Olivia.

It's 4:35 on a Tuesday afternoon. I am finally, in the car outside my house, ready to go to the boys and girls club for soccer practice. Shoot, but I forgot to fill the water bottles up. Time to turn the car back off so I can take my keys to open the front door and make it to the kitchen sink.

We are 4 weeks into the season, my volunteer coaches don't really need me at practice anymore, but I like to be present. This day felt different though. I wanted to serve, without stepping on my volunteers toes!

I'll admit to you, that I am usually so wrapped up in whatever strategy I have to grow and improve the soccer league that I have a hard time just taking a mental break to engage the kids we are serving for more than a few minutes.

However, I required myself to be different today by sitting to chat with a few of them. So I walked into the club and sat down at a table with 2 girls playing checkers. Deandre later challenged me to a game. He was actually pretty good, though I let him win. Hehe. As I am walking out, I decided to stop by the program director, Ms. Patrice's office to chat. She begins asking me about soccer and during that time a little sweet munchkin walks in with her head held low. I couldn't help but ask...

Me: What is your name?
O: Olivia.
Me: That's a pretty name. Did you know my mom almost named me Olivia? But my name is Adrienne, nice to meet you. How old are you?
O: 6... no, 7.
Patrice: She just turned 7 on Sunday.
Me: Well, Happy Birthday Olivia!

Silence... She actually looked 9 or 10 to me, but whatever.

Me: Do you play any sports?
Olivia shook her head no...
Me: Is it because you don't like them? Or you've never had the chance?
O: I never had a chance.
Me: Ms. Patrice, is there anything I can do to help with Olivia?
Patrice: I don't know. She was caught standing on the desk in the computer lab.

Is she serious? I got in trouble for that exact same thing, but I wasn't 7, I was in the 8th grade!

Patrice: Olivia, why did you stand on the computer desk?
Olivia shrugs her shoulders
Patrice: You should never do something without understanding why you are doing it. Did you know it was wrong?
O: yes
Patrice: Then why did you do it?
Olivia shrugs her shoulders again
Patrice: Why was it wrong?
O: ...because I could have gotten hurt.
Patrice: What else?
O: ...because I could have hurt other people.
Patrice: I was just sitting here talking to Ms. Adrienne about the soccer teams and do you know you have to be disciplined in order to try-out?

Ms. Patrice carried on with her mission to help Olivia fully understand the seriousness of her misconduct. In the meantime, I was having flashbacks of the exact conversation Ms. Woodruff had with me in 8th grade.

Patrice: Olivia, I want you to sit here until the end of this period, then I want you to apologize to Ms. Simpson and help her clean the table tops before you leave.
O: Yes, ma'am. as wipes the tears from her eyes.

I watched little Olivia and couldn't imagine her doing something out of rebellion. After all, she wasn't yet two days past seven years old and seemed to be so respectful to Ms. Patrice. I just wanted to wrap her up in my arms and tell her that God has a huge plan for her life.... but I didn't. Instead, I asked her for a hug on her way out and told her I would come check on her next Tuesday.

Ms. Patrice told me about her home life. She and her 8-year-old brother are cared for by two separate grandparents. She said Olivia has been acting up and is starting to get a bad reputation at school amongst her teachers. Her brother was left at the club one night and Ms. Patrice couldn't get a hold of his grandfather so she had to call the cops. Though she has been serving on staff at this club for nine years she said she still cried all the way home that night. Especially, thinking about how little the boy reacted to his grandfather abandoning him for the night. She said, "I'm a grown woman, i'll be okay but I just can't imagine what HE felt like."

Me: Ms. Patrice, would it be okay if I came in to chat with Olivia once a week? I would really like to mentor her if you think that will help.

I can't help but think about intersections. If I had not been led to sit down and engage with the kids today, I would have not had the opportunity to sit in a very important meeting Olivia had with Ms. Patrice. My life would not have intersected at such a raw and vulnerable place for Olivia. Besides, she made such an impact on me.

I saw a quote the other day from another urban ministry in Atlanta stating, "We believe in building boys and girls, rather than repairing men and women." The next generation needs us. I am convinced that 10 minutes with a 7-year-old would not amount to hours, days, and years spent trying to re-direct an adult. We all deserve to feel valued, important, and loved.


Today, was a reminder of how I want to spend the rest of my life intersecting with people, young and old, in vulnerable places to infuse hope through Jesus Christ.

4 Questions

Do you ever feel like you are alone in your relationship with God? It's like you have to conjure up his presence in your own mind? Well, the first 4 years of my Christian walk I felt this way more often than not. I remember journaling prayers and striking up revelations that made me feel more spiritual. I began to ask myself questions, have I ever felt the presence of God? Would I recognize him if he walked into a room? I know that it isn't religion, but a relationship. I knew that, but I was missing something. 

Here are 4 questions helped me better understand what I was missing:

1. Have I met God?
Draw near to him. James 4:8

I meet people all the time. Most of the time, I hear about them from someone else before meeting them. They tell me how they know this person, what their relationship is like with them, where that person spends their time, etc. It wasn't until I reached my (figurative) hand out to meet them that I can say I even made my acquaintance with them. So many times we mistake meeting God with hearing about him from others that know him. Have you ever reached your hand out and made your acquaintance with God? 

Hard: I got to a point in my life that I was rejecting every attempt God made to reach me that I had no discernment of his voice. One evening when I was 14, as an un-follower of Jesus I was wrestling with the Lord and I was convinced that the next song on the radio would apply to my walk with the Lord. Divinely, the song was, "If you don't know me by now, you will never ever know me." by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. If you are in a spiritual saturated environment like I was growing up, maybe you are not recognizing the Lord's attempts to your heart and you need to ask him to soften your heart and give you ears to hear his voice. This was definitely the case for me.
Soft: If this isn't you, then remember the words in Revelation 3:20 that says, "Here I am! I stand at the door and knock, if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me."

2. Do I really know God?
In all ways know him. Proverbs 3:6

Lean not on your own understanding but in all ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight. Acknowledging him does not mean you just throw his name on your situation. It means you KNOW his heart for you! You know what his plans are for his children. In order to take captive all your thoughts and make it obedient to Christ, we must KNOW him. If you read in his word you'll see that he freely offers us love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. His perfect love is unconditional and freely given. In order to identify experiencing the Lord in our lives, we must know him and his character on a personal level.

3. Do I love God?
Love the Lord your God. Luke 10:27

"Jesus loves you" is one of the most used sayings, but what does it even mean? I was a surrendered follower of Jesus for almost 5 years before I felt comfortable saying that I love the Lord or Jesus. It never felt real because I saw how my affection was going to everything and everyone else other than Jesus. I am the kind of person that doesn't keep quiet about the latest fad. Whatever music I am listening to will be heard by nearly everyone that I come in contact with. We are all promoting something, I just never understood why it was so difficult for me to promote Jesus. Because I didn't know or love him. Through this conviction I asked the Lord to give me a heart to know his word. Within the next 6 months, I learned so much about him through scripture and I came to realize that the heart of the Father is to empower us to live a fuller life in him. Once I started to understand this, I began to entrust him with more of my heart, thoughts, and dreams. He then began to be the desire of my heart. Above everything else, I want him. This was when I knew that cupid's arrow had struck me and I was falling in love with my creator.

4. What sacrifices am I making for God? 
Cheerful giver. 2 Corinthians 9:7

Be careful with this one. Making sacrifices to/for someone in hopes that you will receive their love in return is not a genuine love offering. As long as we try to add to the finished work of Jesus' death, we will be toiling in vain! This is a good measure of where your heart is in your relationship with the Lord. Do not confuse it as a list of things to DO, see this as a measuring stick of where your heart is. If you do not feel like these things are being offered to the Lord go back to the first few series of questions and ask the Lord to reveal himself to you. If you have truly experienced the love of God, you will never be the same again. And though there will definitely be times where you discipline yourself to do these things, if you know the love of Christ ultimately it will feel like an honor to be able to sacrifice ourselves for his sake.

Measuring stick of the heart's desire:

• Treasures- Where do I put my finances? Am I giving him my first fruits?
• Time- How much time to I spend Up (with him), In (with other believers), Out (serving non-believers)
• Talents- Whose kingdom am I seeking to build with these God-given abilities?

Egypt :: Wilderness :: Promised Land

I don't want to leave here
I don't want to stay
it feels like pinching to me either way
it's all about comfort when you move so much
the place I was wasn't perfect but I found a way to live
Egypt :: Wilderness :: Promised Land

Fall of 2012 has felt like a Wilderness to me. It all began in August with my grandfathers' passing away. As we returned from his funeral, my mother's close friend was entering hospice as her battle of cancer ended. Just weeks later, I was robbed at gunpoint. A traumatic assault that left me feeling hopeless, lonely, and out of peace. There was so much stress in my family at the time that they couldn't even field questions to me about the happenings until weeks later. He stole my most precious possession, my Bible, that I have had since I was 8 or 9, which made it that much harder to lean into the Lord. I began grad school and therefore cut out other Bible Studies I had been attending to be able to balance the school and work load. I was working like a maniac to manage these two FCA soccer teams while also preparing for the biggest year end campaign since I came on staff 3 years ago. I attended 3 weddings in September, which were in three different cities. I felt so empty and so dry spiritually that I resented the blessing to further my education through Seminary. There just wasn't enough time in the day to get it all done and I really experienced Jesus' words, "apart from me you can do nothing."

The hardest thing to do in the Wilderness is to hold fast to the Lord. To believe in His promises, even when we do not FEEL his presence. I started dating a guy that did not lead me spiritually, and though it didn't last long, I was faced with the reality of my heart that I found a future with him more appealing than what I thought Jesus had for me. I truly entertained the idea of taking my future into my own hands and making this relationship into something that I thought I would be happy with. Then I remembered how Adam and Eve took matters into their own hands, they thought they knew better than what the Lord expected of them. They wanted to be the one to control their future and what fruit they were able to eat. This thought that we know better than our creator is nothing new to the human mind. I had a choice to make. I could follow my will, or I could follow His plan for me.

Though, there was nothing in me that wanted to do things God's way, the Lord put people in my path to remind me of his character. I was open and honest with my inner circle about this tension to build my own kingdom instead of the Father's and they quickly brought me back to truth. One of the dominant things I lacked was peace. I had my pride to hold onto, but I had no peace to speak of. As I was driving off one day I noticed a note card on the floor in my van. It read, "If only you had paid attention to my commands, your peace would have been like a river." Isaiah 48:1. PEACE is a non-negotiable for me.

Then the Lord began to speak my identity over me. I asked him to give me a new name and he continuously brought up, Joy. I asked him to give me my destiny. He told me my destiny was to love him with all my heart, soul, strength, and mind. 

I have a big heart! and many times I think it can overwhelm others! But the Lord asks me to love him with ALL of it. I don't have to hold anything back. He will always want more of me.

Soul. This caucasian sister has some soul :) When I think of the soul I see the true personal DNA and make up of a person. This means that everything that comes out of this soul place of my being is 100% me. If we could put my soul in a juicer, where all the pulp and everything else on it is separated to leave us with everything that makes up my soul, what would that look like? I have some ideas, but I will always keep learning it. This is the part of me that I get to discover and offer to the Lord daily for his Kingdom.

In high school, I maxed out with 120 lbs on the bench press. Strength. You can laugh. But dude, I get to leverage whatever physical, emotional, mental, strength I have to the Lord's work. I get to throw my body on this cornerstone of Jesus Christ, to be broken daily. Broken to be made new again in the Lord, NOT CRUSHED. Broken, because everyday he has new mercies for me. And I have a choice to turn this body into a home for the Holy Spirit, or a vacuum to gain the whole world.

Mind(less). Have you ever felt mindless? Or better yet, have you ever WANTED to feel mindless? I don't know about you but I have never met anyone who wishes they could get their brain to process more information, feelings, and thoughts. It just doesn't happen! We are constantly at work in our minds and we can never get away from them! But we do have some say in where we focus our minds. And the cool thing is this, the Lord wants us to share our every thought with him. Though he already knows them, he wants us to be able to take a single thought and place it on the alter of grace. He wants us to set this single thought next to to the finished work and resurrected body of Jesus Christ. If we did that with every thought, I think we would be so consumed with the fact that IT IS FINISHED, and that we are in a battle that has already been won, that those temptations and struggles don't seem nearly as detrimental as they did before! We would be able to look around and say, yeah - I know who won this game of life. So it's my job now, to serve. To will my mind to dwell on the victory that I have in Christ. 

It does not matter where I go or what job I fill. If I am a wife, a mother, a friend, a lawyer, a tenant, a landlord, a dishwasher, a whatever you want to say. I know my destiny. And this destiny will shine through any earthly role that the Lord calls me to.

Now, I feel like the Lord has taken my hand is leading me up to Mt. Nebo. He is dusting off the things that I picked up from the wilderness and saying, "aren't you glad you didn't go your own way just before we reached this place?" Truth is, I almost turned around and went back to Egypt. Remember?? Remember how my roommate had to block those paths from me? Mentally, I was already back in Egypt. I had given up hope of the promised land while I was in the wilderness and now that the fog is starting to rise, I cannot believe I would ever consider that place again (Egypt): Slavery. Nearly, every series of Egypt, Wilderness, and Promised Land that cycles in my life, this is what happens to me. It's a comfort and control thing. A pastor at my church said, if you only go to the places you have been, you will never see anything new! 

This promised land holds everything my (and your) heart desires. In forms that I could not even imagine or hope for. But he couldn't lead me to these blessings without me letting go of everything I was clinging to in the Wilderness. Thank you Jesus for convicting me of trying to do things on my own without you. Now, I have peace like a river.

I've been painting pictures of Egypt
and leaving out what it lacked
the future seems so far and I want to go back
but the places that used to fit me
cannot hold the things i've learned
those roads are closed off to me
while my back was turned
     -Sara Groves