My Past Is Forgotten: Most of the Time

Praise Him Any Way

Don't you just love it when life is great, God is speaking to you and you feel so wonderful about all that is happening in your life? I do. However, days like today come and try to discourage you and make you feel defeated. A person from your past pops up, says something negatively about you and it gets back to you. Frustrating is an understatement. I have the right as a person to call/e-mail or message that person and set them straight. If I have not brought their past up and tried to make them feel small, what gives them the right to do so to me? Then I think about how God would have me respond to this person. What would I say to them that would not tear them down (eventhough they tore me down), what should I do to allow the past to die (though they keep resurrecting it)? Pray for them. Forgive them. Move on again and allow the past to die. Again. I must continue to do this as many times as it rears it's ugly head. I have to daily die to myself, but also to the history of my life being flung in my face. I learned a new song this past week here at SEBTS called Behold Our God. The chorus goes something like this:

Behold our God, seated on His throne

Come let us adore Him

Behold our King, nothing can compare

Come let us adore Him

Adore Him. This is something I have been trying to do more. Treasuring the Gospel and treasuring my relationship with Jesus. He is good. My relationship with Him is growing and changing every day. If I am truly adoring Him I must try to find as much as possible grace for others. I have to love those who make me mad. I have to ignore things said sometimes and go to God. Will you please pray for me? Ask God to continue to grow humility in me. Thank you blogger friends. 

Boaz

Boaz. What a name, right? Not something you would name your first-born or any child for that matter. I have been reading through Ruth and thinking about my Boaz. I want someone who is strong, not just physically, but spiritually and mentally. I need someone who can challenge me and help me pursue my love relationship with Jesus. I want someone who will walk beside me and minister to the people we will be called to. I look forward to submitting to this man. I can’t wait to share my life with him, but I am not looking for him. I am waiting on him. I think there is a huge difference in looking for someone and waiting on someone. I know God has the right Boaz for me and that he will come when we are both ready. I know that God has called me to marriage and a family and I have recently been more excited about not looking for him. Waiting for him is so much nicer. I don’t have to worry about making things work or messing things up. God is doing it and he never fails. Singleness was such a burden until a few years ago. It weighed on me and stressed me out. I was overwhelmed by wedding showers and candlelit ceremonies; wondering when it would be my turn? Now as I embark on a new journey of seminary and meeting new people and finding a new church, I find myself looking to Jesus to lead me and place me where I need to be.  It’s nothing like I thought, but that’s exciting too! I am completely satisfied with who I am in Jesus and where He is leading me. It’s an overwhelming feeling to feel this. I feel unworthy, but thankful.

My First Chapel

Hands are raised all around me and I feel the stinging uncomfortable feeling of tears coming. I don’t want to cry. I am so excited to be here. Amazed that God has gotten me to this point in my journey and been so amazing in every intricate detail. It’s been a “look what MY GOD can do” journey. As the notes to a new song, Behold Our God fill the chapel at Southeastern Seminary, I am overwhelmed. I am a vile person. I have done things, thought things and said things that I shouldn’t. I have been involved in sin that makes me feel ashamed. I almost bow my head with the weight of that shame, but I remember that God has saved me from that. I am here in this place at this time in my life to worship and glorify Him. I stop the damning thoughts that Satan is whispering into my heart and begin to sing. I belong here. I was brought here. Why am I allowing Satan to make me feel any different? I feel like I am getting to the top of a hill where I am about to see over and look out over the horizon at what God has for me. I cannot wait to see where He leads. 

Faith: Not So Easy

Faith, hope and trust are words we hear almost on a daily basis. They seem so nice and innocent. Beautiful words to have on your mantle or framed above your sectional in your beautifully decorated living room. However, I have been seeing them as an extremely difficult part of my daily life lately. I have been in the transition period of moving, finding a new job and becoming a student once again. So far, nothing has worked out. I am overwhelmed, but desperately clinging to the promise that God works things out for me, because I am seeking His will in my life. I know I am supposed to go back to school. I am hoping that God has it in His plans for me to teach as well. It's important for me to be able to pay my bills and not be in debt.  However, I have not had much luck in finding a job. SO, I am driving to Wake Forest Sunday and visiting schools (resume in hand) Monday and Tuesday. Overwhelming. I am praying that my faith+action= a job. I ask you to pray that God will direct my stops and give me favor with the principals I am able to meet with. I know God has this all planned out. I can't wait to brag about how He answered my prayers! Thank you for your support and prayers.

Accepted

I have been accepted to Southeastern Seminary, officially. I am so excited to move and begin a new chapter in my life, but a little scared. How will I pay for everything? Will I be a good student? Am I going to be successful in my new field? Will I find a job? I honestly don't know the answers to any of those questions, but I am finding that I can trust God and have faith that He works all things out. I find myself becoming overwhelmed at the lack of answers to such important questions, but I always find peace in knowing God has worked it all out already and I do no good by worrying. I have to trust Him.

Single...the story of my life

True Love Waits, but it's hard

Every great story—every story worth telling—is one of suffering and endurance and overcoming. Stories of those who faced insurmountable odds, but persevered to the end. I feel like my life is a story like that. Though I don't feel many would consider it worthy of the big screen, God considers ME worthy. As I go to wedding after wedding and receive baby shower invitations I grow a little more weary with my station in life. I am genuinely overjoyed for my sweet friends and the joy and happiness God is bestowing upon them, but it's hard to see so many receive what I long for.

I still go to bed alone and wonder how long the waiting will continue. I don’t have easy answers anymore (like I did when I was 20), but I can testify to a good God who is allowing me to suffer deeply, beyond what I ever thought I could. He is sustaining me with Himself, blessing me and giving me hope that one day He will grace me with a husband who leaves me absolutely speechless with his love and care.

My single years are sometimes unspeakably difficult. It doesn't feel natural or “right” to be single at 29, and yet I know I probably will be for several more years. I know I don’t have the gift of singleness, and while I continue to fight for contentment and joy, I am not at home in singleness.

I have to rest in knowing that He is doing what is best, even in the midst of great heartache and weariness in waiting. I see incomparable glimpses of Christ in this suffering. I have to choose joy, fight for my tender heart, nurture a hopeful spirit, and fix my eyes on Jesus,” after all...He is the only one worthy of my gaze. 

You're Smart

A student in my after school class today humbled me. He was struggling through 2-digit subtraction worksheet when several of his amigos started jabbing fun at him in Spanish and laughing. It wasn't a menacing chortling session, but I could tell he wasn't exactly happy they were teasing him. I called him over to me and asked what was going on. He was extremely reluctant to talk with me, but then blurted out, "They make fun of me for talk Mestico."

I taught this adorable little brown-skinned boy in Kindergarten two years ago. I immediately thought back to the times of frustration in my class when I felt I could not properly communicate with him. I remember awkward moments during intervention when he looked questioningly at me or moments of terror when I asked him a question during whole group time. I snapped back to the present. As I looked into his embarrassed brown eyes, I smiled at him. "Do you realize how smart you are? How many people do you know who can speak three languages? I asked. He smiled at me and I asked him how to say a million things in his language. He was beaming with pride after our 5 minute talk. He walked over to the other students who had previously been poking fun at him and said, "Miss Crews say I'm smart. I am special."

My heart soared. I thought of all of the times when I have been embarrassed by my actions or words. Moments where I had fallen and committed what I thought was an unforgivable offense. How many times have Satan and His demons laughed at me and made fun of me? How many nights have my eyes overflowed with tears and my heart been heavy? There have been many times in the last 5 years when God has come over to me and said, "Do you realize how much I love you? I love you more than anything and you are special to me." Today was a simple reminder of how much God loves me and how He speaks His love over me, even if it's just to say I'm smart.

Moving Forward

 I have been thinking that God’s love is terrible. Think of what it includes: us, with our best and our worst, with our failed attempts and outright cruelty, with our wrong motives for right actions and our right motives for wrong actions... us, with the mess we have made of the world, with our brokenness and despair, with our rebellions and inadequacies. We are the ones included in and redeemed by the deep and wide love of God. It astonishes me that Christ died for me while I was still a sinner! (Romans 5:8). Why does He choose to give me new mercies every single morning when I am wicked compared to His amazing perfection? I think God sent Jesus to pass through our world as a figure of light and truth, sometimes angry and sometimes merciful, but always just, effective and loving. His life was spent around those who drew disapproval from many, yet he was never insecure or ashamed of His desire to offer them His love and promise His kingdom. I feel sometimes that I am that undesirable. I feel like the woman who was brought to Jesus to be stoned when found in sin. It humbles me that Jesus simply wants me to hand over my life in complete confidence and simply be satisfied in Him. If I desire peace, certainty and transparency in my life I have to give Him everything. Lord, help me abandon myself, continuing to surrender my insecurities and failures. Make me see your faithfulness and sufficiency in my life each day.