I'm sitting in a newly discovered coffee shop super close to my Budapest-home, and I'm reflecting on all that has changed in 2016. I could spend time mentioning the devastation, disappointments, and shocks of 2016 worldwide news... but let's face it. There are people who get their livelihood from studying that stuff and writing about it.
As I think about this past year, and the word presence that was my focus (blogpost here), I see a very clear dichotomy: Times that I chose the Lord's presence, and times I hid from it. Times I chose to be present with His people, and times I chose to disengage.
More than any other year, 2016 has been a year of transitions. January saw me teaching 4th grade in rural Indiana, living with a close friend, and feeling entirely independent. December found me teaching middle school history in a capital city of two million, an ocean away from my closest friends and family, living with my grandma, often feeling reliant on others for simple tasks.
I've tried to transition gracefully, but there are times I know I failed. I know there were times I ran from the Lord's presence instead of running to Him. There were times I avoided people because it was too overwhelming to love, while knowing I was leaving.
But I also realized that my greatest blessings came in times when I did choose presence. Choose. Because being present and seeking God's presence is a daily choice. An hourly choice. A moment by moment choice. To choose to live in community, or in isolation. To choose to rely on myself, or rely on Him.
During the season of support raising, I discovered my greatest failures were weeks (yes, weeks) when I relied on myself. When my pride crippled me from asking for help. It was only when I humbled myself, and sought the Lord's face, (and His people), that He provided. Abundantly more than I could have ever asked or imagined.
I learned to be present in a classroom and a school I knew I was leaving even before the school year started. Though there were daily difficulties and frustrations, I learned what it looks like to invest the temporal (time and resources) into eternity (souls). I learned what it means to plant seeds and be content to leave them to someone else to water and harvest.
There were moments I gave up deep peace because I refused to come to Jesus. I refused to tell him my burdens because I felt like I couldn't. But looking back, I have only myself to blame for any distance I felt this year. Because I'm the one always keeping him away. Sometimes I don't want to bother him with my foolish stories, my silly victories, my heartbreaks because he has much more important things to deal with. Like ISIS and the refugee crisis and the election. Other times I'm like the little girl on her two wheel bike for the first time: feisty and independent. I push him away the moment my "training wheels" are off. Because I can handle things by myself. He runs close beside me, holding onto me as I pedal fast and furiously... but I yell for him to let go and let me go and to give me space. And almost instantly I'm on the ground, nursing my wounds and whimpering. Too embarrassed to ask him to pick me up. But he's already there. Arms outstretched. All I have to do is nod and he's holding me, comforting me, praying over me. Sometimes I'm the teenager storming past him in my world of noise. Too embarrassed to acknowledge him in front of my friends, questioning our relationship and wondering if it's really worth everything. I slam the door in his face even when I feel the tug to be open and share my heart with him. And then, when my heart breaks, he's the one knocking on my door quietly asking for me to let him in. He reminds me of his love, even though there's a part of me that always doubts. I've been afraid to accept the kind of unconditional love that he offers because I know I can't give it back. Because I know I will hurt him thousands of times. And yet, still he is there, forever offering his presence.
And of course the theme of everything this Christmas was "Emmanuel, God with us" (in English and Hungarian), reminding me over and over that the greatest gift is His presence. The fact that infinite God became confined in the body of an infant. The fact that He knew that intimacy is only achieved through vulnerability (thanks Ann Voskamp). And so, seeking perfect intimacy, He left His heavenly throne to become the most vulnerable: a baby, born in a stable, laying in the filth and muck of this world. To bridge the gap between heaven and earth. The holy and the impure. And yet, that stable, that manger, that hay became a holy meeting place of the perfect and the imperfect. And it transformed the world forever.
I have failed many times to be present, but I have learned the gift of His presence. I have learned that there is deep peace to be found in His presence. Even when I think it will do no good. Even when I think I'm too busy or it's a waste of time, or that it will never offer the peace I'm looking for.
Because in His presence there is fullness of joy which can be found nowhere else. Because His presence is a taste of heaven and eternity on this tired earth: when God will forever make His dwelling place among man, and He will be their eternal comfort.
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