in brief...

I came to a coffee shop today with another writing friend, with the intent of writing. It's National Novel Writing Month...but I wasn't quite ambitious enough for that. I at least figured I'd get some blogging in, but now I have less than 10 minutes before I need to leave to meet another friend for lunch. So instead, a little portion of a song I wrote the other day. I discovered Sunday that I so desperately need to continually have a creative outlet, especially now that creativity (at least in a classic sense) is not as much a part of my daily life anymore. I need to be a person who writes and creates and sings and plays her heart out. And I recovered a little bit of that person on Sunday. here's the chorus - I'm late for lunch! :

"Jesus you bind the broken-hearted
You make us into who we never thought we'd ever be
And this is not where I was headed when I started
But the road is clear to You where my veiled eyes can't see"

Little bits of thankfulness

My job has proven to be even harder than I'd imagined it would be. I'm battling my anxiety more than ever, and thankfully God has given some sweet victory in that battle at times. But at other times, I'm pretty overcome by the amount of things to be accomplished, and the IMPORTANCE of these many things. So couple my perfectionism and desire to do all things well with the fact that these things MUST be done well or people in my care will suffer...and you have a Krista who has to beg the Lord daily for a calm, peaceful, trusting heart and the ability to do hard things.

Management was never in my plans, and yet here I am. But what GOT me here was a sincere desire to help people with disabilities, and I have to constantly call that to mind. When I'm pushing paperwork, disciplining staff, dealing with pharmacies, and attending meetings, it's easy to forget. But this week, when things were probably at their hardest (and an on-call weekend loomed in my future), God was so gracious in providing these short, amazing moments with the clients themselves. It was very much like He was saying, "I know THIS is hard, but you love THIS."

On Tuesday, I finished my grocery shopping for one of the houses and was exhausted. I came to the door of the house with my first load, and was greeted by one of the clients, with a HUGE smile, and the most excited little squeal ever. Granted, I think he was just as excited about the groceries as he was about my arrival, but he assured me that he was excited about both. All of the clients were super happy that day, and it was great to walk into a happy home and have a sense that I'm contributing to its happiness, even if it doesn't always feel that way. The smiles and the energy from all of the residents was contagious even to my weary, stressed-out soul.

I manage 2 different homes, and according to my schedule, my time is split evenly between the 2. One of these homes, though, has demanded much more of my attention in recent weeks, and I'd hardly been at the other home at all in about a week, with the exception of stopping by briefly. On Wednesday of this week, I was finally there in a mid-afternoon, following another stressful meeting that left me feeling like my plate was just too full. The clients came home from their day program, and one of the clients smiled a big smile when he arrived and saw me. He immediately signed, "I love you." He then made sure the staff with him knew that he loved me also, signing this several times and pointing to me. Then a big hug and another big smile. I really almost cried. He'd never told me this before, and he chose THIS day to tell me, when I so needed to hear that.

Yesterday, I was determined to get off early since I'd stayed til 10 pm the night before and have to be on-call all weekend. But my plans don't always work out - one of my guys neeeded to go to urgent care. I had one of our drivers drop him off w/a staff, but I needed to go pick him up and get to the pharmacy and get instructions to the staff for administering his antibiotic. So as to not leave the house with too many clients and not enough staff, I brought one of the guys with me for these errands. I was exhausted but strangely happy, and this guy was glad to get out of the house and sit shotgun. Some dance-type music was on the radio in the van when we got in, and we both started dancing along. I am NOT a dancer, and have said before that the only time I dance is with my clients. It was so freeing and fun and altogether fabulous, and again, the smile on that guy's face made my day.

Our small group is studying Colossians 3, and it's so full of mentions of thankfulness, thankful hearts. I praise God that I have an underlying thankfulness -for His gospel and His goodness, and even for this job - even on the hardest days, I'm thankful for it. And this week, God gave so many little gifts to help me with my thankfulness. He is GOOD.

Colossians 3:15-17 "And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him."

Confusing Color

I went up to Flagstaff last weekend to visit with my friend Danielle, who recently moved up there for grad school. We had such a lovely time, and I'm excited to brave the cold sometime this winter and visit again...

I drove home Sunday evening right around sunset. Anyone who's ever done any driving between Phoenix and northern AZ is familiar with a place called Sunset Point - a well-equipped rest area with dramatic views. Many a vacation in my life has had its first stop at Sunset Point. A mocha with Danielle just before leaving Flagstaff necessitated a bathroom stop there on my way home this time around, so I counted down the miles as I approached it...

The rest area looks off to dramatic mountain views on one side of the highway, and the area on the other side of the road is mostly flat, which also adds some drama. But this time, as I got close, I noticed some mountains off in the distance on the flat side, that I'd never noticed before. And something about the light at the time of the day, hitting those mountains, was breathtaking. They were this odd shade of green (a color we Arizonans treasure) that I really can't describe, and couldn't capture on film once I tried. It was absolutely beautiful, and it got me philosophizing...please forgive me, this may be intensely cheesy...

So often in my life, especially in the past year or so, I've wished that things could just be black and white. I've wished that there was a correct answer to all of life's questions that could be deciphered by some sort of an equation. The messiness and unpredictability of life has been a source of much frustration.

And yet...how beautiful is color! And how beautiful a God who chose to include color as He planned the details of our world. Black and white would be a little easier to understand, but easy is not what God intended. Instead, He does things in a complex, artistic way, as only the Creator could do. The green on that mountain did not provide any concrete answers...but I certainly wouldn't have traded it for black and white.

It is Good

"Sunny days, keeping the clouds away. I think we're coming to a clearing and a brighter day..." - Jars of Clay

It seems my personal season of darkness lies behind me - at least for now. There are still certain elements of my life that I would have planned differently, that I would change if that power rested in my hands. But overall, my circumstances look a lot more favorable. And more importantly, my heart seems to be healing. I sense in me once more a genuine love for the Lord - weaker, perhaps, that it has been in other seasons, but present and deepening again. The ways in which I have sort of "gone through the motions" in recent months are increasingly fruits of Spirit-granted desires again...and it is sweet!

I got to spend a good deal of time in the Word this morning, and I was reading Lamentations 3. This is one of those chapters that I love each time I come to it, but often do not call to mind between readings. I was so very refreshed by it today.

"The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.
It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord
It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth
Let him sit alone in silence when it is laid on him;
Let him put his mouth in the dust - there may yet be hope..."

There is so much about the last season of my life that I do not understand, but I can cling to this: that the Lord is good! And that somehow, it is GOOD that I had to wait quietly, that I had to bear my yoke, that I had to sit alone in silence and be humbled to a point of desperation. There is good in all of it.

"For the Lord will not cast off forever, but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion
according to the abundance of his steadfast love..."

May I never make God so small as to say that he only allowed or permitted me to grieve. No, He caused it. And he caused it in a way that by no means diminished His care for me or His perfect love. Today, my heart believes this.

Approval

I'm nearing the end of the 2nd week of my new job. I could probably write 10 pages about all I've learned, thought about, prayed about, loved, been stressed out by, rejoiced in, etc during this time. But I'll try to limit myself to one theme...

I'm a group home supervisor, working with 9 other group home supervisors to supervise 15 or so group homes. I have a boss, we'll call her "S." She's great - very capable, very organized...but also very quick, to-the-point, no-nonsense. She's been helpful and kind, but over the last few days I started worrying because I feel like i just keep asking questions, and I was afraid it was getting frustrating for her. I prayed about it, prayed that I would do my job with excellence, be a blessing to her, to my peers, to the staff I'm over, and to the residents we serve, and then also that I would not base my self-worth on her opinion of me. This is something I DEFINITELY dealt with in New York, during my internship, that hasn't been an issue the last 3 years cause my last job was very independent and didn't involve a lot of feedback.

Today S was in a meeting all day long. I met with her peer, who's the boss of 5 of the other group home supervisors. We'll call her "C." I was glad for the chance to bombard somebody else with questions for a little while, and she was super helpful. She also brought up the fact that "S" told her that I'm picking things up really quickly. That was her only comment regarding S's opinon of me, but it made me breathe SO much easier. Much as I try not to care, I DO care a lot about S's opinion, and just that little comment was so reassuring.

And then I tried to put things in perspective. My boss, a sinner like myself, seems to have approved the job that I've done over the last 9 work days. My God, the Creator of the universe and the only true God, has also given his approval. S's approval is based on 9 days of me learning and completing certain tasks, and probably certain elements of how I've related and communicated w/people in our company. Her approval could mean a good future within a company - an excellent company but surely flawed like every company. And even if I was to stay an employee of this company for the rest of my working life, that still is less than half a century. And S's opinion could change tomorrow.

My God's approval is different. It is eternal. It means eternity with Him. It is unchanging. And it is based only on HIS finished work, by Christ's death on the cross that covered my sins. Some truths from Colossians that this brings to mind:

"giving thanks to the Father, who qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light" 1:12

"And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him." 1:21-22

"And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our trespasses by cancelling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross." - 2:13-14

Why I Went to College?

Going to college was never something I had to think about. From a young age, I knew that was the plan. It was never really something I prayed about, thought through, etc. Maybe about WHERE to go to college, but even that was an easy choice - full scholarship and then some at ASU, which had the degree I'd known I'd wanted since sophomore year of high school. So I went.

At several points along the way, I doubted myself a little. At at one point, i think it was junior year, I doubted myself a LOT. Classes were hard, piano lessons were stressing me out to the point of frequent tears, and I wondered if college was something that I wasn't supposed to finish. It got to the point where I actually went and met with my pastor to seek counsel on whether maybe I should drop out.

I don't remember everything that was said that day. I remember him saying that yes, perhaps it was the Lord's will that I quit school. But not to rush that decision. He told me to reflect on the ways that God had used the experience of college to grow and challenge me, classwork aside. And the part that I remember the most was that he pulled out a worship song, just a sheet with words and chords. He asked if maybe my schooling was helping me to be able to look at something like that and do something with it. And it was. At that time, I was still by no means confident in reading chords, but I was working on it.

Obviously, I stayed in college. Combo of the things he said and other factors, I'm sure. And I finished my classes, then headed off in 06 to my internship in NY. If I'd thought college was hard...the internship almost destroyed me, I almost quit, and I came to a definite decision that music therapy was not the field for me...

Then, I moved home, got my board certification, and got a full-time music therapy job. Apparently, I could do it after all. I loved my work, despite it still being intensely challenging, and it was evident that the Lord had known what He was doing, and that NOT quitting had been the right choice, both times I'd faced that decision.

3 years later, I've fought hard for music therapy. When budget cuts hit, I fought the cuts. When they didn't look reversible, I started my own little fledgling business, sort of, with my employer's blessing. When that didn't look sustainable, I started looking at music therapy jobs out of state.

And now, after all of that, I've stopped the fight, at least for now. I've gotten a new job, still in the realm of people with disabilities, but outside of the music therapy field. I'm thankful to take a break from fighting, because it's been exhausting. I'm excited for many elements of the new job, but deeply sad at the same time. So strange to think my weeks will not be filled with singing and playing and the laughter of children.

But something keeps coming back to me...that convo with pastor Scott so many years ago. That piece of music he flashed in front of me in that meeting, that now is something I can play effortlessly, really WORSHIP with without spending all my energies on finding the right notes. Post-internship, I finally joined the worship band at church, and I'm able to serve the local church in a way I never would have had the confidence to do before. And really, if that was the only reason I went to college, it would be worth it.

And then I think of all the other amazing things that came out of college - the Christian community I discovered there, the deep friendships that formed, all the growing up that happened there. I'll use the education I received in my new job, for sure, and hopefully one day I'll be able to reenter the music therapy world in some capacity, but if not, college was surely still worth it. God surely knew what he was doing.

Someone Else's Words

Over the past week, my battle for right thinking - to think rightly about things and to think about the RIGHT things - has been pretty intense. And what tends to happen when I start to loose control of my thought life is that I just let the reins go completely - like they're slipping out of my hands, and I just don't grab them fast enough. And a lot of this thinking has to do with my own desires and trying to figure out what GOD's desires are, and how to make mine line up with His, and how to think rightly on how to know and understand His will, and how to believe with all my heart in all of His promises...but in my weakness all of this just turns into worry and self-pity and fear, and even anger with this great God.

So, the other day I kind of lost it. And I was reading in the Psalms and was brought to tears as I read the following:

"The Lord is righteous in all His ways
and kind in all His works
The Lord is near to all who call on Him
to all who call on Him in truth
He fulfills the desire of those who fear Him
He also hears their cry and saves them
The Lord preserves all who love Him"
-Psalm 145:17-20a

I decided that rather than sit down and write a song about all my messy thoughts, I'd write a song using only these words - only divinely inspired, TRUE words. What a sweet process this was! Especially because songs pretty inevitably get stuck in my head, in a much more persistent way than words or sentences do. And so as I tried to gear up strength to face the rest of my day, I had TRUTH echoing in my brain - that the Lord is righteous, and kind, and near! That He fulfills desires and hears cries and saves and preserves His children. Oh, that this truth would be the constant soundtrack to my days!