Another New Year

Hello all I know it's a few days early but I wanted to get in wishes and prayers for a wonderful new year. It's amazing all the changes in my life this last year and as I look back and take stock I'm in awe.

There are the physical changes: location, career, etc. but then there are those other changes, the ones that can't be seen, the ones that occurred only within my heart.

I'm both excited and humbled to be in full-time ministry. It's scary to do what you're heart has always desired. This next year will be interesting to see how God chooses to use me (and I'm blown away that He does) and to grow me in this role and place.

The changes of my heart are not any less insignificant and some I'm just now realizing are occuring. It's a different feeling to see yourself change from the inside out, to struggle along knowing that who you are is being refined and reshaped. It can be both amazing and also heart-breaking. And yet these are the changes that mean the most to me, the ones that change not what I do or where I live but who I am.

So as I look back on this last year I am thankful for my family, friends, and all the blessings and hardships that have come my way, but mostly I'm thankful for a God that walks beside me day in and day out even when I don't want Him to, who knows me completly and still loves me more than I will ever love Him, and who through my pain, tears, and cries continues to change me to be the woman that He sees everytime He looks at me.

Happy New Year to you all, may it bring blessings and joy like you've never known and may those moments that are filled with pain be less empty because you are surrounded by the arms of an amazing Lord.