Four Years Ago Tomorrow

I have this medicore ability of easily remembering certain dates, so it's not surprising that thinking of December 17th would fill me with so many mixed emotions. After all, it is the date that I thought the entire world had given up on me. Four years ago tomorrow my mom picked me up from school and we drove to the drugstore in Gibraltar where my mom picked up my dad's prescription and I got an orange Crush; then we drove two hours in the snow to Somerset. I'm pretty sure I was in a bad mood the whole way there.

It's hard to believe we've lived in Somerset for four years! It probably doesn't sound like that long to most, but so many things have changed in those four years. I am incredibly different than the stubborn and bitter almost sixteen year old who came here in 2004...ok, well maybe I'm still stubborn, but I'm not so bitter anymore. I honestly believed that someone with enough power hated me enough to move me out here. I'm not sure that I was ever actually angry at any one person. I know I never blamed my parents. I don't remember ever blaming God, though I do recall begging Him to let me know why. It felt like He took forever to answer my request, but eventually He did.

I've been a believer since elementary school, and for the most part, I acted like one. But it wasn't until I came out here that I felt like it was finally my choice to act like a Christian. Nobody was forcing me to go to church or to serve God. It was my choice, and for the first time I finally found out what people always meant by love being a choice. There are so many depths of love, and I'm not going to go into them here...at least not today. But as I chose to love God in a new and different way, He blessed me with so much more than I deserved.

I've met so many extraordinary people since we moved to this small town. Some have become the people I look up to, others have been simple reminders of God's love, and a few of them have become my best friends. I understand now that they're some of the reasons that God moved me out here. But the thing is, He's not done showing me.

One of my biggest struggles in life is trying to understand why and accepting that God will show me in His time, not mine. I have so many questions, and there are so many things I just simply don't understand. But looking back and thinking about December 17th has helped to realize that someday I might look back and think, oh, that's what He was doing. I am so thankful that God provides hope when I feel so lost in the dark sometimes.