This time last year, I was considering my resolutions for 2015 and rather than a list of things I wanted to accomplish, I chose a word. Ironically the word was patience. Somewhere along the year, I lost track of my word, however, my word never lost track of me. This was a year of patience. The definition I used last year was quiet, steady perseverance; even-tempered care; diligence. I can definitely see those themes woven throughout the year, even when I may not have even realized it.

Perhaps because I was pregnant a good chunk of the year, patience was consistently a theme. Growing a baby is a slow process. And our sweet little guy waited an extra two weeks to make an appearance. I had to laugh today when I looked back and saw my word for the year was patience. Whether I wanted to learn it or not, my baby boy has taught me a lot about patience and a lot about living in the moment. From his late arrival to his sweet baby coos and snuggly demeanor, I never knew I could love so fiercely. And I have a feeling he will keep me on my toes for the rest of his life.

I also learned a lot about patience through launching and running a ministry to women in our local strip clubs.  I kept telling people it would be a slow ministry, but telling people and fighting the discouragement that can bring are two different animals.  As I look back over a year of consistently hanging out in a strip club, I can tell you I learn more about patience each time I go. I am continuously reminded pursuing relationships with broken people is never easy and takes time. However, this is what Jesus called us to do and time and compassion are exactly what is needed inside those walls.

The list could go on of ways I have seen God build patience in me. And while I am no master at patience, I can honestly say God used this year to grow in me a quiet perseverance. 2015 has not been one of long lists of accomplishments, career climbing, or resume building. However, it has been a year of sweet conversations, baby cuddles, and saying no to a myriad of activities. It has been a year of refocus and new identities. It has also been full of plenty of moments when I wondered what God was doing.  I am still not sure in a lot of those moments, but  I do believe with all my heart each moment was and is being used to teach me patience.

So see you later 2015. Thanks for the memories, lessons, and experiences.

Seven months ago I stepped into a local strip club for the first time. Unprepared and unsure of what would happen next, we went and simply asked if it we could keep coming to support the girls who work there.  I believe with my whole heart Jesus loves them and His love compelled us to go. While I believe God can open any door He feels like, I was still a little surprised when we were met with excitement and an absolute yes. In fact, the #1 question I get when I talk about our ministry is “what do the club owners think?” And honestly, I can’t explain it. Perhaps they understand at some level the job is tough and perhaps they are just curious. I think they struggle to comprehend why a group of church ladies would care about them or their club. We are typically the ones picketing outside, not the ones sitting across the table from a dancer asking her about her day and her kids.

Seven months later, going into the clubs hasn’t gotten any easier. As I left last night, my heart was broke in a million pieces once again. I listened to a girl recount a story of incredible loss and addiction and I struggled to respond.  My heart ached for her. Over the last seven months, not only have I worked hard to grow a ministry, I have been growing a child inside of me. Perhaps more than anything in my life thus far, this has changed me. As I sit and listen to the girls we serve, my new mom heart gets so easily overwhelmed. I ache for them. I hurt for them. And some days, I want nothing more than the ability to wave a magic wand and change their lives. But I don’t have a magic wand or all the answers. All I do have is a deep relationship the One who can heal broken hearts. The One who can take loss and hurt and pain and make it new.  So we pray. And we keep going. And we keep loving and pursuing.  And my heart keeps aching. I am confident this is what God has called me to do. To ache for them as He does.  To pursue them as He does. And to point them to Him. Because I don’t have the answers. I can’t change their life. I can’t make the hurt and loss go away.  But I can sit with them in their hurt and listen.  When the words escape me, I can simply be there. And isn’t that what we all want?  Someone to listen. Someone to care about our story. Someone to ache with us or rejoice with us or laugh with us.

So while I will never say going is easy, I will keep going because God has called us. His heart aches for them and He has called us to the mission of aching for the things that break His heart.  It’s messy. It’s tough. It breaks my heart. And it pushes me to dig deeper into Christ and pray hard for my own heart and for the ladies I see week in and week out in the club.

Lent is one of those interesting times in the life of the church.  You have people from all ends of the religious spectrum-Catholic, conservative, to contemporary-who celebrate the season in a myriad of ways. Some people deny themselves something, some take the time to reflect, and there is a growing trend of participating in acts of kindness or justice.

Personally, I tend to vary in my approach to lent. In past years, I have sacrificed something, participated in acts of justice studies, and done nothing.  As I head into this Lenten season, my heart and mind are struggling in the world of balancing life, preparing to enter parenthood, work, and a quickly growing ministry. I have a pile of books about 9 high beside my bed waiting to be read, my inbox is bombarded daily with baby e-mails, advertisements, and well-meaning e-mails from individuals wanting to get involved or needed me to do something.

As hard as I have been working to clear my schedule and focus on simply being, each week seems to come and go in a blur. Perhaps this is because I have been working hard.  Somewhere in all of it, I forgot I am not in this alone.  I am more aware than ever of my feelings of unworthiness and fears over the future. Something about all of a sudden being responsible for the well-being of a tiny person does that to you! So oh what a glorious reminder it was this morning as Lent begins, I am not in this alone. My imperfections, sin, and inability to manage everything are nailed to the cross.  My fears and feelings of unworthiness are no longer mine to bear.

All of this caused me to pause, step back, and focus on something a little different for this season of Lent.  I am committing to carving out a portion of each day to pause, breathe, and spend time giving everything over to the One who does hold it all and who can do it all. He is the hope, the encouragement, and the answer to my imperfections and fears.   And while there are many tools out there to help, the one I settled on for this season is by She Reads Truth.  Rather than giving up, I am giving in to the One who gave it all. Join me in a journey to focus on Jesus and our inability to do anything without His guidance.

Our campus pastor challenged us to be more open with our giving stories. I think this was a mini-ploy to help him convince the members of our church tithing was a good thing, but it still caused me to reflect back over my giving journey.

To begin, I have to give my parents major credit for this area of my life. They have always modeled giving for us. Even when things got tough, the church always got 10%. My mom raised us to believe if we wanted something, we just needed to pray about it. I will admit, this may not always be the best parenting strategy, but on the flip side, I have seen clothes and groceries show up on our doorstep, bills mysteriously get paid, and opportunities open up that from a human standpoint simply should not have. They raised me to be generous and to remember I own nothing, God owns everything.

As I grew up and began to manage my own finances, despite all their teaching, I struggled in this area. Not because I doubted the importance of tithing, but because I spent a good bit of time traveling to developing countries and didn’t want my money going to pay electric bills when there were starving children to feed. (yes, I actually thought that) So for a period in my life, I sponsored a few children, supported some missionary friends, and belonged to a collective tithing group. We tithed a portion of our money to the group and used it to meet tangible needs the group brought to the table. It was actually an incredible thing to be part of and although at times our tithes went to pay electric bills, they were earmarked for the broken, hurting people in our lives. I learned about the importance of being in relationship and maintained the practice of giving even as I wrestled with tithing to an actual church.

When I got my first “real” adult job, I also started attending my current church.  At the beginning I was not a regular giver, but I did give occasionally because you were supposed to give to your church right? Then I started getting involved and I saw the integrity behind the finances being entrusted to my church. First off, they give 10% of all their income away. Period. Even in the tough times.  Second, I can assure you, no one is getting rich off my dollar. And at the end of the day, electric bills do have to get paid so the church can continue to reach those who desperately need Jesus.  As my husband and I started dating and got married, we both decided tithing was going to be a non-negotiable.  Thanks to online giving, which makes it super easy, we allocate our money each month first to God.  Is it always easy? No way.  Some months, I would really like to have those few extra dollars. But has it blessed our life? In ways I cannot even recount.

I know, sometimes life is tough and finances are tight and you can’t give as much as you might like. But let me encourage you to start somewhere. The more you give, the more you are trusting God to provide and the less you are relying on your paycheck. As that happens, God can take all the glory when crazy cool things happen like your electric getting paid or the money stretching a little farther this month. He also gets the glory when rough times come and the car breaks down again and the baby is sick and the bills are mounting. When we trust our finances to Him and walk in the principle of generosity, something changes. Is it always a walk in the park? Nope, but I believe with everything in me, no  matter what happens, giving is a reminder we are not in control.

Perhaps one of my favorite verses is Malachi 3:10, “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the LORD Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.”  I can assure you, we are not rich in the world’s eyes. Nor do we have all the newest, fanciest stuff. But I can tell you, our marriage is stronger, our faith is stronger, and our lives are truly different because we have been faithful.

Normally I make New Year’s Resolutions. A lot of them. And they are usually a long list of big accomplishments and dreams I hope to achieve throughout the next 365 days.  They start out well and somewhere around April or May, I completely abandon them only to return to them somewhere around November to realize I either a) failed or b) unknowingly accomplished the goal.  The new year is a wonderful time to try to kick off old habits or start some new ones and I am not knocking that, but I decided this year I was not going to make a single resolution.  Since I am a chronic overachiever, I have zero trouble adding more things to my to-do list than hours in oh, all eternity.  And I will admit, I like lists. They are neat and orderly and enable you to cross things off them.

But.. not this year. This year I decided I was going to pick a word and operate from said word.  As I make decisions and move forward throughout this year, everything comes back to a single word.  So for this year, the word I chose was..

Patience

I like this definition I found- quiet, steady perseverance; even-tempered care; diligence. To me, patience is about being in the moment. It is about allowing myself the space to relax, to be, to mess up, to sleep in, to stay up late, to say no, to love, and to move slow.  It is about having patience with my husband, my friends, my family, and those I encounter each and every day.  It is the quiet, steady breathing in and out of life which allows you to put aside the high goals of achievement and instead embrace the joys of the moment.

My prayer is at the end of this year, I can look back and see not a long list of accomplishments, but moments in which I loved those around me better, enjoyed life more, took time to relax, and invested in Kingdom building.   I may not be able to say I kicked a bad habit or crossed things off a bucket list or succeeded at such and such, but I hope I can say I grew in the art of patience.

If you already set resolutions, continue on, but if you are searching for something different, perhaps it starts with a single word.

While I am working on finding my approval solely in Christ and trusting Him alone, I will be the first to admit, it is a true work in progress.  A SLOW work. I still find myself craving the validation of others and rising and falling on their words. I still find myself trying in my own strength to get things done. I have been making more time for praying, writing, and I started a Bible study last week on my own which has proven to be exactly the right words.  In the midst of all of these measly efforts, I am convinced God knows sometimes my heart still needs a little extra urging.  As I am growing in letting go of my need for the approval of others, I am also learning, sometimes, God masterfully uses His children to speak life into each other and the result is beautiful.  It is not about gaining their approval, but it is about life-giving encouragement.

Enter my new friend Stefanie.  I am convinced from the start, God orchestrated this meeting.   Last weekend, a church in our area put on a one-day women’s conference. Oh I wish you could have all come!  It was beautiful, freeing, and soul-filling.  When they began advertising for it, the speaker had just happened to start a strip club ministry.  Now, I will be the first to jump in the car and road trip it anywhere to talk to someone who has a tad more experience than I do starting a ministry, but this time, I didn’t have to leave my own town.  Through some AMAZING ladies who happen to believe in the calling God put in my heart (which whoa, why??!), the speaker graciously agreed to sit down and chat with me before the event.  It has been events like this where I can just sit back and say, “All glory to God!”  So I headed to her hotel and was graciously met by the speaker and her ministry partner Stefanie.   Two hours or so later, I left busting at the seams with excitement, boldness, and life.  I left confident in my own inadequacy (because I mean, what better way for God to totally show up right?) and convinced when God calls, He equips.   Stefanie and I had an instant connection. I can’t explain it nor will I try, but what I will say is, God used Stefanie to speak calm to my fears and life to my heart.

As I have taken each step forward pursuing this dream, I have seen God show up. I have been on the receiving end of a lot of generosity, encouragement, and support.  And while my heart is to serve women in the clubs, I have also seen some beautiful things happen when the Church comes together to love the lost.  My own heart has grown in learning to love, to forgive, to let go, and to step forward.  And at the end of it all, through the good times and the hard times, through the current successes and the future challenges, I know God is using these moments to remind me He is good. No matter what, He is good.  And because He is good, He will equip, He will provide, and He will comfort.   A precious message my Type A personality needs to hear over and over and over again.

Sometimes the message is heard at the right time in the right place.  For me this happened at our monthly leadership meeting at my church. Honestly, these meetings typically are just something I check off a to-do list.  Another day, another meeting.  A few weeks ago I even made a monthly calendar to keep all the meetings I have straight-it totaled like 30.  (which I will admit is RIDICULOUS!) But this month, it was different.  The theme was on creating margin in our lives and the message could not have come at more perfect time.

Perhaps I was extra exhausted or overwhelmed or feeling the weight of a never-ending schedule and a never clean house.  I hate clutter. I hate mess. And despite the craziness of my schedule, it is usually neat and orderly.  But lately, it has been CRAZY. I can’t even keep it straight which has led to double-commitments and to many “yes” answers.

Enter Bill Hybels.  This man seems to always know what to say.  In a 10 minute video, he completely altered my thoughts, emotions, and feelings.   I came in feeling heavy, frustrated, and ready to quit. And I left feeling encouraged, challenged, and ready to quit. He asked some simple questions-

What replenishes you?

As I have reflected on this, I realized my schedule has become full of things that drain me and pushed out any time for those things that replenish me.   Things like long runs, traveling, going to conferences, reading, and writing.  I am by nature an introvert.  The more I am around people, the more exhausted I feel.  It is in the alone time, the time spent listening to worship music, writing, or reading when I feel full.  So I have decided these things are going to non-negotiable on my schedule. I will carve out the time to replenish because if I don’t the crash and burn would come. 

Who do you want to be? 

This question requires some more thought.  We don’t think in terms of “being”. We think in terms of “doing””. What do you do? Can you do this? Can you serve here or volunteer here or give here?  A flaw in our culture, we equate doing with success and satisfaction.  Guilty as charged.  My schedule is full of doing.  And it’s not all bad. In fact, most of it is really good stuff. It is life-changing stuff. But wrestling with who I want to be is going to mean taking a hard look at the doing in my life.  I don’t have an answer yet. I am too empty to think about what I want to be. Hence the first question.

What do you need to add to your calendar to get there?

Perhaps the better question for me is what do I need to delete from my calendar to get there. 🙂  First step is to add time for those things that replenish me. I am going to work hard to schedule time for rest and reflection. I have a stack of books I want to tackle. And I am going to dust off my running shoes and try again. Even if I have to walk.  I am going to take the time to replenish and pray and think through who do I really want to be and what do I need to eliminate or add to get there.

As we head into the weekend, take a minute to reflect on those questions. Perhaps you can take one step this weekend to start the process. For me, I am going to a women’s conference which is something replenishing to my soul.

Here is a link to a shortened video- Simplify Session 1 and I think I am going to add the book to my reading list.