Mid-March 2021

There’s so little going on that I don’t always feel the need or desire to write. Which makes me sad, because when I’m writing I truly enjoy it.

Anyway, there’s a few things that have happened so far this year to share. I got a promotion! I’m no longer in HR, which was a much needed change. I love people and liked getting to know staff, but compassion fatigue set in last summer. I didn’t know that is what it was but I felt burnout setting in. I wasn’t even sure where that feeling was coming from but when I read the job description for my new position, as I was posting the opening, I knew this is what needed to change. The new position is in our Performance and Quality Improvement department, which essentially consist of data analysis. I am supporting a foster care program in the southwest region of our state by monitoring and reporting stats on compliance, wins, and areas for improvement. I’ve been in the position for a little over a month and am happy. The people I work with have been great too!

I don’t have any set plans for a mission trip this year, thanks to the pandemic. Returning to Costa Rica and/or Malawi are on the table though. I was able to travel in late January to Colorado. You can see pics of that on my other site (braggingonthelord.wordpress.com). I went to visit friends who I hadn’t seen in a couple years. I met them in 1999 and we’ve been really good friends since. I was in their wedding and have been a pseudo aunt to their 2 girls. I didn’t realize how much I missed our conversations! I hope to visit them again in August when I go to Colorado for my cousin’s wedding!

I sensed early in the year that there were new things coming. At some point late last year I was thinking about the parting of the Red Sea and I got this picture in my mind of the parted waters but instead of Moses standing on the shore, it was Jesus. He had His hand out to me in invitation and with a twinkle in His eye He asked me to come on an adventure with Him. Since then it has felt like I’m on the shore in wet sand, my feet slipping, waves crashing against me as I struggle to get to Him. But yet I know He’s with me now, holding me up, and encouraging me to trust Him and keep going. It feels so hard to endure, I’m physically and emotionally spent, and thoughts of quitting crash at me like strong waves. There’s just enough tenacity in me to fight though. My hand gripping His so hard and leaning against Him in exhaustion, I keep putting one foot in front of another. His strength and compassion radiating into me and drawing me closer. That dry land where the waters part is only a few steps ahead, and while I have little knowledge of what that adventure entails, it gives me hope that the battle to get there will pale in comparison to the things He has in mind.

I take His hand, so strong yet so tender, and look in His eyes. Blazing with a fire so intense, not of anger but of passion. Passion for me. Love so consuming that He left Heaven, lived as a frail human and died on a cross for my sins, yet raised again in victory!