​What are you doing here?
 
This is a question I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. It’s a question God poses to Elijah after he’s freaked himself out, run for his life, and ends up in a cave---far away from his original calling. What are you doing here, Elijah?
 
Life is complicated. It’s full of beautiful and broken moments. There are some so achingly perfect you wish you could drink it in for days, but there are the other days where it's hard to put one foot in front of the other. Life can exhaust you, so much so that you end up like Elijah. He had a great a calling and a great purpose. In the Bible, Elijah was a mighty prophet who encouraged others to return to God when they were worshipping others. He also saw God work miracles (hello?! fire raining down from the sky) but a threat from Jezebel on his life sends him running. He ends up at a tree, where he lays down and asks God to take his life. Instead, an Angel of the Lord appears and gives him some food and drink, and he rests. Basically, God says, “Shhhh, I get that you’re tired. But here’s some bread.” That maybe free advice for some of you, who are tired: Go to Torchy’s. Get a breakfast taco.
 
But seriously, Elijah’s story makes me feel less ridiculous. Haven’t we all had those moments? We see God do something miraculous in our lives. Our family member is healed. We get that job promotion. We are becoming the person we always hoped we could be. Then, something else comes swinging in, causing us to forget and run away in fear. We lay down at whatever tree like Elijah. Our tree can be fear. Our tree can be sadness. It can be regret, guilt, shame, whatever.
 
And that’s okay. We’re so obviously human and life is so obviously real. It can come in big and swooping, making us forget the question that God poses to Elijah, and one I’m posing to all of you reading this blog post: What are you doing here?
 
Why did God place you on this earth? Was it so that you could lay down at your tree, mope, and groan about all the ways that life isn’t going the way you thought it would? Or have you gotten so deep into your feelings that you’ve forgotten the bigger purpose? I’m not talking about a big purpose either, one where everybody knows your name and you save the world. Purpose can be misunderstood like that. I’m talking about your everyday reason for waking up in the morning.
 
We all have one. We all have a small difference that we can make in the world. A ripple of change that we can affect with our tiny steps. Stop thinking of purpose as this big, huge thing and start small. Who are the people in my life I can encourage? Who is someone I can help today? What is one step I can make this week towards a dream I have?
 
Life is like a quilt. That’s what Bishop TD Jakes described in one of his more recent sermons. Quilts are usually sewn together with different patchworks, patterns, and designs. It doesn’t look like it would go together, but when it’s all said and done, you get something beautiful. He went further to say that people are like quilts because we’re complicated or at least he said authentic people are complicated. One minute, we’re full of faith. The next minute, we’re full of fear. One minute, we’re pursuing this dream and passion wholeheartedly. The next day, we’re doubting ourselves. We’re humans. We’re Elijah’s.
 
And yet, as he says in his sermon: we are fearfully and wonderfully made.
 
Scripture goes as far to call us God's masterpieces. A masterpiece sounds like a high calling, right? But I think about the process of a masterpiece. The Mona Lisa’s, the Maya Angelou books, the Picasso works of art didn’t start out as such. There were probably a lot of rough drafts, false starts, and balled up pieces of paper thrown into the trash before we got to see the final finished work. That’s what’s happening to us in life. We’re constantly regenerating. Taking a step here. Falling down. Starting over. Then, beginning all over again, with that same renewed hope, that same vision: What are you doing here?
 
I was reminded recently of part of my here, in these verses found in Matthew 5:
Let me tell you why you’re here. You’re here to be salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors of this earth. Here’s another way to put it. You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world.
 
Light is why I’m here. There’s a light that God always refreshes me with, a strength, a reminder, a hope for more, that I want to continue to spread to those around me. I think we can all start with that, right? There’s so much dark in the world and so much heaviness happening daily.
 
Couldn’t we all start by just being a light?

 
“A sun grows our bodies. But only we can make each other better.”
 
Back in April, I asked Inprint poetry buskers (super talented people who literally write a poem in minutes based on whatever topic you throw at them) to pen a poem for me on faith, hope and healing. You know, super easy and light topics. The line I quoted above is from the last line of the poem. A zinger, that still shoots straight to my heart.
 
Hope, one of the words I asked the poet to write about, is one I’ve been thinking a lot about lately. If you look around, there’s a lot of doom and gloom in the world---feels like more so than normal. I mean, how can it not feel that way? Last month, we had a shooter target African-Americans at a grocery story on a Saturday in Buffalo. Then, just a couple weeks later—19 children and two teachers---gone, just like that, right before the end of the school year. It’s like the trauma since 2020 keeps building, not letting up. The day after the shooting at Robb Elementary I realized somewhere midway through the day, was also the same day as the anniversary of George Floyd’s death. Grief upon grief.
 
And besides the world events, we all have stuff that we’re going through. We have our own trials and tribulations and our personal grief that we’re holding onto in our hearts. When I asked for the poem about hope, this was before all those world events unfolded, because I think hope is always something I’m striving for, something I’m trying to cling onto.
 
If you look at me from the outside at first glance, I’m a pretty positive person. It most likely comes from my parents who are some of the most positive people I know. It’s not a fake, kind of a sugary sweet positive either. It’s rooted in the reality that, yeah, bad stuff happens, but they’re the kind of people who always press on and keep putting one foot in front of the other. I know part of the positivity comes from their faith, being deeply rooted in something bigger than themselves. And it also comes from their love for each other, how they were raised by loving families and the hope they find in threaded in their everyday. But even in all my positivity, there are days that I still struggle for hope.
 
Which brings me back to my poem and this line: “You look up and see clouds crashing into each other, thunder and lightning flashing, like hope, like faith, like healing.”
 
 I wonder why the poet decided to use thunder and lightning as a simile for hope. Was the poet asking us to see hope in the thunder and the lightning? That seems like a ridiculous question, right?
 
But, that made me start to think back to Hurricane Harvey. The endless days of rain. The people who lost their homes, who lost loved ones. No hope in sight.  I remember finding out one of the men I had reported on for months for the Houston Chronicle inside Harris County Jail, had drowned on his way to work. Joseph Dowell, who was affectionately called Unc, had just been released from jail the year before. His whole life was starting over again.
 
And now, it was snuffed out.
 
Where was the hope?
 
Back in summer 2016 before his death, Unc had been inside Harris County Jail, unsure of whether he would ever get out. But inside the jail, there was hope brewing. He became a part of re-entry program for those who had substance abuse problems. He healed himself with the help of others and grew stronger. He was able to take steps forward.
 
At this funeral, his steps forward were recognized by elected officials that he probably never dreamed would ever be there. Mayor Turner named a day after him. A flag at the U.S. Capitol had been raised in his honor.
 
Sure, as I wrote the story, my heart ached that this man---with so much still ahead of him---had to die. But, I saw the tiny shreds of hope that had been weaved for Dowell, starting in a jail cell, and now at his funeral, in the midst of all that thunder and lightning.
 
I think it’s easy to not to find the hope. To cascade into a sea of despair. To just let life and the days pass you by because well, the world kind of sucks right? But, I think it’s wiser to look for the hope, especially on the thunder and lightning days. Because it’s always there, tucked into those moments that you may miss, if you don’t look close enough. I know for me, I also have my faith that feeds me the hope when I can’t seem to find it. I look up and around me at what God created, and it reminds me that there’s light.
 
The line in my poem said it best: “If there is proof of a higher power its that flowers light up our days and fill our noses with the memories of everyday that came before.”
 
I say all of that not to downplay the grief and the sadness that so many are in because of the darkness happening in the world. It truly, sucks. And when you think about it in that way, hope seems a bit silly.
 
But this brings me back to that ending line of the poem:  Only we can make each other better. 
 
I know without the support of those inside the jail, Dowell would’ve never been able to get out. And I know without the support of one another, we’re not going be able to find the hope on the days that we can’t seem to reach it. We can look up at the sun God created all we want, but the poet is right: only we can make each other better. Only we can take steps to leave this world better than we found it.
 
I’ve realized that we magnify hope for others. The light in us, that comes from the One bigger than ourselves, is what’s going to move us forward, and it’s what’s going to make us better.
 
And, I’ll leave you with this from Unc, something he said earlier in the summer before he died.
 
"When you got hope, you can achieve; you can excel. When you lose hope, you lose reality of what's important to you."

Okay, so I'm in the middle of a lot of different things right now. I'm trying to get a book published. I'm trying to plan a book festival. I'm also trying to manage my new self-employed life. I'm looking for a new apartment.  If I'm real with y'all, I don't like the middle.

​For me, I like fresh starts. I actually liked the first day of school growing up. I enjoyed going back-to-school shopping, how new my clothes smelled and how neat my school supplies were in my backpack. There's something about the beginning that's fresh and hopeful. My backpack was still shiny. My papers hadn't gotten disorganized and crumbled in my backpack. There were no real tests yet. However, once we got to the middle of the semester, that's when the unsettled feeling for me would always creep in. Homework started piling up. Midterms. My backpack became a war zone filled with crumpled pieces of papers and leftover food wrappers. See, I don't like the middle because the middle is messy.

In life, I've realized we spend a lot of it in the messy middle. We do get new beginnings.  Think baby showers, new jobs, weddings, first day of schools, going to college, etc. The list goes on and on. But the start of something is always short-lived. Many of us though love to stay in the beginning. Why do you think we love weddings?  Last year, I was a bridesmaid in one of my oldest friend's weddings. My favorite moment was watching her walk down the aisle, teary-eyed and content. How amazing that I got to witness the first hours of her marriage. However, we all know marriage is so much more than the wedding. It stretches, hopefully for years, through kids, moves, new jobs, lay-offs, family health issues, death, grief, sickness and the list goes and on and on. No one is watching the middle of marriage. No one is celebrating the parts that aren't filled with fresh flowers, a shiny dress and a perfect ceremony.  Why do you think we love New Year's? There's so much hype. The countdown before midnight. Everyone is excited about the chance to start over, a chance to for new goals and a fresh year with no mistakes made yet. However, there aren't any streamers brought out when we make it to June. No one is shouting and clamoring at midnight. By then, we're just trying to make it one day at a time.

 When I'm in the middle of a lot and it starts to feel overwhelming, that's when I lean towards my faith. Psalms 139 is probably my favorite scripture in all of the Bible. It reads like poetry. In verse 5, it says "You've gone into my future to prepare the way, and in kindness you follow behind me to spare me from the harm of my past. You have laid your hand on me!"  In this particular part of the Bible, David is writing about how there is nowhere we can go to escape the presence of God. He writes that, "If I dwell by the farthest oceans, even there your hand will guide me, and your strength will support me. I could ask the darkness to hide me and the light around me to become night-- but even in darkness I cannot hide from you. To you the night shines as bright as day."  

The middle of many aspects of life can get dark: trying to make it through college, waiting for a job to open up, or for our family member to get better after a health scare. While, the beginnings are streamers and bright lights. For me, the middle can be long nights, unanswered prayers, and big questions for God.  Still, the reason I keep coming back to Psalms is that the dark isn't scary for God. It literally says that to God the "night shines as a bright as day." and "darkness and light are the same to you." There is nowhere I can go to escape from God's love, even in the hard parts of the middle because he knows us so intimately. David writes in the same Psalms that, "you perceive every movement of my heart and soul."   Just sit with that for a second. 

So, the middle is messy. It's hard. It's dark. Sometimes it seems like there's no ending coming. I think that's why the twenties are such a rollercoaster. We start out at 21, with the streamers and bright lights, graduating from college, everyone telling us the whole world awaits. Once, we get to the middle, we have some bruises, some scars, some real world problems that have hit us smack in the face. It's not so bright anymore. However, the middle is really what makes us. We learn to persevere through the days that we thought we couldn't. We get to the other side. We gain perspective of what the middle is for. We learn to appreciate the beauty of the whole process-the beginning, the middle and the end. 

I'm about to turn 30 in July and looking in my rearview I can see the whole enchilada of my twenties: the highs, the lows, the fresh starts, the hard middles, and the bittersweet endings. I wouldn't change a moment. I know through every high and low, God was there guiding me. He was helping me gain the wisdom and character I would need for my next beginning. 

​

I was listening to a podcast from Sarah Jakes Roberts the other day. She is like my big sister in my head and whenever she drops truth, I know it will stick with me. A young woman in her early twenties was asking for advice about her spiritual walk. She had become a Christian within the last few years and wondered what her next steps should be. Essentially her question was, "Where do I go from here?" 

"I think one of the most dangerous questions that we ask ourselves repeatedly is where I do go from here?" said Jakes. "I think that's a dangerous question to ask because we end up discrediting what here could be trying to teach us. If every time we arrive we're reaching for what's next, how can we ever come to a place of contentment?"

Okay, mic drop right. Jakes said a more powerful question instead to pose, "What is here? What is here for me? Who am I in this here?"

I've been grappling a lot with these questions lately. If I'm honest, I'm a goal-oriented person. Once I achieve something, I'm always thinking about what the next BIG thing is. I have an active imagination, which I guess is good for a writer. So, I could sit and daydream all day about what the next five, ten, fifteen years could look like. I think to some extent we should all set goals for ourselves because it helps us create a vision for what we want our lives to look like. Write them down. Tell a trusted friend. But also, after going through a global pandemic that shutdown the world in a moment's notice---I'm realizing there's very little we can plan or control in life. 

I think we all know that our days are numbered. That life is fragile. That we only have so much time to laugh with our friends, hug our parents, eat our favorite foods (I can't stop craving Tex-Mex lately). But, I also think we can live with a false sense of unlimited time. It makes us focus on what life will be like THEN, instead of right now. 

I think sometimes we want to escape in our minds to the next chapter of our lives because the one we're in right now is tough. We think somehow by daydreaming about the future, it will make today's lessons easier to face. I know this season may be tough for some reading right now, and if that's the case I understand. There have been many seasons in my life that I like to call "eat your vegetables" that I didn't want to go through. I didn't want to eat the vegetables. I wanted the ice-cream and pie days of summer. 

For me, those hard seasons that I toughed it out and learned how to eat my vegetables are the ones I usually grew the most. It reminds me of the Bible verse in Romans 5 that says, "Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope."  Out of suffering we get perseverance, then character and eventually hope.  Many of us want to just skip to the hope part, right? But what if we stuck out the harder days to gain the perseverance we need for the future? What if we let God develop the character we need right now? That way the hope we have later is built on something firmer, greater than it ever could've been if we just skipped this chapter of our lives.

​And while we're focusing on here, God has also been nudging me to focus on more than just myself. I'm also trying to ask who should I serve in this season? Who should I encourage today? Who can I help out? When we're thinking about others instead of ourselves, it also puts our own problems into perspective. It also gives us greater purpose than trying to figure out how to please ourselves that day. 

None of this is easy. That's why I call it "eat your vegetables" because eating your vegetables kind of sucks. But, there's also a reward in focusing on today. Because some of today you may want to remember. What if you want to remember the joke you and your friend laughed about for 20 minutes straight? What if you want to hold onto the lunch you had with you parents because they're getting older and you don't know how much time you'll actually have with them? What if you want to hold onto the person you're becoming right now in this season? 

For me, I know that there's a freedom I have right now that I probably won't have in the future when I'm married and settled with kids. I met up with a couple of friends for breakfast on a Monday the other day, well, frankly just because I could. I know this time I have right now is finite and fragile. I'm trying to hold onto every second and make each day count. 

​I've been watching Pastor Mike Todd's series, "Here is Holy" that dives into this very topic. Check it out if you're interested in learning more about how to be present with here.