Love Me Tender.

I don't know how many times I will have to quiet down my life to hear you speak patience into my heart again, Lord. How many times will you challenge me to surrender this silly plan I convince myself I have under control or how many times I'll split-heartedly say I'm yours, alone. 

I left America in May, boarded a plane to Asia and prayed hard for 6 weeks that all the internal turmoil that flew there along with me would soon depart. I didn't want any thoughts of bills or boys or even the smallest distraction to get in the way of the mission I knew God had foreseen for me this summer.

He took it all away from me. I could sleep at night. I didn't miss things I had or people I knew back home. I learned what it meant to truly live in the moment and let my deep desire to be wanted by the opposite gender completely dissolve.

I had never felt so free or aware of the Lord's presence as I did standing in that moment.
But also, never so aware of how fragile and tender my tendencies to be vulnerable to people made me.
How breakable I felt, ...I feel.

That's the thing about summer, though, you can forget anything for a few months but when you make your way back to everything that is familiar, it's hard to continue ignoring that it's there.

The night before our journey back home it all overwhelmed me again. I returned heavy and as much as I try to fight it, I can't shake it off and the busyness of school has yet to even begin.

After Asia, I stayed home a few weeks doing new things to ruin my routine of sameness, which helped a lot. Then I came back to College Station where everything I needed to find refuge far, far away from came flooding back, drowning me in confusion.

It seems that I am re-opening the last wounded chapter of my life when really all I truly yearn for is an abundance of simple, silent moments to lay down in awe as God writes a brand new one.

It's a long & broken moment to try & have it all together as everything falls apart; bittersweet to want as I attempt to want not.

So, love me tender, Lord, as only you know how to. Overwhelm me with nothing but your love and trust in your plan as you put everything into place. Teach my heart to want not & guide my thoughts to only your light, let all else fade away.