Nineteen

My favorite quote in the whole world is by Jack London. And this is what I want to declare over my next trip around the sun:

"I would rather be ashes than dust!

I would rather that my spark burn out in a brilliant haze than be stifled by dry-rot.

I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

The function of man is to live, not exist.

I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them.

I shall use my time."

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Today I turned nineteen. Every year on my birthday, I spend time alone reflecting on the previous year and vision-casting for the coming year.

This time last year, I was going to school at the University of Louisville. I was praying and preparing for my trip across the world. I was dating a cute boy. I was stressed about picking a college to attend. I had no idea where I'd be now.

EIGHTEEN: a year of discovery

Eighteen was the best adventure. Eighteen was cramming my world into a 50L backpack and moving to South Asia. Eighteen was dead dreams coming alive. Eighteen was finally believing in the simple gospel and its power to transform lives. Eighteen was being completely ruined for the ordinary. Eighteen was running as fast as I could for as far as I could. Eighteen was discovering the power of loving the one, even when it felt like I had nothing left to give. Eighteen was freedom like I've never known and the abolishment of legalism and religiosity in my heart. Eighteen was pressing into a deeper meaning of life.

This past year was easily the best and the most difficult year of my life.

There were times I wrestled with philosophical questions about Jesus. I doubted that there was even a God at all. I learned that Jesus isn't who the world thinks He is. I asked Him questions about times where I felt like He disappointed me. I asked Him how I was supposed to keep dreaming when the weight of the world was crushing me. There were so many times I failed, days where the weight of apathy or temptation or busyness took precedence in my life.

But then there were times that were so spectacular that I can't even put them into words.

How do you describe worshipping barefoot in the middle of the Himalayas?

How can you explain the eternal impact of leading 17 middle school girls into a deeper relationship with Jesus, baptizing three of them and welcoming them into the kingdom of heaven?

How can you write about sleeping on a rooftop under the Indian stars, waking up to the hazy sunrise?

How do you put those moments into words?

Here is what I have learned: to live a full life, you must risk coming awake. You must risk wanting, desiring, and feeling. You can't sleepwalk through life. You can not isolate the good. You must feel both joy and grief, both ecstasy and sorrow, both heartache and happiness, both mourning and dancing. It is when you truly allow yourself to feel that you begin to understand how rare and beautiful it is to exist.

Sometimes if I close my eyes in my Chemistry class, I am back in India washing my hair in the sink. Or teaching English in a rundown ministry home. Or painting a mural in an orphanage. Sometimes I have dreams about that tiny church in the mountains in Roseline, Haiti. I wake up feeling like a piece of me is missing.

I found a quote that sums it up better than I ever could: "You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart always will be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place." — Miriam Adenely

This is the cost of a full life. You mourn the loss but treasure the good.

I've lived more life in eighteen years than I dreamed I would live in a whole lifetime. There are no words for the way Jesus has been good to me. Just gratitude.

I am still reeling from my trip to South Asia. I am still processing it, still learning from it, still mourning the loss of it. Looking back, I had just turned eighteen and hadn't a clue of who I was. I was just a girl with messy hair holding babies in a Nepali slum, asking the God of the universe how He could let something like this happen. There were more times than I can count that I asked Him this year, "What kind of God are you?"

I'm still discovering who Jesus is. I'm still finding pieces of myself.

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Today I woke up at dawn and drove to Red River Gorge with my favorite people (and my best dog). I turned off my phone and spent the day quieting my soul and holding every moment close to my chest. We hiked across ridges and through valleys, recounting memories and laughing and even just walking in silence. Then we sat by a river and ate Miguel's pizza in the freezing cold night.

This weekend I have been sick, so when we got home, I drank hot cider and took a bath. I think it's safe to say that I spent the day doing what I love most.

I begin to tear up when I think about what a gift it is to truly be alive: to be able to hike trails and hug my dog and feel the cold wind against my face. Today I was reminded of the simplicity of life and purpose.

NINETEEN: a year of surrender

I want nineteen to be about gentleness and intentionality and sacrificial love. I want nineteen to be about conversation with the Lord and people. I want it to be a year of venturing deeper and further into Jesus' heart without ever looking back. I want it to be about questioning and wrestling with the Lord. (I refuse to settle for cultural apathetic acceptance of Christianity.) I want nineteen to be about simple love, pure and true.

But more than anything, I want nineteen to be about knowing—truly knowing—the God of the universe.

I welcome nineteen with open arms. Another time around the sun and the only words I can find to express my gratefulness are these:

This life is way too sweet. Thank you Jesus.