Winter in the summer Spring is coming.

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If you and I have had a conversation within the last 10 months it may have been clear that I have been in somewhat of a winter...much longer then any other natural season this one was in my heart.

Fast forward to now. I am embarking on a two month trip traveling across Central US. My goal is to inspire people to follow this Jesus guy in anything he is asking. Yes I am traveling with YWAM but that is not the answer. It's Jesus. Listen to him.

What to the last two paragraphs have to do with each other? I don't know really. Things happened last year at this time in my heart that felt great. Things seemed alive, but little did I know that it was just the beginning of a pretty sucky year. I found myself not making the healthiest decisions physically. I learned that I enjoy self inflicted pain much better then pain that others put on me and if I make it my own fault somehow it makes it better. (Yeah, I am discovering more and more about this lately.)

Here is what I have learned. When I enter a new season of life (Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer) there are lessons in each one that God can't teach me unless I walk through it with him.

I like to live my life in summer, it's a great time of year to be alive things are thriving and alive, funny and weird. But as I said before I have been in a long winter. Things seem dead and lifeless, I want to sleep though most of it, I have no energy for anything and I feel beat up. Life sucks. Sure I have had some amazing days in this winter (Brazil) but winter still loomed. It was heavy and there to remind me every moment that I couldn't really live to my fullest. I wanted to play like it was summer despite the engulfing darkness and bitter cold inside of me.

The strange part about this winter, I have heard so much from this Jesus fellow. Things that have flipped and literally changed my life. Amazing stuff. I caught a glimpse of what my future hold in my ministry, I have walked along side of Jesus and have been able to speak/pray into people's lives and he has moved in them. I learned again why I should trust and listen to him. I am striving for wisdom and I catch tiny glimmers of it. But it has still been winter in my life.

Though I tried and I tried to force myself out of this funk I have been unsuccessful in all my attempts.

But there is a fresh wind a blowing. I can feel things changing and moving. There is still pain of the ground thawing and cracking and the glacier of my heart breaking off, but that just leads to life. Cold refreshing water just a trickle at the start but I can feel the momentum...things are picking up. Old energy and clarity is returning. The water is moving the once frozen soil and nutrients are being carried downstream. God is alive.

I get to spend the next 2 months crammed on a tour bus with 8 other people that I am not too familiar with. But spring is here. New things are planted in the spring time. New challenges are accepted. I am expecting to use muscles that I haven't used in years on this trip. Things I haven't prayed out or had the guts to say before I will do. Pray for things I never imagined praying for will happen in the coming weeks. I am stoked for this new time of life. This birthing of new and old dreams coming true, to finally fight not in someone else's armor but my own.

Thank you Jesus for a crazy time in my life. As for new challenges, bring it on. I am ready and willing to depend on you and not trust in my own ways but acknowledge you for the great God that you are. Thank you for letting me walk your narrow road. I am ready to live Isaiah 35 in my life.