God is at Work

College has been incredible so far! I'm loving Lipscomb and the city of Nashville is just amazing!! I feel so blessed to be in such a great part of this country! It was pretty scary moving so far and being so unsure of so many things! It was definitely quite a big leap of faith to come all the way down here with only knowing a couple people.

The biggest blessing here at Lipscomb has been my roommates. Caitlyn is my roommate and then Courtney and Sydney are the two girls on the other side of our suite. They have all made me feel so welcome and we've grown a lot in our friendships since school has started. I already feel super comfortable with them and I love them so much! I'm so excited to see our friendships grow even more over the years! I know that God has placed us all together for a reason!! :)

It's hard being at a new place and not completely adjusted yet and being so far from my parents and extended family. I'm missing my grandma like crazy! I'll be home in 2 weeks though and I can't wait to give everyone hugs and hangout with them and hear more about what's been going on in their lives! They all mean the world to me and it's way harder being away than I thought it would be. Obviously, some days are harder than others. Today just happens to be one of those more difficult days. As you probably know, my grandpa passed away back in June and I still get really upset about that at times . The most unusual things will remind me of him and I just break down. I'm so glad that I can rest in knowing that he's with the Lord, but it's just really hard to let go of someone that I loved so much, shared so much with and cared about so much! The week that he died was seriously one of the hardest weeks of my life and I think back on that quite often. I'm so glad I was there by his bedside for about four days straight up until moments of him passing, but there were a lot of things that I saw that are very traumatic and difficult to move passed. I'm just so glad that the last thing he ever said to me was that he loved me. I will never ever forget that moment! I try to talk to my grandma on a weekly basis and I miss calling over there and hearing my grandpa's voice on the line. I so badly want to come home and visit him and sit with him and share with him what's been going on in my life. I always loved doing that and I wish I would have done that way more. I wish I could hear him say how proud he is of me again! He would say that to me almost every time I left him and I know he always really meant it. I have the banner that was in the flowers at his funeral from the grandchildren that says "We love you Grandpa" hanging on the wall above my desk with some pictures of him under it. I always look at that and just smile with remembering so many great memories of him and my grandma and our family all together!

I've dealt with grieving the loss of things in my life before and it each loss has seems to be more difficult, but I thank God for each and every one of them. I always learn so much during the grieving process of how to lean on God for everyone and how to trust in Him and how He alone will remove the pain one day. I also know that as I struggle through things, I'm learning more about how to deal with the next big wave that will come in my life.

At this time in my life, I am seeing so many of the blessings from the Lord for sticking close to Him even when I felt like I couldn't give Him my all. He was there during those sleepless nights that I was just sobbing and thought my life would never get better. I was in such a low point for a while and I will forever glorify the Lord for getting me out of those times.

God has really been doing a work in me this year and I have so many different passions that He's given me to want to serve Him in so many different ways. I can't wait to have opportunities revealed to me.

A few prayer requests:

Please pray that my anxiety issues will decrease as I still have problems with that sometimes. And also that I will feel the Lord's continuing comfort in difficult times. I will continue to trust that I'm here for a reason!

I hope you all are enjoying this wonderful fall weather!!! :)

Empty Me

So, the last time I updated my blog, my Grandpa was still alive! Wow, what a tough time losing my grandpa was for me and my whole family. We are all so happy that he with the Lord and no longer sick, but of course we all miss him like crazy!! Thanks to everyone who was in prayer for my family and showed my family so much support!! We are truly so blessed by you all! Please continue to be praying for us through the grieving process and the different adjustments we've had to made. And of course, prayer for my Grandma would be awesome! :-)

Since the passing of my grandpa, there has been so much going on in my own life. For starters, GOING TO AFRICA and as soon as I returned, getting back to working like crazy, spending time with all my amazing friends and family and now I'm getting into the mode of getting ready for school!! If you don't already know, I will be attending Lipscomb University in Nashville, TN!!! yaaaay I'm getting out of Gurnee and heading to such an incredible city!!!!! Praise the Lord!

AFRICA

Africa was amazing!! It was so incredible to be so far away and share the love of Jesus Christ with many. We worked with a lot of kids there and did a lot of little projects here and there. My facebook has many many more pictures that tell more than I can ever share on here. facebook.com/skigirl29

^---- Here's my adorable small group at camp!

<---- Here's my amazing team that I traveled many miles with and shared thousands of laughs with!! :-)

SCHOOL

Well, I leave for school on August 14th, less than 2 weeks away!! I cannot believe how fast this has come up!! I keep thinking how big of a step this is for me and I'm terrified and super excited all at the same time. If you know about any of the hurt that I've gone through the past couple of years, I'm sure you understand why I'm even more excited to get away for a while and experience something completely new! As hard as living here is for me, I know it has truly been a huge blessing to me. I am at peace with knowing that I would not have learned what I've learned and grown in my relationship with Christ like I have if it wasn't for my decision of staying home and going to community college.

LIFE

I have been so busy and I will admit to you all that recently my relationship with the Lord has not been as intimate and close as it has been before and I've been feeling so off balance because of that. After the craziness was over with my Grandpa's passing and then my trip, my focus has been working, working and more working along with making time for family and friends. One of the big lessons I learned this past year was how important it is to make God number 1 in your life. I still have my eyes on him and everything, but I'm just not spending the time I like to with Him. As school is nearing very soon, I've realized that I can't do this anymore and need to get back to getting in the word daily and getting back into my routine. It's hard and I know of so many people that struggle with this. There are obviously up and down times that are going to happen and I'm trying to really acknowledge that and not be too hard on myself. It was really rough going through that whole process with my Grandpa. It was so emotionally draining and I guess I haven't wanted to sit and think about too much lately and face certain things. This week has been really amazing so far though. I've been blasting worship music again in my car and getting into the word more. PTL! :) This has really helped me become a little calmer about school and other things. God is reminding me daily, in the midst of everything, that He is in control of my life and that I should not be anxious about school or anything else. God has brought me on this journey and I know that He is going to be watching over me every second of the day. I should not worry about loneliness because when I was in the most lonely time in my life, God got me through it! He's never let me down and I'm going to continue keeping my eyes set on how much He has gotten me through!!

Well, I guess next time I post a new entry I'll be letting you all know how school is going and everything!!! AAAAHHHHH!!!! I'm going to college! In Nashville!!! Near Kelly and Steven!!! Far away from Gurnee!! Okay. Okay. I'm getting excited!!!!!! :) :) :) :) Please keep my in your prayers the next few weeks. Classes start August 23rd!

God Bless you all!!

Update on my grandpa!

Before I say anything, I just want to thank everyone for all of their prayers and support throughout this entire journey with my Grandpa. It has truly been a tough couple of years with so many different medical issues. I never knew how complicated things could get. WOW! Praise the Lord for all the knowledgeable nurses and doctors that are in this world who can help so many people like my grandpa. My family has been through so much through this entire process and I am so thankful that we are all here together to be with one another and bring so much comort in each others presense.

My grandpa was put on hospice care Wednesday and they are so amazing. A friend of my Aunt Carol told her that hospice is like angels on earth and that is so true. We really don't know where we would be today without them. Praise God for them and their kind spirit and their incredible amount of compassion. It is just a matter of time and we are all just sitting around waiting. This has been such an emotionally draining week for us all. Please continue to pray that as a family we can keep each other going and strong and pray that we all continue to seek the Lord. One real lesson that I've been learning is what God's timing really. We all want my grandpa to go because it's obvious his life is ending and he fought the good fight and it's time for him to live with his Heavenly Father! But we are just waiting on God's timing in this. We want him to go, but I guess God has another plan for now. I'm so blessed to have such an amazing family who has been able to come together and be such a great team!

Please also pray that he continues to be comfortable that he goes peacefully.

I've been staying with my grandma the past couple nights and I will be again tonight. I'm sorry if you've tried to call or text me and I have not responded. Please know that I get them, but may not always want to talk or have time to talk. It really does mean so much to me! This has been really hard and I'm really focusing on these times with my Grandpa. One other personal request besides prayer... I love getting verses sent to me. I have my Bible with me and in the time of just sitting around I love looking things up. So if you come across something that you would like to share either comment on the blog or send me a text. I love you all and I will try and keep you updated whenever I can!

I know that Grandpa is in God's hands and I'm so thankful that I can rest in knowing that!! I am so blessed to be a part of this family and to be this amazing mans granddaughter! I love him so much and I'm so proud of him for all that he has gone through!

Amazed!

So, there has been so much going on in my life these days and so I thought I'd update you all!

Wow, this year has definitely been the craziest year of my life so far! I can't even explain in words how much I have grown and how happy I am to be where I am today. I know in my past blogs on here I've explained some of the more recent things that have gone on and just the way they have left me feeling. One of my main problems is always having a little anger towards God and asking Him "why?" way too much! Well, this past week has been such an eye opening experience for me.

I cannot stop thanking God for what has gone on in my life in the past and thanking those that have helped me through it all. I have always felt a little bit ashamed and not so thrilled about staying home and going to community college. It was a decision that suited me financially at the time and also my boyfriend at the time played a little bit of a roll in that decision also. (something I don't like to admit too much) Anyways, I was always jealous of all my friends meeting new people and having all these awesome times away at school while I'm at home, living with my parents (love you guys to death and thanks for putting up with me!), going to lame-O CLC (it's a good school though if you're going there), and working but my butt off as a server about 25-30 hours a week. I guess what I'm saying is, it hasn't been the most fun 2 years! BUT, I'm soooo glad I stayed. Today, I was looking back on things and thinking about how different my life would be right now if I would have gone away as a freshman. Let me share with you my thoughts....

I probably would have just followed the norm of college and gotten wrapped up in the whole party scene. I would have called myself a Christian, but wouldn't have been living it out. I would be dating jerks who would treat me like dirt or I would have still stayed with you know who, but he fits what I just said anyways. ha I also probably would not have done very well academically because I didn't really care too much before and I would have cared way more about the social aspect of it. I would have just been this girl who was trying to find her place and would have probably messed up big time. That all just sounds so sad and lonely.

When I graduated high school in May 2008, wow it's been 2 YEARS!!, I was a sad and lonely girl. I called myself a Christian, sure, I had friends that I hung out with, of course, and I had an "amazing" boyfriend, yep. Read what I first said again tho... CALLED myself a Christian... wow... the way I was living my life then compared to the way I am today is so vastly different! I sure put on an act, but behind closed doors God didn't matter squat to me. I didn't care about what I thought about or what me and my boyfriend did, or what movies I would watch or how I would speak to my family. NO! I was not living my life for the Lord. All I focused on about Christianity was not drinking or doing drugs, staying a virgin until marriage and not swearing. Hitting all three of those made me feel like a good Christian then. There was no relationship with God at all or anything. It breaks my heart to look back on that! How can I not put our Lord and Savior as number one in my life and surrender all of me up to Him after he died a brutal death on the cross to pay the penalty for my sins?? I cannot believe He came to earth and did that for ME, little me and all the rest of you sinners too! It just blows my mind how we can all sin day after day, week after week and go by without asking for His forgiveness and acknowledging what He did for us!!

This all brings me back to why I can be so happy about where I am in my life today. There is no way I would be the person I am today if it were not for the hurt I have had to deal with. I am so glad that I stayed home for school, even though I was not having as much fun as my friends were, I grew with the Lord a in a deeper way that I know would not have been possible if I were to have gone away. I would have been way too social and would not have taken the hours upon hours of time to spend with just me and God like I did this year. I got to feel loneliness and get comfort from the Lord in that. I'm such a people person and God knows that. He knew that I needed to have this time for just me and Him and not be distracted by friends living around me. Of course it's still very hard to be alone and not have some human to comfort me (specifically a guy of course) and make me feel better after a hard day at work or to sit and watch a movie with me when I don't feel well, but God is going to honor the fact that I am waiting on His timing for someone to come along.

A huge challenge these past few years has been trying to figure out where I want to go to school. I have truly never known until the past few months. I always was so frustrated and upset with myself that I didn't have some "plan". Well, I'm going to school in Nashville, TN next year!!!!! Why in the world am I going to Nashville??? Well because my favorite sister and brother-in-law moved there last August. Speaking of a God thing... there whole year has been such a story to tell about that as well. They were really the ones that drew me to Nashville and the idea of going down there. I have applied to Belmont University, which I am still waiting to hear from, and also Lipscomb University, which I HAVE BEEN ACCEPTED TO!!!!! Holy cow, I got into college!! It's still blowing my mind. haha Both of these schools are such a great fit for me and I love them! So no wonder why I have been confused about where I was meant to go. Why the heck would I have looked at Nashville before?? It all worked out in God's timing!! Kelly and Steven went down there and I fell in love with that city. I'm so excited about moving there that I could just scream about it (my parents wouldn't be too happy about that right now though since it is 2am). eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!

Thank you, Lord, for getting me through this hard time in my life and really, for putting me through it! I finally am starting to feel hopeful for the future. Who cares if I don't have some guy to share my life with. Guys are butt heads anyways!! I have the almighty God by my side and He will never let me go! So God, bring on the future!! I can take it and I promise to lift your name on high with all that I do. (Well obviously I'll stumble at times, but I'll try with everything inside of me).

I'm leaving for Nashville tomorrow afternoon to go and visit Lipscomb. It's a very last minute trip and I'm only spending all day Friday there and coming back home on Saturday. Please be praying that God really shows me the plan He has for me with college next year. I'm still waiting to hear from Belmont as well, so please pray for patience in that too.

I feel so blessed to have so many people in my life who have helped push me along this year!!

Kelly

Steven

Corrie

Carissa

Becca

Sam

Rachel

Mom

Dad

Grandma

Aunt Carol

Cameron

Brian

Shaunes

Cheryl

Briana

Megan

If you guys are reading this... thank you so much for helping me this year! I could not have gotten out of bed some days without your continued prayers and encouraging words! You have all been incredible and my acceptance into school has a big part to do with the impact that you have made on my life. You are all so loved and have been amazing blessings! I will never forget anything that you have done for me!!

This song has been such a big help to me!! I've just been waiting and I will continue to wait on the Lord's plan....

The Desires of my Heart!

I get so excited when God teaches, reteaches, and again reteaches me things!!

In my life, I have completely fallen into the habit of always needing a person to lean on and go to for everything, especially needing that person to be a guy. I sometimes get really scared about doing things on my own and it's a very difficult thing to deal with. I'm very good at telling people what I know about things, but then I really don't act those things out in my life. For example, I can tell people over and over that things will not be completely right in their life if God is not their first priority. I know that God has not been number one throughout my life and I've realized that that is where so many of my problems are rooted. Since I've realized that, I'm able to tell people that and tell them how important that is, so yeah, I know it, but I'm not really doing that. It's a really tough thing. We're all human and we're going to stumble. A girl in my small group a couple weeks ago shared with the group some things that she had recently been learning. She said that the way you can see if God is number one in your life is to see what you think about the most and what you feel about the most. She said that and I seriously was like, "wow, God is totally not what I think about the most or feel about the most." I felt so ashamed and guilty for everything I had been saying since I myself was not doing that. Surely I want God to be number one, but I was definitely more focused on guys, friendships, tv, my job, pretty much everything besides Him.

So, I have a bad obsession with the show The Bachelor/Bachelorette. When it's on I am dedicated to watching the show every week, reading all about it and talking about it with anyone and everyone who is interested. Now, if I would only put that much time and energy into my relationship with the Lord I think I would be doing a lot better then I am today! I could have been reading my Bible instead of reading numerous blogs from Chris Harrison about The Bachelor scandals or I could have been talking about Jesus with people at work instead of bashing Vienna. All of that crap has nothing, whatsoever, positive to do with my daily life or the salvation of myself and others.

I have been desiring this life of making God my number one, but, like many things, it's easier said then done. I want to live my life for the Lord only. Psalm 103:1 "Let all that I am praise the Lord; with my whole heart, I will praise his holy name." I want to live out this verse in my life!! I want my life to be full of praises to Him. I don't want to worry about all these earthly things anymore. I'm tried of feeling lonely. I want to feel complete in the Lord and praise Him and bring honor and glory to Him with everything that I do. With that being through my job, my friendships, my relationships with my family and with the way I think and act about things. This year I have been challenged with finding my identity in Christ and there have been a few things have distracted me from that. I have the hardest time being content with where I am in my life. I'm always worrying about what is going to happen and where I'll be in my life next year. And of course I'm always worrying about finding another guy. I really don't want to find another guy though. I want to find my identity in Christ and be content with just knowing that it's just me and Him. The Lord is my comfort and my shield of protection. He has carried me through so much this past year and I've been so blessed. So now... I'm trying to be excited for where I'm at in my life now and looking forward to the future in a positive way!! God knows what I need, so I need to stop worrying so much!

His Faithfulness!!

Do you ever have a problem in your life that just won't go away and you hope and pray that it will??? Well, that's something I've been dealing with. For a long time now I have been dealing with so many different emotions and internal struggles as I talked about them a little bit in my last blog entry. Today, I was supposed to work and last night I decided to give my shift away, which I never do, just to have a day to myself and do some things I've wanted to do lately. It's such a gorgeous day I'm so glad I'm not stuck working or whatever. Instead, I've been enjoying a nice "date" with Jesus at Caribou for the past hour or so. :-)

Last year I lived with my sister and brother-in-law in Indiana for just a semester. I was dealing with a lot in my life and needed a bit of time to get away. I don't think I will ever be able to express in words how amazing that time was for me. For those of you who have been on retreats and things, it was just like that, but for 3 months. I was on such an amazing God high!! Even though I was having an extremely hard time with a lot of things, I was overwhelmed with the presence of the Lord all day, every day! Well, of course we have those highs and lows in our lives in many areas of life. In our spiritual life there are so many times like that as well. So, of course when I came back to Gurnee, I had a very low time in my life. I did some things that I knew were SO wrong for me and people were telling me over and over how wrong they were, but I just wouldn't listen. I wouldn't even listen to God. I was back home now and what I had learned the 3 months I was gone was still in my head, but had left my heart and I really didn't care about it as much anymore. That caused me some major problems in my life!! I wish so badly I could go back and change those things I had done, but of course I can't and now I just look at it all as a huge learning experience and thank God for it.

As I'm moving on from all this stuff and working through a lot of things I have been consumed with depression in my life. I hate that word... depression. It sounds so awful. Well, it is!!!! In my last blog entry I talked about how draining it is for me to go on with things in my daily life and how I'm really good at covering up my feeling to the outside world. My real feeling are always shown in my room, my car or during my quiet times with God, but never really to any of my friends or family. I really hate talking about it with people because it's such a hard thing to talk over and over about and it's hard when people just don't understand. (I don't expect anyone to though.) I really feel like you don't truly understand what depression is unless you have gone through it before. It's an incredibly hard thing to live with. It's especially hard for me because I work 5 days out of the week and am a full-time student. Working, going to school, getting homework done, keeping up with other activities I'm involved in and trying to make sure to keep up with my physical and mental health is so exhausting. I have to work extra hard on things and everything takes me 5 times longer to do than normal because I have no motivation. It's really hard and I absolutely hate it! I wish I could just focus on myself and not have to go to school and work. I was so spoiled when I was in Indiana. I hope that everyone can have a time like that with the Lord like I did. Even though I was going through so much crap, I am so thankful for that time! Even when I was crying myself to sleep at night and calling out to God asking him why this was all happening to me, I knew that one day I would look back at that time and be so thankful for it. I hope that someday I will be able to help someone that goes through things like this.

During my "date" today I came across some verses that are very helpful to me.... Lamentations 3:21-23 "Yet I still dare to hope when I remember this: The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is His faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning."

I am so thankful that God is so faithful!!! There were so many times that I thought I would never move on from so many of the things that were going on, but God has not let go of me and has continued to push me to go to Him for everything and surrender my all to Him. All of the struggles I have are so little compared to so much and God is such a big and powerful God, but He still cares very much about me and helping me! It's such an amazing feeling that I hope everyone can feel in their life!!

He never lets go!! Amen!

STRUGGLES

This has been a pretty incredible week for me! I got to go to Nashville and spend some time with my favorite sister, Kelly, and my favorite brother-in-law, Steven, got to grow closer with one of the most amazing girls I know- Rachel, spent quality time with my mom, had a much needed break from school and work and saw some of the most beautiful things ever!! God really showed me again how awesome He is and how much he has truly blessed my life.

Now that I'm home and reality is setting in once again, I can just feel that this is going to be a hard week. Over the past year I have gone through some really tough struggles. All the glory goes to God for getting me through some super tough stuff! One thing that is difficult for me right now is that a huge part of my life crashed and burned over a year ago. A year ago! I feel silly sometimes that it still can really bother me. I hate admitting to people that I am still having a difficult time, but I still am! Even tho it's been a while, it's still something I'm working on. There I said it!!! I'm still struggling!! Some days I still don't see what the point is anymore and I continue to question why things have gone the way that they have for me recently. Everyone tells me that God is going to honor this hard time in my life and that someday I will look back on this and be so thankful! I know I'm learning a lot and getting an awesome chance to grow closer with the Lord, but it's still super hard. I obviously have my good days and my bad days! This year has been a crazy roller coaster. I always have a hard time telling people how I truly feel. I can be extremely sad, but still put on the face of "everything is perfect"! That is the most draining thing ever! If you know me, you know that I enjoy staying up late and so normally I do. Sometimes, it's just way to hard to tho. By 8:00 my body is screaming to go to sleep. I'm scared to sleep sometimes though. Either I can't fall asleep because my mind won't shut off or I have awful dreams! I rarely ever sleep completely through the night and so then I just get frustrated. Then, since I don't really get a good night's sleep, I have the hardest time waking up in the morning. It's awful. I've never ever have felt this way before in my life. It's hard to explain and I wish these feeling upon no one. Sometimes my alarm will go off for 2 hours before I get up because I literally can't get up. I just have to pray and pray for the Lord to give me the strength to get up and face the day.

Today has just been one of those bad days. All I've wanted to do is go to sleep since the moment I woke up. I got like 7 hours of sleep tho and that's more than I normally get, so I should have been fine. All day I've been putting off everything that I need to do. I had 3 hours between school and work and had so much to do during that time and instead I laid in bed most of the time. I went to work and I just didn't feel myself. On my way home, there was a pretty bad storm, but it was so cool to see. It was just another reminder of how big the God we serve is. I drove home blasting worship music and felt the awesome presence of God right there with me. One of my biggest struggles is going to God for everything. That is the true desire of my heart, but it's a very tough thing to do. So, as I feel the comfort of the Lord, I'm still feeling lonely. I hate that feeling. I feel lonely all the time and I really don't have a reason to feel that way. I have an awesome family and great friends! What more do I want? I don't want to feel the loneliness because I'm not dating someone. I want God to fill that void for me. I don't even feel ready to be with someone and I know that is why God has been guarding me from that. When will I be ready? When is this guy going to come along and sweep me off my feet? These are things that I obviously battle with in my head over and over on a daily basis. I HATE THAT!!! It's really hard being a girl! Do guys feel this loneliness and longing for someone so bad too?? When I feel like this I just try and pray for my future husband if there is one that God has planned for me. It does make me feel a little better. But on this rainy night that I'll be sitting up late doing my homework I just wish I had him with me. I wish he was here now to push me to do the things that I haven't done yet and to bring a smile to my face. God help me, please!!!

I'm just going on and on right now! haha Sorry if you've actually read all of this, but thank you at the same time. I don't talk about this much and it feels good to just kind of let this out a little bit. If you're reading this and can relate in any way, I hope this makes you feel better in knowing that you're not alone. All I can say is pray and read your Bible. As I'm struggling and tears are filling up my eyes, that's the best advice I can give. He will comfort you!! God is a big, God, yet never too busy for you! Psalm 34:17 says "The Lord hears his people when they call to him for help. He rescues them from all their troubles." Those are such comforting words to read! He is rescuing all of us no matter what we're dealing with in our lives!

I am writing this with an extremely heavy heart and so much is on my mind. I wish there was an "on" and "off" switch for the mind! That would be so helpful to me!! haha So yeah, I don't even know if what I've written makes sense. I just know that the only thing that makes me feel better when I am down is running into the arms of our Lord and Savior. There is nothing in the world that compares to how that feels!!

How great is our God!!!!