Gratitude Challenge: Day Eighteen.

"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven." Ecclesiastes 3:1

Man, oh man. Where do I even begin today??? So much to be thankful for. So much change just around the bend.

I'm not sure how I'm going to effectively convey my thoughts and my heart... so I'm simply asking God to guide my hands as I type.

First, I'll give you the plan for right now :) Then I'll give you a peek as to the hearts that are behind it.

I'm finishing up a semester at Sac State right now. I'm currently a nursing major. In three and a half short weeks, I won't be at Sac State anymore, and I won't be a nursing major anymore. To take it a step further, I'm not going to school at all anymore. I'm moving back home to Redding, pursuing a full time job, and various other activities that I'm SO excited to have the time to do. They include: volunteering in the Stirring kids and speaking into the lives of His little children that He loves so so much, getting to know God's people (and I mean REALLY know them, not just names) more deeply and fully in an atmosphere of community, discipling and being discipled, learning to cook and sew, preparing for my sweet friend's wedding, and being able to love without boundaries and restraints. After my beautiful friend gets married in June, my heart's desire is to move to Southern California in late summer. Similar to the set up in Redding, I would love to pursue a full time job and be actively involved in Grace Community Church in Sun Valley. My heart is passionate about seeing His sons and daughters freed from captivity, specifically in the area of human trafficking. There are countless opportunities to serve in this area, and I'm so excited for what God might have.

However, other than the plan to move home to Redding in three weeks, none of this is set in stone :) I am so so open to the plan God has for me, and I am standing with arms high and heart abandoned... asking Him to have His will with me. In every area of my life.

NOW... to the hearts behind it :)

First up, my heart! But, before I share, I'd like you to know that I value your thoughts :) If you have concerns, express them. If you have encouragement, share it. If you have wisdom, I'd love to listen. I SO SO appreciate them. I don't take them lightly AT ALL. I sit with them, mull them over, take them to Jesus. So feel free. And know that I love you.

First of all, I have heard from the time I was very small that I WAS going to college, because it was important to have something to fall back on. It was a mantra I heard growing up. And here's the thing: I KNOW there is danger and opportunity for insecurity in not going to school. I did not make this decision based off of emotion, or what would be the most "fun." I didn't decide to cease going to school because it was "too hard." I absolutely could've pushed through, I could've continued to fight and struggle through... and I would've become a nurse. There's no doubt in my mind.

BUT. Friends. Honestly? My heart has never been in it. Ever. There were absolutely moments and days that I loved, like a beautiful trip to Mexico and hilarious lab times with sweet friends. But at the root of going to school was the desire to please man. From day one. And if I continue to live my life in an effort to please man, I will be miserable. My deepest desire is to please Jesus, and know that His plan for me will be perfect. I am a person that craves control. It was the ONE thing in my life that I felt I could grasp and work toward for praise and encouragement. As long as I could bring home an "A" or even a "B" on an exam, I had accomplished something worthy. It was the one thing I felt like I was doing right.

I am seeing more and more that this next season is truly a complete abandonment of all control, allowing God to work in and through the unknowns. Someone said to me once, "I think it's unbiblical for women to go to college." Ridiculous, in my opinion. However, I would say that it's just as ridiculous to say that it's unbiblical for women NOT to go to college. I completely believe that sometimes He calls His daughters to not be students. And I believe, after much prayer and counsel, that I'm one of them.

There were so many positives to going to college for a year and a half. SO SO many. I met one of my best friends my first year of college. She walked with me through so much healing and restoration and spoke hope and truth over my life in such a special, beautiful way. I met a family whose home is, in many ways, my second home. It's a place of complete safety and love. I connected deeply with a sweet friend who was searching for the heart of God, and simply needed someone to walk alongside. I learned valuable organizational and time management skills. I took a trip to Mexico that taught me lessons in humility, submission, and gratitude. I worked through disappointments and suffering, and lived with tremendous joy and passion. I put feet to my faith, and struggled with not being in a Christ-fearing home. I learned what it meant to have a posture of grace and humility. I was loved.

... No part about going to college these eighteen months has been a mistake. God's hand was in every single bit of it.

And His hand is in this next season, too. Being in school absolutely constricted and suffocated the desires in my heart to serve and connect and DO. I just couldn't do it. My heart is so filled with joy at the freedom that He has given me to go and do great things in His name apart from school. So many ideas and thoughts swirling around in my head as to what He might have for me these next few years... in order to prepare me to be a wife and a mom, one of my heart's most deep rooted desires. I am not being naive as to the probable difficulty in the desire to stay at home and be a mom. I'm SO not. I KNOW it will be difficult. I know it could be days, weeks, months, or years before He chooses to bless me with a man to love and walk life with. But I also know that He's placed those desires on my heart for a reason, and He's going to fulfill them in the best way possible. He's a faithful, faithful God. And I trust Him.


Now, the other heart that is so so involved in this decision: my sweet sweet Savior's heart.


Jesus has been teaching me some tough lessons about safety lately. Lessons that led to a decision to stop going to school!

I sat across the table of my dear, sweet friend a couple weeks ago. I heard myself saying, "I'm beginning to wonder if the idea of basing my whole life on safety means that I've been missing that beautiful adventure of what God has desired for my life all along."

Seriously it was like I was speaking French. She looked back at me with this blank look in her eye.

Then she began to slowly shake her head. "I have no idea what you mean, Lyss. Safety is GOOD, isn't it?"

I sat and mulled over those words in my head for a while. Isn't it, I thought?

Well, it is if you love the American Dream.

I grew up locking doors and windows. And this is in Redding, no less. Probably one of the safest cities in California. I lived in a clean suburban neighborhood that was a great place to live, and I loved it. But... a forgotten purse on the seat in the car overnight would still be replaced with a puddle of glass to be found on the street the next morning.

I remember going on vacation to Chicago one year (oh, I have SUCH great memories of that trip), and as we drove through the hard parts of town, my parents told my brother and I never to look anyone in the eye. So we hid in the back seats, dropping as far down below the window as we could. Homeless men talking to themselves, women who sat next to their life's shopping carts at bus stops, groups of children wandering the streets alone. We didn't dare stare at anything but the dark grey carpet of the rental car until we emerged into someplace brighter. Even then, at twelve years old, my heart ached to speak Jesus to them. To let each of them know that there was hope beyond the shopping cart and lack of food.

Even still, noises in the backyard scared me in the middle of the night. In my mind, I would create masked invaders with hidden guns from what were most definitely prowling cats or the occasional naughty skunk roaming through the shrubs.

In essence, I became accustomed to being fearful. Safety became my number one goal in life.

To marry a man who would provide and take care of me financially. To find a home in a neighborhood where I could leave my doors unlocked. To watch my children grow up knowing exactly where their futures would take them. To protect my family from harm, from illness, from change, from grief. To not only have enough, but to have more than enough food, money, experiences. To create some kind of nest egg so that I would never have to be worried.

I've lived most of teenage years with these things in mind. But Jesus so graciously chose to reveal to me that safety, at least the way we as Americans define "safety" is, at its core, dangerous.

Safety means I'm imprisoned in my own idea of what is best for me and my family, instead of what my perfect God thinks is best. Safety lulls me to sleep in my own warm bed of complacency and trust, relying on my own ability to provide security. Safety blinds and numbs me to the hurts and needs of others.

Safety is dangerous.

God has not asked me to live a "safe" life. He's asked me to worship Him, rather than safety and He's asked me to fully surrender my need for security. He's asked me to be focused on bringing Him glory and furthering His kingdom rather than my own stockpiling of gates and walls and locks that might keep me safe.

Right now, that means doing things that require risk: ending the pursuit of a college education, moving to a place that's unfamiliar, and taking steps into darkness with only Him to trust.

It means making choices based on GOD'S heart and who I know HE is rather than on what is safe.

I'm still going to lock my doors when I go to sleep at night, and hold the sweet boy's hands in a parking lot...

But I'm so so ready to begin trusting God in a way that requires COMPLETE dependence on Him.

... and that's the best danger of all.


So, what am I thankful for today?

I'm thankful for change, risk, and trust.

Excited, nervous, and completely at peace :)

You are loved,

Lyss :)

"Beholding Your beauty is all I long for
To worship You Jesus with my soul's desire
For this very heart You've shaped for Your pleasure
The purpose to lift Your name high.

Hear and surrender in pure adoration
I enter Your courts with an offering of praise
I am Your servant come to bring You glory
As is fit for the work of Your hands."