Angles, Perspective and Basketball

I am a basketball official. I'm the one that coaches, parents, players and fans get mad at. The thing about being a ref is that you have a different perspective than everyone else in the gym. What very few people realize is how a ref must operate. 

Sitting at the top of the bleachers

The reality is, no matter where you sit in the gym, you will have a unique angle. That angle allows you to see the game unlike anyone else in the gym. Essentially, it is a movie only you are seeing. How awesome!! And incredibly frustrating. We have a hard time understanding how anyone can see a particular angle that is not our own. 

I'm not quite sure what it means to see every angle in a situation. Generally, I can just see my own perspective and that is what I stick with, then I lose the ability to see the bigger picture. 

That's how life works. God has bigger plans than we can see. I have no idea what he is going to do today, nor can I begin to guess. I have the ability to be annoyed by that or TRUST God, believing today holds goodness.

We go through points in our lives where we don't know what is going to happen next. All we see is what is right in front of us. There is nothing wrong with you. But what would it mean if you looked at things from a different perspective, or angle. 

I believe that as God walks with us, he asks us to take a step with him. He asks us to move over a few steps, he wants us to see an opposing view of our own. He wants to give us a gift, by helping us to see what he sees. 

Why not?

Choose to see it from His angle.

Be My Everything

Moments are fleeting. There are moments that we will remember forever. There are moments that we will soon forget. Time is elusive. It is ever passing. Ticking away, never to return.


The question that has stuck in my mind for months is...

Would I be okay today if I died doing this?

This past weekend, my grandmother passed away. My dear friends father-in-law passed away. My close friends Aunt passed away.

At church on Sunday, we heard the regrets that people have when they died. There are so many of them. Too often in life we put things off that we want to do and just do things that we don't have to do. We choose things out of obligation or guilt.

That question has put a lot of my life in perspective. If I choose to do and live in a way that glorifies God then he will provide all I need. But only what I need for that day.

Do I trust Him in that?


The Israelite's had no choice while they were in the desert for 40 years, but to trust God. He provided food for them daily, manna in the morning and quail at night.

I want to live that way. I want to live expecting God to provide what I need for the day. I want to trust Him that much.

And if that means I give up my second job, then so be it.
If it means that I give up eating out, so be it.
If that means saying no more, so be it.
If I have to surrender my wants every day for His, so be it.

That trust is worth it. 

I want God to be my fulfillment. 

I want Him to be my source.

I want Him to be my everything.

{Perfect Love}

I haven't slept a full 8 hours until 2 days ago. It's been about 2 weeks. I'm the kind of person that needs sleep. If I don't sleep, I get grouchy. And WAYYYYY more emotional. So that is why I have been crying daily for a week straight.

Maybe it's not just that. But that is what I will blame for [now.]

It's almost 2014.
It's a time for reflection.
It's a time to be reminded of love.


Love that is
 
overwhelming, 

powerful, 

unconditional.

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

1 John 4:18

We forget that this is the love that we have. God perfectly loves us. 

Our society is so focused on love from another person that people think that will be their fulfillment. No, dear friends, love from another human will be imperfect. Imperfect love was not intended to be your fulfillment. God is. And God is love. {Perfect love.}

{Perfect love} gives us confidence. 

{Perfect love} shows us acceptance. 

{Perfect love} cares, always. 

{Perfect love} is real. 

{Perfect love} can be seen. 

{Perfect love} desires relationship. 

{Perfect love} changes us. 

{Perfect love} wants more for you than you want for yourself.

{Perfect love} waits for you to come back. 

{Perfect love} is perfect.

{Perfect love} is eternal. 

{Perfect love} moves us to tears.

Are you living in that {perfect love?}

Beauty in Brokenness

I think I can do anything. Not because I'm good at everything. Oh no, trust me, I know when I'm NOT good at lots of things. My parents always taught me that I could do anything, because I have Jesus on my side. With Him, nothing is impossible.


Reinvent. No, that's not the right word.
Recreate. That's not it either.
Understand? Getting closer.
Figure it out...I guess.


One of my dear friends asked me if I could describe myself. "Of course!" I replied quickly. She looked at me, with love in her eyes. "Describe yourself as if you're on a first date with someone." My response? My mouth was hanging open.

Pause that thought for a second, I'll come back to it, I promise...but first, read this. 

{The Lay Counseling Program that I have going to since September has been reshaping me (there's a better word!), breaking me, showing me new things and challenging me to see truth. It is not easy. In fact, it is probably one of the most difficult things that I've done in my few years on this earth. It has taken every belief, thought and truth about myself, and questioned it. Good, right? More like, earth shattering. Everything that I knew about myself is being reevaluated.}

Back to my previous story. 

I sat down with my journal. And I wrote short, sweet sentences to describe myself. 
It went something like this... 

• I like to write
• I love to travel
• I don't want to just have one identity (one thing I'm known for)
• I love volleyball
• I'm afraid of the dark
• I don't like being alone for too long
• I worry 
• I have to understand things
• I like learning about different cultures

then it got deeper...

• I want to belong
• I need to be needed
• I don't understand why someone would want me
• I need to know things to think I'm worthy of attention
• I don't want to see my beauty in my brokenness

Looking at this list made me want to change something. I started praying. My wonderful mentor made sense to me about being wanted and needed. I am both. [But these were lies that I have believed for so long that they became truth to me.]

My challenge to you is to write those things down. 

The things that you know and think about yourself. 

Not the things that everyone tells you that you are. 

Read your list.

Which ones are truth? Which ones are lies? 

-Take them to Jesus.-

Ask Him to reshape, refine, renew.

i Accept

*deep sigh*

I wasn't born yesterday, but for some reason, it took me a while to learn this particular lesson.

God has been teaching me about acceptance. It hasn't been about accepting other people, until a few days ago. In fact, it mostly has to do with accepting myself. For my whole life, I wasn't able to accept my failings, my imperfections, or anything of that sort. I had high expectations for myself. Therefore, I have high expectations for everyone else.

After God slapped me in the face with reality, I understood that he accepts me just the way I am, so I need to accept myself in that same way. When I'm willing to accept myself, I'm able to accept other people WAYYYYYYYYYYYY more easily. 

Part of loving yourself is being able to accept every part of who you are. And if you see something that you don't like, then change it.

Only you and God can do that. 

No one else can. 

It is an ABSOLUTE

      I like absolutes. I like knowing that something can be trusted for what it is worth. I don't like confusing situations. I don't like questioning myself, or others. I just like absolutes. But, there is so much in life that is not an absolute. There is so much more to life than the absolute. So much of life, with Jesus, is simply about the journey. It's about the stories.  

It's about the experiences that we have 

that draw us closer to Jesus. 

       The absolute may be nice, but it's the questioning that helps us know that God is with us. And we have nothing to fear.
       Most the time, I just want an absolute statement. I want to know exactly the right thing to do, at exactly the right time, and the exact way how to do it. Unfortunately, that's not how life works. There are so many ups and downs, so many mountains and valleys. I will never know fully why we live life on earth (until heaven), but I know that God has a reason. 

I know that God, in His infinite wisdom, decided that we were going to live on earth, so that in these moments of questioning, we could turn to Him. 

The question is...

do you trust Him?

Trust in the Lord with all your heart,

and lean not on your own understanding;

in all your ways acknowledge him

and he will make your paths straight. 

Proverbs 3:5-6

Journey With Me

I've been alive for 23 years now. I don't remember what it was like to be a tiny human until the age of 5ish. One of my very first memories is laying in bed and across the room, my sister was laying on her bed. We whispered back and forth, but were soon told to go to sleep by my mother. I remember wondering what life would be like when I was older, as I drifted off to slumber-land.


In September, I start the program for my Lay Counseling Certificate. I have been preparing for it by reading the book assigned and reflecting on the content. The book is called, To Be Told, and it is written by Dan Allender. So much of this book is about {my story}. It's about coming to grips with the God-breathed story I have been living. But it also delves deep into my hurts, pains, anguish, and tragedy. I'm not one for the dramatics. I am very in-touch with my emotions. This allows me to feel deeply, in pretty much any situation, whether it is about me or someone else.

As I have been reading this book, those same deep emotions have been tapped into, exposed and left in the open. Which is incredibly painful. Along with all of these emotions, it seems that Satan is trying to come at me with every possible distraction. It has taken everything in me not to just scream my head off! I know that God is good. I know that this path is unknown, but it will be so worth it in the end.

{I want to invite you on this journey with me.} 

God is moving in my heart, my mind,

and all throughout my life. 

It is overwhelming.

It is unfamiliar. 

It is exhilarating. 

It is God-breathed!