The Turning Point

Six years ago yesterday was a turning point in my life. It was the beginning of a new chapter. But before the new could begin I had to walk through a little bit of a valley. 

My appendix ruptured in June 27, 2012. It’s a long story, but let’s just say that my fear kept me from going to the hospital. I really thought that I would just get better with some rest. Crazy, huh. Anyway, because of my delay of getting to the hospital I ended up not having surgery until July 4th. There was long road of recovery ahead for me. I spent time in prayer and really getting to know this Jesus that I had been taught about, but didn’t really know much about. 

I learned a lot about Him. I learned about the people that He spent the most time with. I learned that the people He spent the most time with were the exact people that I had been taught to avoid. So I started on this journey that lead me to loving people that were totally unlike anyone that I’d had a relationship with. 

He began to flip my whole mindset. I was totally materialistic and cared only about having mine and my family’s needs met. Everyone else could take care of themselves. That wasn’t my job. Then Jesus and I got real close. I started to read His Word and that’s when I discovered what He said about loving others. I’d been missing it. I’d never really heard it preached about. I mean I heard love preached about, but more from the aspect of loving people like me. 

I now have more friends who don’t look like me than who do look like me. My table looks totally different. This is how I believe that Jesus wants us to live. Gather people who aren’t like us and some who are like us ...NOT to have a debate, but to just pour out His love on them! 

What’s my point? I post lots of pictures of  ReBUILD. Not to be proud or boastful, but  because I want to share how Jesus changed me. How He took me from a church goer to a Jesus follower!! How He changed my heart to only caring about myself amd my wants to really caring about and loving others. I screw up every day at doing this. But every day I try with everything in me.

•Find someone

•Show up for them

•Love 

Living In Two Worlds

It’s 10:50pm on Father’s Day night. I’m sitting on my deck reading a book and drinking a cup of coffee. I’m looking at the moon and listening to these dang bugs. They act pissy  that I have the light on and am disturbing their rest. It’s quiet here on the deck. A couple of cars driving out of our cul de sac back here, but that’s it. That and these noisy dang bugs. 

While I’ve been sitting here reading and drinking my coffee I’ve been talking to God. Asking Him what He wants from me. From my family. See, the community I live in is not the community where my heart resides. It’s just the place my body sleeps until we sell our house (if you’d like to buy it hit me up). My heart left this area long ago. 

For some reason God placed our ministry in a downtown community. That community has captured my heart and soul. I love being down there. I love being out walking and knowing everyone that I pass on the sidewalks. I love stopping and talking to people. When I’m there I have this peace that I’m where I belong. I love to gather people of that community together. I love the diversity that there is. It’s a beautiful thing to be able to celebrate your differences and to come out on the other side as friends. 

People think I’m crazy to want to walk away from this world. I think I’m crazy to try and stay. Just as a missionary to a foreign country feels led by passion to their country. I feel led by passion to our ReBUILD community. Led to gather and love our neighbors ❤️

{GATHER} bring together and take in from scattered places or sources.

My Real Life Friends

For my entire life everyone everywhere I went looked exactly like me. I didn’t know that this was a problem until I began to meet people and become friends with people who are nothing like me. 

We don’t look the same. We don’t act the same. Our backgrounds have nothing in common. I wake up and suddenly in my life there are more people who aren’t like me than who are similar to me.

 Somedays I’m like how did I get here. How did this happen? It’s not something I set out to do. It wasn’t intentional. I didn’t even know it was something I needed in my life until God had already brought the people in. And then I’m like THIS is the missing piece of my life! These friends are who my life has been missing. 

Our differences don’t cause problems. They make us laugh at each other sometimes. And they make us roll our eyes at each other sometimes. But they don’t keep us from loving each other. The barriers that society and even the church have told us we needed to have are gone from my life (Don’t get mad about the church comment.  You know it’s totally true. We can have a discussion on that on anytime. I’d love to share my exoerience). 

Let’s be real when you step from that bubble...when you invite people in who are different from you...it’s a risk. You don’t know what you are walking into. But then one day.....

You find yourself sitting at friends house (on a street that you were always told to avoid because it’s too dangerous) watching your kids swim and play together and you realize this is real life! And in all of its dysfunctions, chaos and crazy it’s just about perfect. 

Anxiety:This is My Real Life Somedays

I have suffered from anxiety for as long as I can remember. I can go back to elementary school and tell you about all of the memories I have of being worried about something (read that as EVERYTHING). 

That anxiety turned into full blown panic attacks as I entered adulthood. By full blown panic I mean I didn’t drive for a couple of years, I hardly traveled anywhere, I couldn’t stay alone. If I attempted any of these things panic happened. Here I was as a young wife and mother and I wanted to enjoy my life. I wanted some independence that I’d never had. Then BAM the air was knocked out of me. 

During this time I became a Christian. You hear that and you think I bet that made everything better because Jesus, right? No....it actually made it worse. 

1. If I truly believed in Jesus then I wouldn’t be fearful or anxious, right? That’s how I felt. I suffered much guilt because if I was “really” a Christian then I wouldn’t be fearful of anything. 

2. I remember sitting and listening to preachers talk about trials and suffering and the negative things that would come from following Jesus. Yes, I’m aware of those things and aware that those are facts. I just wonder sometimes how different things would have been if I had heard more about God’s love and grace. Rather than waiting on the next bad thing to happen. 

Today...where does that leave me today? Twenty three years after my first panic attack? I’d love to sit here and write that I am cured. That I know longer suffer. Nope...I still freak out when my vision goes wonky from a migraine. I still freak when my husband or kids don’t answer a text quickly. I still freak out when I’m in a closed room and can’t get out quick enough. Some days driving is still an issue. Does all of this make me a “bad” Christian? I’d like to think NO! I’d like to think it makes me human. I’d like to think it makes me a better Christ follower because these feelings pop up I have to turn to Jesus. I have to depend on Him. I was anti-anxiety meds for over twenty years. I am NOT, NOT, NOT anti meds!!! But in that twenty years I never once tried to find the root of the problem. I just used them as a band aid. I never once tried to turn to Jesus and ask Him to help me. Being off of the meds has forced me to turn to Jesus. It’s forced me to pray and to practice being still. Some times meds are needed. Some times being still is needed. I may go back to the meds some day. 

What’s the purpose of me sharing this? Because no matter how I appear anxiety is a part of my real life. I won’t let the guilt over not being fearless or worry free control me. I will get up every day and surrender it to Jesus. When it creeps in during the day I will surrender it again. And again. And again. And again. 

This Is Real Life

I am once again trying the blog thing. Like seriously, with all of my heart, I long to consistently blog and write. But life, ya know...... it kind of gets in the way, right? I am currently sitting on a balcony at the beach listening to the waves of the ocean. That is not my real life. I mean it is this weekend, but come tomorrow I will head back to what is my daily real life. The life that is totally not what I had planned out for myself and my family.

But God, right?

Why do I want to write about real life? What do I want to accomplish?

Above everything else I am a Christ follower. I want to live for Jesus more than I want to do anything else. I also want to do it perfectly. I want to get up at 4am with my coffee and spend the next three hours reading my Bible and praying. Sitting here right now I can picture it. It looks so pretty in my head. That is NOT real life. The unrealistic expectations and perfectionism that I battle all too frequently make me feel like a failure on a daily basis especially in this area. Most days real life looks like oversleeping (I mean past when I expect myself to get up) hopping in the shower and asking God to be with my husband and my kids through the day. Running through my devotions and Bible reading and also wanting to pound my head into a wall because I just can't get up as early as I want to. Then I head to our non-profit ministry and I pray for the porch that we are on and for protection from any violence in the neighborhood. It looks nothing like I want it to, but I'm trusting for that grace that everyone talks about and that Jesus understands that this is my current real life.

I am a new Lawly. My grandson is 6 months old. He is the most precious human being that I have ever met outside of my own four children. My battle with my expectations and my real life collide right here as well. As my kids were growing up you kind of get in your head what life will look like and then real life happens and it looks NOTHING like you thought it would. I always assumed that I would be a hovering grandma invading my children's homes to grab moments with their kid (my son and his wife are probably happy that real life doesn't look like that). Here is real life. I have a four year old. I have a non-profit ministry. Both of things were not in the plans when I was picturing what grandparenthood would look like. I wouldn't change either thing (most days). But honestly getting adjusted to a new normal and putting a different picture in my head is hard sometimes. So now, I will take as many Facetime calls as I can get. I will be thankful for the weekend trips that we can take. I will be appreciative that they just live a few states away and not a few countries away.

I am in full-time ministry that isn't called full-time ministry. It's really just living life. The difference is that a lot of my people are battling addiction, poverty, or facing some type of major thing in their life. It's hard.....I hear about a shooting and I worry that it's someone I know. I hear about an overdose and I worry it's someone I know. It is definitely not the real life that I expected at this point in the game. But God called us here and we said yes! I have to believe that even on the really hard days that He's in charge and He will keep leading us. This "ministry" isn't a 9to5. It isn't a "client based" thing. These are real people that we are doing real life with. They have 24 hour access to us (that could be the reason that I can't get up at 4am. LOL). We are friends. I don't have ReBUILD friends and non-ReBUILD friends. There are not dividing lines in my life. I have friends.


Here are the answers to my questions above:
I want people to see that while saying yes to God is hard and not always fun it is the only way to live. I will not sugarcoat or BS about anything. I will write with as much transparency and authenticity as I possibly can. People don't need anymore fluff. They need the courage to live out their real life. Even when it doesn't look like what they "dreamed" it would look like.

Stay tuned for more THIS IS REAL LIFE.