I know, it's cheese,

but the Lord, the One who is doing all of this, who actually knows what's going on and how we feel,

man. He is so good.

I cry and yell with him at times. Mostly it's, who am i? You know I am not young life. You know this doesn't grow me to be the girl you made me to be. I need you to make me who I am.
And it's selfish to follow the desires of my heart. I'm caught between creation and art and ministry and "real life" chores, because they seem to be detached from one another. Everyone tells me I invest too much time in class, and I don't want to invest so much into young life sometimes. Who am i?

It's amazing how God works. Because I lost that alive feeling from this summer. And i'm scared. And then my roommate amanda cried two nights ago about how she didn't know what she wanted to be when she grew up. And Steph called me at midnight last night, upset that no one lets her be herself. And Anton came over and said the same thing. We're all in one Spirit sometimes, I think. Thank you, Lord. Thank you for stories and friends.

I sent anton a music video yesterday, because I liked it, and I thought he would too.
He sent me a text message saying thanks and asked when we could hang out. I said let's bake cookies!
He came over after ccf with dough already made (gravitons) and we baked and listened to some songs. When the music stopped and while the cookies cooled, I just sat there. I've learned a lot of people are like me. You give them space, they'll blossom because they know you're comfortable with them. or something.

Anyways. He said he was sad. I didn't say anything. He said, I don't think it has to do with school. I decided to be brave and said, "Sarah?"
He said, "yes. it's shit."

more silence.

And then he went on to say, "We still need space. I need to be able to be happy without her and happier with her."
"yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I'd agree."
"But I think I can be happy," said anton.

And then I talked about how Sarah might need the space to figure herself out too. And all of that stuff about trusting. And if you love someone, you let them be themselves, you let them fly away if that's what they want. It sucks, and he nodded.

And then, here's where it comes in to being relevant really. He said,

Do you ever just wish you could be different?

How do you mean? I said

Like, everyone thinks things about you, and if you ever wanted to be something else, something better, you couldn't be because no one would let you be that.

Yeah

Sometimes I think I need new friends. Or a new place to go. I don't want to be in school anymore. I don't want to be doing all of the things I don't want to do.

Yeah. What do you want to do?

I don't know. I used to play video games a lot, but now i don't and I have four hours of free time and I sit around not doing anything.

You like hiking right? You love climbing mountains. And parks and trails. And bike rides and music. And record stores and concerts. And photography. You love photography.

Yeah. But it's not fun by yourself.

Gosh, do I know.

No one really cares about that stuff. For example, if I read an article about a new album coming out from this really cool band and I get all fired up about it, there is no one to share in it except maybe Matthew in Spain, so I'll send him a message, but it's different. No one here cares about that stuff.

Maybe. What if you found new friends?

I don't really want to do that, says anton

What if you brought along your friends?

They wouldn't care.

But what if you showed them? And if they liked it?

Maybe.

 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - -

Alright - it kept going, and it ended really well, but here's the point.

The Church is everywhere, right?

We're all Velveteen rabbits looking for love among rabbits that don't make us feel real. But we are real. We are always ourselves. And i think we're coming down from this wave of "love God, love people."

Yes. Love God. Please love God. and yes. Please love people.

But. Maybe. Just maybe. Loving people, and loving God, is taking those things God puts in our hearts, and doing something with them. Being someone. Being an arm, or a foot, or an eye, no matter how weird or funny we look. We are family. We will find some people in our family who understand our music and some who won't. But all the same we have to share. We have to.

The flagship of the artist, the best that an artist can be is when they give it away. They give the art away, they let it go into the air and trust. Because we are loved. Because he has made us unique in all the world. He has made us beautiful and to be anything less than that would be a sin.

Find out who you are. Squirm and feel funny and make people look at you funny. Be weird. Be different. Say what you feel, not what you ought to say. You'll be alright. We're free to fly. The world is waiting for the uniqueness of Christ in you. The refreshing cold water, if you will.

I believe this with all my heart. Now the hard part is the work of asking, "who am i?" and "who are you?"
And I don't think we'll ever have the words for it. "I am this. You are that."
It's more beautiful than that. It's like undercurrents of an ocean. We don't understand why someone does what they do, we don't know how someone thinks a certain thing, but grace is space and trust is steadying.