Grace.

I kicked off the year 2013 by running myself ragged working the night shift in the ER on New Year's Eve and every night following that for 6 nights in a row. I wasn't aware of it then, but that's what many of the following months would look like in my life. Constantly working, or going to class, or dealing with one mess after another. And somehow in the midst of all of this God said, "Go to Haiti." Um, sorry, in the words of the Despicable Me minions..."WHAAAAA?"
On more than one occasion I found myself looking back on the last 8 to 10 months shaking my head thinking, "I can't believe I did that," or, "I can't believe I got to go there," or, "Why would God choose me to love and use in His great plan even when I screw up so much of the time?" Then I realized... I think about myself way too often. I like to think I'm a caring person and not your average, self-centered American twenty-something woman, but I am. And then I hear God saying, "FINALLY, YOU GET IT."
When we shift our focus from ourselves to Christ, things start to fall into place. Don't get me wrong - there are still consequences to the things we do and we still live in a fallen world, but when we put our eyes on something bigger than ourselves we can begin to see that there is something so much more going on in the world than all the hate and disaster that plagues every nation on this earth. We begin to see that through all the facades and hypocrisy that seem to be human nature, there is a God that is always at work...And the great thing is He loves us unconditionally and wants to have a relationship with us. Why? Honestly, that one is beyond me, but He does. Does the creator of the universe really need a reason?
I cannot tell you how many people I've gotten to talk with who say they can't believe in God because if He was real, He wouldn't let bad things happen. He wouldn't let bad people get their way. He wouldn't allow them to hurt. I can't tell you how many people I've talked with who say they can't believe in God because people who profess Christianity have screwed them over or hurt them in some way. I cannot tell you how many people say they cannot believe because they don't have their lives together, because they're too far gone, because it's preposterous that "God" could love such a person as themselves. And to those things I say, I understand. I've been there. But somehow God put someone in my life that showed me truth and I've never been the same. Paul explains that, "God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:8). There is nothing we could have done to earn that love because if there was there would be no point in God or Jesus or faith, or anything at all for that matter. It's not something that is easy to explain and it probably sounds like a bunch of foolishness to some of you to have faith in a being that we don't physically see...but I can tell you that it's real. I've seen people do miraculous things that just aren't possible without the help of a higher being. I've seen love pour out of people like I never imagined, and it's because they know Jesus.
This summer was basically a disaster for some of my friends and I from the get-go. Whether it was job issues, personal issues, dating issues...you name it, we had it going on. I can't tell you how many times I wanted to question my sanity, my relationships, my faith...but every time God would remind me of His faithfulness by working things out in ways I never could have imagined. Ways so much better than I could ever think of. I guess what I'm getting at is, life isn't all about me, it isn't all about you. It's all about the amazing God who is so beyond our imagination and so crazy generous that He would come to earth as Jesus so that we could be made right with God through His sacrifice for us on the cross. I don't know about you, but that's pretty stinking amazing to me no matter how many times I hear it.