choosing joy

Choose joy. Choose joy. Choose joy.

I think it when Carter gets up to pray and the tears well up as I prepare to break bread with my church family the last time as a youth group member. Eventually my pride crumbles along with my make up and I let the tears fall. This isn't the kind of looks like your eyes are watering cry but rather the type where you hope no one hears you gasp for air and you could really use a nap afterwards type of cry. The two other senior girls and my best friend are both crying as well. I look up after Carter says amen, and I manage a smile. "We are such pansies," I mumble. They grin.

I try to focus on what is hindering me from being bold for the Lord this week, but today my attention span is thin and I can't help but take notice of the family that I have grown to love here.

A year ago I entered this church building that was unfamiliar that held no value to me and now I leave it with a heavy heart because now this place is home. Not many people have this. I am thankful to be one that does.

These people have loved me and they have pushed me and they have laughed with me and they have cried with me and they have prayed with me. They have sought the Lord with me in our pursuit of His reward, and they have listened to my doubts and my problems and my fears.

Choose joy. Choose joy. Choose joy.

I think it again when I drive away after saying goodbye to almost everyone tonight. I gave long hugs and tried to joke around to cover tears and I waved as I walked out the door. I exhale.

Choose joy.

This time I say it out loud.

Life has a peculiar feel when you look back on it that it doesn't have when you're actually living it. It's as though the whole thing were designed to be understood in hindsight, as though you'll never know the meaning of your experiences until you've had enough of them to provide reference.

It makes sense looking back.

The summer before my freshman year, I went to Camp Tahkodah (which I can't say enough good things about by the way) with a lot of my friends that had been going since they were little. We rode horses and made a trash can milkshake and dug into what it meant to reach our peak in our faith. We even went on a hayride where the trailer came loose and we wrecked into a bunch of barbed wire which wasn't exactly the greatest situation, but it made for an interesting story later. Jen, my youth minister's wife now, was my cabin counselor, and Blake, my youth minister, was a counselor there as well.

I remember praying the night before my first night at University that God would give me some sense of belonging in Conway because it was a brand new place to me at the time. Annnnd boom. The next morning I walked into church and not only do I find out that my old counselor is the youth minister there but that the normal preacher is on a break and Blake is preaching. I sat on the back row teary eyed because God had answered my prayer so quickly, and for the first time in a long time I knew I was exactly where I needed to be.

Getting there wasn't exactly a joy ride.  You see Jesus wrecked my life, shattered it to pieces, and put it back together more beautifully.

Jen and I were in contact a few days after my first Sunday there, and it wasn't long before UCC felt like home. My family's original plan was to look around to see where we fit best, but my mom knew that I wasn't going to love it as much anywhere else.

God saw my need of a church family and He did something about it. He didn't just say He was for me or with me. He was actually present with me. And it was then that I realized that I needed there to be something bigger than me. I needed someone to put awe inside of me; I needed to come second to someone that has everything figured out.

If you know me well, you know that I like to have an agenda, a plan. I like to know what's next. And so when God doesn't make things clear immediately I get a little restless, a little irritated. Someone told me once when talking about this that the most mysterious qualities of God are often the most glorious qualities of God. In Proverbs 25:2 I read that it's to the glory of God to conceal a matter. His majesty rests in the unknown. I am simply called to follow him day by day.

To be blunt, college kind of terrifies me. I don't know where my life is headed. I have a general idea, but I also thought that too when I was in second grade and told my mom I wanted to work at the bowling alley. There's so many parts of my life I want to hold onto desperately.

I'm going to miss driving all over the world with Kirsten while jamming out to her "ghetto jams" and making fools of ourselves car dancing. I'm going to miss Blake telling each one of us that he loves us every Sunday during communion. I'm going to miss the mission trips and the retreats and the nights where we would just hang out together and do nothing. I'll miss bantering with Camdyn about theories behind what the Wizard of Oz really means and putting up with his terrible music choices. I'll miss taking pictures and growing together and bringing up inside jokes. I'll miss going to Ava and Carter's house to watch Netflix and just to chill out and have fun. I'll miss fangirling over Ben Rector with Jen. I'll miss looking forward to seeing everyone at church. I'll miss everyone. I'll miss it all.

But today, I will choose joy. I choose to be thankful for the time I have had here to grow and to learn and to experience what it is to be one. I choose to dwell on the fact that God has given me a group of irreplaceable friends here that have blessed me abundantly in multiple ways. I choose to acknowledge the fact that God is good and that His timing is perfect. I choose to reminisce on the times I have had here in Conway.

I won't hide the fact that today it also hurts, but I will love these memories. I already do.