Stay

  I'm not sure if it is the fresh air or the wide open spaces that scare me. I've always craved the country since stepping into the big city in 2007. Now I am placed exactly where I want to be and instead of staring at the stars or breathing in the fresh smells I have been jumping into my truck and driving mindlessly to the city. Running away from my coveted freedom. Isn't it ironic, this running back to the place I felt captive! I miss so much of it, my friends, my church, access to anything I ever needed. Yet, today as I ran on a treadmill and stared at the beautiful clouded sky and the damp ground in my small town, I felt the urge to scream - even loud enough to make my own eardrums explode.

   This frustration inside of me wasn't at what was around me. No, it was with my selfish attitude of never being satisfied. On the other side of the large glass window is a beautiful day but I chose to run inside.  Months ago, I prayed for God to place my husband and I where we were needed and he moved us away and gave us this wonderful home in a friendly neighborhood... but I'm not investing in the place He called us to. I'm running back to the life I came from, running away from what he has called me for - here in this town. In this small, uneventful, drama filled  town. A town where preachers leave because they cannot handle it anymore. A town where brokenness is found in the gossip, the rumors, and the constant unchanging.

   Unfortunately, this running needs to stop. I need to take a step back and focus on what God has called me to here - what He has placed on my heart. I don't know how long it is going to take to arrive on a mountain top again, but I'm going to start walking until I find it and meet Him there. I want to serve my Jesus with my whole heart. I want Him to be my every day, my every moment. I can't live running away from His calling for me because I am scared or don't know where to start.

   So please, please pray for me as I begin staying. Tears have found their way and are drowning my eyes as I write this because it is so hard to stay sometimes. To stay, to breathe, and to not run in fear.  So, through it all I will place my eyes on him. I will believe that his plan is well with my soul, that my God is stronger than this pain, and that whatever he believes needs to be completed here I will respond with, "Here I am! Choose me! I trust you!" This long journey of finding satisfaction in the valley is over. I'm ready to walk back up to the mountain-top to meet my Jesus there; to see his face, meet him, and hear him say "I am proud of  you."