I am tired.

I’m choosing a slower pace and chasing the quiet, but my to-do list is long and life feels loud, ever-moving just like all the social media streams.

It’s been a few weeks since I wrote anything here, and honestly it feels like the words have disappeared, like the well dried up. It isn’t true, I know, because in the dark of night sentences roll across my mind and if enough of them come, I flip over and tap tap tap into the Notes section of my phone. I know it because I watch this plant reaching up toward the ceiling and I compose blog posts in my head, so effortlessly that it’s almost unsettling.

But the words, they’re stopped up somewhere. Sentences form and paragraphs are written but no thought feels complete, nothing coherent enough to share.

I am tired.

And also, I am fine.

You understand, I hope?

It’s the way life goes so often, isn’t it? Questions and answers, dark and light, silence and noise, confusion and familiarity, the beautiful ordinary right now of it all. It is good and it is exhausting and it’s a gift, all of it.

Yesterday I woke up and had a knowing inside that I needed to share it, the realness of the missing words and the desire to linger longer and the truth of so very much not having it all together. Under the covers with sleep still in my eyes, I tap tap tapped it out and hit publish before thinking twice. From Insta:

So the honest story is that I’m really tired. I’ve been running on coffee and God’s grace, and that isn’t a cliché. My ever-growing to-do list probably looks similar to yours, so I won’t spell it all out, but this week every item I’ve crossed off has immediately been replaced with two more things. Somehow when you make a conscious decision to be present instead of project-minded, to slow down and linger longer, life crashes in and speeds up, dragging you along.

So these are the words I’m listening to in the crazy of this week. This is the promise I need to hear and believe, even more than I need coffee and a really long nap. And I just thought, maybe, if you’re tired too, you might need this promise and a reminder that we don’t all have it all together. And if you’re not tired? Please share your secret and send coffee.

I honestly can’t tell you the last time I slept well, but I can tell you, without a doubt, that I hit publish and went about my day, only to find God waiting for me.

That verse, those words, they showed up five more times yesterday. On the radio, on social media, in a work-related project… rest, rest, rest. Come to Me and rest.

And then… last night, something crazy happened. The full story, told just minutes after it happened, is on my Instagram story for 24 hours (then it disappears). The shorter version is this:

I drafted these words you’re reading right here, but somewhere inside I knew the post wasn’t complete. I closed my computer and opened this book on rest and renewal, a book I’ve been meaning to read for an embarrassingly long time.

I started reading it and loving it and thinking “gosh that’s so true” and then after turning a few pages, I turned one more and found money. Yes, money. I don’t think I hid it from myself – why would I? – and so I just have to think it’s a gift from God. That’s a cliché, I know. But also? It’s a gift. It felt like He was right there saying, “Hey, I’ve got this. I see you. I know you’re tired and I know you’re doing your best to be present with your people while the to-do list lengthens. And I know finances are heavy on your mind. So, here. It’s time to rest now.”

The words will return. I’ll tell you my word for 2017, the one God gave me back in October, the same one that immediately received this response: Oh… umm, no. How about another word? No? Are You sure? Well, this will be interesting.

I’ll tell you a story from my time in Haiti, a story that began this time last year and hasn’t left my mind for one single day.

I’ll write about lingering longer, about how the words “based on a true story” change us, and maybe I’ll even wrap a few more words around the things He showed me in Israel.

For now, we sit and slow and savor and show up to life in all its beautiful crazy.

The words will return. God will provide. It’s what He does… it’s who He is.

So. Here’s to the ones who keep at it, who do the next right thing. The ones who open a new page and type and hit backspace but then write another sentence anyway. The ones who respond with kindness. The ones figuring out what to make for dinner. Again. Here’s to the ones trying to make ends meet, the ones working late and rising early. Here’s to the ones deleting the tweet before hitting post because it just doesn’t settle right somewhere inside. Here’s to the ones who are scared, unsure, and nervous, but they showed up anyway.

Here’s to letting our roots sink deep, waiting with hope and looking to Him. Come to Me, He says.

So I’m coming.

All is well and all is being made well

It’s an in between. I’m finding Him here too.

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