So Fresh (Dialogue with Myself)

Welcome back, Hope students! I hope your summer has been more than wonderful. It’s crazy to think that we are all back in this beautiful place, but even crazier to think that I’m a JUNIOR. Oh my. I’m not prepared for this.

Anyways, the glaring questions that I get around this time of the year is “How is the start to your semester?!” I love/hate this question because I love talking about my semester, but don’t have enough time to answer it in as much depth as I would like with the people that I talk to in passing! So here, on this very blog post, I am going to tell you all how I am really doing! Get ready to get an earful, because – *spoiler* – my semester is going great!! You all will get a little taste of how my semester is going so far in a little Q and A with myself. Original, I know.

Me: “Mikaila! How were the first few days of classes for you?”

Myself: “Well, Mikaila, I’m an English major if you didn’t know that, and I absolutely love that I went with that major. Last semester I didn’t take a lot of English classes because of my Business minor, but now that I’m a junior (what??) I am able to take more English classes, which I love love love. Creative Writing and Brit Lit are the classes I’m in and I can’t even express how much I love them. I sincerely hope that every person at Hope can find something they are passionate and thrilled about in the same way that I am about English. It is the most fulfilling feeling when you find something that you love to study and learn about, and I’m hoping that I can carry that over into my job once I graduate (again, what??).”

Once that form of small talk fizzles out, people usually ask about activities and such. Here we go.

Me: “So what activities are you involved in this semester? Anything fun?”

Myself: “Funny you should ask, Mikaila! I am actually involved in this really great student organization called Student Ambassadors and, even though it’s my first semester with them, I can already tell I’m going to love it. What do they do, you ask? They basically help the transition from Hope student to Hope alumni become a smooth one. They put on Homecoming and the Last Hurrah and it’s a group with awesome people. I love it! I am also involved with Nykerk. I am the Junior Treasurer on the Executive Board, and I’m excited to be so closely involved in such a rich tradition yet again this year! Nykerk is actually October 31st this year, so be sure to check it out! In addition to both of those activities, I was also an Orientation Assistant for Hope’s Orientation program for the freshmen just a week ago. It was an amazing experience and I will probably do it again. I loved being such a big part of the freshmen’s first taste of Hope! Thanks for asking!”

This is my friend and myself leading Orientation - one of the activities I was involved in at the beginning of the school year! It was a great experience.
This is my friend and myself leading Orientation – one of the activities I was involved in at the beginning of the school year! It was a great experience.

That is where the conversation-in-passing usually ends, give or take. Obviously I wish I could talk to everyone about my semester more in depth, so if you have anymore pressing questions about the start of my semester or how my summer’s been, let me know! I’m always up for coffee or a bagel. 🙂

It’s so good to be back writing for you, readers! Enjoy your semester and the end to this glorious summer!

Until next time!

New Year, New Decorations.

Classes are back in session at Hope College.

The campus has sprung back to life with the clack of longboards rolling along sidewalks, conversations sparking new friendships, and excited hellos coming from friends long separated by the months of summer.

As the campus outside comes alive once again, so do the inside of the dorm rooms.
My roommate and I knew what we really needed to bring back to Hope for our Sophomore year – decorations. We live on the third floor of Van Vleck Hall. It may be an old, quirky, building, but one major plus of living on its top floor are the nearly ten-foot tall ceilings. So, in exchange for bringing less clothing and other various items, we brought more lights, pictures, posters, etc. to take advantage of our ample wall space. As we put together our room those four blank walls became our canvass to display a little bit of us and by Sunday night we created our home for the year.

Today I turned in my major declaration form for Classics, one of the disciplines in which I intend to double-major with during my time here at Hope. College is the place where you build up your academic foundation for your working life. However, it’s also where you build relationships that will last a lifetime, connections that will benefit you in the future, inspiration for your goals and what you aim to achieve after Hope, and a network of people that will support you through it all. While college is all about academics and the end goal of a degree, it is just as importantly about taking advantage of your four years and decorating them with memories, friendships, inspirations and ideas. It’s the time to build up who you are and who you want to be. And I can’t wait to see where these next three years take me and those around me.

Thanks for reading! Feel free to follow my Twitter (@HopeErin18) or Instagram (e_delaney333) for more thoughts about and pictures of Hope.

~Erin

My Perfect College Breakfast

I moved back into Hope last week, and I’ve been really enjoying my time here so far. I’ve loved living in a house, practicing each day for worship team, going to the beach, decorating my house little by little, buying beautiful flowers at the Farmers Market, and so much more. One thing I really look forward to every day, strange enough as it is, is making breakfast. Taking time to sit down for breakfast before my morning rehearsal each day gives me time to think before I leave for the day, and to make sure I’ll feel good all the way through rehearsal until I get to leave for lunch.

Breakfast
My favorite breakfast of all time (besides an omelet from DeBoer’s Bakkerij!).

The great thing about this breakfast is that it’s so easy to put together in my house or in a dorm room. There’s no cooking involved, and it’s super quick and easy because I’m just throwing things in a bowl. I love it so much that I even told my mom about it because I want everyone to eat it. Here are the ingredients!

This is seriously the easiest breakfast, but it keeps me so full all morning and it’s a lot less terrible for my health than most other breakfasts I used to grab on my way out the door. I have to wake up a few minutes earlier to make time to actually sit down and eat it, but throughout the past couple years of school, I’ve found that those extra couple of minutes can really impact the way I go about my whole day!

I used to really not care about breakfast at all because I never had time for it, but I’ve really come to value it, especially since starting to work at camp in the summer. I don’t know how I ever went about my days without getting any food in my system until noon. That sounds like the worst when I think about it now. Also, sitting down for breakfast makes me feel like an adult, which is an important part of college. So, next time you want to feel more like a grown-up while still not putting in a ton of effort, try this breakfast. Not only will you feel accomplished, but you will also feel nourished. And that, my friends, is a great feeling.

Thanks for reading! Keep up with me on Twitter (@hopekathryn17), Instagram (@kathrynekrieger), or email me at kathryn.krieger@hope.edu.

“Let me hear of your unfailing love each morning, for I am trusting you. Show me where to walk, for I give myself to you.”

– Psalm 143:8

Camp, God, and Mysteries

It’s currently 9:31 a.m. on Saturday morning.

Right now, I should be telling parents how much money their camper has left in their canteen account (which is, 90% of the time, a whopping zero dollars), whether or not they need to talk to the camp nurse, and where they can pick up their luggage. If it were a weekday, I would be teaching kids how to do archery, how to put on knee pads, or how to tie a bunch of knots that would ultimately result in either a really cool friendship bracelet or a really tangled mess that the kid doesn’t realize looks completely different than it is supposed to.

Instead, I am sitting in my kitchen at home with a cup of coffee from my French press, my Bible, my journals, a bowl of maple and brown sugar oatmeal, and my laptop. I am majorly out of my routine.

Everything is weird. But everything is good.

Leaving camp is something that I have loved/hated for the past two years. I absolutely LOVE camp. I love the ministry that it has and the impact that it has on kids by God’s grace. I love the people there and I love that my bosses are also my friends. I love that my personal appearance is the last thing I’m ever worried about. I love that I get to live on a lake and tag along on boat rides in my free time and paint ceilings and sing songs and play tag with kids and get paid for all of it. I love seeing the ways that God provides even when we have no idea how things are possible. I love that it feels normal to have paint or stickers all over my face and speak in weird accents and that sometimes I feel like I’m giving the most glory to God when I’m making an utter fool of myself.

Camp
This is most of what camp is. PS, I’m wearing a Hope shirt. Photo taken by my friend Anna!

I love camp.

But I also love the life that is not camp. I love seeing the changes that God made in me and in others come into the “real world.” I love grocery shopping with my mom and eating ice cream with my dad. I love that I get to move into a house with my best friend in five days. I love telling people about the things I experienced this summer and listening to their stories. I love taking showers without shoes on. I love sitting on the front porch with my grandma and grandpa. I love knowing that God works in places that aren’t camp, too.

Sometimes leaving camp is really hard. I think in one way or another, it always is. But this time, I have peace about the transition. God has shown me so many things about myself and about him this summer, and one of the biggest ones is that he is constant and he will provide. Though so many things change around me and in me, God remains the same, and so does the identity that I have as his beloved child.

As one of my friends said, I think it’s impossible to leave a whole summer working at camp without being changed. Sometimes those changes are more obvious than others. Sometimes they require real life actions. For me, these changes involved quitting some things in my life that were taking up time that I could be using more effectively. They involved making decisions to get rid of things that weren’t necessarily bad, but also weren’t glorifying to God. They involved a shift of my priorities and of my views on what it means to serve others and to serve God. I am so different than I was two months ago. I am completely different than I ever expected to be. I am so thankful for that. God is shaping me into a person that I could not have imagined. Camp is a huge part of all of this and I am so thankful for the privilege of being called there though I was not equipped. As one of my bosses/friends often says, God works in spite of us. Half the time I had no idea how to do my job, but God saw my meager efforts and my mistakes and did whatever he was going to do anyways. I love that about God.

Our theme at camp this summer was “Life Mysterious.” I don’t think there could have been a more perfect theme for this summer for kids or for myself. It was a great theme to make cheesy jokes about all the time, but those cheesy jokes were often also very relevant. It was fun to be able to tell kids that our schedule was part of their “life mysterious” whenever they wanted to know what we were going to do next. However, our theme became so real when a nine-year-old boy that I never thought would listen to me became one of my best pals and wanted to hold my hand every time we walked somewhere. He also called me Kenneth and ate Cheetos at 7:30 a.m. It was adorable. Uh, anyways… It became so real when the job I had, which was intended to be done by four people, was somehow managed by the two of us that God provided for the summer along with some gracious volunteers who arrived at the perfect times. It became so real when so many of the staff members who were new to camp this summer absolutely knocked their jobs out of the park and made camp that much better. It became so real when I felt God leading me to quit activities that have been a far bigger part of my life than they should have. It became so real when I was instructed to memorize the Beatitudes before school started and they hit me exactly where they needed to on the day I began doing so. The “Life Mysterious” theme became so real in so many instances throughout the summer. The Holy Spirit’s work was evident. At the end of the summer it was suggested to us as summer staff to begin making a list of where we could recognize the Holy Spirit in the things that happened at camp this summer. I had never done anything like that before, so I didn’t really know where to start. But as I began trying to figure it out, I realized that it was obvious. The list went on and on and on. I love the way that God’s glorious mystery is revealed to us in tiny, tiny chunks as he works. We will never know everything, but we will always get to know a little more as we seek God. I love that I don’t know everything about God. I love that I don’t know what my life will be like in five years at all. I love that God has shown me enough of himself to make me want to constantly know more. I love that no matter how much I get the privilege of learning throughout my life, I will never have it figured out. I love that God has placed me at camp for the past two summers and I love the role that camp has played in shaping my life.

Rad
My painting on the ceiling of arts and crafts basically summarizes my most important feelings in life.

Camp is the best summer job I could dream of. I am so thankful for the opportunity to do the things I’ve done for the past two summers, and to learn so, so much. I am also so excited to do the things that God is calling me to over the next year until I hopefully get to return to camp for my third summer. For now, as I enter into my junior year of college, I have peace in the unknown because I know it will provide challenges and situations that will allow me to learn more about this mysterious God I serve and the mysterious life I get to live each day.

Thanks for reading! Keep up with me on Twitter (@hopekathryn17), Instagram (@kathrynekrieger), or email me at kathryn.krieger@hope.edu.

“We declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began.”

– 1 Corinthians 2:7

 

 

My Hope College Bucket List

You guys, college is so great. There is so much to do and there are so many things to learn and it’s just a great time of life. I have gotten to do so many awesome things since being at Hope, but there are still so many more that I want to do! Here is a list of some things I haven’t gotten around to doing yet, but that I hope to make happen before graduating!

Sail
I have a feeling that this guy I saw the other day is really good at doing things on his bucket list.

1. Drive to Niagara Falls.

2. Visit the Grand Rapids Downtown Market.

3. Take friends home with me to experience my little town for a weekend.

4. Have a fun, themed gathering at my house on campus.

5. Meet Ben Rector (Is this possible? I don’t know, but I hope and pray that it is!).

6. Sleep in my ENO in the Pine Grove.

7. Have dinner at President Knapp’s house.

8. Visit Downtown Dogs.

9. Picnic on the beach (my favorite beach is Kirk Park!).

10. Cook a full meal that isn’t terrible with my friends.

11. Eat at Crust 54 with Paul Boersma, one of Hope’s chaplains.

12. Go to Madcap Coffee in Grand Rapids.

13. Have a slumber party in Dykstra Hall during my years as an upperclassman.

14. Visit every coffee shop in Holland.

15. Finish writing a paper more than 24 hours before it is due (Is this a bucket list or a crazy dreams list?).

16. Take my friends to Sherman’s Ice Cream in South Haven.

17. Read every book of the Bible (Almost there! I started in sixth grade though. Oops.).

18. Attend the Hope-Calvin basketball game. And see the Dutchmen win, of course.

19. Have all my friends from camp who go to Hope over to my house for some fun.

20. Make banana pancakes while listening to “Banana Pancakes” by Jack Johnson.

21. See Bob Goff speak again.

22. Somehow make it over to the side of the beach that Big Red (the red lighthouse) is on. I don’t know how to get there, but if anyone does and wants to hook me up, I wouldn’t be mad.

23. Bike to Holland State Park.

24. Complete the Daniel Fast.

25. Take an art class.

26. Go to Meijer Gardens.

27. Run or work out at the Dow every day for a month straight.

28. Visit Sleeping Bear Dunes.

29. Get a picture with the guy who owns Good Time Donuts.

30. Graduate!!!!!!!

Why do so many of these pertain to food? Anyways…

There are a lot more things I would like to do before I graduate, but this is just the starter pack. Hopefully, if you keep up with my blog, you will get to read about the completion of some of these items. I’m pretty excited about them.

In the meantime, I move back to Hope in less than two weeks! It’s so crazy. Keep up with all my junior year adventures here, on Twitter (@hopekathryn17), Instagram (@kathrynekrieger), or via email at kathryn.krieger@hope.edu. Thanks for reading!

“Then David continued, ‘Be strong and courageous, and do the work. Don’t be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you. He will see to it that all the work related to the Temple of the Lord is finished correctly.'”

– 1 Chronicles 28:20

Loner Status: Loving It

Sorry for the long pause in writing, followers!

It’s been a pretty crazy past month for me – I’ve had to take a summer class (Accounting, gross) which left me with a lot of homework, and basically no social life. This was reiterated daily since my sister is away in Colorado for the summer. I’ve also had a lot of time to bond with my parents, which has been an awesome blessing, but as I’ve been praying about what to write, a topic that God keeps putting on my heart is aloneness, or being alone.

What a concept, right? The world’s focus today is to be surrounded by people – friends, parties, etc. Because if we’re surrounded by people we aren’t missing out on anything.  And honestly, being on Hope’s campus you definitely are surrounded – there is constantly something to do. Don’t get me wrong, that’s not a bad thing at all, but sometimes its just a little much, and me being the introvert that I am, I would find myself craving the alone time I most desperately needed. Personally, in order for me to be as unstressed and carefree as possible, I need at least an hour or so of decompressing time a day, and at Hope, that was nearly enough to keep me sane.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I was worried about coming home for the summer because I was worried I didn’t have a purpose. Well another reason I was worried to come home was because I was worried about being lonely, bored, and alone so often. I thought I couldn’t handle all the alone time I knew I was about to get. I thought it would get old. But readers, I was so so wrong!

Being alone for the past three months has been extremely beneficial. I think I was worried about being alone because I didn’t know how to be alone. To actually be alone with none of my friends to surround me, I was worried about coping with myself and the millions of thoughts I had running through my head. This would be the season where I was going to have to forget about anyone else’s opinion, and just think about what I believed, and what I thought on certain subjects. At first, it was extremely stressful just being alone with my thoughts, but now it’s the most wonderful pastime. Take today for example – my mom is out of town, my dad is in the yard doing yard work, and I’ve been poking around, doing things I have to do completely and wonderfully alone. To some people, that sounds super lame, and I would have said this was super lame a few months ago, but now it’s just a peaceful day that I get to be alone with myself and think or write or do whatever I want.

This is the epitome of my alone time. Using all the foods I bought from a farmer's market, I made probably the best lunch I've ever eaten today. Guess who I experienced it with? MYSELF.
This is the epitome of my alone time. Using all the foods I bought from a farmer’s market, I made probably the best lunch I’ve ever eaten today. Guess who I experienced it with? MYSELF.

It’s awesome.

This transitioning of mindsets on aloneness has also let me become closer to God. Being alone gives you a lot of time to think about life, and journaling and praying with Him is one way to get a different perspective on the world, especially as I settled into my thoughts from the first day of the summer.

As I get ready to go back to Hope within the next few weeks, I can confidently say that because of this summer, and because of my outrageous amount of alone time, I am a more confident person. I’ve had time to think about what my values are, the person that I want to be, and action plans to become that person. I’ve become more self-aware, and because of this, more decisive. I can’t wait to go back to Hope, but I am becoming more and more appreciative of what this summer has brought as each day of it comes to a close.

I hope you’ve found your own kind of peace this summer too, readers. Enjoy these next few weeks of summer before the school year starts back up!

Until next time!

Planning for August in a Busy July

Man, it really seems like school can start to sneak up on you fast, doesn’t it?

I am enjoying the summer working at Covenant Harbor Bible Camp, so I am pretty busy most of the time. Camp is the best, but there is not a ton of downtime. I only have a few days in between camp and school to get ready, so I’ve been trying to plan ahead to make sure I have what I need to move into school. But it’s usually hard to even think more than a couple hours ahead, so it’s even more difficult to be thinking a month in advance! However, it’s definitely necessary, at least to whatever small degree I can make time for.

Boats
Sometimes it’s hard to think about school when I have views like this every day!

One way that I’m trying to prepare for school is just by writing things down whenever I think of them. I have a running list of things I need to find in my house or buy, and I just make sure to jot them down. I know I’ll forget about them otherwise. I’m also trusting my mom to remind me of a lot of stuff when I get home, too! Moms are great, am I right?

I’m also making lists of groceries I want to keep in my house. I am living in a cottage this year, so I have a real life kitchen! I also only signed up for seven meals a week from Hope’s dining halls, so I’m going to need to cook more for myself, which I’m really excited about! Having a list of groceries I want to buy when I get to Holland keeps me from having to think about that later, and is also a good way to get some of my excitement out. You guys, I love grocery shopping. I don’t know why, but it makes me really excited. I’m also extra stoked because Holland has the awesome farmer’s market, and I’m going to buy so many fruits and vegetables and flowers there, you guys! I’m so jazzed!

Flowers
Beautiful flowers I bought at the farmers’ market last fall!

I’ve also been using Pinterest and Keep whenever I have a little bit of time to get some more specific ideas for things I want to do in my house (check out the Pinterest board I’m sharing with my roommate for cottage ideas! Can you guess one of our theme colors?). I’ve especially been researching planners and some cute DIY things for my room.

I’ve also just been snatching a few things up here and there when I happen to find them on a Target or Walmart run on one of my quick camp breaks. A couple weeks ago I found a great deal on a French press at TJMaxx and couldn’t pass it up! $10 for twenty ounces of French pressed goodness, you guys. There was no way I was skipping that one.

How have you been preparing for school? Let me know on Twitter (@hopekathryn17), Instagram (@kathrynekrieger), or via email at kathryn.krieger@hope.edu. Thanks for reading!

“For the Kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk; it is living by God’s power.”

– 1 Corinthians 4:20

 

Mountain Lens

Hello Readers!

It’s been a while since I’ve last written, and I’m excited to be back at it this summer. Basically, it’s June 7th, May flew by, and life has been crazy – but what else is new?

Ever since the last few weeks of school leading into summer, I was praying a lot about purpose – how people know what theirs is and what living out your purpose looks like. Specifically in my life, I had to figure out what my purpose actually was, at least for the summer. Don’t get me wrong, I had/have things planned for the summer, but everyone around me felt stirred by the Holy Spirit to DO something. Anything from being camp counselors to setting up internships, people had big, life changing plans that they knew they needed to fulfill. They felt it in their hearts, or were just blessed with amazing opportunities.

One of these people was my sister, who, per her personality, accepted a job as a camp counselor in Colorado – a state she’s never been to before, in a camp she’s never laid eyes on. Readers, let me tell you, that is bold, but at the same time so cool because she, like the many others mentioned, felt a stir in her heart to go there and do what God wanted with her. Anyways, because of her accepting this job, our whole family would get the opportunity to go out there to drop her off at the end of May, and that was the one thing I could look forward to. As summer closed in, I couldn’t wait to go home to figure out what God had there for me (because obviously he MUST have something brilliant lined up).

As I arrived home and the unpacking process commenced, I quickly learned that my purpose wasn’t at home (or so I thought) and a certain sadness settled on me because where was God’s plan for me? Starting a summer class while working a part time job kept me busy and seeing old friends was great, but that is hardly a purpose for the whole summer. To be honest, my sister’s story sounded a whole lot better than mine did – camp counselor in Colorado vs. accounting in metro Detroit. Do I even have to ask which sounds more interesting? I wanted adventure and fulfillment! Not studying and boredom.

May flew by, and all of a sudden it was time for our family Colorado trip to drop Meg off at camp. Landing in Denver, I knew this wasn’t going to be an ordinary trip because from the second we landed, all we could see were mountains. And let me tell you, pictures don’t do them justice, and they are a lot more intimidating than you think. Not from far away, but when you get up close and personal and are driving up one, they’re menacing. So driving through them that first day, all I could do was stare in awe and just gape at their beauty.

The second day we were there was the day that really got to me. We were driving through Rocky Mountain National Park, and I’ll tell you up front the way I hear God best is when I’m taking pictures with my camera or reading or writing. So at one lookout spot way up in the mountains, I had hopped out of my car to get a really good picture. There were a million thoughts going through my head like “wow this is beyond beautiful” and “how did God even create me after he made these beautiful mountains that could crush me” and after I got the picture, I put my camera down and just looked out and knew what God was trying to tell me all along.

Pano.
Absolutely unreal.

My head was clear and my heart was full, because God was telling me that my purpose for this summer was to live in the moment and find the beauty in the everyday life that I’m living. He told me that life was a lot like taking a picture in the mountains; you can look out at it through a lens, but to really experience it’s beauty, you have to put that lens down and actually live it first hand. It made me feel big and small at the same time, and made my jaw drop to think that Jesus died for me, of all people, when he didn’t have to. It made me think about every other person’s purpose here on this earth, and how I was so obsessed with finding my purpose, that I always looked toward the future, and never stopping to notice all that God done for me.

It was a beautiful realization and one that I think will help me get a lot more out of the life I’m living. Because adventure is wonderful, but if you can find the beauty and blessing in everyday life, you’ll always wake up to the best gift that God has given you – a life that is distinctly and individually yours, full of His grace and mercy.

Enjoy the start to your summer, readers, until next time!

Redemption’s Story

When I first wrote this post, it took me about five hours to complete and was over 5,000 words. That meant 99.99% of you would never read it, and most professors would most likely skim.

So, I scrapped my first draft, and I’m starting from the beginning.

I arrived back in Holland at 10:15am Saturday morning after a six hour flight from Anchorage to Chicago and a three hour drive from Chicago to campus following a two week trip to Alaska with a one week class in Holland to preface in order to complete my Hope College requirement of a Senior Seminar. That was a lot of logistical information I needed to include to make this post make sense, but other than logistics, it has little purpose. If you want to learn more, check out Alaska May Term: Thriving in Transitions or Hope College Senior Seminar to view course descriptions.

I’m sitting on the floor of my bedroom, glancing at my left arm. I pulled up the sleeve just a little bit and rolled my arm to the right, just so that I can see it better.

On my upper arm, I have seven freckles that align to form the Big Dipper, with one additional lone freckle off to the right: the same shape as the Alaskan flag.

As much as I would love to call that a coincidence, I believe that everything is connected.

I believe everything is connected because I believe in a God that goes before us. I believe in a God that knew us before we were born.

When I stepped off of the plane in Alaska, I can tell you that a radical love was taking over my heart. It was a love that I had encountered before, but this time, I could accept it, because God’s vision meant more to me than my own will.

Grace meets the mountains

Before I left, the Lord promised me two things: 1) that He would teach me to love with real love and 2) that I would run for the first time without pain in over six years.

He is a God who is who He says He is and will do what He says He will do. I knew it, I know I did. But belief is an entirely different phenomenon.

The first morning, I woke up at 5:45am to an Alaskan morning that felt like daylight. The sun doesn’t set there in the summer.

And I ran. I ran like I was out of shape, but did not run with pain. Each time my feet hit the concrete, it felt as though they were landing on a cloud. I don’t know how far I ran, but it was farther than I ever had before. When I returned back to our campground, I was breathing heavy and at some point, I closed my eyes.

When I opened them, in front of me was the landscaping just past the entrance of the ministry, a giant message spelled out in rocks that said, “WELCOME” and a white wooden cross that stood above it.

When God’s power intersects with our potential, it becomes a collision with grace.

I broke down. I fell to my knees and I knew I didn’t deserve it, but my Savior told me I was worth it all.

Before the trip, I knew we had an hour of quiet time in the morning so I prayed a lot about where I was supposed to sit. God gave me a picture of a log with some trees in front of it, and I knew that was where I was supposed to be.

The first day, God told me to take a left as I walked out of the bunkhouse door, so I did, and I walked into a brush area with thorns and weeds and poison ivy. I was thinking, “oh man, this is absolutely terrible,” but I knew it was where He wanted me to go. All of a sudden, a path opened up in front of me. I began to follow it through the woods. Then, to my left, I saw the place that He had promised.

I sat down on the log and realized that God loves to prove that He is God.

I thought a lot about where I was at that time last spring, and what the past year had held for me. It was full of challenge, but no challenge stood in the presence of heaven’s redemption. I would go into detail, but I fear I would boast in my problems, therefore diminishing the reality of grace.

I’m going to backtrack for just a moment.

I got a new phone for Christmas. And me, being my self, never re-downloaded my music library onto my phone, so for the entire six-hour flight to Alaska, I had one song playing on repeat. It was a song I bought my freshman year of high school. Dare You to Move, by Switchfoot.

There was one line that stood out to me among all the rest:

maybe redemption has stories to tell.

Before my life met Christ, I was like a tree growing upside down. The roots were growing upward into the air, and the branches were growing into the soil. Roots of a tree were never meant to be exposed to those kinds of elements.

People asked me to tell my story, and I put on an act. I talked about the good things, and I left out the bad.

I decided I didn’t want to live like that anymore.

If you just read that and think, “that’s me,” I pray that you give grace a second glance. Because in God’s mercy, He has given you a second chance.

When I chose God, He had already chosen me. He uprooted everything I thought I knew and flipped it upside-down. He took my branches, and He turned me around. My roots now grow down into His foundation of soil, and my branches reach upward toward the sky.

I can tell you my story, because God retold me mine.

And that is you, too. Your life has been redeemed. Your life is not pebbles thrown across the floor. He’s put everything together to be better than before. His power is ready to meet your potential– potential you don’t know you have– because nothing is impossible in His grace.

when the glacier met grace

 

Cool, huh? I probably won’t be tweeting much throughout the summer, but I’m always still around at sophie.guetzko@hope.edu if you want to chat. Or Facebook message me, that works too. Don’t give up. Your story has just begun.

 

This Feels Like Home

I arrived home on Friday; I’ll be here for a week and two days.

It feels different being home, even though most things have remained the same.

There’s one building on the downtown strip that’s been demolished and there’s different pillows on the chairs on my front porch.

There are many more things that have never changed, and probably won’t, in the rest of the time that I spend here.

But I have. I’ve changed. And I know a lot of people say that because the world is constantly in motion. People say that because they encounter experiences in their life that shape their worldview for a little bit but then they fall back into the same habits they had at the beginning when they’re placed back into the same situations and spend time with the same people.

This type of change is different, I think.

I’m running into people I’ve always known and I’m driving down the four main streets in my hometown. Everything is familiar, but everything is different. The view in my rearview mirror is different.

Instead of letting it be what it’s been to me, it became what I’ve always wanted it to be.

When I went to college as a freshman, I was looking for a fresh start. In a way, I “broke up” with my hometown like it was my ex-boyfriend and traveled a little over 405 miles to a new place with new opportunities.

And a new place with new opportunities is exactly I found when I came to Hope. I praise God for that every day, because when I walked in as a freshman, I would have never believed I would be in the place I am today – full of joy, patience, and new knowledge.

But my hometown and I had an awkward “breakup,” because there wasn’t really any resolution. Neither one of us really had an answer to some hard questions, and we left each other without really talking – falsely hoping the relationship would improve with us being further apart.

My assumption was that, by building a life somewhere else, I’d fix all the parts of me that were broken. I was incorrect.

There was a time that it didn’t get better; in fact, it probably got worse. But then, it did get better; and now, it’s the best it has ever been.

Porch Swing
So often, we swing close to the person we want ourselves to be, but when we’re working off our our own strength, we swing back to the person we were.

I’m writing from a couch in my living room, and I’m more than happy to say I have two homes.

One is Hope, and one is here. And as awesome as it would be to say that “making up” with my hometown was on me, with joy, I say it’s Jesus. He made the view in my rearview mirror clearer than it’s ever been before.

I never would have found Him without Hope.

The choices we make sometimes lead us to places where we can’t find peace. We know we messed up, but we can’t find the way out on our own. We can’t find a way to break our habits, adapt our character, and change our perspective permanently. As often as we try, we fail twice as much.

We often run away in attempt to find what we’re missing, and in effect, we gain more loss. And I wish I had a list of steps to take, a magic recipe to find that peace to keep us from running away, but I don’t. I only have one word.

Jesus.

I learned that instead of running from something, we have to run to something. And the only One who will stay constant enough for us to run to, the only thing that will still remain, is God. He’s permanent, He is never changing. He’s the only thing that was there before I was here and will be here long after I am gone.

For the first time in a long time, perhaps the first time in the history of ever, my house is home. And my hometown is home. And I’m at peace. I’m happier than I’ve ever been in a place that hasn’t changed, but feels brand new.

We love a God whose desire is peace, and He gives us peace because He loves us in return.

Glad I got over that breakup… thanks, Jesus.

Follow me @hopesophie17 on your social media outlets (I’m trying to get better with my Instagram, I’m really trying). If you have questions or comments about anything at all, I would love to talk. Please send them my way at sophie.guetzko@hope.edu.