silence is golden.

it's been a long time, and much has happened in my life since i last wrote. i came through some heart break with an increased sense of my self, of my own freedom and strength, of my own empoweredness. as my friends and family laugh at me, i still love to claim that i am an empowered woman. i assert that who i am, who God has made me to be, is beautiful and loved and unique and strong, and i choose to surround myself with people who allow me the freedom and grace to continue to learn and live out who i am at the core of my being. i am so grateful from the beauty that has come from ashes of pain in my life.

i have also decided for sure to live at j-house next year. i feel called to live there; i believe so strongly that Jesus is with and desires me to be with the poor, the broken, and to see myself too as poor and broken. and how more fully can i be present to and with those who are suffering and to my own suffering than to live in community with my beautiful brothers and sisters who are dying at j-house? i know it will be hard, but i also know that it will be incredible, growing, rich, beautiful. so pray for me as i prepare to transition. and pray for my community now as well - it will be hard to leave this sweet community. i will miss living with them so much - they have become my family, my confidants, my closest friends. and there is still much uncertainty for many of them about where they will live, what they will do. i know and trust that God has so much in store for each of us, and i pray that the gift of community that God has given us this year will continue throughout our whole lives.

this past weekend, my community went on a silent retreat at a beautiful retreat center in maryland. we traveled to the beautiful land on friday afternoon, ate dinner together, and then entered the silence, which we kept until sunday mid morning, where we broke it for a worship service. it was really lovely. it's amazing how much, in the silence, i am even more aware of how my mind is constantly racing! but even to notice how my swirling thoughts became thinner and more slowly moving was a blessing. i desire to cultivate more space for silence in my life. i believe that God desires me to just spend time with God in silence. and in the silence, in nature, i felt God's presence - in the songs of the bullfrogs by the pond, in the sunset giving its golden light to the tall grass, in the fireflies twinkling in the dusk, and most of all, in the warm summer breeze. that breeze that seemed to fill me and breathe into me and through me, reminding me that God is with me and in me and all around me. and so i am grateful for the silence.

i am also grateful for the metaphors in nature that i feel blessed to see and feel. i sat for a while with my feet in a stream, just taking in the beauty around me. as i looked at the stream, i realized that i could choose to see two realities. one was the muddy, murky, brown stream bed covered in rocks and mud. the other was the beautiful reflection of the green glowing trees and the blue vibrant sky in the water. i couldn't see both at the same time - almost like one of those magic eye books, i had to choose which reality to focus on, and that was the only one i could see. this is a reminder to me about the kingdom of God. i have a choice to focus on the sin and pain and brokenness of this world, the mud of the world which seems without hope; or i can focus on the ways in which the bigger, more vibrant reality of the kingdom of God is already reflected and seen in the world now. i can choose to see the kingdom, acknowledging that sometimes it will be marred by ripples and harder to see. but still, God's kingdom is here and now, and it is coming in its incredible beauty and strength and life. i want to choose to both see God's kingdom in the world, as well as to be that kingdom, to be that reflection of God's love and justice and peace in a world that is still full of muck and mire. help me, Lord, to see and reflect Your kingdom.