The Present.

I’m not a genius. No, according to a Facebook quiz my mental age is around 13 years old…you can say I have a long way to go (...but I also hope it was lying to me as well!) But, I’m just going to go ahead and state that it doesn't take a genus to know you can only be in one place at a time. In this moment, you and I are where we are, and unless I take a long flight back home, I will not be able to be where my heart longs to be.

I’ve realized the extreme intentionality of how God orchestrates our lives, even more so over the last 10 days. On August 5, 2013, I wrote a blog entitled FOMO – The Fear of Missing Out. In that moment, I did not recognize the life long lesson I was learning from a week vacation in Costa Rica. I was at the beautiful beaches and wanted to be home. Now, today I sit in beautiful Rome, Italy on the verge of tears because I want to be home. I battle between the reality of where I am in this moment and the urge to catch a plane to Georgia to go to Bible Study on Wednesday, Passion Conference this weekend, to see my friends and family…and my puppies! But, I’m not there. The more I continue to wrestle with my reality, the more weary I become. I’m living in a beautiful city with wonderful people and a language I have yet to master, but my heart leads me astray.

God calls His children to be present. He is good and therefore His plans are good. Why must I always question this? I second-guess my present state because it is uncomfortable, it is new, it is adventure, and when focused on my efforts I am more than a little bit afraid. I looked up the word “Present” in the dictionary only to find the following as synonyms: here, at hand, available, ready. When I am focused on being somewhere else than where God has me, I am saying to God, “I am unavailable to be used.” Wow. What a statement. When you put it that way, I don’t want to be that. Little by little he is unveiling the darkest fears from within me, bringing them to light so I may become fully available, ready, and present no matter where He may lead me.

I’ve realized my role now isn’t to be present but to pray. Though anyone who knows me knows that I love to be hands on, I love serving in anyway shape or form, but God has taken that away to place another task into my hands – not to be present physically but to be alive prayerfully. No matter where we in the world, the ears of God are always the same distance away. And in this time, God is allowing me the opportunity to purify my heart from one of doing to one of being still, praying, and waiting, whether or not I ever see the benefits in this lifetime. God is slowly stripping me of everything I know to be true about myself to reveal His reality of purpose for my life. He is transferring my longing of being “home” onto Himself. He has changed everything, so that I may know no gap to too big and everywhere is “home” when I’m walking with the Creator of the Universe. So, humbly from across the ocean deep, I will pray. Not with a heavy heart, but with one of great expectation for what God is doing around the world. Tomorrow, Atlanta will be wrecked for the gravity of the gospel. God is spreading out His people so all may see the glory of who He is and the beauty of His hands.  I pray that the ripple effects of grace with pour out on to broken hearts and lost souls. He is doing a great work! He will not be silenced! He alone is worthy!