Sound of Surviving

His hand was over my mouth to cover my screams. His body on top of mine, punching my face and head into submission and quiet. I knew what this stranger wanted, but I refused to give it. I would not let this man overcome me without a fight. At every chance I could, with every ounce inside of me, I punched back. He knew he was stronger and had all the power. He did not expect the struggle. He expected me to relent under his strength to get what he so selfishly desired. Yet, one blow to his face knocked him off releasing his grip as I tried to roll away and flee. Only milliseconds later, his fist hits the back of my head and I am thrown across the room into the tables and chairs on the other side. My mind is running a million miles a second. Wasn’t only a few moments ago, that I was in this same room with dozen of people serving our community and laughing with my neighbors? That seemed like years away from where I was now. I grasp for something to fight with, anything I can get my hands on must become a weapon of defense for my survival. My keys are in my hands, I take them and use them to defend against his attacks. Yet they seem like childrens toys compared to the strength that he is throwing my way. The keys are no longer an option to save me. Time keeps ticking and still no one knows the evil that is happening in broad daylight to me. Who will rescue me from this enemy?

The fight is brutal and he is merciless. Yet with every blow I realize that my punches are not stronger than his. I will not be able to win this battle on my own power. So something overtakes me, as his fist makes contact with my face, I begin to speak words of truth and love over my adversary. I speak the name of Jesus and how his love his greater than all this hatred. The man becomes angrier and punches harder. I punch back with as much physical effort as I can, but he has clearly overtaken me and death is now approaching as his hands are wrapped tightly around my neck. He tries to squeeze the life out of me. It gets dark, yet I can still clearly see the light as I feel the presence of the one who never forsakes me so clearly in the room. Evil thinks its triumphing, yet it is radically mistaken. I make the choice to give up the fight with my body so that I can live. As I surrender to a heinous act, the Spirit of God moves within me and words of praise come flowing out of me while I know I am loved and protected. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound…. Peace comes and stays with me when it made no sense. This man can have my body, but my soul belongs to someone else.

Ever since that September day 12 years ago, the darkness has tried to overtake me time and time again. I have walked through a journey of PTSD and new found trauma that is so intricately woven into my life. I have gripped a steering wheel and thought about driving it straight off the road wanting to end the pain. I have held pills in my hand, considering what the consequences would be if I just gave in and gave up. Yet, hope and joy continued to find their way into my soul. The light always broke through even if it was just a sliver.

In those early days when my words were few, my prayers were often just repeating “redeem this, redeem my story”. I recently heard someone give the definition of redemption as “punching back”. I love this imagery so much as it hit close to home for me. I experienced a genuine physical attack in which evil quite literally tried to take me out, yet I kept punching back, leaving my mark and never giving up. I refused to let it overtake me and win. Even when it looked like my story was over and on the brink of death, I still found a way to punch back by praising God through it all.

These last few years, the way that I can see redemption is through the way that I am punching back the darkness . I am no longer swinging with my fists but with my life, with my testimony, and with love. The hope that Jesus has filled me with, gives me a reason to keep on singing. Romans 12: 21 says “Do not be overcome with evil, but overcome evil with good. This is what I believe redemption looks like.

I have seen the ways God has taken my story and brought beauty from ashes. I encountered his goodness on that September day while evil was all around me. He continues to bring hope to my heart each day. There is more than this brokenness that we see and experience in our lives. My spiritual director says that the goodness we see in our lives after trauma is not the reason we suffered, but it’s the choice we make to open our eyes and look for how He’s at work. We can choose to punch back. We can keep getting up even when life throws the worst at us because God is there giving us the strength when we don’t have any of our own. He will always overcome the evil with good.

My biggest fear used to be losing my husband. I felt like losing him just might be the end of me. I remember someone asking me the totally unfair question ” Which would be harder? Losing your spouse or losing your child?”. I thought about that dreaded question and came up with an answer. Of course losing a child was and is devastating to imagine, but I chose losing a spouse as being the more difficult path for me to walk. I think most moms would come up with another answer, but I didn’t.

Here was my reasoning. I could not imagine walking through such great and devastating loss without the support and care of a husband by my side. See I had walked through tragedy before. Within 15 months of our marriage, I experienced a brutal assault that left me needing both physical and emotional help for years. Although I had help and support from both friends and family, it was my husband who had walked most intimately with me in the grief and the healing. Family and friends were amazing, but it was my husband who witnessed the real anguish that came in the dead of night. It was my husband who would anchor me in the midst of an anxiety attack with the coping techniques we had learned in counseling. It was my husband, who I could call at any moment of the day, when I was hit with extreme fear when someone knocked on my front door or I had to walk by myself in the dark. It was my husband, who sat with me awake all through the night saying scriptures over me and wiping my tears. How could I ever lose this kind of a support system? If I lost him, I felt like I would be completely and utterly alone in the times that grief was at its worst. That was my greatest fear. Yet it was my husband who told me the night of my assault, that when we allow our biggest fears to consume us, we are not trusting that God’s grace is sufficient to carry us through whatever that fear is.

At the end of 2016, my greatest fear became a reality and I lost my husband. Although I had played out this fear in my mind a million times, never once did I imagine that I would lose my husband by his own choices. I would lose him, but I could still hear his voice on the other end of a phone call. He was still in this world, but he was gone from my grasp. The guy who carried me through so much heartache was now the cause of so much more. My grief was overwhelming, crashing over me like tidal waves that just wouldn’t relent or let me have a moment to take a deep breath. Friends and family swarmed in to lend their love and support, but as predicted I found myself in the dead of the night utterly alone with an anguish that felt like it would swallow me whole. As the days, turned to weeks, and the weeks turned to months, I found myself actually surviving my greatest fear.

After my assault I spent the first 6 weeks off of work as a time of resting and healing. I would spend the entire mornings with a cup of coffee, an open bible and journal, and the bright Texas sun shining through my window. Each morning I could feel his mercies renewing and a hope in my heart. I had several friends and family come stay with me who brought great encouragement to my soul. My husband was there for me nearly anytime I called for him for emotional support. All of these people and moments were great gifts from God that I did not take for granted. However in contrast, my days and weeks after my husband’s arrest were the opposite of peaceful. They didn’t feel like gifts filled with hope and encouragement. Everything looked dark and desperate. I didn’t have hours of quiet time spent with the Lord reading and meditating on the truths of the Word. I could barely manage to get 5 minutes of reading in. I found myself crawling through my day. I had so many things to take care of for my family. In one day I had so many responsibilities that were placed on me that I wasn’t used to. Everyday was a huge checklist of physical things that needed done as I also cared for my two year old and a nursing baby. They were also going through major transition as they had lost their highly involved dad and moved across the country to a new home and city. My time with the Lord looked more like desperate cries to get me through the moment. My prayers were shorter than ever, “help me Lord, I can’t do this anymore, and redeem this Jesus” were on repeat. My faith wavered back and forth during a single day.

Many people called me strong and commended me for pushing through hard times. I knew they meant well, and I truly appreciated it. However, I knew there was no strength in me. Those people couldn’t see my 1 am self, completely exhausted from a day of single parenting, still up with a sick crying baby who didn’t sleep all the while trying to sort through pain that kept resurfacing. The once stranger called anger was now an uninvited guest in my home who wouldn’t leave. I wasn’t strong, I was a complete mess. Weakness oozed out of me in every direction. I would lay awake crying out to God in desperation for him to help me, and He did. He showed me that I most certainly wasn’t utterly alone in the dark. Although I didn’t have a physical presence to hold my hand, I had scriptures such as Isaiah 41: 10- Fear not, for I am with you. Be not dismayed for I am your God. I will strengthen you. I will help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. Every night for months I reached out for Jesus to show himself to me and carry me through. I often felt as though it was a miracle that I made it through the day and wasn’t sure how I would get through the next without God’s grace in my life. As I now understand suffering in a broader way, I think that is the whole point.

I heard someone say in a podcast “The only thing as believers we need is need”. I rewound this a few times and let it sink in. Oh yes, I can resonate with that. I need to know my need for God. Its when we lose touch with our need for God that we lose the point of the good news completely. The Gospel is for today, not just for a future afterlife. It is Jesus, our Emmanuel “God with us”, in and through the pain, day in and day out, no matter how long it lasts.

Its been over 7 years of being divorced and parenting on my own and God continues to allow me to be “needy” on him each day. I am surviving and enduring my worst fear which doesn’t feel as scary anymore. Its incredibly hard, yes, but not as scary. The loneliness and exhaustion are real especially at night, but I have learned so much about my God who never leaves me or forsakes me in the middle of the struggle. God’s grace and mercies continue to reach down into the middle of my mess and pull me up out of it.

Of course new fears have risen to take the place of my old ones. There will always be circumstances to worry about and fears to consume us if we let them. I am incredibly guilty of going to the worst case scenario in panic. I have not conquered this tendency, however I do know if I stop to think about it, these fears do not control my life, only my creator does. My God is sovereign and cares for my soul and my kids more than I do. I lean into His goodness and trust, that whatever fear comes true next, He will be kind and near me each step of the journey.

Christmas Day 7 years ago, I was broken and hurting like I had never been before. The shards of what my life used to be lay all around me and it felt nearly impossible to put the pieces back together and heal from such a disaster. Yet, I also believed in a God who redeems and restores, a God who makes all things new again, a God who makes beauty out of ashes. This was the God I needed to come through for me. This is the God I have been trusting in the last 7 years. Now I have to be honest, this has not always been easy for me. There have been a million late night conversations where I am asking God to make good on that part of his character. When I didn’t know what to pray, sometimes my prayers would simply be a whisper of “redeem this”. I have spent many countless nights thinking about redemption and what that could look like in my story. Is it even possible for me, my boys and everyone else involved?

I have spent countless hours telling God the versions of redemption that I think would make the most sense for us. In the early years, the original version was that my marriage was restored and my children could grow up with a present dad in their lives. I soon realized that was probably not the version that would ever come out of this story. So I wrote down another version of redemption that I would accept. A redemption story of a new man coming into our lives, loving my kids as his own, caring and providing for me in all the ways I need, spiritually, physically and emotionally. Now this is the story of redemption that I am sold in the movies that supposedly comes so easily. In fact, I have watched many friends and family find this version of their story. I have asked God over and over again why that is not the story me and my boys get to have. Yet, the answer I keep hearing is for me to open my mind a bit wider and to think bigger, think more eternal and less Hallmark. So do I just sit here and wait for God to show up in that specific way, or do I open my eyes to the million other ways that God is moving and working around me? As I have prayed for God to show me his redeeming nature at work in my life, he answers me in the most unexpected ways.

I stand in front of a group of 100 people leading an international student ministry and see people from all over the world and all faith backgrounds being loved and welcomed into our community and I hear my God whisper, “this is it”

I sit in my office as students weep and share their hard stories of trauma and heartache, and the empathy that is so easily accessible pours out of me to truly listen and love them, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.

I sit alone on the floor with scripture opened in the darkness of morning and feel the sweet friendship of Jesus and his love for me, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.

I drive home to glorious display of colors and beauty as the daylight escapes behind the horizon, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.

I see my children growing in empathy and kindness to those who are hurting, having experienced heartache themselves, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.

I share life with women who have been abandoned, abused and discarded, never really finding a safe place in the church, yet still teaching me and mentoring me how to hold fast to Jesus through it all, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.

Redemption arrives in the Christmas story in the most unlikely of ways. The Christmas story is raw and full of rejected and broken people. You see desperation and fear and our God entering into the realm of the chaos, choosing to become fragile and weak himself. Jesus is our Emmanuel, God with us. He didn’t choose a palace or to be born into a family of the highest religious officials of the day. He rejected power and greed, and embraced humanity at the lowest level, an infant. He became as dependent as he could on imperfect people whom He had created and formed in his own image. For me, Christmas is that reminder of hope and joy being found in the worst of circumstances. For many, the Christmas spirit feels so far away this time of year. Its hard for them to find peace, joy and hope when their life looks completely broken. I get that feeling. Yet the beauty of the Christmas story is that its not about the perfect circumstances or the perfect people. A lowly manger scene with a poor family who quickly become refugees fleeing to a foreign land to escape genocide is not an ideal #blessed Christmas. Yet the angels rejoice and the shepherds and wise men from afar are still drawn to this scene, to this family. God is still moving and redeeming his people.

If you are feeling alone this Christmas, not loving the story that you are living, take heart that there is God who enters into that story anyway. There is a God who redeems and restores in ways that are deeper and richer than you can imagine. It may not be in the way you are wishing. I am reminded of the passage in Luke 24, where two disciples are talking about Jesus and how they were disappointed in how he didn’t do what they wanted them to do.  Literally Jesus himself is standing before them in a resurrected body and they don’t recognize him. They tell Jesus that “we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel”. They were looking for redemption in the wrong places. They were looking for their own version of what they were hoping for, not the one right in front of them. Despite not overthrowing the corrupt Roman empire, Jesus absolutely redeemed Israel and the rest of the world, with his life, death and resurrection. He humbly laid down his life out of great love and conquered death. He brought an everlasting hope to his followers that could not be shaken.

Redemption most often doesn’t show up in elegant displays of might, power and dramatic transformation. It comes quietly, in small sacred ways that we must look for or we might just miss it. We might be looking for a big grand story that doesn’t exist, when maybe the one right in front of us is just as beautiful if we take a closer look.

On May 13, I walked across a stage full of confidence, joy and accomplishment and received my masters degree in TESOL(Teaching English to speakers of other languages) while my two sons jumped up and down with excitement cheering their mama on! If you saw me that day, you would have never known the stories and the moments that went into making that day possible for me. On my graduation day, I felt the pride and success that I absolutely should have felt. However, I also needed to reflect and appreciate the struggles and challenges that brought me to that long awaited moment.

15 years ago, I graduated from Illinois State University with a degree in communication studies and Spanish, not knowing what was next for me. Through a series of God ordained events, I ended up in Mexico living as a missionary and teaching English. The passion for teaching English to speakers of other languages quickly kindled in me and it took me on the best ride. I moved to Houston and found myself teaching ESL in refugee resettlement agencies, literacy councils, a private institute and even starting a couple programs from scratch in my neighborhood and local church.

In 2012, I was living in a refugee community and leading a resource center and a ESL program on site. The classes were full of beautiful people from around the world who had stories of tragedy, escaping atrocious violence and persecution. Many were women with young children trying to start their lives over and provide opportunities for their next generations to thrive, despite all the challenges they faced. Even though I was a teacher, I learned so much about resilience and strength in the face of tragedy from these dear women. That helped carry me when I was brutally attacked in that same ESL classroom and nearly escaped with my life. It was a miracle that I survived. Despite that trauma changing so much in my life, it never changed my love and passion for immigrants, refugees and ESL education. It only amplified it more as I was given a glimpse of what its like to overcome adversity and keep going, just as my friends and students did everyday.

My kids were both born in Houston and I was thrilled that they would know the diversity that I didn’t at such a young age. Working as a part time ESL teacher, doing church ministry and raising my kids was truly an ideal scenario for my life and I was so grateful. Then at the end of 2016, my world turned upside down and every plan I had for our future was shattered (or so I thought). I found myself as a single mom of two small children, back in my rural hometown of Illinois, without much hope of a future for us at all. However, within 2 weeks of that trauma, I had secured a position at the community college teaching ESL at nights. Teaching those evening ESL classes were some of the brightest moments in the darkest of days. I would spend all day alone with my kids grieving our loss, sometimes feeling like I couldn’t function or go on, and then I would walk into a classroom and it was like flipping a switch. I could put all the sadness away and pour myself into my students and teaching. Those students in those days had no idea the darkness that was plaguing my life, but they were a light that gave me purpose to keep going.

As my boys grew and got older, I knew I needed to find myself a way to properly provide for them with more than a part time teaching role. Despite all my experience teaching ESL I had never studied education and desired to go back to school. I wrote in my journal many times how much I wanted to get my masters degree, but it just didn’t seem possible as a single mom in this stage of life to do so. Yet, with Covid-19 I started to realize the value of online education, especially for people like me. After hours of agonizing over decisions and calling schools, I finally chose an online program at a school in Arizona that told me that I was the perfect fit for their program! I started in January 2021 with so much excitement. I went through two classes and quickly realized that no one in this program had any experience with Adult ESL and everything was geared towards K-12. The teachers didn’t know what to do with me and I was the only person in my actual field in this program. I was frustrated and completely shocked when they told me that I couldn’t use my Adult ESL hours as an internship and I needed to be in a K-12 ESL classroom. I felt gullible to believe enrollment advisors and had been deceived into something that wasn’t right for me at all. I felt like a failure for not inquiring more beforehand and had no idea what I was going to do. One morning, I broke down in tears with a group of friends at a local diner over our pancakes feeling so defeated and lost, yet I felt so supported and loved on as well. They helped give me the courage to pursue something else, despite losing a good amount of money and having to start fresh again.

So after some more searching and help from a colleague of mine, I restarted grad school in the fall of 2021 at Hamline University, a school that I found to be full of professors who absolutely understood me and my passions for adult ESL and had all the expertise to back it up! That setback of mine turned out to be a life lesson of not giving up at the first sign of failure and not to accept defeat. I decided to keep pursuing and try again, when it wasn’t the easiest decision. Oh the pride I had to swallow not to allow the embarrassment of making the wrong decision to overtake me!

The last two years of graduate school have been the busiest years of my life. I wrote and read thousands of pages, I studied countless hours at all times of the day and nights, hung out in so many booths at the local Panera trying to focus, and squeezed in Zoom meetings with my teachers and classmates between all my other life commitments. Through that, I taught several ESL classes, tutored a student from China at a ridiculously early hour in the morning every Friday, took on a second part time position at the college, coached kids baseball and basketball, led an international student ministry and women’s ministry, taught kids Sunday school, volunteered at my kids school, met with college students, attempted dating, poured into my friendships, took multiple trips and vacations, all while single parenting. Just in case someone mistakes me as superwoman, to keep it real, I also yelled at my boys more than I care to admit, forgot a lot of important appointments, left a lot of texts and emails unread, got overwhelmed and anxious, had a few panic attacks, procrastinated on projects, had to cancel on friends, and overall struggled managing a good life balance between all the things!

It has been quite the journey to be able to accomplish this goal of a masters degree. The phrase “it takes a village” has been my mantra. Multiple times, I had family and friends show up to take my kids for an afternoon or evening so I could finish an assignment or get some reading done. My parents did so much these past two years to make this possible. Even my own students often encouraged me and even helped me with homework at times!

As I walked across that stage in St. Paul Minnesota a couple weeks ago, I could feel the presence of God with me. Right before they called my name, I looked out into the crowd and saw my parents, a good friend (an international student), and my two boys cheering me on. It was as if I could hear a voice within me say with clear confidence ” You were left alone and abandoned 6 and half years ago, and you thought you had no future. You thought you couldn’t live or make anything of yourself without your husband. Look at where you are now. You did it. Be proud of yourself and be grateful”. I am so very grateful that girl in 2012 or 2016 didn’t throw in the towel and that God made a way for me to move forward and overcome challenges despite adversity.

In order to graduate I completed a Capstone Project. This is my dedication that came at the beginning: To all my ESL students throughout the years for inspiring me with their stories of bravery, triumph and success as they overcome significant challenges. I have learned far more from you  than I have ever taught you. To my boys, Judah and Lucas who inspire me to be brave, kind, wise and constantly curious everyday. To my parents, who without your support, I wouldn’t have come close to finishing this project. Thanks for always being there for me.  

This past September, I boarded a plane heading for a city I once called home, a city that held my most painful memories. As my dad dropped me off, he asked me the obvious question of “whats the point of this trip to Houston exactly?” Days before that I had sat in my counselor’s office looking for language on how to answer a question like this, for myself and others. I knew deep in my spirit that I needed to return to the places that held the most pain for me, but I wasn’t quite sure how to explain that to those closest to me confused and asking me why I would want to go back. My counselor offered the words ” to honor my healing journey”. They were good and true words for me. I have spent 10 years processing the trauma I experienced there and putting in all the work I needed to heal my heart and my mind. It has been anything but easy. Yet the words still lacked so much more of the purpose that God had put in my heart. Truth be told, I am not sure I knew the exact reasons for my return, except that God had placed the longing in my heart and soul to face the past and declare that it didn’t have a hold on my present.

September 8th marked the 10 year anniversary of the assault that changed my life. One afternoon, I came face to face with darkness and evil attempting to destroy me. I have spoken about this experience multiple times, yet it feels sometimes like a surreal nightmare that I still cannot explain. The best way to put it is that although it was a physical attack on my body, it felt even more like a spiritual attack on my soul. In the fight of my life, I felt like evil was throwing all it could at me, draining any light or any hope that I had inside. Often times when I looked back on this day, I saw myself lying on the ground defeated, bruised and broken. A young girl, who ran out of fight and succumbed to the darkness which has now infiltrated and consumed me for the next decade of my life. The effects of that day have rippled to every corner and crevice of my life. I was going back to Houston to face that trauma head on. I couldn’t help but wonder, would I find healing or more hurt?

I had no plan or strategy of how I was going to approach visiting the apartment complex. As I pulled in, I realized that there would probably be no one there who knew me and wasn’t even sure I would be allowed in. I started second guessing the wisdom in this idea. Would I look suspicious walking around where I didn’t belong as an American in a predominantly international neighborhood? It was Friday, the Muslim day of worship so the complex was busy with men coming and going from the mosque and women and children out on their balconies. I got a few stares as I waved hello but pushed forward. As we walked to the front of the apartment, I quickly noticed that the front window was smashed out. This was the exact window that I broke through and escaped from that day. My first thought was had no-one fixed this in 10 years? I could not believe the coincidence. The awe kept coming as we turned the front door handle and found it to be unlocked and completely empty. As the door swung open, I was hit immediately with a wave of grief that made my knees buckle. 10 years washed over me and brought me back to that September day. I walked inside and like a movie in my head, I could hear the screams, see the violence, and nearly feel the pain I experienced that day. This might be too much for me, I thought. I was with a dear friend who had spent many days in that apartment/classroom with me serving and teaching. She started talking about the sweet memories that this apartment held. A packed out room of refugee women from around the world learning and laughing together over a feast of delicious food. Meeting beautiful people sharing their stories of loss and triumph, and learning so much about the world that I had never known. That apartment held so much more than just that one tragic September day. So much light flowed out of there. So much joy and laughter shared among friends. So much redemption in the making over impossibly hard stories.

As I moved through the apartment I felt God’s presence and his prompting that he needed me to see something different. He wanted me there to remind me of what else happened that day. Although, I have shared my testimony many times and spoken of how God met me in that place supernaturally, I felt it once again. It had almost become a distant memory, one that I have second guessed over recent years. I stood there in that room, remembering vividly of how Jesus showed up for me, rescuing me and giving me another chance at life. He spoke directly to my heart what I needed to hear “I have been with you the whole time. I never left you. Not then and not now.” It felt like a sacred moment as my friend prayed a blessing over me and I declared that as much as the enemy tried to destroy me that day and crush my spirit, I would not allow it. The light always wins over the darkness. This has been a hope I keep holding on to with everything I am!

Throughout that weekend this theme kept coming up. God gently reminding me of who He has been in my life and that evil doesn’t have the last laugh.When I told the testimony of my assault in the first few years afterwards, I often spoke of my husband as my rescuer, my protector, and the one who cared for me unconditionally through it all. Those words have come back to me as painful stabbing reminders of all I have lost. What I heard that weekend was the still small voice whispering to me ” It was always me. I am your rescuer. I am your provider. I am the only one who can see all your pain and love you unconditionally and perfectly”. God was patiently and kindly showing me his love and care that has always been greater than anyone else could ever give.

I faced even more difficult places that I never expected to go that weekend. I had come to get healing and closure from the first trauma in my life, but God wanted more than that for me. He wanted me to face another. On that Sunday morning, I walked into my home church, a place that I never imagined being able to go again. As I walked in the front doors, the same scene unfolded that happened in the apartment. My mind may have been ready, but my body was not. I did everything I could to prepare myself to walk in, yet when I did, my body remembered and it was sent into a strong physical reaction of being in place that held such painful memories. Yet the beauty that came as instantaneously I was surrounded by people who cared for me and was covered in prayer. A circle formed around me holding me upright and giving me strength. This was one of the holiest moments I have ever experienced. Because of this support, I was able to walk in the sanctuary and worshipped while tears ran down my face the entire service. In the closing prayer, my pastor prayed ” go forward, be healed and glorify God”. It wasn’t just for me, but it sure felt like it.

I came to Houston looking for healing, hope, closure, and redemption. I came to honor my journey over the last 10 years and all the work I have put it to overcome it all. As I got on my plane heading towards Chicago, I felt a deep peace that I got what I came for and more. I came face to face with God’s love for me and the validation that he always sees me. I was reminded that I am stronger than I knew and have overcome life circumstances I would have never thought possible. I give that glory to God’s grace in my life. This doesn’t mean I don’t struggle, and that PTSD is behind me. In fact, December was full of anxiety and obstacles, this is just another step on the healing journey that continues.

Also, as much as I wanted this to be a trip about my own independence and strength, I realized that I haven’t done this healing journey alone and would be lost without my community. Every step of that weekend I was covered in prayer, and someone walked with me. Dear friends and family traveled to spend the time to be near. I was showered with undeserved and overwhelming hospitality. The pictures shown here are just half of the people who loved me and were there for me that weekend. I am forever thankful for those who continue to pray, love and support me over all these years.

I listened to my friend on the other side of the phone say “ I don’t want to get my hopes up”. The following day, I was repeating those same words back to her about a situation in my life. We often use this phrase “ I don’t want to get my hopes up” when we are waiting expectantly for something, yet worry about being too enthusiastic in case it doesn’t deliver and give us the desired outcome. Honestly, there is risk involved with hoping for something.  Hope is all about expectations and desires that are most often out of our control. As humans, we choose to put our hopes in many earthly things.We put our hope in a job to provide for our families. We put our hope in leaders to guide us with integrity. We put our hope in a spouse to be faithful. We put our hope in our children to make good choices. We put our hope in friendships to meet our needs. We put our hopes in doctors and medical treatments to heal and cure disease. Yet none of these things are guaranteed and what happens when that hope disappoints us?  We are often left weighing if it is better to hope and be disappointed or to have never hoped at all. 

When we look to scripture we see a different type of hope, an eternal and steadfast hope. Since the fall in the Garden of Eden to the covenant promise to Abram and on throughout the entire old testament, God instills hope in his people. I He promises a savior, a messiah who will be a Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father and Prince of Peace.   

When we reach  the Christmas story, we are told that it has been 400 years of silence for Israel. 400 hundred years without a word from the Lord. Yet still we find ordinary people who have been patiently hoping and trusting in God’s promises. Take a look at Mary, a young  girl born into a humble Jewish home. When the angel delivers the message that she will carry the Messiah, she takes the message with joy and praises God for the son she has been given who will fulfill the covenant promise that was made to Abraham thousands of years earlier. We find shepherds faithfully doing their work in the middle of the night who are delivered the good news that this baby will be a Savior for all people. They immediately believed and went to the manger to worship.They left this experience changed and with a confident hope in that child. Despite that child being a helpless baby born to a poor young couple at the time, they had hope that God would deliver on his promises just he had told them that night. . Lastly, in Luke 2 we are introduced to Simeon. We don’t know much about Simeon except that he is described as righteous and devout and waiting for the consolation of Israel. He spent his entire life hoping and waiting to meet the Messiah, and God in his grace allowed Simeon’s faith to become sight as he held Jesus in his arms. 

Scripture talks about Mary treasuring all these things in her heart. Mary was the only character from the Christmas story that was present at the crucifixion 33 years later. As she stood at the foot of the cross, watching her son and her savior taking his last breaths, she must have been filled with great despair. She had so much hope when he was born, yet the intense darkness and injustice of that day must have overwhelmed her heart and soul causing fear and confusion. Did Mary still find hope at the foot of the cross? We don’t know what she was thinking, but we do know she stayed there by side in the most gruesome of scenes. Through the deepest despair, maybe there was still a small glimmer of hope left in her knowing WHO her God was and what He was capable of. She had seen His miracles, She had heard His promises of a new kingdom. Maybe all that she had treasured in her heart through her son’s life along with her intimate relationship with Him was what she needed to carry her through those next three days. 

Darkness will attempt to steal our hope as well. We may confidently believe in the gospel, yet when true suffering comes our way our hope that we thought was so confident may feel more like sinking sand to us. That hope gets more difficult to hold on to.   I have found myself often on my knees in despair asking God for answers when life doesn’t make sense and the heartbreak feels like it’s just too much to handle.  Henri Nouwen is quoted as saying: “Hope is not dependent on peace in the land, justice in the world, and success in the business. Hope is willing to leave unanswered questions unanswered and unknown futures unknown. Hope makes you see God’s guiding hand not only in the gentle and pleasant moments but also in the shadows of disappointment and darkness”. 

How do we overcome the days when hope seems so far away? We trust in the character of our God and who we know Him to be. Hebrews 10: 23 says Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. We will not get our hopes up when we place them in the right place with the right person, and that is with Christ alone.

If hope is slipping through your fingers this Christmas and it’s getting harder to hang on to it, know that you are not alone. Remember WHO you are putting your hope in, and cherish the ways he has been faithful in your life.  Don’t be afraid to hope. Know that our hope in Jesus is the only hope that doesn’t disappoint. Rest in the truth that Jesus is our Emmanuel, God with us.  Let’s keep our hopes up this Christmas.

Today I turn 36 and although I haven’t blogged in quite some time, I still consider myself a writer and with that comes a lot of reflection as I head into another year of my life. As is custom I like to flip back through past journals to see what I was saying on birthdays past. When I look at my journals in my 20s, I am filled with fierce hope and enthusiasm at the life I was living, always making the most of it and writing out goals for the new year. On the night before I turned 30, I wrote with great expectation that my 30’s would be the best decade of my life. I was just starting out with my family of four expecting to build a life together with my husband, buy a house, do great things in ministry and change the world. Yet all those dreams came crashing down just a few months later and has left me still trying to pick up the pieces all these years later. 

Emotional. Exhausted. Depressed. Failing. Stuck. Purposeless. Weary. These are the words that have been on repeat in my journals over the last 6 years. For 6 years I have been living a life of a single mom caught in a windstorm of trauma trying to navigate what it looks like to move forward, serve others, love God, hold on to hope, be a caring teacher, parent my kids with grace, succeed in graduate school, lead in ministry and the list goes on. Its a constant juggling act that I am sure everyone who is reading this can relate to. How can we do it all, when at various times grief sweeps through like an unsuspecting thief trying to steal any resemblance of joy and purpose it can? People say time heals, but they don’t always prepare you that actually sometimes the pain lingers. It doesn’t always get better as fast as we plan. Christians love to use a lot of analogies of coming through the valley and getting to the mountain top, like its a final destination for us in this life. It sounds good and can be true for some. As a believer in Christ, I do believe that glory does wait for us in another life with our loving and beautiful savior. I believe that we will get to that place where no more tears are shed and sorrows cease. It is in this, that I can find a deep resonating peace that hope is possible to hold on to no matter what is raging on around me. However, I have found it important to leave space for when our journeys of suffering in this world may not vanish overnight, or even may last over a lifetime.

I learned pretty quickly that people are uncomfortable sitting in someone else’s pain, especially if there isn’t a way to fix it. Growing up I can remember so many Christians talking about the Christian life as one of success and happiness. Any sort of emotions that showed you were struggling were not always welcomed and often came with judgment or shame. There was godliness put on your outward behavior and how you showed yourself a person who never questioned God and his ways. If only I had heard more sermons on the godliness of sorrow and grief. What if the church had preached more on the doubts and the confusion of David when he felt abandoned by God than on his victories in battle? What if we talked more about the time Elijah was alone in the wilderness begging God to end his life, shortly after he just won an epic fire from heaven battle and raised a child from the dead? What if we stayed a little longer on the part about Jesus weeping at the death of his friend than just always fast forwarding to the miracle that followed that grief? What if we preached more on the intense grief that Mary and the disciples must have been feeling at the feet of Jesus on the cross, than on the empty tomb 3 days later. If I had heard more sermons on lament and heartache and how the Bible is full of people who lived lives of deep suffering, maybe I would have spared myself of the years of shame for still being sad about the way life was going. Maybe I could have felt not so lonely or ashamed when dark thoughts came my way. Maybe I would have felt like I fit right in to the kingdom of God and his people better than I thought. Sorrow is the one thing that often makes me feel like I don’t belong in the American church, yet might just be the one thing that unites me with the saints around the world and throughout church history.

KJ Ramsey writes in her book “This Too Shall Last” this quote. “When the church amplifies stories of healing and overcoming without also elevating stories of sustaining grace, she is not adequately forming souls to hold on to hope. If the majority of stories we hear are tales of triumph, we will question the worth of our stories when healing doesn’t come. God, in his wisdom, in his hidden purposes, allows some of our suffering to linger, and the church unintentionally turns hearts away from the heart of God when she does not hold space for the sacred mystery that weakness reveals God’s strength.”

Oh how this quote resonated with me as I am in the middle of my 5th year of being a single mom and coming up to the 10th year of surviving an assault. There have been 10 years of waves of sorrows crashing on many sides and just when I think I have gotten to that mountain top, I am swept back down into the valley once again. Have I questioned the worth of my story over this last decade? Absolutely. Where is the redemption? Where is the pretty bow to wrap up my story and show that God is going to restore everything to me tenfold? It is hard to find on a daily basis when life looks like chaos. Last week I taught in our international student ministry the difference between happiness and joy emphasizing that we won’t always be happy with our circumstances, and it is okay to be sad if life looks different than we expected. Our emotions can go up and down and that’s the way God made us. However, joy is that long lasting, internal act of the will that is found in our heavenly Father, no matter what comes our way. It is deep and resounding in our soul when nothing else makes sense. Fighting for that joy is our goal, not a constant need for pursuing happiness.

I am thankful to have had a few friends who have joined me on the journey of life and can be real with one another when our emotions are out of control and life is pulling us under. There is a beauty to those who allow space for others to not be okay all the time and yet can appreciate the authenticity of a faith that isn’t perfect, but is being perfected through the trials. Pointing people to joy and allowing their tears to flow beside you without judgement is a sacred act.

As I start year 36, I am honestly weary and wonder how much longer I can hold on to the hope I believe in. Yet, when I lean into Jesus I feel at home in that weariness. He promises to give me rest. It doesn’t mean he promises a release from my reality, but a safe place to land. He is the man of sorrows acquainted with grief. He is not going to reprimand me for validating that this world is broken and things are not as they should be. He will walk beside me. Yesterday I sat in a kayak, beholding the beauty around me while tears fell down my face. Struggling to find hope in any circumstances around me, yet acknowledging that God is in control and that He sees me. I don’t want to be fearful of hoping for good things in the future, so I still dream, still make plans and still pray for things to change. I still look for beauty, find the laughter, delight in creation, live with gratitude, and embrace the adventures. I still jump off the diving board, wear silly glasses, dance in the kitchen, play on the trampoline, and sing loudly in the car to embarrass my boys. For now, I rest in JOY that is steadfast through it all and will lead me in the days to come.

This Christmas song has been on repeat for me over the last two years. Christmas is a time that comes with so much fun and excitement. I have always loved the season and have so enjoyed making memories with my children each year. Baking cookies, going to Christmas parades, and watching all the Home Alone movies are just a few of our favorite things to do. However, as much fun and happiness I can attempt to muster up during the holiday season it will certainly fall short if I don’t land on true hope and true joy. I find that suffering will always win out against a perfectly decorated Christmas tree, however it doesn’t stand a chance to the truth of Emmanuel- God with us. Creator God coming down to dwell among us and bring peace to our weary world is what our hearts are longing to find rest in. The nativity story isn’t just another tradition of the Christmas season, it IS everything to those who are hurting and in despair.

I grew up in the church, went to Christian school and hold a biblical studies associates degree. I have studied theology and doctrines much of my life. 10 years ago, I could debate and argue over many topics. However, once true suffering came into my life and my faith was put to the test, my faith evolved, deconstructed and transformed in so many ways. Nowadays, there are few hills that I would die on. However, if there is anything that I would hold most tightly to it would be the truth of Jesus, being our Emmanuel- God with us.

I have experienced great heartbreak and sorrow over the years. There have been times when the darkness felt so incredibly strong that I couldn’t breathe or find a way out. What has been my steady, my constant, and place where I always land is knowing that God truly doesn’t leave me alone in the darkness, but comes into it and dwells with me. Jesus was called a man of sorrows and experienced the depth of human emotions and experiences while he walked this earth. He understands pain and injustice more than anyone.

A few weeks before Christmas in 2014, I got on a stage and spoke for the first time about how God had been with me every second of a brutal assault. The theme of the sermon series was “Emmanuel- God With Us”. However as I began to speak I was overcome with emotions and could barely speak through the tears. The service was put on pause and leaders and members of the congregation laid hands on me and prayed for the Holy Spirit to calm my anxious heart. I was able to continue on and testify that even on my darkest day, I knew the presence of Jesus was real and he had not abandoned me.

On Christmas Day 2016, I posted on social media a picture of me and my two babies claiming that I was holding on to Emmanuel even though there wasn’t much light to see that year. There I was, alone with two children to raise and my entire future upended and thrown on it’s head. Would God truly be with me as I began this new chapter of my life that I had never wanted or asked for?

Well here I am 5 years later, and I am a bit more bruised, scarred and worn, yet the truth of God with us hasn’t shifted. I have spent many a lonely night crying out to the Lord. He continues to meet me and show Himself near. He meets me through scriptures that declare his everlasting love and presence over me. He meets me through the love of His people, who faithfully show their kindness to me and let me know I am cared for. He meets me through the peace of the Spirit in my life despite the chaos that threatens to overwhelm. He meets me through miraculous provision that doesn’t even make sense. He meets me through healing over my children. He meets me by pouring out wisdom to me right when I need it. He meets me by bestowing gifts upon me that bring purpose and meaning into my life.

Jesus being Emmanuel to me is so deeply personal, yet it is something I continually need to be reminded of. I have spent many years believing this over my life and praying for it to sink in but that doesn’t mean I lose sight of it sometimes. In fact, just last night I needed to believe it for my own child when his pain was so deep. I could feel the spirit nudging me, asking me to believe for him just as much as I believe it for myself.

I just recently got the Star of Bethlehem tattoo as a way to daily remind myself of the Christmas story no matter the time of year. This star on my arm means so much than what it appears. It will forever be a reminder of how God chose to be with me and that he has never left me alone. In the Christmas story, the star guided the wise men exactly to where they needed to go to meet their savior and worship Him. This star represented years of waiting for God to rescue his people. This star shows us the grand gesture that God did to show the extent of his great love. He delivered on all of his promises. So the next time, I am lonely or feeling the weight of the brokenness of my story, I’ll look to the star of Bethlehem and remember that God sent us a sign to point us towards him.

“Emmanuel, glory in the highest
Emmanuel, heaven here beside us
God Himself, with us now to dwell
Emmanuel!” ( Emmanuel- Glory in the Highest by Sovereign Grace Music.)