Inadequate Words.

Last night I went to the funeral of the woman, Colleen Caudill, that I asked you to pray for a few posts back. The truth is, that I barely knew Colleen and I don't really know her husband that well either...sure, we've exchanged warm smiles, and hugs at church, but I couldn't tell you much about them or their lives. Sitting in her funeral though last night actually made me pretty sad that I hadn't had the opportunity to share more of life with Colleen...the things that her family and friends recounted about her -- the literally HUNDREDS of people that filled Faith Bible Chapel to celebrate her life -- the way her husband spoke without a bit of hesitation in his voice about the amazing woman that was his wife....they all made me realize this was a woman I could've really learned from.

And somehow there were lessons that I learned from her even at her funeral -- when her kids got in an argument she would make them touch noses until they started laughing (I think this is a brillant method! Store that one away...)...she spoke boldly and in confidence to her friends and family about God's goodness and plan for them even while she was sick in the hospital...she was full of love for her six children, serving them and giving her life for them....she had a room full of hundreds of people that she had touched and blessed with her life.

And goodness, did she marry a good man! You know, I try my best during worship at our church to actually interact with God. But have you ever been in one of those moments where out of the corner of your eye you see someone else worshipping? There were a couple of times where that's happened with Patrick, and I'll look over and I'm overwhelmed with how much he loves and knows our God. It's just evident watching him. And there's something about watching older men worship that drives me to tears every time....knowing that they have a rich history with the Lord and still after all these years are filled with passion for Him. Then, watching him speak about Colleen last night - hearing the love in his voice - in way that is too deep to talk through on this blog, made me understand more the love of God...and beyond that gave me renewed excitement to someday have a husband like that. I wouldn't want anything less than a guy who is going to serve Jesus passionately all his days, and love me not just faithfully, but with all he's got. I think that's what Patrick was to Colleen.

I think alot more of why it all hit me was the deep thankfulness that my dad is still alive. We've gotten so close over the past few years and even closer since he's been diagnosed with cancer. And honestly, when father's day rolled around this year, it was hard for me to even call him because I was afraid that he would answer the phone and I would just start crying because I loved him much and I am so grateful that he's still alive. And as I sat there in Colleen's funeral I realized that this could've been our family so easily...life really is so fleeting...and that for some reason, so far, God in His grace has chosen to spare us from that temporarily...but not forever. I want to love my parents with all I've got, for as long as I can.

And I want to think through what I want to be remembered for. I remember in high school youth group, they made us write out our eulogy at one point. I thought it was a dumb and morbid exercise as a fifteen year old...but there is something to that. What legacy will I leave behind? Who will be at my funeral as a testimony to my life and love for those around me? Am I loving people...and giving my life for them now?

So, to be honest, these words don't do any of it justice...it's so hard to wrap up in a nutshell and explain why I was crying through the entirety of a funeral of a woman I barely knew...(other than that brief stint in which Seth and I both thought the pastor said something that he didn't (twice), and I was laughing, but pretending I was crying...you know, if you're going to be a speaker, you must learn to ennuciate...and I must learn to stop laughing at inappropriate moments!)...but that's okay, I suppose.

Rain rain go away.

I am sitting at work 45 minutes after I got off. Why, you may ask?

Imagine a torrential downpour...like of epic proportions. The kind where you can see sheets of rain coming down.

Now imagine me, on my scooter...with my little bike helmet in some nice gallery clothes. Braving it out.

After hearing about the guy who got struck by lightening on his motorcycle I decided against braving it out.

I guess my Saturday night plans will have to wait, haha.

I forgot!

When I was a kid I had two future career aspirations.

The first was pretty normal - a marine biologist. As I grew older and realized that science wasn't one of my strong suits, that dream quickly died and was replaced by the bigger dream - graphic designer. I would sit for hours in the office of the graphic designer at my dad's company and just watched as she tiresly plugged away at her daily jobs. Anyone who has seen a graphic designer work knows that isn't the most interesting thing to watch, but somehow Carol DelGrosso and her little computer drawing pad were fascinating to me. She totally left an impression on me.

What's funny about the marine biologist dream was that I've never met an actual marine biologist as an adult. Does anyone know one? I'm not sure they actually exist, and if they do, they certainly don't run in the same social circles that I do.

Today though, my dream was reawakened as I took the little boys that I nanny to the Denver Aquarium. It is AMAZING! Maybe it was the free yummy seafood that their parents paid for to satisfy our dinner needs, or maybe it was the incredible fish swimming over our heads....it could've been when we got to pet the sting rays and feed them fish in between our fingers....I KNOW it was the up close look at the sea otters....but I was like a giddy little kid running all over the place checking out different fish and giggling with joy (I've been doing alot of giggling lately, huh?).

I think I was embarrasing the kids that I nanny for, but that's okay. It's good for them.

Urgent Prayer Request

Hey, Everyone,

I just got a phone call telling me that a lady in our church - Colleen (of Pat and Colleen, sorry I don't know their last names....., they're a middle-aged couple, he's balding I think, they usually sit toward the front in the morning service) is dying suddenly and rapidly. She's not expected to live another 24 hours.

To make a long story short, she wasn't feeling well last week and went in for some tests. It looked like nothing. Even this weekend, Pat told Jay that she was going to be fine. Then, Monday, they went in for some more tests, and the doctors found her liver very enlarged and some tumors behind her liver or kidneys.

She's been unconscious since Monday night and not expected to make it. Apparently she's got some sort of wildly progressing lymphoma. She's put on 50 lbs of fluid in 2 days. Because her liver and kidneys aren't doing well and because whatever's wrong is progressing so quickly, there's little the doctors can do. They are going to try to do a little dialysis but they're not sure it'll work. The doctors are saying she's got maybe 24 hours.

Whether you know this couple or not, please, please, please pray for Colleen, her husband Pat and their children/family. Pray that family will be able to get to see her before (if) she passes away.

I'll update you as I get some updates.

Thanks all!

So every once in awhile I'm overcome with excitement and well....there must be a better word for it...you know..that giddy feeling in your tummy like when you were a kid at the zoo....or when you feel like you might just be falling in love...or when you have your leave your last day of 6th grade for summer and you're sure the entire world is at your fingertips.

And, that feeling has been frequenting my tummy lately...from dinner last night....laughing so hard we are nearly crying at a yummy Greek dinner with one of my oldest true friends, and one of my newest...and being overwhelmed at my growing adoration for both of them....

...laughing with glee with my new soon to be roomate, Murielle, as we drove to a fancy dinner in cute dresses on my new scooter....

...getting to pray for a random woman today who sold me my scooter and realizing that living a kingdom filled life is just never boring....nothing is a simple transaction, but it's always an opportunity to interact with the person and what God is doing in their life right now....

...sitting on my porch last night, smoking cloves, reading a new novel, listening to my new favoriote band Psapp, under the pink Christmas lights that create such a surreal lighting that you have to remind yourself you aren't dreaming....and staying right there doing that until almost 2 am...


I guess I just feel so excited and so alive and so thankful. If somehow you would've transported Nicole from five years ago, to this very week, I wouldn't have believed you....that this was really my life...that I would find joy in things I never knew I desired...that Jesus would be so faithful.

Here's a couple pictures of things I'm excited about these days....my new scooter and my new soon to be roomie. Good times.

Friends who string words together better than me....

I like those ones.

Here's what my dear Atlantaion friend Meghan says....

Hearts and Heads
Rarely make sense to each other
They sit on opposite sides of the bed
trying to make another
point or a plea
that the other would see
just how important
they are.

Ah yes.

It's about to happen again...

I feel an art explosion coming on.

I'm full of ideas.

Prepare world. Prepare.

(It's nice that this coincides with the last class of the quarter tomorrow. And then my last 3 week break ever. Summer time here I come)

Sacrifice

Lately, I'm in one of those times where everything sticks. Let me rephrase that - I feel like I'm a sponge and I'm soaking everything in all the time...The sounds of bike tires swooshing through puddles, the heat of the sun on my back when I'm at the park, the smells of hookah that mix in my senses with the laughter of dear friends...and the words that people speak...the words of sermons and of the Bible. I'm in one of those places where everything feels applicable and alive all the time.

When I think thru all the things I've been really starting to let penetrate deeply into the depths of me - or at least the things that I hope will - at the top of the list is an understanding of sacrifice. I feel like the words are floating around me all the time - the letters of love from God placed in the Bible...in stories from friends....in sermons and in the sweet whispers from the Holy Spirit.

The call to continually risk, sacrifice and live beyond myself...for others.

Last night Murielle told us about her parents. A couple who chose time and again to take in children that weren't their own - to be foster parents and adopted parents and to love those that Jesus did, when no one else was. They kept a modest home, a church van for a car, and worked their best to provide a better life for the kids, because they knew they were worth it. They said a heartfelt "No thanks" to the things that this world tells us is most important - because they believed God at His word that the Kingdom was the most important thing of all.

My friend Seth is leaving for the Sudan in 5 or so weeks. He just graduated with an exemplary GPA, from a very competitive university with a promising degree. But rather than follow the status-quo track ... keeping up with the Joneses with the great job that he certainly is qualified for -- he's going to give his life away for the next two months. To serve children and families in a country that the world is passing over. All because he loves Jesus and believes that He means everything.

And these are just two examples -- time and time again I've had incredible opportunities to watch average people do extraordinary things because they think Jesus is worth it. Worth giving up everything they ever thought they wanted so that somehow they might find all the life He has for them. That even though following His is strange at times and is a life filled with tensions and paradoxes - that the paradox of "To find your life, you must lose it" is TRUE.

I pray that I will become one of these people. That I will respond in obedience to the things that God is asking me to give up or lay down so that I may have the fullness of what He has for me. That I would learn to follow Him in life of sacrifice and submission and obedience. I can't keep holding up the merits of past sacrifice...He's always asking for more of me and risking and going the next mile. I want to finish well.

Doesn't fit...

Today, I went and checked out my first possibility of place of my own. A cute, studio apartment about 4 blocks away from my favoriote coffee shop in the city...a closet big enough that I could almost fit a twin bed in it.

But then the woman said, 'You have a queen bed? That will pretty much take up this whole room.'

And I realized....my queen bed won't fit in this little studio. And as dramatic as it may sound, I felt like that was a picture of everything in life right now. My queen bed won't fit in this little studio.

Nothing really seems to fit right now. I think I'm actually a little embarrassed that I'm going through the typical "I'm-about-to-graduate-from-college" drama and emotional strain. Combine that with moving out of the wonderful home with the incredible roomates that I've had for the past two years and the other insane amounts of random indecision and up in the air-ness....and I'm a little stressed. My poor friend Billy today had to watch as it all as I sort of disinegrated in the mess. I hope at least some of these questions are answered soon.

A friend of mine has a song that her 5 year old son wrote that says something about "I'm beginning to like the sight of closed doors."

How I wish I had the eyes of a child these days.

:)

Choices

This week I had one of those realizations...you know...the ones that kind of hit you upside the head and give you a headache and make you tired for the rest of the week....

and yet...

You feel so alive because you aren't living under the weight of the lies that you've chosen to believe for so long. You feel actual freedom, and even though it's scary, you feel ALIVE....you feel REAL...you feel like you're actually being more fully yourself.

It's been a long time since I've came to grips with just how broken I am...that I've created so many walls to protect myself...thinking that there are keeping me safe, protecting me from the evil and pain that I've encountered too many times...from the pain I've caused others...from an existence that just doesn't care to serve me...or anyone...and just seems to run by it's own rules that aren't ever "fair".

And all the sudden, (by the loving, firm words of a friend and the confirmation of God's Spirit), I realized that all that my walls and vows were protecting me from was the fullness of what God has for me. The real freedom that He offers us. The abudant life.

And yes....yes sometimes that means pain, and confusion and trying to figure out the grey areas of life. But once I read that the problem with "protecting" yourself from pain by hardening your heart against it, is that it hardens you from the good, beautiful and wonderful things in life too. You can't choose and be selective to where your heart is hardening.

So, instead, I'm chosing to believe that what God says about himself in His Word is true. That He really is good. That He really knows me and cares, and has the best in mind for me. That He doesn't want me to be anxious, but encourages me to petition him and pray and ask...and to try to align myself with His will because it really is best. That I really really can trust Him.

It's a choice. But it's worth it.