archer hairline & pictures of grace

i have learned something very important.  it has to do with this quote:
   "Sweet but not saccharine, earnest but not grave..Archer Hairline is designed
    to hit just the right notes of forthrightness, credibility, and charm."
i love this quote, but if i didn't know what the author was talking about, i would not have guessed a font. of all things.  but that's my point: whoever wrote this worked very hard to choose the words he or she saw most fit to describe the object of description.  in this case, the object is wholly undynamic..inactive, unpowerful, and..dead.
it's for the same reason i love jane austen's conversations - we all lament that none of us talk the way "they" did.  the words they say to eachother are so formulated - truthfully, it's hard to imagine real people talking about nothing in particular using their best vocabulary.  good old jane.  i wonder if she knew what she was doing..i bet she did - to be able to hit an honest behavior directly on target the way she does produces some kind of glow.  it has a similar feeling to getting a great picture.  you know? how it feels when you know you have embedded an image in the memory card SO precious and perfect that it almost makes you afraid to touch the camera, for fear that you might some how accidentally erase it forever.  and a picture, comparatively, isn't even that important.
comparatively.  compared to the wholly dynamic..active..powerful..living..work of God.  how am i, who cannot even come up with an example of something i can't describe, supposed to put to words the acts of a God who is all these things?
it's for the same reason that i love oswald chambers.  because on december fifteenth, he writes a thought entitled "approved unto God".  rachel just read it to me.  and it of course, even though it isn't december fifteenth, (because that doesn't really matter now) he blows us away.  it was hearing a piece of his marvelous anthology that drew out the realization that was lurking in my subconscience.  the sermon is based on 2 Timothy 2:15, which says this:
   "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not
    need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth."
i don't think i would have interpreted this bit of scripture the way he does, and maybe i wouldn't have even gotten from his thoughts what i did if i had not heard it from my friend.  here is what he says:
   "Struggle to re-express some truth of God to yourself, and God will use that expression to
    someone else...Go through the winepress of God where the grapes are crushed.  You
    must struggle to get expression experimentally..."
it is annoying to have to leave out anything but the whole thought.  but this is more or less the concept i am - ironically - struggling to put on the table.  i am well acquainted with "truth that has been dumbly struggling in [me] for utterance."  i think many of us are.  why should we let the truth struggle, when we can fight to set it free? oswald is a reminding us that it is not only a possibility, but a responsibility to work hard enough to say the things that are true...it is most important that we take hold of our right to 'freeing of speech', if you will.  and while i am here, this will be my striving point.  yes.  i am striving to follow the Lord. and as i am, i will strive to find the words that may only brush their feathers against justice to what things He has done.  oh, great things He has done.
as the old hymn says: oh tell of His might, oh sing of His grace...it's time now to stop letting the grace go by, uncelebrated in its miserable lack of being retold.  time to stop letting the photograph get away, leaving the hollo, falling feeling that ensues.  because that feeling may only last a little while, but that's comparatively..remember?  i want to take pictures of the grace.  word pictures.  i want to store up the comparatively more invaluable pictures of grace, and sing of them loudly.
i think, i have decided, to be an english major.  if for no other reason, there will be plentiful opportunity to be reminded to take pictures of His grace.

nug life 101

i have arrived in nugget town, praise the Lord! i cannot believe how blessed i am to be sitting here..in this new house, completely whelmed (which IS a word, in case you were wondering..right, mom? ;) by the blessings.
i realized last night, as fear was beginning to set in over dad and cj leaving...that now that i'm here, i get to wait on the Lord for Him to show me what He's brought me here for...and what sweeter thing could there be but to wait on the Lord and follow His lead?
on top of it, shelley and katie and i just watched pride and prejudice.  which i have forgotten how much i love.  so, yes, to be absolutely cliche, i will quote lizzy:  completely, perfectly, incandescently happy...is how i feel.  the Lord has given me so much hope in Him, so much to strive towards, and so much to look forward to.  i hope that if you are reading this, and haven't known Him to be such a God, that you will discover Him to be so! 

^ this is a cop-out. i didn't take it.  but i have seen a view like this over the trees! i'll take my own soon, i hope.
i know this is a pretty sad post.  but hopefully, i'll be more specific as this gets to feeling more natural.  the truth is, it feels kind of funny to be doing this at all! but i super want to keep you posted...so i'm going to stick with it.  i just need to give it some time to get a feel for it, to feel like i'm not talking to myself :)  it'll come.

more rain, no longer monday

i woke up this morning to wild thing telling me the latest plan...which is that we're leaving today, at threeish!  which was surprising...and sad.  i finally felt what i normally feel when something is about to change...the panicked search for the nonexistant plug i want to pull, to stop the whole operation and pretend the idea was never born, to keep living life just as it is.  i love the idea of embracing change, i just struggle with the reality that comes with.  after halway pulling myself together, i re-read Psalm 19...which i read yesterday, too, and found such affirmation in it.  especially verses seven and eight, which say this:
   "The law of the LORD is perfect,
   reviving the soul.
   The statutes of the LORD are trustworthy,
   making wise the simple.
   The precepts of the Lord are right,
   giving joy to the heart."
it reads more like a proverb, really.  but what it said to me is that if i believe that the way of the Lord is perfect...that He is trustworthy, that He is right...then i can also find restoration and joy in Him.  and He will make sense of the things that don't.  He will do for me what i cannot do for myself. 
yesterday our car was not ready to leave town when we were...and even though it felt yucky to think that maybe we were out of line...or that we shouldn't have trusted that it was the right car...etc.  there are a hundred possible ways to lament misfortune.  but there is one all-encompassing, infinitely sweeter principle - which is to trust in the Lord.  Praise God that He is giving me so many opportunities to expand my trust...i surely need it.
and so, we continue to pray.  and to trust.  and to love.

just today.

did i mention that i have only been home for three weeks? and everything - i mean everything, i.e. credits transferring, car hunting...car purchasing, home-finding, date-setting, liscence getting (actually, we're still working on that part.  but we'll get there).  you get it...all of the elements of making a move, a million calls and arrangements it seems, have happened in three weeks.  my dad has been the hero of making it happen - he just jumped in and knew what to do, which he's really good at in general.  then mom has been the hero of keeping dad okay, especially today.  oh my goodness.  let me tell you about today.

today was going to be the day that we left - dad, cj and i - because i didn't mention it before, but this is a move-slash-college-visit-tour.  so we're all going.  and there is that part about i can't legally - or even illegally - drive yet.  don't get me wrong, i am so excited to visit colleges with my sister (guess that's the little admissions intern in me) but it does add another element for an already-too-unreal adventure.

so yes, today was going to be the day.  until we discovered that the jeep we bought for the purpose of said adventure is not ready to go.  and she needs more than just a little work.  now, finding and buying this car has been a big part of these past few weeks, and it was somewhat of an act of faith just trusting that it was a wise purchase.  so now we're in a position of needint to trust again...i really have no idea how all of this will work out, but you know what?  i have seen that it is so much more important to fully rely on the Lord than to try to fix stuff like this myself, or even to lament the situation.  it is what it is, and i want us all (my family and i) to come away from this having learned more about trusting and the God in whom we trust.  and so, we pray.  please pray with us:
- that God would make a way for us to go through with this move, if it is His will, and that we would heed his instruction in this time of complete...i don't know, not-control.
- that we would be given wisdom as to how to handle the financial decisions that need to be made in this time
- that He would alleviate anxiety and instill peace.  deep, lasting peace, in our hearts, to see us through this bump in the road.

He is making all things work together for my good.  I know it, beyond any shadow of doubt.  I hope that you are being given opportunities to trust in the Lord as well, even in these little things - how sweet it is to know and trust in Him!

if i haven't already told you...

here it is, in fast-forward: i had the opportunity to go away this summer with campus outreach on summer leadership project, which is a time when college students from different campuses in a designated region go to the beach to live, work, and learn about God. essentially. it isn't hard to describe, exactly, but it is hard to convey the essence. what i can tell you is, i learned vastly about God, myself, and about real, practical faith. i found vocabulary for things i previously could not describe, but could only feel. though there wasn't as much time for reflection as i might have liked (which truthfully would have been an inordinate amount for any reasonable person) the Lord still made clear the lessons he had for me.  the story of this summer certainly has much to offer as a testimony of His absolute greatness.
that said, the Lord really showed me the importance of finding a community that enables us to run after Him with everything we've got.  i know that He has given me the desire to pursue Him, and to meet that desire, He has given me a new community to grow into.  so, i am leaving home, and leaving Gordon - two communities that have blessed me (and continue to bless me) enormously, to walk this other path.
was that vague enough for you? realistically, what it means is i'm moving down to Georgia, where i will (1) finish college at a state school where i can (2) be involved with the ministry that campus outreach is already establishing there.  i am moving into a house with five girls i met this summer, who have so graciously accepted my coming and welcomed me into their home.  and after that...well, that's God's call.
there is no other way to describe this decision other than natural.  different from other choices or turning points in my life, i did not hear the voice telling me which actions to take.  rather, all of the pieces came together first in my mind, then in reality.  which left me in the position where i really needed to believe that this is something the Lord has for me - and friends, it has been a journey of its own, but by the grace of God i have come to believe in His purpose in this practical, everyday, reality thing.
so, there it is.  the only version i know how to tell - i am yet to relay this story with ease or eloquence.  i am choosing to believe that far too much of it was divinely orchestrated for it to completely make mortal sense.  but it doesn't have to.  i am totally okay with that.