kitsch

Bri's freshman year is quickly coming to a close. I really can hardly believe, as trite as it sounds. This past year has been a muddle of change and growth. It's been fun, it's been HARD, but it's been genuinely good. Things happened that were completely out of my control. Something happened that I had a lot of control over that, looking back, I wish I didn't have control.

A lot of things have happened that I'm not proud of, there's a lot that I am proud of. I've seen sides of me I didn't know I had. I have met so many beautiful people this year and lost old friendships with some. College has been a wake up call. College is also sheltering me from a real world. I've felt inadequacy like never before, yet I've been pushed and encouraged in directions I never thought I would. God has been far from me, yet God has never been nearer. Oh, the paradoxes of this past year!

But one thing has stayed completely untouched throughout all my short comings, successes, crushed sprit, and rejoicings: God is real. And I am His. I have always struggled with the basics of Christianity. Oh, I have theological views and Christian life theories all figured out, but it's those little things like GRACE or OBEDIENCE that I struggle with. And probably will for the rest of my life. But this year an unwavering truth, no matter how hard or strange my life may be, has that God is absolutely real and loving me.

I know everyone has gone through about as much change as I have before, at some point in their life, but it's mind boggling for me to think about it at this moment. Most of this change has been fun and acknowledged as good things. But there has been a lot that has been so tough. I think back to those moments that found me banging angrily on a piano in a practice room, tears falling on my fingers, or making those phone calls that leave you feeling worthless, or sitting in a chapel service feeling completely isolated, even from your God. Especially God. Or having conversations with wise adults that tell you like it is ...and the answer is not easy.

There was so much going on in my life that I could hardly function as a person. Sometimes I felt like I was just floating between who I was and who I knew I needed to be, without anyway to get from one place to the other. Through Christ, I can forgive people who have caused me pain -and truly forgive. Through Him, I see that I all I need is the Father.

Grown up? Not at all.

I want to be perfect so badly, but I'm afraid you're just going to have to take me as I am. Just like Jack White puts it, "sometimes I just feel like you're the hardest button to button".
All that to say, this has been an absolutely fantastic year. It's not been easy, but who wants easy? The Lord is near to the broken.

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

- The Velveteen Rabbit

Peace
[Let us press on, press on to know the LORD...] hosea 6:1-3