Christmas Time at the Kenyon's

We actually had a real fireplace to hang our stocking by this year!

This Christmas season has been the best I have had in a long time! It was our first Christmas together as a married couple. And can I just say, being married is great :) One of the greatest feelings in the world is knowing that you are surrounded by people who love you and who you love. I was so privileged to have felt this again this year.

Habitat for Humanity

Matt led a volunteer group for Habitat for Humanity for his company and I never got to share about it! So better late than never :)
In the fall we worked on a house in the inner city of Rochester. It was fun but also hard work! We had the privilege of doing the "dirtiest job" they had volunteers do. Insulation. The insulation was recycled paper which we had to rip a part and throw into a huge vat which then sucked the insulation down a tube and was spread on the walls to insulate the house. I probably didn't explain that very well. Regardless it stuck to EVERYTHING, including us. We had to wear masks and goggles so we didn't breath it in too much. But it was a great experience. And we got to see a house dedication to a family receiving their new home. They were so thankful and it was very moving. There was also a block party that we crashed :)






Matt juggling at the block party



The kids LOVED Matt and his rip stick. Soon he had a line of kids wanting to try it!

Matt sidewalk chalking with the inner city kids. He is so cute :)

The Valley Deep

Everyone talks about the mountaintop experience, some people even live for it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not hating on the mountaintop moments we have, in fact I love them when they come, but there is something to be said about the valley. In fact, my name actually means valley. The valley is the place in between the mountains. It is the place where all the water running down off the mountains go...making the valley have the richest soil. Making it a place where the best crops are gown, and the richest nutrients are found. It is also in the valley where God shapes us the most. Where we gain our deepest maturities, our strongest character, and our strength as a person and of course, our humility.
Thank God for valleys, if it were not for them I would not have enough character to stand on the mountaintop without my pride knocking me down.

I got lunch yesterday with a close friend of mine. My mom just came through her second brain surgery, she is ok, but there is a heaviness that lingers around me lately. We were talking about life and such and she said the most wonderful thing to me that lifted such weights off my back. "Be a woman of rest". My life at the moment is extremely normal. My husband and I both work 9-5 jobs, we go to the gym, we eat dinner, we sleep, we go to church and do it all over again. I am in a season of the mundane and weariness sets in sometimes. Then she said this, "If you can love God in the mundane you can love him ANYWHERE. Can you sit still and keep your peace when the promises God gave you have not come to pass yet? How about when all your friends are being blessed, hearing from the Lord, participating in exciting moves of God and you have to stay in the mundane? Can you keep your peace trusting God has not overlooked you while they all run past you? If you can, that is what it truly means to be a woman at rest."

I need to learn to not rush the Lord anymore. I can feel Him do an eternal work in me. Joyce Meyer says the slower and longer the change takes to happen in a person the deeper and more profound the work. This work began in '05. Never in my life has the Lord taken me through such a long lasting season, ever. I feel as though He is doing such a deep work and building a foundation. Although no one would probably realize that just by looking at me. I believe He is taking His time because things that are built fast fall down fast but foundations that are built slow and steady can withstand a great shaking. So thank you for this wilderness Lord, where I wage my private wars, and thank you for this valley deep that I am becoming...and for the maturity, humility, and softness (no matter how small amounts I may have of each) that this wilderness has given me.

If I can love you in the wilderness I can love you anywhere, if I can praise you in the mundane, then I can praise you anywhere...
To be refined by a fire is a way of God, and it stems from His great compassion for us.

"He's brought me to the wilderness where I will learn to sing, He lets me know my barrenness where I will learn to lean...beautiful mercy do what you have to do, jealous lover do what you have to do.."
-Laura Hackett


Let every valley be lifted up, and every moutain and hill be made low
-Isaiah 40:4

All the windows are open and the fresh air is blowing through the house. I am convinced fresh air makes everything better. Just cleaned the house, threw in a load of laundry, and waiting for Matt's fam to arrive. We are having a BBQ today and we get to use the new grill we got for a wedding present. This is the first time we have used our deck since we moved in. It is a good day!

I love our new place. The walls are still bare and we still have no curtains but the creative juices are flowing and
I can't wait to get my hands on some nice interior decorations. Our TV broke the other day, but whatev, who needs a TV anyways? ..but I do miss The Office...

I ran out of gas in the driveway the other day. Convenient that I ran out of gas in the driveway but inconvenient because I had to go to the post office. So I ended up walking there, which was better than driving anyways. On my way home I passed a cemetery. It was one of those days where I had been inside all day, and it was sunny outside with a breeze, and Matt wasn't going to be home for a few hours so I took the left hand turn that led me inside. I found a huge oak to sit under. I don't know if you have ever gone to cemetery to find some peace but I have many times. Maybe I would think it was creepy too if it didn't work every time! It was so beautiful and peaceful. It helped me collect my thoughts on a number of things...I don't think there is a time when I'm not thinking about something.

Lately I have been wrestling. Do I love just because I want to be loved in return? Do I serve just to get that pat on the back? Do I want to humble myself just so I can be exalted? Even though I have been offended by Him, broken by Him, crushed by Him, I have never walked away just always stayed and wrestled.

But I am coming to this place where now...I see that He is extremely wise and my own ignorance has been exposed. He only hides us to prune us, he only crushes because He wants to pour us out. So our wine will be sweet. So our aroma will be fragrant. He is patient beyond words. The cup He offered me has been filled with many of my tears because I chose to drink it. Because my calling in Him is not comfortably but my calling in Him is self-sacrifice, and the process is to be pruned, crushed, poured out only to start the process again. Each time my wine will be sweeter, my aroma more fragrant, my heart more broken, but not the kind of brokenness that leads to death but to life.
There was a time when I thought He was holding out on me...but now I think that this was just all so I could be more. Maybe more like Him, for He withholds no good thing from us! He is not a mixture of good and bad, dark and light, He is a pure being. He is only good.

BTW pray for the Rifqa Bary case!!!

This Place

What if I have been wrong this whole time?
Do you want me to change?
What if my fear always holds me back?
Does this all have an end to it?
Where are we going?
Is there any purpose to all this?
What are we doing?
Am I even heading the right way?
Am I going to work there forever?
What if I hate it?
What if they hate me?
What if all my potential goes unrealized?
Or what if only half of my potential is realized...
What if I never make it there?
Maybe I had it wrong the whole time.
Am I becoming anything?
Why am I the way I am?
Am I too complicated?
I wish I were smarter.
I'm not sure if I am good enough...

This journey can bring us so many reeling questions at times. At points it's hard to see through them or get past them. This season quiets me. I do not feel a need to talk that much at all or explain myself, or explain what God is doing in me. Wresting, struggling, processing, trusting resting, without being able to see where we are going.

On another note, for those of you who may be curious, married life is great :)
Nothing comes close to beating it...however, it is not easy, but nothing worth having is easy.

Beautifully Broken

I'm finally settling down for my first night in my mom and I's new apartment. We have moved a lot since I finished high school, this is our third place in four years but I think I'm going to like it here. I'm sitting among many boxes and I definitely do not know where the tissue box is I was looking for earlier, and it took me about two hours to find the lamp that goes in my room but I did find it, and I am picking up someone else's wireless right now because ours is down at the moment. Getting used to a new place can be an adventure. I listen for every new sound and take in every new smell so I can learn to call it home as soon as possible, sometimes it doesn't work, but sometimes it does. All day we had very tall men who I did not know moving our things in and out of our place, it made me dizzy. I frequently made myself disappear a lot today. Our fridge is louder than the last one but I don't mind and I love the high white ceilings and our purple flowery shower curtain and the fact that the washer and dryer are not in the basement anymore... mmm life is too good to me right now :)
My bed is about the only thing set up but I feel like sleeping on the floor tonight and I don't know why-maybe it makes me feel more one with the place, like I'll get to know it faster and better or something.

I went to my grandma's tonight for some good home cookin! mmm It blessed me! I took a walk on the trail behind her house. Alone and quiet. The way i like it sometimes. It was enchanting. As I walked I put my i-pod in, a song by Sean Feucht played, and then I noticed it. I had walked to a part of that trial, surrounded by green trees and leaves, no people anywhere, and floating down from the sky were white tiny seeds. I know they come from some kind of tree. There were so many that the ground was so covered with them it looked like snow and they were still falling by what seems the hundreds just lightly floating through the air. It was magic. I felt like I was in a different world. I stared and stared and stared into the woods. I didn't know else to do. Gratitude swelled within me, Thank you Jesus.... He romances us everyday, we just need eyes to see. An open invitation to fall in love with love Himself. I didn't want to leave. I would have given anything for a horse right about then. I'm totally one of those girls that has a thing for wild horses. Typical maybe but it would be so awesome to be friends with a wild horse one day :)

And you know...as magical as it was there was pain in my heart. In the breath taking beauty of it I could feel the ache of brokenness over the wounds in my life and it hurt. But I left the allurement and captivation of that place feeling broken but feeling so beautiful and put together! It's ok to feel, it's ok to hurt, it's ok to carry beautiful weighty burdens He puts on us, and finding the courage to truly rejoice, smile, and laugh in the pain is truly beautiful and inspiring and it brings Him glory! In His kingdom my pain is my gain, and it make me more colorful, sculpting out deeper places, keeping my heart soft and more compassionate. As I walked away I could almost hear Him whisper a lesson to me. "First, let it shake you, then let it mold you, and ultimately let it make you. Let it make you." In the most difficult times maybe pain is sent to us as a friend and companion because it makes us lean in closer to Him....and become deeper, and more colorful, and more alive, and certainly more beautiful.

I want my heart to be bold. Beautifully surrendered, boldly broken, full of color, and then so very mendible so He can make me barley shakable...fiercely unmovable... into whatever He desires. I want to be beautifully broken. Jesus MAKE me....into a disciple.


"He who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, but he on whom it falls will be crushed"
-Matthew 21:44


"The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise"
-Psalm 51:17



Press into Him until the train of His robe fills the place where you are.

My Burden

human trafficking. human trafficking. human trafficking. For over a year now I have been thinking, breathing, living: a burden, a heaviness, the weightiness of it. I think about it often. Almost everyday, as much as I think of Him. Justice. Righteousness. JUSTICE.

Jesus warned us about a lawlessness that would increase in these last days and Jesus even warned us that in the last days merchants would mourn over their lost merchandise, and their merchandise will include human lives. (Rev. 18:13)

They are not for sale. Humans should not be for sale. Children should not be sold for less than cows cost. I have learned about abolitionists of the past and forerunners that made our future what it is today. I believe there is a movement coming to the church and something is happening again. God is rising up forerunners but more importantly modern day abolitionists. I think this issue will become one of the leading human rights issues of our time and generation. I can just feel His heart of justice beating so loudly on their behalf. I have a sense the poor, oppressed, the underground churches are coming to the forefront of things. Not because they need our help but because, we need their help, they are shining! If they have nothing then why do I envy them so much? They may be poor in the natural but their spirits are rich. They have nothing but they posses everything. To be so simply devoted to our Savior is so stirring. It makes me realize that I am only eating the bread crumbs of His presence when I could be eating the whole loaf. Would it be okay if I threw everything I owned out my window? I would only like to live with the shoes on my feet and a couple items of clothing in my closet. Just to live with what I need!! If I had only a little it would be easy to give away everything! I am SO rich!! I have more than enough compared to the rest of the world. Throwing everything out my window would be a natural expression of what I'm feeling in the spiritual. Leave out the thee's and thou's, the programs, just give me Jesus. If I sound crazy and too passionate, good. I have decided in the past two weeks that I CANNOT live a non passionate life. My friend exclaimed to me the other day, "I don't want to be an echo!" I shouted back "neither do I! We don't want to be echos because we are called to be voices!!" We are all going to be extreme for something. Let's be extreme for love, and justice is just love in public. I tried these past couple weeks to be normal and want a normal job and a normal life and dream normal dreams and it just about suffocated me. So I have decided that I will live my life the way He has spoken over me to live it. A revolution sounds good to me right about now.



by the way, prophetic evangelism, awesome. I think there will be a great increase in this.

Social justice issues. could talk about em all day.

one of my favs:

"But let justice roll down like waters
and righteousness like an everlasting stream"
-Amos 5:24



I should be sleeping.

Stray Thoughts

I have been meaning to write a new post for a while now. It's just that sometimes I have so much to say I don't know where to begin or sometimes I feel like I have nothing to share. Wedding planning is going good, school is ok. I just think I need to be still. I keep trying to move...my heart doesn't want to wait for Him.

I feel like I am entering into something new. Although if you asked me what it was I would not be able to tell you...but I feel as though my inner person is changing...not in a bad way, it's becoming softer or something. no one would notice just looking at me or being around me but I notice something rustling inside of me ever so quietly. I have been wondering what it is. I think it has to do with him. I know he is helping me become who I am supposed to be. So thank you, I don't say it to you enough.

I often find myself waiting for life to change but I am thinking it's not life that needs changing it's me. If I became more outwardly focused instead of making it all about me sometimes, if I focused on serving others, something inside me would fill up. Why am I afraid of being too soft? Because I don't want to be looked down upon, trampled on, taken advantage of...

I also know that it should not be feelings first then actions but actions and then feelings. Feelings will be the fruit of your actions. I heard yesterday, "don't follow your heart, lead it." It really spoke to me...I need a spirit of discipline and consistency and then my feelings will follow.
I haven't been doing good at loving Him lately...I think it's because I have swayed from letting Him love me. I struggle with letting Him love me in my sin and when I mess up, I pull away from Him, I need to learn how to let Him love me even in that place.

I do get scared about where my life will end up...if I will fall short of what I am meant to become...whatever that is...but I am being taught again that circumstances do not bring happiness or peace, all this is a condition of heart. You will become what you behold. He has been telling me this lately. Explaining to me that humans are like mirrors. We will reflect what we see. Incapable of being independent. We all are leaning on something.
I feel as though these past few years have uncovered what was truly in my heart. The offenses in my mind over the things I could not understand eventually became a stumbling block to my heart.

"A person’s heart is more clearly seen by what they’re willing to embrace without offense, than by their expression of faith only in what they already understand."
-Bill Johnson

I am in this divided place of loving him and the God who created me. There are now two that I would die for, two that I awake thinking of every morning, two that have won my affections, two I serve, two that deserve my time, two that deserve my love and passion. And this division that Paul spoke of is a new thing for me. It is not bad, just new. Even though things may look different between He and I, I suppose nothing has changed. I can feel Him say, "wait." So I will watch and wait while this new part of me is fashioned in the dark, and I will try to avoid those temptations that say "step out into the light and be seen", I just know it's not time yet.

Announcement

I got engaged last night!!!!

:-D

People are asking me: What are you going to do after school? What are you going to do with your life? What are your plans?

In my head I answer them: I want to completely end the child sex slave trade. I want to completely abolish human trafficking. There are more human slaves today than ever before in the world's history and 14,000-17,000 are trafficked across U.S. borders every year. 80% are estimated to be young women 50% children. And for what? Most commonly for sexual exploitation. I want to shut down every brothel in India and save every child who has ever been sold into a brothel in Cambodia. Why? No, not because I'm a good person but because they are vulnerable and cannot defend themselves and quite simply they need us. If we do not save them from a life of horror then who will? Their government? No. The leading chief of police in Cambodia is known to traffic drugs and children himself. The church needs to rise up and take part in one of the most important human rights issues of our day and I want to be part of that movement. That's what I want to do.

Out loud I answer them: Hum, I'm not sure...maybe something in marketing.

Sometimes Old Times Can Come Knocking

I went back there one day and found that it was not my place anymore. I had seventeen years of ridiculously sweet memories there that absolutely made my summers unarguably the best. I tried to hang on to it as long as I could but I eventually let it go one day. I remember the exact date and I have never set foot on that property since then, it would ache too much. Another piece I left back there.

Why am I still thinking about this? Please lets leave the past in the past, but I decided that it would be okay if I took the sweet remembrances with me. I awoke this morning with old memories flooding my head involuntarily. Sometimes that happens I have no idea why. Maybe it is just a processing thing I'm still going through. This morning they were not the bad kind surprisingly, just the bittersweet kind. I wish I could go back just for one moment to soak it up again and I know I would have never had to leave it if he never left us. I would still have it. But it does not help me to think of how things could have been if he was still here, it never does.

Oh but I remember such sweetness and placidity there. There was an unspoken rule that no one could wear shoes until night time came and as long as there was daylight we could not be on land. We reveled spending time on that old party barge all day long. Time in the sun, swimming, hanging out with our friends on the lake jet skiing and tubing and it never got old. We were always golden brown by the end of those summers.
I remember sitting on that old dock many times watching a storm roll in over the green hills and watching small fish swim beneath me. I remember rolling over logs searching for worms to go fishing and I remember the camp fires that would last until at least two in the morning. The kind of camp fires that would make people spill out all the deep things inside of them.
And the s'mores, never leave out those.
I remember the sunset canoe rides that became a tradition every night after dinner.
I remember when I woke up the morning the sun reflecting off the lake that hurt my eyes every time and I would sit with a blanket on that old creaky swing on the porch and watch the mist slowly lift off the lake.
And I remember the sky at night. After seeing that sky it has ruined me for any other night sky where you can't see the milky way splitting across it. There was not one place in that sky that was starless. I remember I would scoop up my little dog and snuggle him in my lap and stare at the sky, as if we were sharing it together. I remember the summer after high school we had at least ten people on that old party barge and we swam under those stars.


I remember that shack by the lake that always had this lean slightly to the left and the siding was falling off of it. My friends would always bust on me about how my family must have only paid $60 for it but as awful as looked, and still looks, I loved it and so did they.
The roof leaked incessantly when it rained and the cupboards would be emptied of all pots and pans to try and catch the drips. There was no running water or indoor plumbing but to me it was somewhat of a paradise. A place that shaped some of my most delicious memories. We would have loved to fix it up but that took money we did not have. Since it was only five minutes from my house I was there every summer, everyday.
My friends and I owe to it our gratitude for making our summers so sweet. It's still there but it just is not my place anymore, sometimes that hurts but as time continues it does become somewhat more sweet than bitter.

Why would I wake up and instantly remember so vividly? It startled me. After months of not thinking about it. Maybe it is the freezing winter air outside that makes me long for those summers again. The good kind of summers where we worked to live instead of living to work.

I blogged this more for my own records and recollect than for anyone else really. Just something I don't want to forget and memories so heightened and strong this morning I felt I needed to release them or I would fall over under the weight from them. But I am very happy to have remembered these things. It makes my heart feel warmer in these cold winter months.