good better best

tis the season...for finals.

Although for the average student, finals week is well, finals week.

For a Hospitality student, we get three weeks.

1. For all the Projects due.

2. For all the tests in HTM classes.

3. For all the business class finals during normal SDSU finals week.

This makes nearly a month of cramming, freaking out, procrastinating and oh yeah, studying.

Have I convinced you to switch majors yet?

Anyways, as you may guess tis also the season for to-do lists

color coded, highlighted and organized lists. 

its a matter of survival really. 

What have I learned from all this madness?

It is OKAY to say no. 

I am an eager human being, ready to take on every new adventure.

but rather than juggle 37 commitments with grace and perfection.

I tend to drop a few or many.

a dear friend of mine told me the other day,

"say no to what is good so you can say yes to what is better"

isn't that the truth.

there are lots of good things, but there are also a whole lot of better things.

better commitments, better opportunities, better relationships.

it's scary to let go of something good,
but be reminded that if your not totally confident about a choice,
 there is most likely a better option for you, if you wait a little and work a lot. 

in fifth grade, my teacher had a quilt on the wall that said:

"good better best, never let it rest, until your good is better and your better is your best."
That has been a constant reminder in my life to always look forward.

thats all folks.

worth.

There are those days where everything just seems to go wrong.

I had one of those days last week.

I could go into detail about why my day was lame, but who cares?

Its over, and I was reminded of some good stuff.

So really, the bad day, is good.

Its really easy as a student, well more like as a human, to be hard on myself.

To see my failures as HUGE, and let them weigh me down.

The bad tests, the failed projects, the embarrassing moments.

You know what keeps me sane?

Knowing My worth is not in what I do, what others think of me, or even who I am.

My worth is in ONE thing.

Jesus.

That is utterly, completely and totally freeing. 

It doesn't matter what my grades are, how awesome of internships I get, how popular I am, how many events I plan, where I live, how I look...the list goes on.

I am a daughter of the MOST HIGH, ALMIGHTY KING.

sooo come at me bro.

But really this is good stuff.

What helps me get through each day is knowing that my purpose is SO MUCH GREATER than my 'titles' of student, employee, member of student org xyz, ect.

My purpose is to know God and to make Him Known.

Who better to cling to than our Perfect, Constant and Loving God?

Yeah, no one better.

So this week, and every week, every day, and every minute I am clinging to Jesus.

&&

Remembering, it's not who I am, but WHOSE I am.

friendship

To belong and to be known are two of the most important things we as humans need.

I have found two traits in friendship that I value very much, almost above anything. 

Besides trust of course.

These aren't your typical traits, I have never put them on my lists (which I make a lot of)

Or really given much thought to them, until now.

Ready?

Inclusive and Inquisitive.

Yeah yeah yeah, I like the alliteration, but thats not why I picked the words. 

Inclusive. What does that mean in friendship? 

When I am friends with anyone, or really when I first meet someone, my number one goal is always to make them feel included, wanted, accepted. 

Maybe its because I was created with this desire, or maybe it is because I am so aware of this in others, but when I am friends with someone, I want to be included into their life. 

Not just a tiny sliver of their life, but the ups, the downs: the good, the bad and the ugly.

The book of Ruth is the one of the most beautiful stories of friendship.

This story is about a widow, Naomi and her two widowed daughter in laws.

She is retuning to her homeland and urges her daughter in laws to return to theirs so they can find new husbands. Ruth, one of the daughters pleads with her to stay: 

 "Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God." (Ruth 1:16)

Thats kind of exactly how I define true friendship, not just the people you hang out with and pass time with, but those you do life with. The friend who says my friends are your friends,  invites you in on their adventures & most importantly encourages you to know God.

We are not meant to do life alone, we are created to connect with others. 

That brings me to Inquisitive. 

Inquisitive means to be curious, interested in knowing.

When I am truly friends with someone, their joys become my joys, their tears, mine.

When I have good news I can barely contain myself from sharing with those gem friends. 

A sign of true friendship is displayed when that friend inquires about my life in such a way that it is evident they are interested and that they care. 

Its easy to find people to have fun with, laugh with and enjoy life with, but finding those who invite you into their life and care deeply about your thoughts: those are hard to find. 

Invest in those people. 

When you invest in the right people, I promise you, you will aways walk away with more than you gave. 

broken reality

This week, darkness attempted to take joy from the world.

Again.

This happens a lot doesn't it?

The evil in this world is shocking, heartbreaking and truly unbelievable.

The only way to look past the brokeness is to cling to the hope that true life is coming.

Pastor Al from Reality Church in Boston said something beautiful:

"We were not made for such atrocities. In such darkness, the church—the people, not an

edifice—are made to shine as a city set upon a hill, and as a lamp in a dark moment.

As we mourn this moment, we do so with a hope that a Kingdom is arriving—a

Kingdom that will right all wrongs, and turn all our sorrows into dancing. Until then,

we look for ways to help others grieve with a hope beyond themselves."

http://www.realityboston.com/city-wide-prayer-a-message-from-pastor-al/

I have no idea how people can look past brokeness without Jesus in their hearts.

The only hope I can cling too when tragedy strikes is knowing John 16:33

“I have spoken these things to you so that you shall have peace in me. You shall have suffering in the world, but take heart, I have overcome the world.” ...

No matter how awful the world becomes, I know that My God has conquered it all. 

Darkness may fight to steal that victory but it simply can not win.

A wise woman shared this with my friend and I think it speaks great truth about Mondays horrific incident. 

"The devil may have moments in a day, but our Lord will always have His way."

While I will never understand this darkness, or the future darkness to come, I don't have to because I know that God is still winning, by infinitely more.

Scatterbrained

I should probably just rename this blog to adventures of a scattered brained leader trying to make difference.

Thats me in a nut shell.

I met up with two of my young life girls last thursday and was barely speaking full sentences. I had had two midterms that day and two too many cups of coffee. I was a literal definition of a "hot mess" and you know what? We had a great time. Thats what I am learning more and more each day. I may get the title of leader but I am really just a follower, of Jesus. Thank God for that. I am so utterly imperfect and flawed I cant even begin to explain, yet still God allows me to hang out with these girls and talk about Jesus to them. Each thursday night, after Biblestudy with these crazy girls, I walk away just in awe. How good is God!? Can I get an Amen?  It is an incredible honor to be trusted to do life with these students.  Sometimes during small group I have to just sit back and take it all in, I learn so much from these girls. Its hard to believe they're in high school sometimes.

The longer I lead, the more these girls trust me.

With trust comes..a whole lot of tricky questions and messy situations.

I used to think that I had to know all the answers, I was terrified of not knowing.

I learned now that I was ridiculous to think I could ever really know even .00001% of stuff.

There is something really freeing about not knowing the right answers, being able to admit to your failures. We weren't made to know it all. I think we were made to know one thing: Jesus and clinging to him for all other knowledge. So thats what I am doing. Clinging so hard in hopes that He will answer every question that comes my way.

Life is messy.

Today: I am embracing the mud.