Not for the Faint of Heart

Life is not for the faint of heart. It's just not. At least life the way I want to live it, the way I feel called and compelled to live it, is not for the faint of heart.

Photograph by AW Photography

Of course there's a portion of me, bigger than I want to admit, that craves comfort. I want the job with every benefit imaginable. I don't want to experience other's pain and struggles daily. I want to come home and spend hours reading or watching TV, in my pajama's, and eat as much ice cream as is humanly possible without gaining a pound.

I want the newest iPhone. I want a closet full of shoes and bags and to live in an exotic city (read: not Oklahoma City). I want to travel and write and be asked to travel and write. I long to be known. Not in a personal way but in a way that I am recognized and that recognition fills my bank account until it overflows.

But when I am quiet, when I distance myself from the world, there's a stirring and longing in my heard to live life the way Jesus would have me. And that sort of life is not for the faint of heart.

I waiver on my heart's status nearly every day. Sometimes multiple times throughout the day. I spend time with Jesus in the morning (second week in a row of starting my day off with the Bible, which is a record) and rest in His presence.

But then I am rushing to dress three littles, play or read books for a few minutes, make getting into the car seats fun (which it never is), have a dance and sing along in the car (current faves: Shake It Off by Taylor Swift and Let It Go), unbuckle three littles and manage to get them all into their classrooms.

After that, there's work, email, grad school, practicum, and a million other items. Sometimes I seek Jesus out. More often, he is a passing thought. More often I'm concerned with not having an iPhone 6, not being thin enough, how much coffee I need to make it through the day, and reading emails while sitting at a red light.

It has to stop. At some point and preferably before I leave this earth and enter into heaven.

Photograph by AW Photography

The stirring and longing on my heart is there for a reason. I have gifts and talents. I have a purpose. I have a life that Jesus needs me to lead. Though I don't quite understand how or why, I have been placed exactly here and exactly at this moment. I have been called into a place where there are no borders, where I am overwhelmed on a daily basis and aware of my lack of strength, where I have no choice but to fully trust and rely on him.

When I listened to Oceans today on the way to work, the words slammed into me and the tears poured out of me. I so badly want to be in control of my life. I so desperately want to plan for everything that could happen and account for it all. And while I know that God has blessed me with forthsight and the ability to fight for the voiceless, I am not God. I am only me, the tiniest drop in the ocean, and I have to remember that God is bigger than any of my plans, any of my fights, and any impact I could have (or would have/should have/have had) on another's life.