we have to give to the world around us.

While We Wait

“Everything will work out in the end”: a phrase we all have heard muttered to us at one point in our lives. I am the first to say that patience is not an attribute that I have been blessed with. When I want something, I want it immediately. When I want something to happen, I do everything in my power to make it happen as soon as possible. But even still, I have always trusted the quiet work of time. I believe that with time, we gain the healing that we need, we acquire understanding that may not have been known otherwise, we learn infinitely more about ourselves, and we grow undoubtedly more compassionate about the world around us. But as I wait for the nature of time to allow things fall into place, I often find myself wondering, “What do I do in the meantime?” It is completely against my nature to sit back and allow things to happen. I want to do something, I want to work at something, and I want to know that with whatever I am working for, there is an end goal in sight. So, what do we do in the meantime? What do we do when we cannot do anything at all? Throughout this past year, I have learned to let time run its course. It has been both necessarily humbling and completely frustrating. But, in my moments of restlessness, I have learned that letting go has freed me to gain far more than I could have ever dreamed of. A year ago, I found myself in an LSAT prep course. I spent my summer days taking practice tests, attending online classroom tutorials, watching videos, learning skill sets, researching top law schools, and crunching numbers that would ultimately determine where I would lie on a spectrum of students all hoping to achieve the same thing. About halfway through the course, and few months before the test date, I decided that I did not want to attend law school after all. While I felt convicted that pursuing a law degree was not what I wanted to do, I forced myself to keep trying it. Though I wish I could say it was the drive of perseverance that kept me to my studies longer than I wished to be, it was actually the fear of not knowing what I would be doing otherwise. My fear, instead of my passion, was driving my decision to stay in that LSAT prep course. For me, this path held a somewhat known four years ahead of me. I would study for the test, take the test, work in the meantime, apply to schools. Then, I would choose, from a hopeful competitive batch of schools, the perfect school for me. After that, I would spend three years in school, learning, working, experience the legal world. I knew what was ahead of me. But, if I followed my heart, if I listened to my instinct that was steering me away from those known four years, consequently leaping into the unknown, I would land in exactly that: pure, raw, dark unknown. “What would I do?”, “Who would I be?”, “Who would I become?” were some of the questions that plagued me during this inner battle with myself in trusting and following my heart or living in security. What I was not aware of, though, was the outflowing amount of opportunity that lay ahead of me in my decision to follow my heart and leave my fear behind. Today, I am preparing to move to London, to attend graduate school at London School of Economics, and to begin my journey towards a career in journalism. In hindsight, I can confidently say that with time, everything worked out the way it was supposed to. Before graduating college, I would have never pictured myself living in London, pursuing journalism, or even writing for a blog in the year after graduation. And although everything worked out better than I could have ever imagined it to be, I still had moments of doubt, times of restlessness, and instinctively found myself wondering, “Well, what do I do now?” But, those quiet moments taught me that what I found my security in was not sufficient for the longing in my heart. I had to learn to allow my sense of security heed to the will of my heart. You see, we often idolize our sense of security. We find ourselves worthwhile when we have a security in our futures. We attribute value to ourselves when we are actively pursuing our futures. On the contrary, we wallow when we cannot actively do anything, when we lose control, when things are out of our hands. But, the truth is, our best prediction of what our future holds does not nearly reflect any amount of our worth. You are worthy whether or not you are pursuing your dreams. You are worthy even in the midst of the chaos and calamity of the unknown. You are worthy while you wait to figure it out- whatever that “it” may be. You are worthy even when you do not have anything figured out at all. You are worthy. So, as you wait, as you ponder, as you rest, as you feel helpless, and as you begin to dream again, let your worth be found in the strength of who you are. As you wait, let your spirit be free in the person you know yourself to be, instead of the future you think you ought to achieve. Believe in your worth- not because you have carefully mapped out the next five years of your life, but because your life, thus far, has created a uniquely beautiful, strong, and worthy person. Believe in yourself today- because you stand confidently and wholly loved in who you are today more than any other future “you” that you could possibly dream up. While you wait, believe that you are the truest “you” that you could be and that you stand distinguished exactly where you are, not wherever you think you ought to be.

Sparing Change

I will be the first to admit that I hate change. Personally, I believe that most of us, to some degree, hate change. While some of us cope with it better than others, I err on the side of trying to ignore change into nonexistence. Needless to say, it does not work for me. But, in this whirlwind year of post-grad, I have been learning not only to cope with change, but to look forward to all that it may bring. Almost two weeks ago, my oldest sister got married. She married the man of her dreams, her boyfriend of nearly ten years and, in what seemed to be only a few weeks, she bought a new place, set up her new home, and moved in with her new husband. This short period of time before her wedding day was filled with beautiful and treasurable new additions- a new brother, a new home to visit, a new life to admire, and a new union to wholeheartedly celebrate. But, it was also a time that I mourned because my oldest sister, my role model, my roommate of twenty-three years, and my best friend was moving out of our home. It was a lot of change to handle, especially for someone who unashamedly and admittedly hates change. But, as I learned to accept the inevitable, the unchangeable, I learned to be okay with change. Then, the unexpected happened: I learned to grow comfortable with change. So, why does change scare us so much? We hate change because it is unfamiliar- we have nothing to compare it to, nothing to judge it by, and we are uncertain of its outcomes. We also are uncomfortable with change because we grow comfortable and secure, instead, in our own perception of “normal”, in what we have created our own normal to be. But, when we begin to accept the inevitability of change, we also begin to open ourselves to all the opportunity that change will bring into our lives. As we grow more comfortable with change, as we begin to hate change less and less, we may begin to notice positive outcomes of change in our lives. You see, change is scary, but wholly necessary, because it shifts and sometimes altogether redefines our normal. But, in altering our sense of security, change causes us to accept and create new normals for ourselves. It allows us to adapt to different circumstances. Without change, we would never be challenged to thrive in newness, we may never grow to trust uncertainty, and we may never realize our potential beyond our own understanding. Change is good because it unlocks a growth we would never choose for ourselves- a growth that is uncomfortable, new, and incomparable, but a growth that is wholly necessary in order for us to experience new depths in all relationships and experiences in our lives.This change is good because it opens our eyes to an otherwise unseen world around us, a new order, an alternate way of life, or otherwise hidden opportunities. Change is good for us because it forces us to accept new normalcies for our lives, normalcies that take us in new directions and help us to uncover new meanings. If it were not for forceful and inevitable change in our lives, we would grow so accustomed to the normalcy of our lives that we would not look for or be interested in anything else. But, inevitable change shifts our focus and realigns our gaze to things, people, and experiences that we may not have looked to otherwise. Change causes us to adapt to creating new normalcies and to relying on the process of normalizing new things, new places, and new people. Change opens our eyes and our hearts to a world that encompasses vastly more than the parameters that hold our individually crafted sense of normalcy.Leo Tolstoy once said, “The changes in our life must come from the impossibility to live otherwise than according to the demands of our conscience not from our mental resolution to try a new form of life.” In wrapping my mind around this concept of change, I have thought of someone asking you, “Can you spare me some change?” When someone asks us this, we willingly, and usually unquestioningly, offer them the change they need- a few dimes, a nickel, a quarter. But what if we learned to spare change in our own lives? What if we learned to preserve it, to accept it, and to allow it to offer us all of the experiences, places, people, and things that we would not have been open to otherwise? What, then, would sparing change, embracing change, look like for each of us? Might we begin to make room in our lives to spare some change? And, might we allow that change to recreate new normalcies? I believe that we can. I believe that we can begin to grow comfortable and accepting of all the vastly different forms of change in our lives- the good, the bad, the enjoyable, the necessary. And, as we begin to accept change, I believe that we will grow to allow ourselves to adapt to new normalcies and to accept all the outcomes, good and bad, unexpected and expected, wholly beautiful and incomparable, that this change will bring us.

A Vow from a Bridesmaid’s Point of View

As we begin to approach the warm months of summer, wedding season comes into full swing. Some of us may find ourselves at a certain stage of life where “wedding season” seems to be in no particular season at all; instead, we attend, or we find ourselves a part of, weddings all year round. But, this coming Sunday brings about a particularly significant wedding among all the rest: my sister’s wedding. My family and I have been eagerly awaiting this day since my sister’s fiancé asked her to marry him almost five months ago. But, the truth is, our family has been looking forward to this union of theirs for the entirety of a  near ten years of their relationship. I have found this season of their engagement to be unlike any other. It has been filled with joy, love, bliss, and excitement. Parallelling the incandescent moments of happiness, however, were certain stressful and overwhelming moments as we worked to lock in every detail of the day’s festivities. Throughout this time, I watched my sister work through details and make plans, all while learning the curves of planning a wedding in the first place. Still, I was amazed to see it all come together. I watched florists, caterers, wedding coordinators all come together, working with each other’s preferences, styles, and creative outlets for the best interest of the bride. I witnessed parents, pastors, mentors, and friends step alongside my sister and her fiancé in the planning process- offering them advice, giving them their support, and loving them by serving them in this somewhat hectic but wholly beautiful stage of life. I observed my sister and her husband-to-be grow closer together, working through differences of opinion, resolving conflict, celebrating roadmarks, reflecting on memories of their relationship, and cherishing the love they have built for themselves over the course of the past ten years. Over the past few weeks, especially, I have been able to watch them build their new home where they will begin to build the rest of their lives. As I prepare to stand alongside my sister on her special day, I cannot help but reflect on her union with her husband from my point of view, a newfound perspective that will forever shed light on my presence as a wedding guest. You see, guests, bridesmaids, groomsmen, officiators, caterers, coordinators, et cetera, are hand selected by the bride and groom to be a part of their special day. On the day of the wedding, all of the staff have to work together as a team to make sure that everything runs smoothly, that flowers, centerpieces, and place settings are displayed to honor the couple’s taste, that the music brings guests and family together to celebrate the happiness of the day, and that every detail reflects the beauty and sentiment of the celebration. But, this teamwork, this support system, exists long after the bride and groom drive away, the lights are turned off, the chairs and tables are put away, and the final candle is blown out. You see, our support for the celebrated couple existed long before any wedding event and it will be just as essential as anniversaries come five, ten, twenty-five, fiftyfold. Attending their wedding day, then, is a reflection of not only the union that we have watched them form, but of the support we will continue to adorn them for the rest of their lives. So, a wedding day not only signifies the beginning of a deeper union between the bride and groom, themselves, but a union that we as the guests form with the couple. From where we stand, we extend our hands to them, we witness the commitment they make to each other, we promise to hold them accountable to their commitment, we humbly and empathetically listen to their future struggles, we selflessly and sacrificially support them in times of need, and we wholeheartedly rejoice with them in times of celebration. From where we stand, we commit to do life with them. Amid the chaos of choosing between a thousand different swatches of linens, of finding the perfect dress, of picking the perfect cake, and of locking down details of the perfect florals, menus, aesthetics, music, and everything else, we must remind ourselves of the love that warrants the craze in planning such a celebration in the first place. As we let go of our desire for perfection or our longing to control every detail to make sure everything goes exactly as planned, we must be reminded of the love that transcends perfection and surrenders to humility. As we begin to surrender to the will of things beyond our control, we may notice that this union glorifies a deeper meaning beyond anything that could be found in the events of a single day. When we open our hearts to this couple we adore, we witness the forming of a union between two imperfect people, honoring and bringing glory to a purely perfect entity and a wholly perfect God. So, as we celebrate with the couple, as family, as a member of the wedding party, or as a guest, we commit ourselves to support and join with all the sacrifices, desires, dreams, ambitions, achievements, and opportunities that this couple will undertake. As we witness the bride and groom vow to one another, we make our own vow to them, to strengthen, empower, equip, and encourage their union all the days of their lives.

While You Get to Where You’re Going

Sri Chinmoy once said, “Ours is a divine journey; therefore, this journey has neither a beginning nor an end... This journey has a goal, but it does not stop at any goal, for it has come to realise that today's goal is only the starting point of tomorrow's journey.” Whenever I am upset about something my mom always says to me, “Find something good about it; find something about it that you can take joy in.” Usually, this piece of advice only frustrates me more as I stew on what I think I deserve or how I believe I ought to be treated. I have often told her, “I don’t want you to tell me how I should be feeling. I just want you to listen to what I’m saying and agree with me.” More often than not, though, I find that when I am most frustrated that someone is not agreeing with my own thoughts or emotions, it is usually because they have advice worth heeding. At the end of May, I will have been out of college for a full year. In these past nine months, I have experienced time both begrudgingly drag on and simultaneously speed up. At times, I feel like it was just yesterday where I confidently walked across my graduation stage, ready to take on the world with open arms. Since that moment, I feel like no time at all has passed, as I try to frantically plan out the course of my life. Other times, that moment feels like it had taken place centuries ago, as I impatiently wait for the pieces of my life to fall into place. This first year since graduating college has been filled with unparalleled, harsh, worthwhile, and redeeming lessons and realities. My circumstances have not always or not quite nearly aligned with my expectations. I failed, I got back up, I followed my heart, I created, I imagined, and I dreamed again. Throughout the lowest valleys, the points of disappointment, the heartbreak and, likely, the excitement, the joy, and the accomplishments, I have been learning over and over again to take my mom’s advice- I have been learning to let go.Often, we find ourselves focused on the destination. Our circumstances do not meet our expectations. So, we tell ourselves that whenever we get to where we are going, we will be happy, fulfilled, that our souls will be satisfied, or that our lives will finally have meaning. We prize the end goal- a job everyone else covets, a perfect marriage, a complete family, an impressive degree, a magnificent home, an extravagant life. While we may accept that these goals of ours may not be easily handed to us, that we may have to work to achieve them, we are not always tolerant of any deviations on the road to obtaining our dreams. Somewhere along the way, we have convinced ourselves that the destination is more important than the roads and paths we take to get there. We forget about the value in getting to where we desire to be. But, when we become aware of our present circumstances and happenings, we begin to open our eyes to all we have to offer the world around us, despite where we think we should be or what we believe we should have achieved by now. Once we learn to let go of our expectations of our destinations, once we find joy amid the various bends and curves to our journey’s end, we will begin find value in our failed attempts, unmet expectations, unpredictable circumstances, harsh realities, and unachieved ambitions. When we open our eyes to wherever our feet are planted along our way to our self-defined success, we will embrace imperfection, we will be free of the weight of our own expectations, we will find the courage to surpass the limitations set before us, and we will become comfortable with resting in the “now.”In every circumstance, situation, lesson, and reality that teaches us to rejoice in our own unique journeys, we will become more enlightened of our own strength. We may, then, see more clearly the value in each step we take towards the destination of our dreams. We may find that there is not a single experience, disappointment, failure, nor any setback that is wasted along the journey in which we undoubtedly learn about our incomparable and invincible nature. When we begin to embrace our journey, we will discover that while we have so much to offer the world, we, just the same, have so much to offer whatever reality we find ourselves in and whatever circumstance we find ourselves amid. So, while you get to where you are going, pause, breathe, let go, look around, embrace the present, and rejoice in the person you are wherever you find yourself along the way.

We are Family

Look after one another. Marvin J. Ashton said, “If we could look into each other’s hearts and understand the unique challenges each of us faces, I think we would treat each other much more gently, with more love, patience, tolerance, and care.”Cape Town is a very adventurous and outdoor-oriented city, so my housemates and I would often go on hikes, exploring the endless, breathtaking beauty surrounding us. On our hikes and adventures we would quite literally and physically have to look out for one another. This was made easier and came more naturally as we grew to know each other better. We knew which of us were afraid of heights, which of us got cranky the earliest, which of us were more prone to wandering, which of us were athletic, which of us were determined, which of us were opinionated, which of us were stubborn. We knew each other, so we were able to comprehensively look after one another.When I first moved to Cape Town to study abroad, I was placed in a house full of people who were complete strangers to me; strangers with profoundly different experiences, wholly different upbringings, ways of life, ideas, opinions, passions, and dreams. I had not known them. I was unaware of what shaped them to be the people they are, the people that would be living with me, sharing a small space with me, for the next five months of my life. However, it did not take long before these people became my family, people I would deeply care for, people I would look out for. Soon enough, these were the people that I stood on the curb outside our house and cried with as we said, not our “goodbyes”, but our “see you laters”. We were the closest thing to a family that each of us had while being thousands of miles away from our actual families. We fought, we made up, we laughed, and cried together. We threatened to beat up anyone that hurt someone in our little family. We explored together. We experienced homesickness together and we helped each other adapt to an entirely different culture and an altogether different way of life. We helped each other process our emotions and experiences, and we leaned on one another for support. We opened up to one another, vulnerably exposed our hearts and souls to one another, and we trusted one another. As we continued to learn more about one another, we grew to selflessly and completely love one another. Throughout those five months, a group of complete strangers became a family.I still would do anything for any one of these people. But, I know that my family continues to expand. You see, in every season of our lives, we open ourselves to receiving more family. The people placed in our lives throughout the various bends, curves, ebbs, and flows are intentional. We are surrounded with distinct people for a reason, and if we allow ourselves to be open to these people, we continue to build our families. As we continue to receive new family members, new friends, new loved ones, our hearts grow more protective, more compassionate. We learn, then, that only when we truly open ourselves to knowing the people in our lives better, to learning their stories, inquiring of their pasts, listening to their desires and dreams, we equip ourselves to love them better. We see that the more we understand one another, the more territory we are able to explore of each other’s pasts, passions, desires, hopes and dreams, the more deeply and profoundly we are able to care for one another.As the end of my study abroad experience loomed nearer, I began to associate with the phrase, “Home is where the heart is.” More than a mere typography scribbled on a greeting card or a sentiment exposed through a nostalgic social media post, this phrase embodied everything I was feeling up to my departure. As I tried to make sense of my emotions, of leaving a place I had grown to love and had learned to call home, I came to realize that I was beginning to have many different homes. In all these homes, I had experiences that had shaped my life, I had grown in ways that I never expected, and I had learned to form families with the people around me. I began to realize that I might have different places that I would call home. I accepted the fact that my heart may forever be pulled in different directions. And, in all these different places that my heart would be drawn to, I would have families, people that I grew to trust and learned to adore. So, my home would not just be found in the places that my heart grew to love, but with the people that my heart related to; with various people that made up many different families I grew to adore.We have the endless opportunity to continue to grow our families, as long as we regularly open our hearts to one another and intentionally invest in learning one another’s stories. Our hearts can grow to love and adorn many different homes that house many different families in every season of life. As we come and go, wander and explore, may we continue to open our hearts to those around us. May we open our eyes to the beauty we see in one another. May we bravely, unapologetically, and vulnerably form many different families in many different places that we call home. And may we continue to learn from our families, grow with our families, and better protect, advocate for, sacrifice for, and selflessly love each family that we form.