Help Me God – Thoughts from Blue Eyes

Lament // Waiting

I think it’s week 6 of my shelter-in-place/quarantine/coronavirus panic insanity? It’s a bit unsettling that I’ve somewhat lost track of the days. I’ve tried to keep track by baking something every weekend. But it’s blurry.

Our world is in chaos due to a tiny germ that broke out of the East and floated around the world on unsuspecting travelers. Many comparisons have been made to sin, the metaphors abound, talk of lament and prayer and reliance on the Lord are ABUNDANT. So many articles. Devotionals. Stories. I’m drunk on it, there’s too much to read, too many opinions, too m a n y t h o u g h ts.

The news is exploding. No one even remembers the Biden/Sanders primary race (was that really, juuuust a month or so ago?) There’s nothing else to say and nothing else to talk about. I know the names of a lot more governors and

Lament // WaitingKaitlyn2020-04-19T04:23:38+00:00

Wisdom from Pooh

I am in the process of ending Year 4. I will soon cross the stage. I will shortly have my piece of paper. I will be sent.

Bible College has been the most incredible experience of my life. Trying to say goodbye “well” has involved a large, Hermoine Granger-sized mixed bag of emotions. This has been my favorite season, favorite place on earth, and now it is time to leave.

Maggie took me to a ridiculously sketchy-but-good grilled cheese dive tonight for one last spontaneous dinner. God continues his profound stooping as he constantly uses agents to encourage me and mediate his love. I love the Body of Christ for this reason and so many more.

Reading Romans 8 shows the tension between the already-but-not-yet world we live in. There are goodbyes, and pain, and sufferings, yes, but we as Christians await the new heavens and the new earth, we have hope that

Wisdom from PoohKaitlyn2017-04-25T04:30:19+00:00

Jacob and the Ladder

How many people does it take to tell you something and actually believe it is true?

To tell you that the objective of life is not to just escape through with the least amount of scars, and to bemoan the ones you carry?

To tell you that you are beautiful, a treasure, worth a suffering and a sacrifice?

To tell you that your sins and flaws and edges and grotesque deformities don’t negate unconditional love from your Father in heaven?

Wrestling with the truth leaves you tired. I’ve been mulling over all these things, which have come to light this semester as I’ve been reading and writing and contemplating my life and post-Year-4 existence. I’ve been studying Ruth and Hosea and Genesis and 1 Samuel and realizing the same God who was there in the beginning has always been relational and has always mourned the disobedience of his people.

I have read examples over and

Jacob and the LadderKaitlyn2016-10-24T03:37:56+00:00

Proper Lives Lived

“‘Dear God,’ she prayed, ‘let me be something every minute of every hour of my life.’”
—Betty Smith, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Her parents started a major missions organization that impacts thousands of Eastern European youth each year and has ignited a gospel hunger where the Iron Curtain once hung. Her mom wrote a book detailing the life story of their family and how the mission happened by God’s grace and leading. I am privileged to call this dear sister a very close friend. Her faith and contentment inspire me.

As I skimmed the memoir her mom wrote of saying “Yes” to God, I’ve been thinking about how every fiber of my being longs to live a life of “Yes”– to God’s plan, will, and promises.

The hard part about saying, “I surrender all” to God is that there’s a ton of suffering that accompanies that, because God uses trials to shape us,

Proper Lives LivedKaitlyn2019-10-08T02:29:18+00:00

Please Rescue Me from my Mind Palace

The black hole of my mind.

I can spend hours pondering my future, internalizing anxiety and trying to over-analyze my heart’s current state. I can become absorbed in replaying memories, following threads into tomorrow, running and racing and lying awake. I mope over my lack of Christian growth and how I’ll never be good enough to xyz. Everyone is always better, more equipped, more focused. I could never write anything worth reading, have a grip solid enough on the Scriptures, know enough to have a ministry job…

My mental energy is often wasted navel-gazing at my own self. I have wept often and begged God to help me overcome my anxious, over-stimulated mind that runs until it’s exhausted. Where is the peace that passes all understanding? Where is God in my anxiety? Why does my mind have to do this to me, preventing me from enjoying seasons and moments too many times?

Why can’t I just

Please Rescue Me from my Mind PalaceKaitlyn2016-07-25T02:41:19+00:00

Small Escalator to the Dungeon

Orlando.

Jane Doe, the survivor of the Stanford rape case.

I read their words today.

The world is broken, suffering, a slew of one-after-the-others. ISIS. Another Ebola outbreak. Another mass shooting at a high school. Another high-profile sexual assault case. Another child who dies of cancer.

I find myself sometimes, in the teeny tiny recesses of my heart, quietly asking God is the gospel is enough.

“Lord, is the Good News…is Jesus actually enough to heal and make right and restore?”

…

“Lord. Are you actually enough to fix all this?”

Doubt is real in the face of a groaning planet where humans are starting wars and destroying each others’ bodies or you find yourself waiting for “the phone call” that someone in your family has an incurable disease.

Doubt is real when you wonder if your grandma’s heart will ever soften towards the true Gospel and if Christians will ever act like Christians.

I heard a message on Romans

Small Escalator to the DungeonKaitlyn2016-06-13T22:42:37+00:00

Broken Beating Hearts

Tonight, I met Hagar.

She was pushing a stroller at top speed through the subway tunnel. She was haggard, dirty, poorly dressed. Her daughter was eerily silent.

“Excuse me, I was wondering if you could help me out?”

Metra ticket….safe house for women leaving abusing relationships….they’re saving a bed for her but she needs to get to Kenosha….

I didn’t have my purse. She left as fast as she arrived.

I was frozen to the cement and felt a wave of emotion. I wanted the scene to be put on hold so I could sit there for a moment, process the fact that this woman was on her own, with a baby, run down, with nothing to her name.

God, do you see her? Will you encounter her, save her, restore her?

My heart is continually made heavy by the racking pain of other people’s stories. My story is hard, but it’s pretzels compared to 99% of

Broken Beating HeartsKaitlyn2016-04-05T01:54:02+00:00

So, Does this Outfit Make Me Look Relevant…?

“Do you have Instagram?”

I looked at the man across the counter of the donut shop and shook my head. He was trying to connect me with the store’s coupon offer. Needless to say, I couldn’t jump on the bus.

I twaddle back and forth with the lingering frustration that I don’t fit in to my generation. Oh sure, in many ways, I am certainly a Millennial:

-I remember when terrorism wasn’t a thing

-I remember the advent of cell phones and pre-HD days (hey there, 2004, nice slow-mo effect in that movie)

Despite shared life experiences, in many ways, I feel irrelevant among my demographic. This unfortunately can extend to the Bible College cafeteria.

Problem 1: I have a deep heart for the lost of my generation. And I struggle to connect with them.

Subpoint B: How can I preach the Gospel to Millennials if I loathe social media?

Must I become all things to all people

So, Does this Outfit Make Me Look Relevant…?Kaitlyn2019-10-08T02:29:18+00:00

I’d like to order one Rapture, please…

It’s hard to look at the monstrous expectations of your future and of yourself and not be overwhelmed. I want to grow up well. I want to do this life thing right, honor God, finish strong. Keep going….

There are plenty of folks in Scripture I can see parallels with. It’s hard not to feel like Timothy sometimes, staring at a rag-tag congregation of Ephesians who are veering into idolatry and Paul’s far away and it’s up to his youthful, dreadfully inexperienced self to protect the deposit of truth and lead them back. The pressure against maintaining the Gospel even among his own was very real.

It’s hard not to feel like Daniel, a kid in a foreign land where they’re forcing him to melt into a new identity and making him do things his Jewish mother would gasp at, and he’s navigating the war between inner resolve and compromise. The pressure

I’d like to order one Rapture, please…Kaitlyn2019-10-08T02:29:19+00:00

Perhaps

“Great is Thy faithfulness,” the congregation sang. Worshiping at a historic church here in the City, I receive a weekly dose of beauty and hymnody. This morning, as I looked another semester square in the face and was wondering how long I’d be able to retain my mental capacities, I joined in singing these words.

“Strength for today, and bright hope for tomorrow…”

Anxiety is a crippling demon that drowns out the truth. Shutting out the reality that God is here and able prevents us, his children, from letting the peace of Christ rule richly in our lives (Col 3:15). We have peace that endureth, and we are united with the One who has bestowed pardon for sin.

The thing is, God always comes through. What does that mean? It means that he never fails and always does what is right. This could mean that he chooses not to rescue us from our

PerhapsKaitlyn2019-10-08T02:29:19+00:00