I don’t really know much about what it takes to renovate a house. There are probably a few reasons for this, the largest being that student loans have crippled my finances to the point where I doubt that I’ll ever be able to purchase a house on my income alone. But let’s not go down the rabbit hole of the millennial student loan crisis in America; we can save that for another blog. 

My larger point here is that I’m not one of those Christians who religiously watches “Fixer Upper,” exclusively shops at the Hearth and Home section of Target, and dreams of visiting Magnolia Farms. No, truly, I am clueless about what it takes to renovate a home, and frankly, I kind of don’t care; thus, my lack of knowledge about it. So, when God told me He was renovating something in my life, I had no idea what I was in for. But here’s what I’ve learned. When God renovates in your life, you can expect a few things. 

1. It’s all consuming

Homeowners are funny. Every single person I’ve met who’s gone through home renovation can talk about little else. But I guess there’s a reason for that because renovation is an all-consuming process. Not only does it require a great deal of detail and decisions, but it is also quite literally happening in the place you live. You can’t escape it. So, when God renovates in your life, you can bet that it’s going to take up a lot of your time and mental space. After all, that’s where you live, isn’t it?

2. It’s messy

Another thing homeowners tell me is how messy renovation is. Now, really some of this is to be expected because they are literally building new things and tearing out old ones. But what you don’t realize is that sawdust is the glitter of woodworking: you never quite get rid of all of it. When God renovates in our lives, it’s just as messy. He uproots your habits, mindsets, plans, and insecurities all of which leave a great deal of residue and don’t come out without a fight. So, it’s normal that your life feels like a mess during renovation. It’s supposed to be. 

3. It takes a long time

Here’s a fact about me: I hate waiting. Like really hate it. I don’t even like to cook because I have to wait, and you better believe that if I have to wait on someone to complete a task, I will absolutely just do it myself the next time. God help me if I ever renovate because from what I hear, it’s not a short process. Not only is there the time you budgeted for planning and execution, but there’s also the time you didn’t expect. The time that it takes the contractors tear up the floor only to find mold which sets back your initial completion time to treat. Or how about when there is a fault structurally with the house and they have to spend time mending the part you can’t see before they can get back to making it look nice on the part that you can see? Bottom line: it never ends when you think it’s going to, and it always takes longer. What’s worse is that you have a vision of what it’s going to look like and a plan for how long it’s going to take which can be shattered within a matter of moments. 

Problem is, I feel like God should be a quicker worker than a human contractor. He can do anything, so why doesn’t He just fix it in an instant? I know these workers would love to have that capability. But I think that’s intentional for a few reasons. See, God works largely through process because process is more sustainable, and I know this because I know what it’s like to teach humans something. If I do something for them without going through the process, it’s likely that it will not stick. But if I teach them how to do something through process, they are more likely to remember because as humans, we learn through practice and process. Yes, it takes longer, and it’s as exciting as watching grass grow, but it’s better. When God renovates your life, it will take longer than you expect. Just know that right out of the gate. But also know this: just like repairing the mold on your floors will make your house last longer, He’s using process in this time in your life to make that change you’re praying for last longer. 

4. It messes with your day-to-day functioning

Now here’s something I didn’t think about that sounds completely obvious. When they renovate your house, they do it inside your house. Like where you live. Granted, they probably aren’t there while you sleep, and you’re probably at work for part of the day as well too, but they’ve taken over your space to the point where it’s likely unusable. Heck, there are some rooms you can’t even access during that time, and you have to make do with what you have. If God is renovating in your life, you better expect that He’s gonna be all up in your business 24/7. Expect that you cannot do things the way they’ve always been done. Expect that it’s going to be super inconvenient and will likely change how you live your comfortable life. That’s ok. It’s part of the process.

5. Your house, as you knew it, is not the same

My sister is so funny sometimes. She very much holds onto the idea of “the way things are” instead of embracing change when it arrives. For example, her argument for not getting a tattoo isn’t because of the pain but rather the fact that her body, “will never be the same again.” But aren’t we like that too when it comes to matters in our own lives? We hold on to things because we can’t imagine letting something that valuable go even if we know there’s a chance it will be replaced with something much better. When God renovates your life, expect change. Expect that the way you know your life will change. Expect that the way you’ve always operated will change. Expect that you will never be the same. And yes that’s a scary thing, but it’s also a good thing.

I moved into a newly renovated condo back in September. The condo itself was built back in the 70’s, but you would never know that if you’d just walked in. The appliances, floors, hardware, lights, everything had been updated. In fact, its aesthetic was its biggest draw for me and my roommates. And you know what? We just got to move in. No work was required on our part. 

But what I didn’t get to see was what the house looked like during this process. You see, renovation is not what we think it is. The process is never glamorous, it is always stressful, and it’s really hard. So, if your life is like any or all of those things mentioned above, consider this: maybe God is just renovating. Hang in there; the end product will likely be better than you imagined. 

For the past two years, I lived in the basement of a house. While there are massive pros to this such as a cooler atmosphere and more space, there are also massive cons. One of which is VERMIN. 

When I first moved in, I truly had no idea how many rodents and insects were lurking around the basement of my parents' house, the most popular of which were spiders. Now, normally as a rule, I don't really get freaked out by small spiders. I can squish it and move on. But big spiders? Spiders the size of quarters, much less my palm? No, thank you. 

I remember distinctly at first when I would see large spiders in the basement, I'd text my landlord (read: my dad) to come down and kill them for me. I'd avoid that area until I was sure that it was gone and that my basement was free from eight-legged inconveniences.  

That was, until encountering them became more of the norm. 

Over those two years, the more I saw them, the more I started to realize that the spiders were there all the time, whether or not I saw them was a different story. So, over time, I became less startled by them. I got to the point where I'd see a spider scurry across the floor and just shrug and continue on with what I was doing. We could co-exist. He wasn't bothering me and I knew that in just a little bit, I'd come back and he'd be gone. I didn't need to know where he went. In fact, it's better if I didn't.

I even would go as far as to say that my fight or flight receptors are immune to spiders at this point because I was so conditioned to them for so long. 

2020 has metaphorically been one big spider pit.

2020 has been riddled with my biggest fear: uncertainty. 

Lots and lots of inconvenient, spidery uncertainty. 

But because of this, much like my spider friends, I've finally become comfortable with uncertainty. 

For as long as I can remember, uncertainty has been my biggest fear. Aside from my anxiety, I have a personality that very much likes to know the details of things. As a writer and a teacher, I need a well laid plan. Problem is, life honestly doesn't work that way. 

Before the pandemic, I lived under the guise of certainty. There were areas of my life that I felt more comfortable with simply because I felt like I had more control or there was more certainty attached to them.

What ended up happening though was that every single area in which I thought I had certainty suddenly became uncertain:

• My job was put on hold and I was no longer able to feel successful and quite honestly "hide" from life's problems at work. 
• My trip to Disney was canceled. Which is a small thing but not when it's used as an escape from the weight of life's problems. 
• My Master's Degree graduation was canceled indefinitely. Which I'd been working toward for two years and by that point, was all I felt I had left to look forward to. 

My whole perspective was flipped and here's the emergent truth: Nothing in this world is actually certain. 

Photo by Matthew Wheeler on Unsplash

Poet Emily Dickinson penned the phrase*, “Hope is the thing with feathers,” and that sounds all cute and flowery, but the metaphor concerns me a bit because it makes hope seem elusive like it could fly away at any time.

I’ve always struggled with the notion of hope. In my life, it’s been more of an elusive bird than a secure anchor. Just when I think I’ve got a grasp on it, it’s gone. It wasn’t until recently that I realized that it escaped me so often not because hope was flighty, but because I didn’t actually know what it meant.

Hebrews 6:19 famously says, “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain.” (NIV)

I don’t know about you, but up until recently when I read that verse, I thought it was talking about the action of hoping; a verb. That hoping for something, an outcome, is an anchor for the soul; it’s what keeps us going. We need something to hope for or look forward to in life. That’s not entirely wrong, but it’s also not entirely right either.

You see, in that verse, hope is used as a noun. It's a thing. If you really want to get into specifics, it’s actually used as a direct object which is always a noun. I looked into it further to see if that syntax was specific to our English translation only to find that the part of speech is indeed consistent with the original Greek. The word used there for “hope” is “elpidos” which is a noun that means, “hope, expectation, trust, confidence.” The question now is, “What makes up this hope?” And the answer to that, my friend, makes all the difference in the world.

Our hope is Jesus. I know that sounds obvious but stay with me here. In that sentence, “hope” is an appositive (or renaming word) for what Jesus did for us on the cross 2,000 years ago. That “hope” is that we have been made right with God. I know this because in the next sentence he says, “It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain,” which is what Jesus’s death did for us. The pronoun “it” is referencing the noun, “hope,” in the sentence before.

In other words (in non-grammatical terms), this verse is saying that the hope that anchors us and keeps us going is that Jesus has made us right with God and thus we look forward to the day where we can be with Him in heaven. That’s hope. Our overused, earthly version of hope doesn’t even compare.

We hope we will get a new job and then we don’t. We hope that relationship will work out and it doesn’t. We hope the Redskins go to the Superbowl and then they don’t because they’re terrible. So what happens then? We’ve lost our hope. That’s a dangerous place to be because hope is indeed what keeps us going in life. If we lose it, it stands to reason life is no longer worth living. Problem is, a lot of us lose hope because it was the wrong kind of hope. That kind of hope is too elusive and inconsistent. It is indeed a flighty thing.

You see, hope as a noun – heavenly hope - is not crossing your fingers and hoping for the best, it’s a certainty in the promises of God and His character. The finished work of Christ is certain. It is not fragile, and it is safe because it is quite literally stored in heavenly places. Matthew 6:19-21 says that which is stored in heaven is safe from ruin or decay, which is why it’s compared metaphorically to an anchor. Where it is stored is what causes it to be secure. When we store our hope in earthly outcomes or wishes, it’s no wonder it is so elusive!

This perspective changed my entire outlook on life. Sure, I can wish for things to happen, that’s not wrong, but if they don’t happen, I’ve not lost my reason for living. I’ve not lost my faith. I no longer have the incorrect idea that an earthly outcome is tied to God’s faithfulness.

This is a game-changer. If we can start to see hope for what it truly is, I believe disappointment will have lost most of its hold on us and we can start seeing God in a more accurate way. God is a redeemer, not a magical genie. He’s given us security with Him not necessarily a fragile outcome that we wish for.

It’s like hoping that no one steals your money when you put it under your mattress and being certain that your money is safe in the bank. Where you put it makes all the difference.

As humans, we are more inclined to take the easy way out, yes, but we are also often known to go for a challenge if we can see a reward. I’m like 99% sure it’s a psychological principle. We are wired to persevere regardless of how painful it is if there’s a reward worth receiving at the end of it. I know this is true because I see it every single day with my students. Reading and writing are not their preferred method of entertainment. As such, they are inclined to try to find the easiest (and often most ineffective) way to get through it. Now, if they’re making a Tik Tok, you best believe they are going to invest the time and energy to develop the idea, execute it, edit the video, and add effects. I once had a student tell me that it took them 2+ hours to create it when it was all said and done. 2 hours. For a 30 second video. For what? Likes. Now to me, likes are cool but not 2+ hours cool. I’d rather take that time to read a book, but our rewards are different and thus our motivations are too. Nonetheless, it's still a lot of effort for both of us even though we are doing things we like to do.

The thing is, even though we are wired to do hard things, it doesn’t make them easier, it just makes them possible. Christianese translation: hard things are still hard.

Being a Christian is kind of like this. Scratch that. Being a Christian is often like this; being a Christian is almost always hard. I’m not sure why a lot of us walk around acting like it’s not because to me, it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It’s hard to live for God when the rest of the world isn’t. It’s hard to maintain standards when many people around us do not respect them, much less uphold them. It’s hard to maintain purity in a world that is so dead set against obliterating it. Christianity is just hard. I think many of us, myself included, had this expectation that living for God was something that was supposed to make our live better. The problem is, we grossly misinterpreted the meaning of “better.” Either that or our version is vastly different from God’s.

I think about Job. Job was a faithful man. He did everything right and was considered, "blameless," which in that time was pretty legit since Jesus hadn’t stepped onto the scene to make us all new and whatnot. But you know what, his faithfulness did not make him immune to suffering. In fact, I would venture to say that he got the worst out of it compared to people who were far less faithful to God. To me, that seems imbalanced and unfair. To me, that doesn’t make a bit of sense. But yet, I remember that the only perfect man to ever live didn’t have a fair run of it either.

And as if that initial shock of loss or disappointment for Job wasn’t bad enough, the most agonizing part, I would imagine, would be the bit in the middle. In the middle, he still had to remain true and choose not to curse God and give up although it would have probably made things easier. Friends, the hard part often isn’t the loss, it’s dealing with the consequences of that loss in the battle between our flesh and our spirit. The hard part is not giving up on living God’s way even when it seems like that might alleviate the suffering. The hard part is still choosing to praise God even when it looks and feels like he’s taken everything from you. Anyone can do something hard for a short period of time. It’s when that time period becomes significantly longer that many of us quit. But unfortunately, it’s only when we don’t give up that we see the reward. With the exception of maybe salvation, Christianity doesn’t really give participation trophies.

You see, living for God does make your life better, but it’s a long game; often we don’t see the payoff right away or even in our lifetime. That’s not glamorous and it doesn’t really sell Christianity all that well; it’s actually somewhat disheartening if I’m being honest. But the reason I think I feel that way is because so many things in this world are quick and easy, and what makes it tricky is that it’s not universal. What may be quick and easy for one, is slow and grueling for the next. And suffering, like reading and writing for my students, is not our “preferred method of entertainment,” so we want that quick and easy fix. God never promised easy. God never even promised fair. But here’s what he did promise: hope, peace, grace, his presence, and abundant life. So I know that if I am missing those things, I’ve either got to refocus, remain patient, or both. After all, God did restore Job’s fortune to more than what he had before, and the story ends in chapter 42:17 when it says, “Then he died, an old man who had lived a long, full life.” Let’s hold out for that long, full life. A life that can only be found when we choose to continue to do hard things.

This weekend is my 10-year high school reunion.

Aka: I've been out of high school for 10 years.
Aka: I'm old.

I know, I know. All the people over 35 are rolling their eyes, but for me, this is the first milestone where I'm starting to realize that my adolescence is a lot further away than I feel like it is. Believe it or not, as a planner I did think about what my 10-year reunion would be like when I was in high school. And also as a planner, I had a plan of what my life would be like. I envisioned myself being married with kids living in a house and killing it at my job. That was a given to me. Surely by 28, I'd be doing all of those things!

We are now officially at that weekend and I can update you to say that life didn’t quite turn out that way. I even contemplated not going this weekend for fear of what people would think. Would they judge me for not being “further” ahead in life? Would I be one of the only ones there whose name hadn’t changed? And although those feelings are real and the disappointment of unmet expectations is real, so are the things I have accomplished since high school. I’ve worked on myself nonstop since I left Battlefield. I am NOT the same person I was when I walked those halls. I’d venture to say none of us are. But even though I don't have the accomplishments I thought I would have, I’m proud of what I have accomplished in these last 10 years.

Since graduating high school, I’ve rededicated my life to Christ which has been the driving force behind all my growth. I’ve experienced some of the highest highs and lowest lows of my whole life both of which worked to teach me crucial things about who I am as a person and have shaped me into the person I am today. I’ve gotten a grasp on my anxiety disorder and have used that experience to speak out to advocate for others. That alone is unreal. If you had told me in high school that I’d be doing that, I wouldn’t have believed you. That’s how ashamed I was; I didn't talk about it. All of these things marked my last 10 years in negative ways, but ultimately in the most positive ways as well.

One thing did come true though. I am killing it at my job. I’ve worked my butt off for the past 10 years; 4 of those years in teacher prep courses and the remaining 6 in my job. Through that, (and the Master’s degree I’m almost done with HEYOO) I have gained the experience and expertise necessary to now lead the Language Arts department at my school well. But more than all the cool leadership opportunities, I get the distinct pleasure of shaping minds and instilling a love for reading and writing within my students just like my high school English teachers did for me. Well, some of them catch that vision at least and leave with a passion for reading and writing. For most of them, I’m just trying to make middle school a happier place, and if that’s all I accomplish, then it is 100% worth it. You always remember your teachers and there’s rarely an in-between in how you feel about them. It’s either a positive memory or a negative one. I want my legacy to be positive. I want kids to know that their teacher cares about them, and I really think I’m accomplishing that. What’s more, I’m preparing students to go to the very same high school I graduated from 10 years ago (with some of the same teachers I might add). If that’s not generational leadership I don’t know what is!

So some people will remember me as a 17-year-old senior whose sole passion in life was dance. Some people will remember me as an avid member of the choral department. Some people, unfortunately, will remember me for the negative things I said and did because my attitude at 17 sucked and I was a huge gossip (dance culture am I right?!). Some people will remember all of those things and some won’t remember me at all. All that to say I’m not where I want to be, and I’m not where I thought I would be, but thank God I’m not where I used to be.

Although, it is worth noting that I haven’t quite shaken my love for Zac Efron and I doubt I ever shall. Some things never change.

As a middle school teacher, sometimes I expect the problems that will come my way with my students: friendship drama, relationships, disorganization, sluggish behavior, etc. All of those I can be down with because I signed up for that. But there's always one thing that throws me for a loop with middle school kids and that is tattling. Maybe this is expecting too much, but as an 8th grade teacher, I, for some reason, expect them to have grown out of tattling by age 14. Spoiler alert: they haven't and it's my number one teacher pet peeve. So, a few months ago, on our class quote letter board, I wrote the following reminder because I'd had it.