Thursday, June 21, 2012

"Live a Good Story."

"Live a Good Story..."

these four words have become sort of a statement in my life. The first time I heard this was while I was in Haiti, I don't remember how it came about but this amazing person and a awesome friend named Michael said it one night while we were all talking and it has kind of just stuck with me since. That and the constant pestering of every time I didn't want to get out and do something or turned something down out of fear, i could hear him saying this either to me or in my head. So it's definitely stuck around.

I find myself constantly thinking about what it even means to "Live a Good Story" and I'm still discovering what it might mean, it's not like a YOLO or whatever that thing is, but it is something different, something deeper, something that only Christ can truly give us. A Good Story.

If I'm honest I've always thought my story sucked. Coming from an aspiring writers perspective I am overly and horribly critical of myself. I always know I can do better, be better, and I always seem to be trying to edit the story of my life the way I edit the stories on my word document. And I realize that in writing I can't go through and edit my stories while I write because it completely ruins my plot lines and that's exactly what I have learned in real life. I can't go through trying to edit the story God has written out for me because all I am going to do is ruin the plot.

But really I am constantly grabbing the pen out of His hand. I was talking to a friend on the phone yesterday and he asked me how everything was going on preparing for Tanzania. I said it was good just a lot of paperwork. But he knows that I am still a little discouraged because I desperately wanted to go back to Uganda. He mentioned a conversation we had a few months ago about where I would go and I told him it would be between Uganda and Tanzania, and with all my heart I wanted to return to Uganda, the first place to grab my heart. And he told me he knew in that moment that I would be going to Tanzania because it wasn't the one I wanted, but it was what God has for me.

And he was absolutely right, seeing as in 3 short months I will head overseas to this foreign place. And truthfully I still struggle with it. I am so excited and I'm ready but I am constantly fighting with the world and our society. (I am a Sociology major so society just bugs me sometimes) The message that keeps getting sent to me has just been weighing me down and giving me such a cloud over my excitement. The message of "You're just a child, you have no idea what you're doing, you'll never be good enough, you're never gonna raise that money, Africa, why? are you serious? you should be getting married not traveling overseas." These words just float around in my head constantly and it has been hard to silence them.

Until that phone conversation when he said "Cami, live a good story" I hadn't thought of those words in awhile. And once they were out there, bouncing around in my ears and floating through my head I thought letting these words control my thoughts and weigh me down is not living a good story. not going out and enjoying the time i have with family and friends for this short amount of time, is not living a good story. it's not living God's story.

He has so many plans already written out for them and I have to stop trying to reorganize them and just let everything play out the way He has prepared it for me. No I'm not crazy and yes I am a child, but God say's to have a child like faith. It's true I have no idea what I am doing but God does and He's going with me of course. I am enough, God tells me everyday even when I disagree and the money will come through in some miraculous awesome God way, because it always does. I am serious and yeah maybe there are people who believe I should be searching for that person I'm going to marry, but honestly who knows maybe i've already met him, maybe I'm not suppose to be married, maybe that guy will come along next month, or ten years from now, but really I'm not worried because this journey right now is what God has written out and it is what I shall follow.

You see I may be a writer, but God is the ultimate writer, ultimate author, editor, publisher of my life and I think it's better if I let it stay that way. So as I wait for the next pen stroke I pray. Pray that He will lead my heart where it is suppose to be regarding matters I have been struggling with. That He will provide an amazing ministry partner, and that He will give me and surround me with people from home, from church, from school and in Tanzania that will encourage and uplift me. I know God's got it taken care of, so for now I am just going to "Live a Good Story" ...God's story.

Putting down the pen,


HIS and yours,

    Cami