Highlands and the Heartache

So I will praise You on the mountain

And I will praise you when the mountain’s in my way

You’re the summit where my feet are

So I will praise You in the valleys all the same

No less God within the shadows

No less faithful when the night leads me astray

You’re the Heaven where my heart is

In the highlands and the heartache all the same

Highlands (Song of Ascent)-Hillsong UNITED (Click here to listen)

I play this song at the end of every run right now. Constantly a reminder that wherever I am, whatever I’m going through-God is there also. He is still faithful and I will still praise him.

The past two months have been surreal…if I were to choose one word that’s what I would choose. I wish someone had warned me…I could never have imagined a time we’d be sheltering at home and a mere trip to the grocery store would be considered a huge risk. Yet here we are…

2020 has been quite a year so far. It started off kinda hectic to be honest.  I was sick at the start of the year after coming home from Chicago and struggled with ongoing nausea for a few weeks. Then with new team members at work and a weeklong work trip, at times I felt like I was treading water.  I literally added “breakfast” to my calendar bc I kept forgetting to eat. Gahhhh. Added to thatttt a relationship to stress over…followed by breakup, I was toast. (My yoga instructor asked what I did to lose weight…change my diet?? Ehhhh not quite…) All this to say-here was the state I was entering Quarantine in. There ya have it folks!

This quarantine has brought me to feel more alone, more isolated than I have ever felt in my entire life…. BUT where loneliness is great, the Lord is greater. This quarantine has also brought me to experience God’s love and pursuit of me more than ever before.  Both the highlands and the heartache.

The Heartache…

King of my life,

Wound my heart that it may be healed;

Break it that thine own hand

May make it whole.

Give me perpetual broken-heartedness,

Keep me always clinging to the cross.

(The Valley of Vision, The Broken Heart)

Wow…who prays for a continual broken heart?! That takes serious courage. Those words always pierce me deeeeep. Such a beautiful excerpt from Valley of Vision. What if we prayed like that?…the heartache really IS the highlands—spiritually. Because it is in the heartache that we cling to the most secure thing we could ever hold onto: The cross. 

I live alone..me, myself and I.  I don’t have a dog. I don’t have a cat. I don’t even have a plant…well update…I eventually bought a succulent the other day-just so I’m not technically the only living thing in my apartment anymore. Knowing me that poor thing doesn’t even have a chance ;) No green thumb here lol!

#WILSON!!

I’m naturally more of an introvert (INFJ), so being alone is usually calming for me. I need alone time…but this is alone time on steroids.  I don’t necessarily miss interacting with people as much as I just miss being in the presence of people. Hearing the voices of people…as opposed to endless thoughts in my head. Some days I’ll play 6, 7, 8 podcasts in a row just to hear humans talking. Some days I’ll go to the store just to see people and “interact” with them…but as you’ve probably noticed being in public does not actually equal “interacting” anymore.

If I’m not careful, my thoughts can go to dark places...and they have worse than ever before. The enemy thrives isolating us and repeatedly telling us lies that lead to hopelessness and despair. He is “The Accuser” after all.  In this situation we’ve isolated ourselves and I think the enemy is trying to take full advantage of this. This has been a huge struggle that cannot be underestimated. I pray for those that are particularly vulnerable to these attacks at this time-primarily those that are doing quarantine alone as well right now.  A few weeks ago I started thinking…if I died, I wonder how long it would take someone to find my body here. Two days, maybe 3? There’s no one I talk to everyday, so it wouldn’t be weird if I wasn’t responding…”

That’s incredibly morbid and discouraging…believe me I know. To think that it wouldn’t matter if I woke up tomorrow or didn’t. This is not just a “mental health” issue…forget not that we are fighting a spiritual battle as well. Be on guard! I’m praying for you as I pray that the Lord would be the shield around me and that we will be able to put on the armor of God and that God would bring others around us to speak words of truth and encourage us and point us to Christ when we need it most.

The Highlands…

O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you;
    my soul thirsts for you;
my flesh faints for you,
    as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.
So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary,
    beholding your power and glory.
Because your steadfast love is better than life,
    my lips will praise you.

 So I will bless you as long as I live;
    in your name I will lift up my hands.

 for you have been my help,
    and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy.
 My soul clings to you;
    your right hand upholds me.

(Psalm 63:1-4, 8)

The first week in quarantine I made the decision (I use the word decision because it was a conscious choice) that I was not going to use this extra time for Netflix or mindless activity (I mean TikTok videos are cool but….lol). I was going to use it to actively pursue Christ in ways I usually don’t have the time to do. Sometimes I think we just think that we’ll “fall” into relationship with God (preaching to the choir here!). The thing is we’re not going to read the Bible unless we actually “pick.it.up.” You pickin’ up what I’m throwing down?!

God gave me eyes to see that this time is incredibly unique. I am completely free from any distractions. There is no one and no thing to distract me. The noise of life ceased. I am in perfect position to be with the Lord and hear from Him. I am not alone. My father is with me in every moment.  The LORD is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. (Psalm 34:18).  I used to read this and believe (in my mind), but now I know this to be true. The reality is that I will NEVER truly experience God’s healing without pain, God’s strength without weakness, God’s power without helplessness, God’s love without rejection. I have felt the hand of my father wrap around me as I cry out to him with tears streaming down my face. He has met me in this dry and weary land. He has been my comforter, my refuge.

God has been using this quarantine BIG time. I have learned the most in the area of prayer and the Psalms. I started listening to a sermon series on Prayer (Tim Keller) going through the Lord’s prayer line by line (also listen to “Praying your Tears” Click Here. You will NOT regret it). If you’re like me, you’ve always been good at the “requests” portion of that prayer and everything else? Eh not so much haha. I found a few 30 day prayer guides, one for gratitude, one for praising the attributes of God, etc. and started using them to guide me each day. I especially loved praising God for his different attributes. It has been the most challenging for me as I’ve never really deliberately studied the attributes of God in scripture. I love seeing all the places in the Bible that talk about God and His character.  

One of the gratitude prayer guides mentioned thankfulness for modern comforts—and as I was praying I looked at my sink and started to thank God for the fact that I have access to clean water…I literally walk 10 feet to get clean water each day! God was opening my eyes to a need in the world that I wasn’t even aware of…and I’m embarrassed to say that I was never aware of this. I finished praying and started looking into the statistics and I was in shock…

“Globally, 844 million people lack access to clean water. Without clean, easily accessible water, families and communities are locked in poverty for generations. Children drop out of school and parents struggle to make a living. Women and children are worst affected — children because they are more vulnerable to diseases of dirty water and women and girls because they often bear the burden of carrying water for their families for an estimated 200 million hours each day.

(Global water Crisis: World Vision)

Dirty water and poor sanitation kills over 5000 children every day!

Whoa!! Suddenly I didn’t care that I was not able to go to the yoga studio right now!  I was researching ministries that serve this need…It’s amazing how God can use things to move our hearts. To make us see something we “see” everyday (like a sink) but it’s when He gives us His eyes that our vision is suddenly 20/20.

As I mentioned before, podcasts have been soooo helpful during this time. The Boundless Show and The Porch are really good young adult ones. The Porch recently did a series on Esther which I really enjoyed.  I ordered a few books as well (I’ll share all of these resources below!). I started memorizing scripture-one psalm for every week in quarantine. Much like everything else, the biggest time of growth in my faith have come from the hardest fights. The times my heart has been wounded and I draw near the one in whom I find forgiveness and healing.  The word "steadfast" has been the word the Lord keeps bringing to my mind year after year. 

As things start to open back up again, I look back at this time and I can't help but smile.  I feel like the Lord just gave me an amazing gift. God has given me some pretty interesting "gifts" these past 5 years, but every-time I look back and say, "God your greatest gifts to me have come wrapped in fear and heartbreak." I'm confident that this quarantine is going to be one of the best things that ever happened to me. I mean I did create my Survivor Audition video in quarantine so maybe THAT can be the silver lining?! LOL 😂

Here are some of my top favs from quarantine: 

Books:
Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy (HERE)
Pilgrim's Progress (HERE)
The 4 Wills of God (HERE)

Podcasts:
The Porch (HERE) *Live youtube broadcasts Tues at 8pm Eastern
Boundless (HERE)
Gospel in Life (HERE) *Great series on Habakkuk (Trusting God in Difficult Times)

Prayer Guides:
30 Days of Gratitude (HERE)
Names and Attributes of God (HERE)
Prayers for Missions/Bible Translations (HERE)
COVID 19 Specific (HERE)

Running quarantine playlist: 
*Just reading the titles you can tell why these songs made the playlist LOL



Fun Memories: 
@kimjgabriel (IGTV) Click HERE 

Prayers for everyone in this time. We all face our own challenges in the midst of this pandemic. If there is anything I can be praying for specifically for you, please let me know 💕 I would love to lift you up in prayer! 

I should be leaving you with my survivor audition video...but I'll just wait until I actually get casted 😉 ...Stay tuned haha!