beautiful, beautiful!

Watch this!

this is difficult to put into words.

but...  i am going to give it a try.

a few things to note:  when scott and i prayed about moving here, we begged God to not let this move be about a job.  while we needed a vehicle, we didn't feel good about making a huge life change for something that wasn't kingdom centered.

at my going away dinner with my coveted friends, my friend brooke asked the table to join me in praying for friendships.  she intentionally chose to ask my closest christian women, who knew all the parts of little old me, to pray that i would be blessed with friendship.

that felt good.  in the lonely and hard of that first year, i clung to the fact that brooke and the rest of my people were praying for me.  specifically.  to have friends.

I rested in those prayers.

this girl is an extrovert.  she is people people.  i don't do alone well.  i don't do internal processing at all.  i thrive and grow from the outward.  i need people to sharpen me, grow me, reflect me, fill me, fill me some more, and add value to my life.

in our first few years of living in this lovely land of goodness, god stretched me in my church home.  i led this and was asked to do that and serve here and teach there...  and for a while it was very good. i had oodles of friends (in and out of the church).  i grew as a christ follower and felt very much like our "not for a job" mission was being fulfilled by a very generous and loving Father.

and then there was that day...  where God said, "nope.  tasha, i need you to step down from all of it."

"all of it?"

"yep.  all of it."

"are you sure?"

"yep.  super sure."

and so i did.  i remember talking to scott about the details and breaking inside because our lives were sort of built around all of the kingdom things we were doing.  i was fearful that this act of obedience that i had been called to wouldn't make sense for my family.  i brought it all to scott and scott didn't hesitate.  he just supported.  it was a weird and beautiful era.

as we stepped down from our church obligations and began to create this divide, i remember feeling lonely.  i longed for the relationships that i was deliberately separating myself from.  it was weird.  obedience felt so right and yet so hard and yucky at all the same moments.

and very quickly, the people that had been my people for several years, were not my people.  and quickly, space opened up in my life for new people and my social calendar began to fill with people...  not affiliated or associated with a church or a love of Jesus or a mutual religion...  but because of heart connections and a mutual love/respect for each other.

and while i was full because of these new emerging friendships, i also felt lonely and empty because the ones i had cultivated for so long and served with and poured into had forgotten me so quickly.

yikes.

yuck.

and so for many years, i cultivated new relationships and filled my time with people.  not for any reason other than the fact that they were people.  and we had connectivity.  and i loved them.  and we had fun together.  and it was good.  very good.

but it also brought me back to that thing...  "God, don't take us to california for a job.  make it be about kingdom stuff."  and my friend brooke praying for friendship.

and it left me unsettled.  i love my people.  each and every one of them.  right there.  for who they are.  for where they stand.  for what they add to my life.  for what i can add to theirs.  for laughter.  for tears.  for honesty.  for realness.

ALL OF IT.

and yet there was this piece in me that felt like something was lacking.  my service heart wasn't doing what it was called to do.  the piece of me that was cultivated to teach about Jesus was stagnant.  and yet i was terrified...  terrified of falling into an identity crisis where my self-worth had something to do with how much i served.  and i was paralyzed by the rejection and the fractured friendships that occurred when we chose to obey Jesus and follow a new path.  i had lost a whole circle of my life who clearly only wanted me in my life if i gave to them, served for them, volunteered in their circles and met their needs.  it left me dead in my tracks.

and yet Jesus is more powerful than me.

and the prayers of brooke and my friends were heard.

and answered.

and then this summer, after bearing my whole bag of trash to a new friend who loved Jesus, asked me to be part of the leadership for a mom's group (my whole heart on my sleeve) and i had no choice but to say "yes? Yes.  YES!" because God had prepared me for the ask and pushed me into the uncomfortable place of awkward, and serving, and vulnerability and obedience.  ick.

AND THEN...

are you ready for this?

this girl posts the registration link to the mom's (Jesus) group on facebook and a few friends REGISTER.  HUH?  what you talking 'bout willis?  my non-Jesus talking peeps are registering for the Jesus group?  at a church?   where we are going to fo sizzle, one hundy, talk about God and how he loves us and how to live intentionally for him?

Yep.

that happened.

and then....

my sister comes to town and has a cabi party and people get talking to people and suddenly ten-ish friends register for the Jesus loving mom's group.

and they come week after week.

and week after week, i walk into that room and see them, and hear them, and celebrate

that THIS

is

what brooke

prayed for.

beautiful, beautiful.

"Now there's a joy inside I can't contain
But even perfect days can end in rain
And though it's pouring down, I see You through the clouds shining on my face"

and with perfect vision i can look back and see the plan.  i can see how each and every person was part of god's perfect plan.  each and every one of them were an answer to prayer.

there has been a lot of rain in my heart- hurts, rejection, loss and confusion, but i promise you, the joy in uncontainable.

and my heart is full, and bursting, and celebratory at each and every heart interaction that has been brought forth by a friendship circle that prayed for this girl to have people and a god that turned those people into HIS people.