Waiting..

  God works in wonderful ways. I graduated high school not having a clue what I wanted to do.  I got to watch my friends and classmates go off to college.  THEY had it all figured out. Not me.  I wasn't even close. Oh I interviewed and visited a few schools, desperately trying to figure it out, even trying to force myself to like a new plan I made up for myself. I would get excited about it but I knew my heart wasn't quite in it enough.

  My friends were all gone, I was lonely and not making quite the right choices in my life that I should have been making.. You could say I turned my back on God. I remember talking with God and saying "Ok I can take it from here now.. I'm not sure what your plans are for me, but it's starting to feel like you aren't really here for me after all."   It's no surprise that this was when things got really tough for me. I'm not even sure if I realized how low I have gotten but I was numb, and sad, and just not well.

   Looking back, I think I was just filling a void of uncertainty, maybe even shame that I didn't know what I was going to do in my life when it seemed like everyone had it figured out. I was lonely. I was sad and just a confused mess. I could go on and on about that time in my life. So many bad things happened yet it was one of the most important times in my life because I came out of it stronger then ever. More sure of myself  and sure of God and his love and plan for me. I got to a point where I said a prayer, asking for an answer about a guy I liked way more then I should have, another void I was filling I guess. I got that answer so loud and clear.  I realized God was there for me, just waiting for me. It took way too long but I did come back. I remember my dad telling me that I gave my heart God, he lives there in my heart, and there is nothing I can do to turn him away now. He's just waiting on me and ready for me to come back. That once I am a follower of Christ, I will not be forsaken, even when I mess up terribly and forget about Him. That is the beauty of it all.

I began to search. I read the Bible.. the book of Romans was a good one for me. I was highlighting, underlining and copying down so many verses that really just hit me.  My eyes were open and I felt like those words were written just for me.

I came to realize that God really has a plan for me. I had no idea what it might be but I need to trust in Him. I came to peace to the fact that maybe God's plan was for me to never get married.  Maybe His plan for me was to be stuck in a job that I didn't like for awhile. I had no idea but I was going to trust in Him and be happy knowing that He has that plan figured out, I don't need to figure it all out, I can just live my life and follow Jesus and do my best at what was handed to me at that moment.

Just 9 months after I came to peace with this realization, I met Matt. I knew very early on that it was something very special. Soon after becoming married, I got pregnant and be came a mother.

8 years have now passed since that hard time in my life. Now that I am a mother, I realize how much I love pregnancy,labor, birth, newborns, breastfeeding.. all of it.  I know when My kids get older I am going to want to work with pregnant women. How in the world would I have known that before? I needed to go through it all to realize how special it was to me. God had this plan for me, he knew what was in my heart even though I didn't know it at the time. Now I have to wait some more. Wait for my kids to get older so I can do that dream job that I have been searching for for so long. I am Ok with waiting some more. I know God is looking out for me now, and everything will come with time.

It's amazing the way He works. When I am having a hard time, I always think back to that troubled time in my life and I remember HE is there waiting for me, even when it doesn't feel like it. He has a plan for me, and it's a good plan.. a plan writen out just for me.


 These are just a few verses that I wrote down during that hard time.. you can just see what I was thinking or feeling as you read them. I'm so glad I recorded them to look back on when I need it.:


Romans 7:18-20
For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.


1 Corinthians 10:13

And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.



Romans 12:2
 Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.



Romans 8:38-39
 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.


Romans 8:15
 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba,Father.”


1 Corinthians 15:33
Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.”


2 Corinthians 12:9-10
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Romans 6:21-22
What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death!  But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.