Broken Leg

Hanging out in the Anchorage airport

I will never forget the day I left for college. I was so excited and naive and terrified and quite frankly, I had no idea what I was doing. I sat at the airport in Anchorage, Alaska drinking Starbucks with my parents and a dear friend. I checked in my two cardboard boxes, hugged my parents goodbye and got on the plane bound for Fargo, North Dakota. Now, I had never seen North Dakota and I really didn't know what I was getting into but I knew God was telling me to go and so I went. I do remember walking out of the airport, pushing my boxes on the ground, one of top of each other (I know airports have those cart things but I was too dumb to use them I guess). I stepped off the plane into North Dakota's winter in January and I said out loud "Oh Lord, what have you done to me?" Now, before you get offended about my reaction to North Dakota, let me just say that it grew on me like crazy and I'm moving back in the fall but having come from Alaska with its gorgeous mountains and views everywhere, I was not impressed.

I jumped right into the campus ministry at North Dakota State University, made some amazing friends and slowly learned to like good ol' Fargo. I returned that fall for my sophomore year ready for God to do amazing things and fully expecting that He would. I had believed Him for incredible things and He did do incredible things year but it was also one of the hardest years of my life. That year I faced death, loss, grief, family tragedy, ridiculous amounts of stress and heart ache. I remember that as the year wound down, I would sit in my dorm room on weekends and just cry.  God was good to me and

The night I left for North Dakota 

He was moving mightily but I was facing some of the biggest battles of my life. For the first time in all of my memory, I could not feel God because I just hurt so bad, I had turned numb. I'm not sure how many people knew what was going on, I don't think I'm as good at keeping secrets as I think I am, but I remember feeling so alone. Sometimes we bring stress and things on ourselves and we bad choices and sometimes we don't trust God but sometimes things just happen and life is hard and heartache hurts and you just need a break and this was the case for me. The last day of my sophomore year my friend stayed with me praying over me as I cried myself to sleep because I was too panicked to be alone.

Although the decision left me heart broken and relieved all at the same time, I transferred to a different college my junior year to be closer to my family. I needed them and they needed me. I said goodbye to Fargo with no intentions of ever going back. But God had different plans. Over the past two years since I left Fargo, God has hemmed me in and healed my soul and pried into areas of my heart with a grace and mercy and gentleness and conviction and firmness that only God can achieve. I have learned to cry a lot, to let go, to forgive others and mostly to forgive myself. I have clung to God like never before. I can honestly say that even though my relationship with God before was sincere and true, I feel like He has saved me all over again. But being the wonderful God that He is, He doesn’t let us settle with just enough healing. A year after I left Fargo, I returned to be in a dear friend’s wedding. I had to “face my demons” during that time if you will. It was a great, hard, tearful, freeing week and at the end of it, God told me I needed to move back to Fargo. (If you would like specifics about what I’ll be doing check out blogpost “Less of Me”)

I reluctantly followed God with this plan, in anticipation and excitement and fear all at the same time but it has been a year of fighting God about this. I’ll be honest, the idea of going back to Fargo and dealing with all of the issues I faced there and the people that I hurt and hurt me has terrified me. Me, the girl who has no problem going off to college in an unknown town by myself. Me, who can fly to Uganda by myself to work with people I’ve never met before. Me, who sees a mountain and wants to climb it and sees a new food and wants to eat it, who sees a challenge and says “I will conquer that”, was afraid of moving back to Fargo, North Dakota.

Bison life for me

God is so full of grace and goodness and He loves us even when we are afraid and almost two years to the day when I had my last panic attack (something that started happening to me during my last semester in Fargo) and sat on my mom’s lap crying for an hour (I was 20 years old), He brought complete freedom and healing in my life. It didn’t happen in one particular moment or with one particular prayer or conversation but rather through the thousands of prayers, conversations, God-encounters, tears and steps I took towards His leading even though it terrified me. And, now as I sit here, typing this story out, I sit here in complete peace knowing that my path and my future are secure, no matter my past.

I was praying a lot about this blogpost when I decided to write it and the Holy Spirit revealed a few things to me. First of all, I think that the worst of pain can come when we trust God and follow His plans and it fails and we are left heart broken. In fact, there are people sitting in our churches all over America that took a step of faith and got burned. I do not know why things work out the way they do but I do know that the Bible tells us that it rains on the just and unjust alike (Matthew 5:45). I think when things like this happen, the temptation is to not go out on a limb for God again but to sit back and play it safe. I’m not judging anyone who has found themselves in that position. I have wanted to just stay in my parents’ basement forever and never have to face the scary world out there but if I did that not only would I not be fulfilling part of God’s plan for my life but I would also be missing my biggest point of victory. I do not know why bad things happen. All I know is that man sinned and sin ruined this perfect place God made for us and we are all living with the consequences. But we have the opportunity to turn these horrible, life-altering situations into powerful testimonies and victories in our lives.

Another revelation I got from the Lord during this is that sometimes, we settle for just being okay and when we do that, we rob ourselves of the opportunity of being restored. It’s kind of like if you break your leg and you go to the doctor and the doctor says that they have to rebreak the bone or do surgery or something to set it. Now that is going to be a scary, painful ordeal but if you don’t do it, your leg is going to be deformed and you won’t be able to walk right and you’ll never reach your physical potential and you look at the doctor and say “No, just give me some pain meds so I don’t feel it.” And then you walk around with a limp and are crippled for the rest of your life. That is what we say to God about our hearts sometime. Before God called me back to Fargo (to do a ministry internship) I thought I was perfectly healed. I was happy and content and was doing things with my life and growing with God. I could easily stay where I am now and live a happy life but I wouldn’t be living the restored life. God doesn’t want to just heal us to the point of being okay and take away our symptoms, He wants to restore us and make us better than we ever were before. We just have to give Him the opportunity.

I am reminded of the story of Joseph. Now, I am in no way comparing what I went through to some of the trials that Joseph faced, but heartache is heartache. Joseph went through unfathomable betrayal, deceit, slavery, false accusation, imprisonment, being forgotten and being despised and yet, it says over and over that God was with Joseph through it all. Joseph seeks God, keeps His heart right and God brings so many good things into His life. He is a husband, a father and a successful and trusted ruler. That sounds like a really good life and Joseph probably could have lived out his days in contentment. But being the wonderful God that He is, God didn’t let things stay okay for Joseph and instead, Joseph was confronted smack-dab in the face with the very people that hated and betrayed him and whose actions led him to slavery and imprisonment. And not only did he encounter them, he had the power over their lives. If you ever want a test of whether you have forgiven someone, find yourself in a position to make or break them and see how you behave. But Joseph didn’t act towards them out of revenge or vengence and God restored him and his family and his father and through his actions, the Israelites were saved. Talk about a huge plan that Joseph could never have imagined.

I remember praying one day, shortly after leaving Fargo that God would completely heal me, not just take away the pain, the symptoms of the problem, but to fix my heart, to make me new, to make me closer to Him on the other side. And He did. It was hurtful at times and not fun and I definitely did not always like it but I am so grateful that I prayed that prayer and I meant it and that God hasn’t given up but His plan is vast and great and more than I can imagine. I can’t wait to see what happens this next year and all that God is going to do in Fargo. So the next time you go through something hard (which will happen a hundred times) don’t just settle for just enough healing to be okay but allow God to deal with all of the messy, broken, dirty, shattered places of your heart, even if it means you have to encounter your past and then move on. It’s definitely worth it.

Check out Joseph’s story: Genesis 37-50