Hope in 2021 Goals

The beginning of a year doesn't seem complete to me unless there are goals set and a year reviewed.  Whether it be the beginning of January or the middle of the year (my birthday), I find myself subconsciously running through the past and the future.  I'm a visionary perfectionist.  My tendency is to set lots of goals that are not realistic.  I dream big and think positive.  Until reality sets in.  Then I hit the bottom.  The rock of let-down and disappointment.  As I've gotten older I've found words to describe these feelings.  It's been enlightening and hard to accept.

This year as I approached 2021 I caught my visionary mind and threw her into the room of caution.  She fought the feelings of rejection well by facing reality with hope.  The line of pushing oneself while walking a road of healing is very fine and difficult to detect.  I have to say, though, that 2021 looks hopeful to me.

I always picture the year in a circle.  Currently we are at the bottom moving counterclockwise.  This year the circle is covered by clouds.  The sun is shining on today and the past is tear-stained.  I don't know that I've ever felt so deeply confident of the coming year and it's goals.  I don't say that because of 2020 and what it looked like to the world.  I say that because 2020 was an incredible year of learning and healing while at the same time very dark emotionally.  I've never struggled as deeply as I did this past year.  To be honest, I looked at the beginning of 2020 with hope because the previous year had been painful.  I remember thinking to myself, "It's a good thing you didn't know how hard this past year would be at the beginning of the year."  This season of entering the New Year I told myself the same thing.  Especially because 2020 brought emotional and mental struggles I had never imagined would enter my life.

As I mentioned earlier, this year the circle is covered by clouds.  The world is still the same and the people around me are still facing the same unknowns.  But deep in the bottom of my heart I have an anchor.  One that hasn't been there for years. It's small, but strong.  Deeply rooted and unable to be moved.  The circumstances haven't changed.  The losses are still there.  I still miss my childhood home greatly.  But there's peace.  There's hope and redemption.  There's vision and possibilities.  I feel capable of setting a goal and seeing it come to completion.  It makes the cloud covered circle seem exciting and inviting.  I keep telling myself that this year is going to move rather rapidly so every moment needs to be utilized to it's greatest potential.  Learn all there is to learn in a moment and make the moves today count for tomorrow.

To you, the one who is struggling with entering this year:  Keep fighting.  Fight for Truth.  Be honest and real.  Ask for help.  It might take you through a deep and hard journey but when the wounds can heal completely without rocks and dirt in them you'll find the anchor of peace greater than anything you could ever imagine.  He wants you.  He doesn't need you, but He WANTS YOU.  He went through death for YOU.  As you walk into this New Year, give yourself grace.  It's not the end.  There is hope.  And it's found in Jesus.

HAPPY 2021.

May you find the peace of God more real to you this year than you did in the last.

  

10 Practical Ways to Help the Transitioning

Transitioning people have a difficult time knowing how to enter a populated space where relationships are already deeply established.  Loneliness, cluelessness, fear of being hurt and a state of being overwhelmed can at times keep them from reaching into the community around them.  As real as those feelings may be, they should never be an excuse for the transitioning soul.  An effort should be put forth in applying oneself right where he resides.

That being said, we are going to dig into the Top 10 Ways non-transitioning people can reach out to the transitioning individuals in their lives.  These all came from people who have either walked through or are in the middle of transition.  Just for entertainment purposes, I placed the advice in order of how many times they were sent in.

1.      Ask Questions. There’s an entire life and world overseas that is vastly different from yours.  The only way you are going to know what your transitioning friend is thinking or going through is by asking.  In doing so, you will speak volumes of interest.  I don’t know that one can ask too many questions.

2.      Listen.  There is nothing worse than a person who asks a question and pays no attention to the answer.  If you remember little details (the anniversary of their move, the date of a difficult, upcoming event, their favorite holiday overseas or any other random fact) you will communicate love to your friend in transition.  Be there for them.  There are days when they may need to talk about how difficult life currently is, how much they miss ‘home,’ and how good the family vacation to Paris was.  Be a listening ear.

3.      Include.  Often the first month or two are full of people inviting the transitioning person/people over for supper, out with friends or to a holiday event.  This is great but including can’t stop at the first- or second-month mark.  Don’t assume someone else is including them.  Take it upon yourself to make sure they are included.  If you invited them to a friend outing, make sure they have a place in the conversation as well.  Holidays are special and sentimental times in a person’s life.  Reach out to the transitioning during a holiday and make sure they have a place to go, people to be with, and events to take part in.

4.      Validate.  Acknowledge that the transitioning soul in your life is grieving.  It’s not always fun and games.  There are countless times when they won’t feel overly happy to be “home.”  When you ask them what has been the hardest part of transition, don’t respond to their answer with a list of what’s good in this country.  A great way to show care is by listening and validating their current struggles.  You can always pray for them and continue to check in on them as well.

5.      No Assuming.  You really don’t know how they are doing in the middle of the transition unless you ask them.  Please don’t ever jump to conclusions on your own or via someone else’s word.  Make sure you ask, listen, and get what they are saying. Assumptions kill relationships.

6.      Use the Word “Home” Lightly.  Referring to the current location as “home” is very risky and even painful at times.  For the transitioning soul, “home” is often still the place they just moved from.  It takes time for a place to feel like home.  In fact, it doesn’t happen over the course of a year, but over several years.  Just be mindful of the fact that this may not currently feel like “home.”

7.      Extend Grace.  A transitioning person doesn’t know how to live in this country just because he was born here.  Life has been very different and the current culture can be overwhelming to jump into.  He will make mistakes and will need a gracious person to help him navigate through the new changes.

8.      Enter Their World.  Find ways to hear about the culture, eat the food, look at pictures, and grasp a little more of their lives.  Be creative. 

9.      Offer Help.  If there’s a community event coming up, check in with your transitioning friend to make sure they know what’s going on.  There are times when the most obvious customs will seem confusing to the transitioning individual.  If they are clueless, you can explain and give as many details as they need.  Make yourself available for them to ask questions when they feel clueless and never make them feel dumb for asking the questions they do.

10.   Be Welcoming.  Look for ways to make them feel welcome as they settle into a new home, while at the same time giving them space to find their way in this new culture.  Whether it be a grocery shower, inviting them to a book club, including their kids in a Summer Bible School, dropping off a meal, or including them in a holiday event, make sure this continues throughout the years of transition and not for the first few months alone.

Still Transitioning

 It’s hard to imagine the familiar life around me vanishing into only a memory with a select group of people to share it with.  As hard to imagine as it may be, it happens.  It happened.

Everything I knew to be familiar and stable in the physical world faded into the distance as the plane left the ground.  The sights, scents, words and customs were gone.  The darkness of night folded in over the world I called home for eleven years as the aircraft took us higher and farther away from land.  It felt unreal.  Almost like a dream.

A couple months passed and the ache to go home hit hard.  It was time to go back to normal, but I couldn’t.  I tried to face reality, but reality was harsh.  He stared me in the eyes with a cruel and lonely look that only transition and death can bring.  Transition and I have a love/hate relationship.  There are parts of change that bring comfort to me and at times almost feel like they need to occur to keep me sane.  Death, on the other hand, has been a little too cold for me.  Death to homes, relationships, people and familiarity are not something I have ever enjoyed.  As much as death keeps me focused on what’s important, there’s a dark side to him I don’t enjoy encountering.

Here I am today thinking back over the past twenty-five years of my life.  Fourteen years ago we set foot on a brand-new county (to us).  In my lifetime of traveling I had never faced a fourteen plus hour flight.  Not to mention Asia being an entirely new continent and set of cultures for me to grasp.

The air was warm and the scents were kinda weird.  The food was decent, but boy was I tired.  The following days took us to lots of empty houses and left us with the decision of whether we wanted to rent one of them or not.  I didn’t like it.  I really didn’t want to be there.  My heart was still in the Caribbean where all my friends were.  Let’s not even start on the cousins and family in the North.  My heart was torn…no, not just torn.  It was broken and my eleven-year-old mind didn’t know how to fix it.

Days turned to weeks, weeks to months and months to years. Meanwhile the funky scents became familiar and almost comforting, the language made more sense to my confused mind, the food was incredible and daily life was so ordinary.  It was home.

There were countless times I messed up, used the wrong word, didn’t like a certain dish, had bad manners and offended someone; but the Thai people were so forgiving.  There were days when I was tired of fighting the cultural battle deep within me and wished that I could just live without all the frustrations, miscommunications and expectations.  At the end of every day, though, my friends and people around me knew that no matter what happened I would always be a white, American girl.  Because of that, they gave me grace to find my way, learn, make mistakes and be myself.  I could not have done it without their grace, care and love for me.

Eleven years and two months later my family boarded a plane for the U.S.  All of our belongings were packed up and the house we called home for years was in the hands of someone else.  Being warned by people with great years of experience told us the journey before us was going to be deep, tiring, lonely and long.  As much as I believed them, I honestly didn’t know it would be quite like this.

December will mark three years of life in the States.  I can’t say I’m that excited about it.  In fact, I find myself embarrassed to even tell people that sentence.  I guess I thought it would be a little different.  That the American people would be a little more gracious.  For some reason I expected them to care more than they have.  I was wrong.

You see, Journal, I look like this group of people called the Mennonites.  The state we are currently residing in contains tons of them…no, like really. TONS! You remember the days I’ve told you I wish I looked different, don’t you? Ok.  You’re right.  I am Mennonite, but the Mennonite culture here is so….different might be the best word.  I don’t think people ever even think about the fact that my brain doesn’t comprehend why they are doing what they do, Journal.  So, subconsciously, they assume I like to eat browned butter with everything, have ham balls for Sunday lunch (which, tell me, Journal, how do you even make those things?) and determine the food’s level of spice the same way they do.

Oh, and Journal, the truth is that I can hardly pay for toll with my left hand because that feels rude, but using my right hand causes embarrassing stunts.  When we go to someone’s house, it feels rude to not take them something, but is that the way it’s supposed to be done?  Why do people wear their shoes in the house and hang out with their little group of people all their lives?  It’s uncomfortable for someone to freely worship in church and work is part of their identity, I guess…  People don’t really know how to be needed by others apart from their families and Journal, it must be rather important for Christians to be self-sufficient.  It all seems rather backwards to me, but then again, I don’t know how all this works.  I guess I just subconsciously thought I’d find that community feeling I grew up having, but reality is that life in America is different.

So here’s to swimming through the waves of transition, Journal.  Some days they’re huge and other days it almost feels like they’re hardly there…Which means we are making progress, right?

Oh, and Journal, HAPPY 14^th MOVING ANNIVERSARY a day late.   

I Long To Belong.

I long to feel like I belong.  To have a place where I fit in and I’m needed.  Switching countries or states is not an event that is conducive to that particular feeling.  Your roots are continually pulled out of the ground and replanted in multiple places.  It takes time to connect and go deep with people.  So the feeling of being needed seems rather scarce, honestly.

The thought that has been racing through my mind the past week is:  As a Christian I tend to search for my place of belonging in a ‘safe’ place…in a group of Believers like myself.  It often dives into an even smaller circle than that though.  We like to stick within our own people group or denomination.  There are definitely pros to that, but I also see a weakness in my life.

Growing up as an MK forced me to rely on other people.  There were people around us who were different, but we needed them because we weren’t surrounded by our own people.  It was hard.  It was also beneficial.  I learned so much from so many different people that I would have otherwise missed out on.

That takes me to my current thought process.

Here I am.  A Christian girl in a city in America.  I love culture and being around different people.  Currently I am trying to fight through transition.  It’s hard.  I never thought I would attend such a large Mennonite church.  That’s hard to swallow.  But God calls us to things that are different and even appear illogical to our humanistic ways at times.  In the past year I’ve felt like I was losing myself.  Like RaVonne was slowly disappearing and I didn’t know what to do with it.  The things I stood for, the ways I thought and the challenges I wanted to jump into were being sucked down the drain.  I wasn’t ok with that, but I didn’t know what to do with it.  Was there a way to actually stop it?

I found myself struggling to find a way to fit into the church we are currently a part of.  It hasn’t gone like I thought it might.  I mean, in a church of 250+ people, it’s easy to attend and then remove yourself from everything else.  I don’t feel like I fit or like I’m needed.  Sorry, that’s a little vulnerable to say, but that leads me to this point…

For me, as a Christian girl in America, I can tend to want to find my place of belonging at church.  I don’t think that’s wrong because we all need other Believers to walk with us through life.  But I do think that for me it’s wrong to look for my complete group of people there.  How am I ever going to share the Gospel without having relationships with the people who are searching for the Truth?  They long to be needed too.  If I go to them for advice on the culture I am learning or the language I can’t understand and they feel like I really want and need them in my life, we will develop a healthy relationship of giving and receiving.  No, it won’t always be easy, but the Christian life is not meant to be easy.

I find myself living in a little bubble and that scares me.  It’s been a year and half of living here and I can tell you the name of one of my neighbors. That’s ridiculous!  How dare I allow moving to America to change my lifestyle.  I can’t be satisfied with being in a little comfort box where the people around me look the same all the time.  The Word of God needs to be my daily source of life and challenge.  What I believe has got to be more than what my church is asking of me.  I have got to be asking the Lord to fill me daily with the Holy Spirit as I enter the world around me.

God didn’t call me to live in a little bubble or on an island above the world.  Jesus got involved.  He helped people but wasn’t their crutch for life.  He healed many, fed others, and spoke Truth while loving them deeply.  Am I committed to loving unconditionally?  That requires me to put other needs in front of mine.  Am I committed to saying “Here I am, Lord, use me,” when I have no idea what all it might cost?  If not, then I am not a follower of Him.  I’m just a fan in the crowd searching for benefits.

Jesus Christ means so much to me.  To be here for benefits seems rather disrespectful, selfish, and ignorant.  Am I willing to live a different life and accept the responsibilities that comes with the incredible gift of salvation?  If not, than what’s the point!?

This Is Me

Hey Guys,

This is me.  RaVonne Rhodes.

I was born in Northern Minnesota to a white, Mennonite couple.  So, yes.  I have a white, Mennonite face and convictions that fall under Mennonite standards.  So to all of you who are white Mennonites…I look just like you.

The hardest thing for me to swallow and even say to you is that I am a white, American, Mennonite girl.  As true as it all is, everything within me wants to be separated from that title.  Let me try to explain…

When I was six years old my family moved to a small island in the Caribbean.  I went to a school where all the students’ beautiful, dark skin made my skin look ever so pale.  My friends were my brothers and kids on our street.  I distinctly remember dreaming of the day I would live in a small village like the one we would go to for quality time with our friends or live in a big house on a point with a beautiful view of the ocean.  That island was home and I thought I would be there forever.

After four years on the small island, my family moved back to Minnesota for a year to reconnect a little before we moved to Asia.  I loved being close to my grandparents and cousins, but sometimes it was hard.  I missed all my Grenadian family and friends.

Sixteen months flew by and we were suddenly on a long flight to Thailand.  I hated it.  I didn’t want to move there, but that is where God was calling my family.

As I look back on those eleven years of my life, I see God working in my heart.  Thailand became home and Asia was a place I didn’t want to leave for good.  After school my brothers and I would play with other TCKs in our housing development or with our Thai neighbor.  When I turned fifteen, I got my motorcycle license.  Almost every day my brothers would pile on the back and we would drive to school.  I had to learn to balance weight on two wheels while at the same time not allow the moving of kids to wreck our ride.  Rice and spicy food.  Hours at the pool.  Multiple nationalities present at church every Sunday.  Learning a foreign language and finding ways to communicate.  It was all a part of every day life.  Every day I would find myself around people who looked nothing like me.  It wasn’t awkward or weird.  They would ask me why I cover my head and why I wear skirts all the time.  I struggled to know why and even to be ok with being different all the time, but as I grew older, I began to understand the Word of God and what He was asking of me.  I would learn from my Asian friends and find myself inspired to reach out to people around me.  They used what they had to worship God.  It spoke to me and changed my view of life.

Eleven years of being in Asia and four years of being in the Caribbean made me someone different than the culture I was born into.

I stepped onto American soil on December 13, 2017.  To a lot of people, it looked like I was coming home.  Pennsylvania hasn’t ever been home to me before, but it’s supposed to be now.  It’s hard.  Every day I find myself wondering what new cultural thing I will learn next.  Kinda weird, right?  But let’s look at it this way…

I feel at home in a church service with other cultures.  I feel more at home when I look different from everyone around me.  When the food is spicy and English isn’t the only language being spoken. 

As white as I may be and as Mennonite as I may look, I don’t understand American culture or Mennonite culture.  I’m learning.  Every day I find myself in awe of the way something works.  It’s just like it was when I first went to Asia.  Only here I speak the language and look like the people on the outside.

In the past year I’ve started a relationship with a guy from my church in PA.  It’s been incredible.  One of the brightest parts of moving to America, actually.  But it has come with challenges.  Our cultures are different.  We see things differently at times.  It’s hard for me to stay in one place for a long period of time and be content with it.  Thanksgiving is an interesting holiday.  Churches do odd things to figure out who is going to be on a committee or who will be the next pastor.  Sometimes church feels formal.

I’m grateful for people who have patience to explain things to me.  For people who ask about my life.  For people who allow me to do odd things because I don’t know what’s expected.

It’s hard.  Relationships are difficult.

But learning is a huge part of life.  Especially for a Christian.

If we are going to share the Gospel with the people around us, like we are commanded to do, then we need to learn the culture of the people we are reaching.  That's a given.  So learning should be second nature.

To all of you TCKs out there today, learn all you can.  Our lives are different and we don’t always feel understood, but we can learn from others.  We can learn about our birth culture or our nationality’s culture just like we learned to adapt to all those foreign cultures in the past.

The biggest thing I’ve learned in the past few weeks is to grieve the countless losses.

Cry about those things you miss.  Shed tears over the fact that it’s hard and it hurts.  Admit that it isn’t what you thought it would be or that people don’t get it.  Find someone who understands.  Let God take your pain and frustration, your losses and disappointments.  Once you’ve allowed Him to clean the wounds, He will be able to bring healing and restore.

It’s a journey that’s hard.  But let me tell you, EVER SO WORTH IT.

We’ve been given a valuable gift.  Be who you are RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE.  Learn all you can and pursue Jesus Christ with everything within you.  You’ll never regret it!

Sincerly,

A Third Culture Kid

Strategic Life Plan

My mind has been in a constant search for a strategic, life plan.  Not a plan that tells me what I’m doing for the next five to ten years, although that would be kinda cool; but a plan that keeps me on track without a derail every fifty miles.  I hear people talk about their prayer lives being so powerful for them.  There are people who share about their daily time with God that starts at 4:30 or 5:00 in the morning and I’m over here thinking, “How do people keep going the rest of the day in a sane state of mind when they wake up that early on a daily basis?”

On a side note, I’m a night owl.  I have been for as long as I can remember.  I’m also someone who needs a solid night of sleep.  If I’m getting eight hours of sleep a night, that’s perfect.  Sure, I have those weeks where I run on four or five hours for about five days, but then I’m trashed for a while until I can get back up on my feet.  I’ll admit, I love mornings…when my sleep starts at 21:00 or 21:30, but to keep that as a daily routine…well, I guess I have a lot of things to work on in my life….

So, when I think about my relationship with God and the amount of time I spend with Him, I get a little sick feeling inside.  I know it’s not where it should be.  It’s not that I don’t enjoy that quality time with Him…reading His Word, praying, journaling…It’s all so refreshing and invigorating for me.

I’ve been hearing a lot of advice on this whole strategic, game plan for life recently and I’m convinced that it’s one of the wisest things we as Christians could do.  Will every strategy look the same?  Absolutely not because we are all different human beings with different weights, temptations, weaknesses, and thought processes.  So, I’ve been brain storming a game plan for my life.

Two weeks ago, I started teaching school again.  I love those high school kids so much.  The energy they have for life and the excitement they bring to my ‘normal’ days is just plain fun.  It’s also tiring at times and that’s why I’m struggling to find a good routine for these days of the week.  It always takes time to adjust to a different schedule and find a routine that works exceptionally well…I’m in that stage right now, but I’m also feeling like I’m failing my Spiritual life miserably.  Thus the continual search for a strategic, life plan.

Devotional time has always been one of my biggest weaknesses.  It bothers me that I can make time for a quick bite to eat before work, but I can’t fit some spiritual food in my schedule.  I should be able to go without physical food before I cut the spiritual filling from His Word.  Let’s also face the facts that I can spend fifteen minutes talking to someone, watching something, or scrolling social media before I go to bed without picking up my Bible to do something even more productive before those precious hours of shut eye.  How is that even just?

This summer I had a job about twenty minutes away from home.  I loved my drive to work because I could talk to God for a solid twenty minutes without an interruption.  (I even had less feelings of hate towards other drivers…I mean, how can you beat that?)  Now I’m back to driving a solid two minutes to school and I hardly have time to say, “Hey God, today I need some energy...”  So, my prayer life needs a little more scheduling these days cause going for a drive isn’t always the best financial way to spend one’s time.

When I say strategy, I don’t just mean scheduling a time for devotions and prayer…I’m also referring to the fact that I need to make a game plan for reading and praying.  This whole “average Christian life” thing is driving me nuts.  There’s no passion involved!  And to call ourselves Christians…I’m just not a fan in people separating radical Christianity from being a Christian.  Either you are a Christian or you aren’t.  If you are one, you’re radical because that’s what the saving grace of Jesus does to your life.  It turns it all upside down.  You aren’t afraid to worship on your knees in front of other people or with your hands raised. You take those three minutes to pray with a stranger in a coffee shop because you felt the Spirit prompting you to do so.  It doesn’t matter if it looks retarded.  You are different.  You aren’t made to fit into the cultural norm.  You love every person you meet because God made them with a story and a value we can’t fully understand.  The love you have for them will compel you to pray that the Father will spare their lives so they can experience His grace before it’s too late.  It’s a different lifestyle than what we are used to.

I’m preaching to myself because I have a lot to learn and grown in…Overcoming my natural tendency to want to please people with a loving boldness to do what the Father is leading me to do.  Looking the same as people around me and yet, not being afraid to live differently.  Our cultures scream, “Blend in.”  While at the same time they raise up people who are different in some areas of life.

I had this thought the other day while I was driving, so I wrote it on my gas receipt.

“I want my life to make other people question their relationship with God in the aspect that He means so much to me that they question whether or not He means that much to them.”

It comes from a quote I read somewhere along the line…but as a Christian, isn’t that how it should be?  I’m convinced it’s attainable.  I’ve been with people who have made me feel a little bit uncomfortable because I knew my relationship with God isn’t where it should be.  It wasn’t that they were degrading or lifting themselves up, they were just living their normal, every day lives…sharing the love of Jesus through conversations with strangers in gas stations, taking the plunge into deep, personal, honest conversations in a blink of an eye, and worshipping God anywhere at any time.  Talk about a challenging person. 

I really believe that the only way the world is going to be reached is through our everyday lives being different and visible to everyone around us.

Do I have a plan that is pushing me to do that?  Is what I’m reading going past my eyes and to my heart?  Or is it just a daily ritual to make me feel better about myself?  Is my prayer life existent?  Is it an actual conversation with the Creator of the entire universe?  Or is it a bunch of quick, desperate requests about my packed schedule?  Does my weekly schedule have time to just sit and breathe a little?  Is that time a priority and is that time spent in a beneficial way?  What am I doing to keep everything in its rightful place?  How many questions am I going to keep asking myself??

I’m currently working on coming up with a solid game plan, but I believe that the family of Believers is here to help each other out.  So, if you are one of those people with a game plan, I ask you to share some of your wisdom with me…Maybe it’s things that haven’t work.  Maybe it’s things that have been super beneficial.  Maybe you’ve never heard of a Believer’s strategic, game plan for life, but you have some ideas that might work…Hey, I’m willing to see if they work. 😊 There’s nothing like learning from each other and I’m a fan of learning from other people’s experiences.

Here’s to this week taking my relationship with Him deeper.  I’ll be honest, I am scared to say that sometimes because I’ve prayed that God will take me deeper with Him and then I find myself in some deep waters trying to swim to the top just for a breath.  The thing is, I never look back on those times and say, “I wish that wouldn’t have happened.”  The only way I’m really going to go deeper with Him is by completely abandoning my life, dreams, and ideas.  It really changes everything. 

"I'm Thankful for the Scars"

"The entirety of your life is made up of two percentages.  Ten percent is what happens to you.  Ninety percent is how you react to what happens."

Literally read that quote ten times because it's so true and what I need right now.

I don't know what you perceive my life to be...Social media has changed a lot of things for all of us and one of those being the way we view other people...but let me speak straight with you for a second...

In case you think my life has been a beautiful bouquet of roses and other beautiful flowers, is it OK if I remind you that there are thorns on those roses too?  The bouquet isn't just colorful flowers.

These days are hard.  Experienced people say it will be this way for several years...
"Give yourself grace." 

My internal calendar has been telling me to board a plane and go home because it's been three months in America.  I absolutely LOVE snow.  Always have.  I expect to always love it in the future.  (You all know that.)  But the past few days have me dreaming of sunny days with blue skies in Asian cities.  Eating spicy food from vendors, asking for directions with signs and wonders, smelling all sorts of interesting scents, and taking in all the beautiful scenery...

It's not that I want summer to come...I just want my life back.  I want it to be the way it normally was.  If I can't go home, I at least want to sit on a plane again...because that feels right.  It's normal and has been for as long as I can remember...

But now we are here.  In America.  As much as I hate to admit it, we have a house here and it's supposed to be home.  But it's not.  The people here are different.  They eat differently, talk differently, drive differently, and see life differently.  The culture is different.  I haven't figured it all out yet...Some people think I should fit in because of the way I look, but I don't.  In fact, there are times when I wish I understood what's going on so I wouldn't look so stupid.  At home, if I looked stupid, it was OK...because everyone knew I was different.

I guess different is the most common thing these days...maybe that's what normal looks like..?  I'm not sure, though...

But as I picked up my book tonight and read this quote...
"The entirety of your life is made up of two percentages.  Ten percent is what happens to you.  Ninety percent is how you react to what happens."
...I knew that ninety percent needs to be adjusted.  My attitude can be trashy towards the culture I'm supposed to fit into at times.  Sure, life is now completely different from what it used to be, but the way I respond to culture, incidents, problems, and struggles shouldn't be different...Or maybe it's not.  Maybe it is the same as it was before...Maybe I just need to work on my response to what happens...

There are things that hurt in life.  Big Time!  We can't change it.  Just the way it is...but there's always something to learn in the struggle.  The scars from those deep wounds will remind us of Who He is. 

I've seen God in new ways in the past few months.  He's literally become my Best Friend and Life Savor.  For that I could never say thank You enough...This past year has brought new experiences, fun travels, and death to normal life.  But all of those things have helped me see Him in new ways.  Sure the wounds have been deep in some areas of life, but as I came across this song today I was reminded how beautiful the scars really are...

Below are a few pictures from my 2017.  I've had to look at them time and time again to remind me of all the blessings I've had because truth is, life is full of so many blessings.  Some we see clearly and others we take for granted.  I am very grateful for the countless blessings I've been given in my life and I hope to never take them for granted even though I know my human ways fail over and over...

 

May this week be full of days that take you to Him...through the good and hard. 

"I'm thankful for the scars cause without them I wouldn't know Your heart..." 

♡♥♡♥