A Letter to my Poppop

Dear Poppop,

You are missed. As the 21st anniversary of your death is approaching it still feels like yesterday I lost you. I walked beside you as you fought a good fight to stay alive. I remember being beside you as you lay in your hospital bed. I remember the pain in your eyes yet your love and humor never ceased to make me smile.

I still remember the smell of cigarettes and leather with a hint of double mint gum on the rides to church. I remember sitting in the garage watching you doing what you love and never backing down from a challenge. I remember you falling asleep watching wrestling or NASCAR and we would try to change it and you would wake up and yell at us.

I’ve held onto 11 years of memories but I’ve held onto 21 years of hurt. The last words from you I remember are, “Tanya, give me one more hug because I don’t know if I’ll ever see you again”. In the moment I was quiet, I took it like a champ just like you’ve would’ve wanted, I was dying inside. A week later we got a phone call, you went home.

But I lost the man who loved me unconditionally, the man who couldn’t get mad at me regardless of how many times I messed up and acted up. I lost my best friend, my grandfather, I lost a piece of me.

God gave us a time together that will go down in history but I’m still struggling with my 11 year old self trying to get passed this hurt today. I’m not who I was 21 years ago. The root of my pain and is driven by the hurt I felt the day you took that last breath. I ran away from God. I pretended he didn’t exist for many years. I filled my void with alcohol, pornography, and men beginning at the age of 13. I lost all self worth and identity. I stopped believing in who you told me I was. I blamed myself for your death, “If I only prayed more, if I was there more, if I was a better granddaughter, if I loved more”

I didn’t know who I was anymore. I never found myself until I got a glimpse of the God you believed in, I met Jesus. I got to finally feel the love you had for me. I got to witness the man you tried to be for me. I want to say that from that moment I was a completely different person. But I wasn’t. My life changed drastically, roads I was going down rerouted to where God wanted me but it took years to dig through the sin and it’s still taking time fighting the enemy and my flesh to get back to who I was before you died. There’s still shame, guilt, and more I’m still digging up I have to work through. But with Jesus I can do all things, you taught me that, I was just too blind to see.

Thank you for loving me like your own daughter. Thank you for teaching me even though I was too blind to see. Love you Poppop. Until we meet again.

Your Granddaughter,

Tanya

The Seed

2006. My first true freshman year of college. I was at High Point University. A university I never actually applied to because we couldn’t afford to pay the application fee. But I got the letter anyway.

Anyway, it was my first time being away from family. My first time I felt true “freedom”. I went into college as political science major, my dream at the time was to be lawyer. So since I knew I would stressed out, I decided to do the thing that would ease anxiety and stress, sing. I joined a group called University Singers at my college. We would sing at events and one time we event went to NYC to sing at a church. It was an unforgettable experience. I’ve never had experienced anything like that before.

In University Singers was this amazing young woman, Stephanie. There was something different about her. She was handicapped but she didn’t let it stop her. She shared her faith with me when I didn’t want to hear it. In my mind the only thing I could think about was “I wonder what I’m doing on Friday night? Whose having a party?” I didn’t care at the time what she was saying but my soul cared because it longed to be like hers. It envied her.

That year I was almost suspended from school because I was caught drinking and completely wasted throwing up in women’s bathroom in my dorm. And It wasn’t the first time. I talked my way out of the suspension and a large fine by getting community service and a minimal fine. But even through that Stephanie never gave up on me, I would tell her what I did and she didn’t care. She loved me through it. Something different.

My glimmer of light and hope shattered suddenly. Stephanie passed away unexpectedly. I can’t say it shattered my world because I was more focused on me and my fleshly desires. But it opened my eyes. The school did a dedication to her so the University Singers got up and sang a few of her favorite songs. I Can Only Imagine was one of them. This song resinated in my soul and every time I heard it, I cried. I had no real idea of what the song was about but my soul cried for it.

I transferred schools that year because I wanted to be “comfortable” next to friends. So I transferred schools to Lynchburg College. My flesh took over full fledge and hatred for Christianity began to stir up inside of me. I would debate it until my face was blue. I had all the answers. I would mock it. I would be mean to anyone who believed in it. I was an unpleasant person.

There were times I would listen to the songs we song at her dedication because it took to a place I couldn’t let go of. These songs were her light shinning through. They were hope. But I hid them from everyone. I didn’t want to be a “softy” or a hypocrite. So I only would put it on when I was completely stressed to the max.

6 years after the seed was planted, I found Jesus. That hope they sing about was found. My soul that holding on to those words was home. I felt alive for the first time.

Life happens but it’s what you take away that’s important. People come and people go. But there are people who you might only see for a very short moments that will end up changing your life forever.

Love like Jesus. Live with your faith in your sleeve. Never give up hope. And always listen to the spirit inside of you. We are chosen, sons and daughters of a living God. This world is not our home. Our father has a place for us in heaven…. I can only imagine.

Untapped Power

Prayer is an untapped source of power to so many. Many of us unknowingly put it off as just another task to do or we just need to check that religious box, “I prayed today”. But it’s so powerful and we shouldn’t neglect it. Why do we open our lips before we get on our knees? Why do we think we have it all figured out, when in reality we know only a small amount of anything?

Jesus said in John 15:5, “I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.” We can do NOTHING of the spirit without him, yet we think we can rule this world and this flesh without him. We think that if we don’t pray, it all will work itself out but it’s a wrong way to think.

Prayer is so powerful we shouldn’t neglect it. We need to cry out for our city, our neighborhoods, the lost, our nation. We should cry out to God about the darkness in this world because it is not okay. We should cry to God to surrender all of us because we need to be filled with all of Him. We can’t change the world by ourselves but with God anything is possible.

This world needs Jesus. This city of Baltimore is in desperate need of Jesus. We can’t expect mountains to move if we never get our knees.

Picture of the Past

So tonight I can across a picture with my niece and me. I was watching her and then taking her to church the next day. However, behind the facade of my goofy face was a terribly hung over broken woman.

What my niece didn’t know is that the night before I went to celebrate my friends birthday. But I just kept drinking. I didn’t see a limit. I paid for it. I blacked out. People who “knew” me saw a side of me they hadn’t seen… but wait a few months prior they did. You see I did the same thing a few months earlier at a party. I was drinking and drinking and just not caring about me or anyone else. It was my escape from the darkness I was living in. It was my “high”.

The night with my niece hurt me. I could not offer the love, support, or even fun times. I couldn’t keep anything down. My insides and head were throbbing in pain. I was defeated.

The next day was church and my niece was so excited! I put on a happy face and we went. I never felt more like a lair or failure that day. Anytime someone would try to ask questions, I simply deflected them and just try to push through for my niece.

Later that night, after saying goodbye to my niece, I fell to my knees and I wept. I was still in pain, hungover, and broken. I remember screaming out to God in frustration because I was reliving my life before I got saved. I was moving backwards in faith of what felt like deliberately, because part of it was in my hands of control or at least I thought it was.

God changed my heart that night on those knees. He turned me around and covered me. He took those burdens, that shame from me and put it on himself. I surrendered that night to who I was and to be molded into who God designed me to be. That was three years ago today.

Alcohol was my drug of choice it was one of my secret sins that I didn’t want people to know about so it’s actually one of the hardest to talk about. Where I didn’t drink much, when I did it was ugly and nasty. I used to tell myself I drink because it makes me comfortable in my own skin or it allows me to be “me” because there is no filter. Let me tell you those are all lies the enemy tells you to convince you to have one more drink because the more we numb ourselves the more we focus on this world and our flesh. So I was never “me”, I was the ugly version of me because I was closer to the enemies mouth than my ear was to God’s voice.

Alcoholism is real. Drug addiction is real. Luckily there is help and hope. God states he will never abandon you nor forsake you. He has and will always love you. You are his Son or daughter. He cares for you. There is hope found in Jesus. He died so that you might live.

Sacrifice

The other night in growth group one of the ladies asked “How do you even begin to know what Jesus went through?”

I answered with something our Pastor said awhile ago.

“Love is rooted in sacrifice.” – Pastor Tally Wilgis

God sent his Son, Jesus to be the sacrificial lamb. He sent Jesus to die for us so we didn’t have to.

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 6:23

He sent his Son because he loves us because he wants us to be with him for eternity. We get the free gift of eternal life, but Jesus lived in this world and then voluntarily hung on executioners cross and died for our sins just so all of us can have the gift of eternal life.

Think about that for a moment, Jesus died for you. He voluntarily got up on the cross. He is God in flesh, he could’ve stop it. But he didn’t. He didn’t want to die in Matthew 26:39 Jesus says “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” In another Gospel it says he was so anguished that he was sweating drops of blood. Can you now imagine what he was going through? I still couldn’t.

But I said to them for us to experience even a glimpse of what he went through. Try doing something for someone else when you don’t want to or don’t have the time to. It might be a silly sacrifice but when you had a hard day at work and all you can think about our pjs and your favorite shows and someone you know is hurting or is having a rough day, try switching your plans around to put them first above your own. You’ll get frustrated and you might even get mad because you don’t want to sacrifice the time or energy of your own time.

One of my big things I tell myself is when I don’t want to do something it probably means I should be doing it. Meaning that when I evaluate something by my mere flesh and worldly views my automatic response is I don’t want to. I don’t have time. I don’t have the energy. But when I evaluate through the lens of the spirit I immediately go through it differently. I ask is this purposeful? Does it impact a person? The Kingdom? Is it meaningful? So when I don’t want to do something a lot of times it’s my flesh fighting back because my flesh doesn’t want to put others above me.

One of my pet peeves is when people say they follow Jesus and “live it out” but there is no sacrificing for others and it’s always about them.

God is Love. Love is rooted in sacrifice. And in order for us to show the love of God we have sacrifice time, talent, treasure. We have to be willing to give something even when there is no return.

Meeting you at the point

In Genesis 22, Abraham was to sacrifice his son after God told him to do so. But the beauty is when they go to altar, God showed up. God had Abraham free his son and provided a ram to be sacrificed in his place. God met Abraham in the place after he placed a calling on him and Abraham was following through.

God will meet you where he called you, just not on your timing. I’ve been struggling with faith, I’ve been struggling on whether this life is what God has called me to do, I’ve been struggling with connection with God, I’ve been struggling with a relationship with God. It’s been rough. It’s been battles with the enemy, internal struggles and some very dark days. God promises me he will never leave me nor forsake me. He promises he will always love me and he is working all things for good for those who love him.
But I didn’t want to hear it. I didn’t want to hear the goodness of God. It was as if I put myself in this box and the enemy decided to trap me in there and tried convinced me that God had forgotten me, and repeatedly told me if he truly called me then I wouldn’t be going through this pain. But all this time, God was out there telling me to hold on because I had to endure this moment to get to where God wanted me but I couldn’t hear him over the words of the enemy. I was right where the enemy wanted me, trapped in my own thoughts.

But I was set free. You see there was this moment I had to pull over and allow tears to just flow down my face and be broken before God. At this very point was the point at which God met me. I yelled. I screamed at God. But a peace had come over me. It was in that moment that I knew I was free and all I had to do was let go. 
God will meet you where he wants you. Today I walked into church with more happiness and joy than any Sunday over the last few months. I got to serve Jesus today and for that I am thankful. 

The Brick Wall

There’s a wall. I can’t tell exactly what put it there or when it got put up. I haven’t been able to journal in a long time. I can write posts or do a quick journal but to dig deep, I can’t even get passed it. It’s like road block.

I put on a mask without even realizing I’m doing it.  I pretend that I am who I am on the outside of the wall. Everything is surface level, including most, if not all, of my relationships. I don’t even know what’s behind the wall.

Maybe it’s my heart, my trust, that I locked away because every time I tend to get close to someone, we end up parting ways not on good terms. Maybe it’s my past that I haven’t fully moved on from and that past addiction that keeps haunting me. Maybe it’s because I isolated myself from the world because I don’t want to admit that I’m extremely broken and that I need Jesus every moment of every day. Maybe I’m hiding from fear; fear of failing, fear of being inadequate, fear of  judgement.

In service Sunday we were taking communion. As I began to ask God what I needed to ask for repentance for a full list of things started popping in my head. I was taken back by it but as I repeated them I remembered them. It was a game changer. 

It has allowed me to get back up on my feet and move forward. Even if it means  it’s a slow removal of the wall brick by brick. God knows why the wall is up, even if I have no clue. The best thing I can do is hand him the papers to it so he  completely knock it down. Otherwise, all I can do is fight the wall, and the wall will always win because I don’t have the strength on my own to fight it. 
 

Center of it All

I came to realization that I typically take whatever topic and talk about myself and my past and how I can use what was taught to grow myself and hopefully others. There’s a flaw in that however. A flaw that is drilled into all of us. It’s all about me. Why? Why do I have to talk about myself? Using my own personal stories to reflect on the Word of God is great, but if you take a blog, even my blog, and you read it, it’s centered around one thing, ourselves. 

“Well then what’s the point of a blog if its not about me?” Here’s the thing, if you are a Christ follower and I pray you are, it should reflect your life, and Christ should the center of your life not yourself. So many of us will take negative situations and allow it to affect our emotions, feelings, and our day even weeks to years. We give the situation control of our lives, all because we allow it to affect us, because it’s all about us. BUT it’s not suppose to be about us.

Jesus did not die for us to be in our own self pity world. He suffered and died for us to live in freedom in him. Negative things happen, but we can’t define ourselves as the situation. Allow Jesus to set us free from all the horizontal chains and weights we put on ourselves.

Jesus loves all, love like him. Jesus forgives, forgive like him. Jesus shows mercy, allow mercy to flow through you. Jesus was sinless, live a life trying to achieve a sinless life. Jesus redeemed us, live in freedom. Jesus said to love your neighbor as yourself, love yourself so that you can show love to your neighbor. 

Loving yourself is hard. However, God made you. He doesn’t make junk. He makes wonderful and lovely things. You have purpose in life, even if you do not see it. God made you just the way you are. God loves you. God is your Father. Love yourself because The Creator of the World is the Creater of You. 

A Planted Seed

High Point University, a university I was only at for one year, a university where I became friends with people, I still talk to day or at least friends with on Facebook. If we weren’t playing Spades in the lobby of the dorm, some of us would be out partying, including myself. I lost myself that year to alcohol, I got in trouble numerous times, put on probation, and almost kicked out. I lied my way through it all. But through all the law and rule breaking, God was still reaching out to me.

I joined University Singers a group/choir meshed up with misfits and some amazing voices during the fall semester. I met some amazing people there. One in particular had a mission to change to my life.

She was handicapped. My selfish heart felt sorry for her, felt as if I had to take a stand and become friends with her because everyone deserves friends. So we would spend some afternoons walking and talking. I may have been hungover some days, she didn’t seem to care. She was there to start her ministry, her dream was to become a minister, to reach people like herself.

Jesus was the topic of discussion must days. Everyday I would say, “that’s your thing”, “I don’t really care”,” I don’t believe in any of that” and give ridiculous or political reasons as to why, “I don’t even know if there is a God”. Jesus just wasn’t it for me. She knew I felt that way. But she didn’t stop sharing.

One tragic morning, I get a call. This girl who was trying to speak life into me, passed away. She was only 19 years old. If God really existed, she shouldn’t  have died, He wouldn’t have taken her life, not that soon. Her dreams never saw the light of day. This light I had in my life, was blown out as quickly as it was lit. I had no idea what to do, I was lost.

Some of my friends and I took the trip to her funeral. It was beautiful, but sad. High Point University later that week, put on their own dedication ceremony for her. University Singers was asked to sing because after all she was apart of it. We sang her two favorite songs, both Christian. The one I remember the most was, “I Can Only Imagine” by Mercy Me. As the words left my lips that day of her dedication, tears started to build, there was something about that song that planted in my soul.

Four years ago, I was heading down pathways that were dark and dreary. I started losing hope. I felt like a failure. I was rock bottom. Suddenly, I came across her picture I had.  “I Can Only Imagine”  started playing in my head. I downloaded it and listened to it on repeat. I felt as if that girl who tried to speak life into me was right there with me telling me it will be okay.

One year later, I realized who actually was with me telling me it was going to be okay. Everything she had said to me before, every promise she had ever stated, was true. Jesus is the answer and I saw why she had the dream she had.

I may have only known her a few months before the Lord took her home, but she was the most inspirational and the most loving person I have ever met. She was not scared of anything or anyone. She only had a love for Jesus and to share it with those around her. She may have not lived out her dream of being a full time minister but she reached this poor lost soul, I was part of her mission here on earth and for that I am joyful and thankful.

Last night, was the first night I had the chance to worship publicly to a song that  changed my life. I wanted to break down in tears with praise. I am forever thankful and cannot wait to see her face to face in heaven.

Judgement

We use social media only to show our best side, only to impress others. This is true. We use every source to impress others typically without even realizing what we are doing. Why? Because most of us only want people to see our good side, we don’t want to be judged by others. We live the majority of our lives in fear of what others might think, or at least I do.

But the blessing is God will not reject us.

God is by our side every time we fall. Every time we trip during our walk with Jesus. According to Psalm 139,  he was the very creator of your path, why would he judge you on the very thing he put in your life for to grow from?

I am know that I will fail, that I will be judged because I have posted something wrong, or have offended someone. I constantly worry about what others think, where that may be a gift at times, it has stopped me from doing things I used to love, to opening up to people, to just being me.  But it also has helped me, it has allowed me to realize God is the only one who can truly judge me.

In todays world, we are constantly judging others. We judge them based on their looks, on their skin tone, on their attitude, on their past, on their decisions, on every detail of their life. Why? Because they are not like you.

You may hear, “Oh, I wouldn’t have done that” or “Look over there [giggle]”. Let me tell you, I am afraid of judgment it has paralyzed me at times. I am afraid sometimes to make decisions or to say what I feel is right because I am afraid I will be wrong, and if I am wrong, then I will be judged and unworthy of everything. I can blame society for this, I can blame the fact that I have this shy little girl inside of me that gets her feelings hurt if someone says something negative to her. But I won’t. The only true one who can judge me is the very creator who knitted me together in my mother womb, God.

I did not pick my life. I did not pick what I went through as a child. I did not pick my skin tone. I did not pick my personality. So if people want to judge, let them judge because they are stating that God didn’t know what he was doing. But He did.

I am the only person who can let judgement affect me. I am the only person who can let it get under my skin. But from this moment I am walking this walk with Jesus, not afraid on condemnation, not afraid of judgement, because let people judge. I have nothing to hide.