The Final Days

The final days of pageant preparation are upon me. My wardrobe is finalized, my tan is on, and I'm practicing my make up. (Those of you who know me know this is a tiny miracle in itself.) All of my summer classes are finished and so I finally have time to read, decompress, and focus on competing. Now therein presents the problem. I recently wrote that I am competitive. My competitiveness really shows its face when I have time to analyze my actions before hand and consider how to make myself the most pleasing thing to the judges. Those thoughts right there sent off a red light in my head. I can only be myself. I want to be my best self, but nonetheless changing my personality to attempt to fit the situation will not help me present myself. I don't want to present someone else's vision of me. I want to show who I have become through trials and celebrations. 

One of my wonderful friends sent me some encouragement after I told her that I am truly trying to not fall into my analyzing and staying composed. 

"You will be (composed and ready). Let God keep you hear still!" 

God has kept me thru so much more than pageants and he will definitely keep me thru this. I feel no pressure. I was once told that pressure doesn't come from God. I really believe this is true. "For God is a not a God of disorder but a God of peace." 1 Corinthians 14:33. (Shout out to CentriKid 2011 for that verse!) I feel organized. Ready to go. And a lot of peace. I also hope to keep it this way. I know my direction and I know what I want to go out and do. I pray for God's will but more importantly his peace.

Four more days!

Live Today.

Back In The Game?

On a completely unrelated note, this is my 60th post! I've written more than a paragraph 60 times... this is an accomplishment.

Two weeks until the internship is done. Two weeks until Miss Cobb County. One week until my final in my summer classes. One year to graduation. Forever until I get there.

That is a small timeline of what my life will look like for the next year. I am so overwhelmed and yet so excited at the same time. God has opened so many doors for me this year and this summer that it's been hard to keep my head on straight because I'm looking so many different directions. 

Before my surgery I began to develop feelings of inadequacy, fear, embarrassment, and doubt. I was a big bundle of emotions that was walking around ready to talk about anything else than ultrasounds, mammograms, biopsies, and needles. Thankfully, my wonderful family and boyfriend encouraged me to look past the thought of "I just don't want to do this anymore" to "I want to make sure other people don't have to do this". One day, I decided with finality that I was going to take this message past my family and past my hometown and turn it into something that everyone can hear. After trying to come up with a way to get my vision started, I KNEW that pageants were far and above the best way to get people talking. I have a ten minute interview with judges asking about my cause, I get an onstage question, if a crown is awarded to me I get a YEAR of going and promoting my message to girls all over Georgia. If I am given the opportunity to be Miss Georgia I will get a chance to take my platform to the national level, if I win MIss America I get to travel the COUNTRY and talk to people who I would never have the chance to meet about my platform and encourage them. I know I'm dreaming big but at the same time, all things start with a vision. 

God has blessed me with an incredible team of people to come through for me. Whether it is donating to Children's Miracle Network, reading my platform statement and resume, whipping up a dress to help me look and feel like Kate Middleton, interview prep, and a listening ear. Most importantly, God has given me a new perspective. I no longer depend on these judges to tell me my worth, I depend on God alone and ask for his will and guidance. Don't get me wrong, I definitely want to win (I am only slightly competitive) but winning is no longer everything. Stepping back, realizing, and truly believing this is something that has taken a few years but I believe I have gotten there. I pray to stay with this perspective and not let my competitive side take over.

I am back in the game and there are 17 days until I'm up at bat. So much to enjoy, and so little time.


Live Today.

Propresenter and The Game Of Life

Wow. What a weekend. I was able to get down to Norman Park and spend much needed quality time with my Pop, his new wife, and my awesome cousins. It was raining cats and dogs but we enjoyed the weather and staying inside. 

My sister-like cousin brought over family videos and the first night I was down we watched them and they brought me to tears. It was a video from when I was two months old, around the time of Father's Day, and we were down at a beach house with my father's side of the family. My heart skipped a beat when I heard a little voice screaming about something or another and I recognized that it was the voice of my brother. It was surreal to see him on screen and practically feel like he was in the room with us. Next on the video, we saw my father get down on the ground and lay in front of me as a baby and talk to me saying, "Are you my baby girl? Are you my little baby girl?" in such a sweet voice. He then picked me up and cradled me in his arms and started singing, "I'll like you forever, I'll love you for always. As long as I'm living my baby you'll be." At that point I basically became unraveled. I missed my father so much and seeing him sing to me was beautiful. It made me so unbelievably happy to have found that video.
 
However, we were delivered a huge blow as a family. One of my cousins who recently recovered from kidney cancer, has been told by the doctors that she is also suffering from pancreatic cancer. Since kidney doesn't normally jump to the pancreas, we are fearful of bone cancer as well. It is a hard moment for my family and we are hoping for the best but at the same time we recognize that there is a large chance this may be fatal.

After meeting up with the family to talk, we ended up laughing the night away and giving thanks for the life that she has lived so far. Later in the weekend, we were stuck inside yet again by the rain and played the Game of Life. Being that I hadn't played it in years, I'm pretty sure we were just making up rules as we went along to try and get the game over. Robbie kept claiming innocence yet she completely showed us up with raking in about two million dollars...too bad it wasn't real money because we said we all knew who to come to when we needed loans for college.

All in all I'd say it was a completely successful weekend with the family.

My internship is going along and is still completely different than what I ever could have imagined. After too little sleep on Saturday night and getting up early on Sunday morning, I fel like I was completely dragging. NOISE began and I was thankfully seated in the back running the technological side of things and making sure lyrics and pictures came up at the appropriate times. It gave me a chance to sit back and see kids genuinely worship. They didn't know I was watching them and basically in awe of how lovely and mighty there worship spoke to me. Sometimes learning more about the business side of ministry can get to me, but it's little moments like this past Sunday morning that help me realize and continue to persue my calling. I know I'm supposed to do Children's MInistry.

Live Today.

Week One.

A lot has happened since the last time I posted. I have gone through surgery and came out wonderfully on the other side. The pathology came back all clear so I am officially cancer free! I have finished school and came out with a 3.7! Which means I made an A in calculus. Yes, this math challenged lady made an A!! With a lot of help from a lot of people. Shout out to my awesome boyfriend/tutor. He's already gearing up for physics next semester!

I am completely on track to graduate! I have all of my classes ready to go and I only have EIGHT CLASSES LEFT! I can see the light y'all! I am ready to graduate already to be done with classes but in no way am I ready to be out of college. 

The first week of the internship is almost over and what a whirlwind it has already been up here. It's a bit different working with a church the size of Johnson Ferry compared to Jesup First Baptist. One thing I did notice is that EVERYONE is so welcoming. It's almost like being in a small town because everyone is waving at you as they pass. They don't even know you, but they're smiling and waving. Yesterday the other intern's and myself went around the church to meet the staff and just get a feel for navigating around the church. Needless to say, I was more than lost by the time the tour was over. 

Last night was a moment of bonding for the ministers and the interns. All of us were sitting around trying to sing the "Cups (When I'm Gone)" song while playing the cup game and we were failing miserably. We were all dressed in our BRIGHT YELLOW shirts advertising VBS and placation. Amazingly enough, we are going to do both events in one week. Talk about putting the interns to the test. 

Everything has been wonderful so far, but I'm definitely on a learning curve. This blog is more for a prayer request than stories. Please pray that I will be able to not only hang on, but exceed expectations. There is a lot to get done and I feel behind. Pray that the team continues to gel and get along so well like we are now. Pray for the children we will be serving this summer. You will be reading my encounters with them as I go throughout the summer but those little babies need prayer. 


Live Today.

Good Soil Seed

As I wrote about last time, I have had a biopsy and have gotten my results back. 

No malignancy, praise the LORD! I am so happy to say those words that I grin whenever I just think about it.

The only part that I wasn't expecting was that I will have to have the tumor removed. There is nothing quite as unexpected as surgery. But as I was talking to my doctor, he told me that the type of tumor I have will continue to grow and place pressure on structures so surgery to remove them is a necessity. 

I'm still not exactly ecstatic about having to go under the knife, but I know that my health should come first no matter what my circumstances. That being said, I will have my first surgery this Friday April 12 and a second one in May. And if all goes as planned, those will be the only two I should ever have to need! Now THAT is something to get excited about.

As silly as it sounds, I was extremely bummed out that my surgery was falling on the day before my birthday and severely interfering with my plans to celebrate with people in Athens. But the more I talked to my family and friends the more I realized that a party can be delayed but good health cannot. 

I can't say that this journey has been easy for me. There are days when I talk to my aunt or my mom and say, "I just don't want to do this. I know tomorrow I will wake up, but today I just don't want to." This experience has been more of a mental game than anything else and some days it feels that I am losing, but the encouragement and support of the people I have behind me helps me to overcome any slight shade of doubt or gloominess. I was reading my quiet time today and fell on the Parable of the Sower. Now the story basically is, a sower went out to plant and some seeds fell on the bath and birds ate them, some other seeds fell into rocky soil and didn't grow strong roots and when the sun shone upon them they withered away, other seeds fell into the thorns and began to grow but the thorns grew with the seeds and choked them and killed them, other seeds fell on good soil and began to grow and produce a lot of grain. Then Jesus goes on to explain the parable to the disciples:

"And he said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? 14 The sower sows the word.15 And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. 16 And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. 17 And they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away.18 And others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, 19 but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. 20 But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.”

It sounds like the seeds in the good soil got a pretty sweet deal. That is where I want to be. I want to be able to withstand the cold and the sun because those times will pass. No matter what you're going thru, it will always pass. And at the end of the day I would rather be deeply rooted and alive than eaten by birds, killed by the sun, or choked out by thorns.

Live Today.

One Thing Remains

Instructions: Play the embedded video as you read this, and listen to the song in its entirety. 

Well y'all, Pop is officially married. I never thought I'd write those words. This weekend, I watched my Pop walk down the aisle with a beautiful (and blushing) bride and watched them profess their love to each other. It's definitely been a whirlwind of a courtship and wedding for them, but there is no doubt that they are in love with one another. 

After the rings, Pop gave a speech to Miss Robbie (now Mrs. Robbie) that went something along the lines of this:

"The human race explains things in metaphors. When Jesus started the church, and Paul followed up, Paul looked for a metaphor to describe the church's relationship to Jesus. The metaphor they came up with was one of marriage. As the bride gives herself to her husband, so the Church gives themselves to Jesus.

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. (Provision)

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. (Provision)

He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. (Provision)

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. (Protection)

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. (Protection)

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever. (Provision)

As Christ provides for and protects his church, I hope to always provide for and protect you, my wife."

Needless to say, there was not a dry eye in the building. If that doesn't speak volumes of love and respect, then I have no eye for love. I believe every word of his speech and even more so am thankful for Christ's provision and protection of us as his people. Even when I walk close with death, I will not have to be afraid.

This song speaks to me on many levels and many many situations that I am facing as I type this. There's nothing that I need to worry about. Because he will never fail and he will never give up on me. 

A few weeks ago, I found a lump that grew very rapidly and after talking with some close friends, I went and got it checked. The doctor felt for it and found it but could not locate it with an ultrasound machine. So naturally, a second opinion was sought. During that doctor's visit, the doctor found the core of the lump. I have had a biopsy done and am waiting to hear the results. There is extreme fear of the unknown here. We are all hopeful and optimistic but there is always the chance that it could be cancer. I never thought that I would be worried about something like this at 20 years old. Ever. And it has definitely brought good days and bad ones. But it has given me a spark. This has ignited a passion to not waste any time, to never let fear grip me and freeze me. 

God has a plan. He will use this. Good or bad.

"Constant in the trial and the change, this one thing remains." I refuse to let the fear of the unknown consume my life. I will always remember that there is something and someone that already knows what I will have to go thru and what will have to happen. All I can do is walk down the path laid before me and praise him.

Live Today.

Just Do It

Can one person do it all? 

Sometimes I feel like there is so much going on in my life that I can't keep up. That if I even try to look at my calendar I'll start spinning wildly out of control. Actually, I know for a fact that if I looked at my calendar all the time during the day I would go crazy...because I call that day last Thursday.I sat down and looked at not only one day, but the next two weeks. Within about 0.02 seconds my heart started racing, I got cold/sweaty hands, and broke out into a cold sweat. 

I just laid on the bed and breathed for a few minutes and tried to calm down while a barrage of thoughts came to mind. In the midst of it all, I called a good friend and told her what all was blazing thru my mind and after finally laughing about some things, she started to tell me something that was immediately familiar. 

"Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." Matthew 6:25-34

Well there it is folks. The whole reason of this post. I worried over my life. And who better to trust that with than the Lord? He created it all, and continues to create amazing things, and give us amazing opportunities. "Tomorrow is anxious of itself." I mean, I can't even control what is going to happen within the next minute what makes think that I can even try to get a grip on the next two weeks? Not gonna happen. 

It might be a long verse, but it's worth at least paraphrasing for memory.

Live Today.