My clinical group made a podcast for a school project - here is the end result!
Watch the actual documentary here:
Because I am a distractible nursing student, I have some aspirations that are stewing regarding this particular medium and would love to interview friends/family and create an archive of sorts of stories and experiences. More on this later!
-Having Joan stay with us and getting lunch at Sultan's Market. We then proceeded to grab coffee at Ipsento 606 and take a (brisk) walk along the 606. Truly, so lovely.
-Attempting to make panna cotta (turned into panna cotta ice cream because it didn't set and I had to stick it in the freezer).
-Wine and cheese night with some gals that I've been wanting to get to know and hang out with.
-13.1 miles on lakeshore (kept repeating "just keep running running running" in my head. And yes, the voice in my head sounded very much like Dory).
-Fall leaves.
-The beauty of trusting in the Lord and failing to trust and trying to trust and receiving his grace throughout it all.
-Dropping by Jamie and Ryan Gorgol's small group this past Wednesday; hospitality in the form of Ryan making all of us lattes from his espresso machine (!!!)
-The Gospel and Our Cities conference - hearing Charlie Dates, Pete Scazzero, and Tim Keller speak
-Happy Camper dinner with Alison and Kelly
-Calling Michelle and catching up with her post-wedding/honeymoon/move to Kansas City
-Hanging out with Mae at Bridgeport Coffee; the beauty of friendships that are raw and gritty and transparent
-Sex 101 talks with Sherrie and the rest of the girls I live with (as Christian women, how do we express our sexuality and yet value purity and live out Gospel-centered holiness)
I got a chance to attend the Gospel and Our Cities conference here in Chicago and wow. WOW. I was convicted and challenged and encouraged by the plenary sessions. What does it look like to fervently love the African-American community and the Black church? What does it look like to be an emotionally healthy leader? What does it look for the Church here in the city to actively engage the people around us who don't know Christ? There were so many dimensions that were covered during this three-day conference and I feel blessed to have been exposed to different catalysts that I know will move me to know God deeper and live out the Gospel in my personal life and in my community in North Lawndale.
One thing that struck me was Tim Keller's talk about how we as a Church can engage the people around us. Certainly, it won't be the programs and curriculum that churches offer that will compel non-believers to try out church. It will be ordinary people who aren't afraid to live out their identity as passionate followers of Christ. Tim Keller made this extraordinary metaphor that I think works well - he said that Christian beliefs are like a suit that is too big; non-Christian beliefs, however, are like a suit that is too tight. For anyone who chooses to believe in anything other than Christ - because, believe me, if you don't profess faith in Christ, you will most likely profess faith in something else such as power, money, beauty, sex, etc. - the suit that is too tight will eventually rip in different places. Your belief and trust in money will give, your pursuit of [blank] will at one point fail to deliver. When existentialist justifications start to fall apart, where does it leave you?
It is exactly in moments such as these that believers can step in and say, "There is more. There is someone (Christ) who loves without condition and who satisfies far more than power and money and beauty and sex. The identity that you have tried to achieve can be received."
It is my desire to be so radically in love with Christ that people see something different. It is my deep heart conviction that Christianity isn't a cop-out religious belief system and way of living that squashes life's pleasures - it is a personal relationship with the living God that brings life and brings it abundantly. And truly, it is my passion to see people encounter the Lord and taste and see that He is good.
How can I fully and adequately describe this current season I am going through? It is one where the Lord is tearing down idols, breaking strongholds, pruning rough edges, building my faith and trust in him. I have been experiencing healing through confession and repentance and I realize that the Lord loves me in all of my ugliness and brokenness. I can honestly and truly say that I am living out faith when I choose to turn to Him in the midst of anxiety and fear. In the moments when he asks me to confess sins to trusted others and all I want to do is run the other way and not open the can of worms - because let's be honest, no one wants to share the ugly. And yet, even though my heart is lurching and I feel like my stomach is going to fall out my butt (I believe this is a Mean Girls quote), I take a breath and trust that the Lord wants to use this to encounter me deeper still. As much as I want to side-skirt, turn a blind eye or even trivialize sin, I cannot disregard the fact that the Lord cannot fully heal me if I keep the most broken areas of myself under wraps. I cannot disregard the fact the Lord is Holy and that what kills intimacy is sin.
What does this generation need? It is intimacy with the Lord. And indeed, this is something I desire above all else. I desire intimacy with God. The act of repentance and confession ushers in a space where we can truly be honest about our brokenness; it is a space where God's grace and acceptance meets us and where faith in the power of the Gospel takes on an active and dynamic form. There is something freeing in the act of confession and repentance, and there is grace to be found when this is done in the context of Christian community.
The thing is, I want to live fully and completely in the reality of who I am in Christ: a beloved daughter of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Known and received and free. And you know what else? The Lord does not leave me shorthanded - He always meets me in those moments, which in turns strengthens my faith and motivates me to turn to Him again when I find myself in moments when I am reminded of my smallness and fickleness and tendency to turn to things other than Him. In all of this, I boast in the Lord's love and faithfulness. I boast in his supreme sovereignty and goodness. I boast in Him because in the end, there is no one else I can put my utmost confidence in. I will disappoint myself. My family and friends will disappoint me. Life will disappoint me. But the Lord has and never will disappoint me.
Thankful List:
-My clinical experiences, which have thus consisted of being on the mother-baby floor at Elmhurst Hospital and teaching sex education to 7th graders at an elementary school in North Lawndale.
-Sultan's Market
-Alison is back from MTI - Y A Y !
-Prayer meeting at Chicago Tabernacle
-Meeting with some folks from church on Tuesday and spending the time in repentance, confession, and prayer. Love the people at my church.
-Getting to know 2.0
-Spontaneously going over to the Werner's for dinner and feasting over homemade Indian butter chicken. Hearing Rob tell stories about the legacy (haha) of 1818 Troy. Also, Rob gave me a jar of honey harvested from his beehives. This is probably the most local honey I'll ever get (all of a sudden, I don't regret the swarm of bees that I would try to evade while walking on the sidewalk close to the Werner's house on the corner).
-Homemade kombucha tea
-Prayers uttered in my heart when I fall asleep and when I wake up.
-Getting to observe a c-section at the hospital today.
