What Are You Wearing?

This weekend, it poured love in my house. 

One of my best friends is getting married this summer, and we celebrated her bridal shower with mini-cupcakes and mega-balloons. We put out flowers and pom-poms and put on our fancy spring dresses and biggest smiles for the makeshift photo booth.  

 

From all outward appearances (you can confirm this on Instagram and Facebook), the shower was truly Pinterest-worthy. But that wasn't the praise-worthy part in my mind. 

For me, the beauty of the day appeared in a different fashion--a fashion that doesn't change to suit hipster whims and never fades or fails or goes out of style. 

For me, the beauty of the day came from the community. In the generosity of each of the women who attended. In the outpouring of love I witnessed. 

Even before gifts were opened or the greens with goat cheese, cranberries, and walnuts were enjoyed (told you it was Pinterest inspired), we chose a passage from Colossians 3 to share as a theme verse for the shower and as a prayer for the future bride and her husband.

  

"Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony. And let the peace that comes from Christ rule in your hearts. For as members of one body you are called to live in peace. And always be thankful. (Colossians 3: 12-17 NLT)

As one of the bridesmaids, I had the honor of helping devise our love-showering strategy. 

What could have been a stress-filled, Bride and Bridemaid-zilla event, was anything but. 

Instead, this day was a day that was decked out in love. 

Instead of entitlement, I saw mercy.

Instead of cattiness, kindness.

Instead of arrogance, humility. 

Instead of demands, gentleness. 

Instead of irritation and eye-rolling, patience. 

And instead of comparisons and tearing down, I saw love. 

I was reminded of the rare gift it is to have a group of girlfriends who love each other, encourage each other, and support each other without a hint of mean girl drama. I met most of these women during my first state-your-name-hometown-and-major-in-one-breath week of college, and they have been like sisters ever since. 

And, like sisters, they have been teaching me and molding me and loving me ever since. 

This was just one day of many that they have shown me what it looks like for Love to put on clothes. And I can only hope their sense of fashion wears off on me. 

***

So what are you wearing? Who in your life would you like to influence the types of character you put on? 

A Call From Grace

I quietly slid the door closed and buried my hands in my pockets, making my way along the maze of sidewalk in the darkness. I paced back and forth in front of the stacked silver mailboxes, like a confined polar bear at the zoo. Finally, hands shaking, I flipped open my phone and scrolled to his name.

I had been haunted with the nagging feeling that I should call him for weeks. And it was getting worse. You know the feeling—the same tug on the back of your mind that exhorts you to finally get your oil changed, switch your laundry, and text your mother-in-law. The voice of should and ought and must.

I thought the voice was God’s, calling me to connect, to reconcile, to be the better person. Calling me to call.

As I scrolled to his name, heart racing, a trickle of sweat running down my back, I froze. I scanned the letters of his name that once made my heart leap, and the tears pricked hard at the back of my eyes, hurt balling up in my throat.

The ought to voice screamed louder, screamed “DO IT!”

I dropped my phone, dropped my body to the sidewalk and yelled back “Just give me a minute!”

Huddled on the curb, I forced the breath in and out of my lungs. Forced my hands to still. And in the stillness, a different voice spoke:

“Aly, I love you whether or not you make this phone call.”

Not the voice of ought, but the voice of Love. The voice of Grace.

I wasn’t accustomed to hearing voices so kind, so clear. I knew it was not my own.

I stared wide-eyed into the sky, the dark, soaking in grace. When, minutes or hours later who knows, I pocketed my phone and walked back to my apartment, the phone call still unmade, all outward signs pointing toward failure, I didn’t care.

I was a different person. A person who was just beginning to tune her ears to the voice of Love, but a new creation nonetheless.

I did eventually call him, and we met up to reconcile, albeit somewhat unsatisfactorily. But that’s not really the point. That night I learned something, knew something, I perhaps had never known before: I was loved in that moment and in all moments. Even if I didn’t make the phone call that night. Even if I never made the call.

Even if I never obey the prodding of his Spirit, I am loved.

I am loved. I am loved. I am loved.

Daily I am a new creation. Daily I am learning to retune my ears. To depend on Grace to call me out of my own ego and frenzied justifications and call me in to relationship with the One who loves. 

Light Floods: Darkness, Dreams, & Daylight

The Darkness

“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.” (Proverbs 13:12 NIV)

The darkness flooded strong and heavy. Torrential.

Before Plant With Purpose wiggled its way into my heart, I wanted to live abroad. I dreamed of Antigua’s cobblestone streets, flowering woven shirts, bright skirts, distant volcanoes, and a day when I would dream in Spanish. I hoped to call Antigua home.

And that hope burrowed down deep within me, determined.

But I was scared. I was content, even joyful, to serve at Plant With Purpose. So I stayed silent. Stayed put.

About a year and a half ago I felt God calling me to ask if it would be possible to work for Plant With Purpose remotely from Guatemala. To ask if my dreams could come true. After an initial yes, I was given a final no.

I. felt. so. foolish. for thinking I could get what I wanted. That I wouldn’t have to choose between the job I loved and the country I wanted to call home.

And so, not ready to leave my job, I stuffed in the disappointment. Swallowed it down. Tucked it into a pocket. And went back to work.

Could I dare to hope again?

Night Vision

I spent one and half years in grief and burnout, trying to discern if the call for Guatemala was God-given or God-thwarted. Was I being too selfish or were my dreams too small?

I learned to name the grief, the ache, the burnout.

I learned to see God in the dark.

As my sight failed, my Hope grew. I learned to don my night vision God goggles, my hope growing wide as my pupils.

At a prayer workshop at my church, I was given a vision of light, of freedom, of joy:

"Someone is running in the dark, past all of these closed doors. But God rushes in and takes your hand; suddenly you are running with him in the light—free."

I was running in the dark, past closed doors. I was running so hard and so fast and so desperate. I couldn’t see the light, but knew the light was coming. I kept running anyway. What else would I do?

I was promised light.

The Light

I know this is a lot of background and you’re probably wondering why I don’t just hurry and up and tell you already how the story ends, how God has made a way, but the darkness is what makes the light so sweet.

In the last few weeks of praying and pleading, of discerning and deliberating, I sensed a calling to let go. To loose my fists that clench too tightly around Plant With Purpose. To silence the voices that tell me I am nothing without my job, without this identity as a social justice do gooder. To quell the fear that Plant With Purpose is the best part of me, the only good part of me. That alone I will unhinge, disappear, disintegrate.

And so I decided to leave. To let go. To step forward.

I have friends who live in Guatemala who have graciously offered their home to me. I have roommates who have graciously agreed to let me leave halfway through our lease. I have a family that has graciously encouraged me to follow my dreams, even if it means I’ll see them less.

And so I told my boss I will be leaving Plant With Purpose at the end of June.

And so I told my roommates I will be moving out in the middle of July.

And so I told my friends I will be coming to live with them in Guatemala.

Just as soon as I made these plans, as I took this step, the light began to flood in. God answered my prayers for confirmation, my heart cry for meaningful work.

I have been given the opportunity to work as a freelance writer for other non profits. Over the last few months, the dark months, God has been building connections and giving me time to cultivate relationships that will allow me to do what I love to do in the country I would love to call home.

I have been running in the dark for so long, banging closed doors, and now I see the light. Like the woman at the prayer workshop told me, it is as if God has rushed up beside me, grabbed my hand, and we are now running in the light.

FREE.

I stand here astonished. My vision flooded with light, with gifts, with promises fulfilled.

Ful-filled. Filled with fullness. Only the Great of Greatness, the Holy of Holies, the true God of True God, the Deep of Deep can fill with fullness. Is Fullness Himself.

The light floods quick, burns pupils. I am left, face unveiled, squinting out the glory, whispering gracias, gracias.

***