For I know the plans...

Excuse the wedding dress!  This is the most recent picture I have with Abby (in the pink dress).
Also pictured is our friend, Sara, who taught me all I know about leading youth small groups!

This week, I got an email from a friend, Abby, asking if she could guest post on this little blog.  My poor blog needs some love, so I said "yes" immediately, having no idea what she was sending.  When I read her post, I got chills.  I had been thinking about some kind of New Years post but had no real direction with it.  Abby's post was perfect, and I can't wait to share it, but first some background information on the writer...

I met Abby when she was in the 8th grade, and I was in college.  I helped co-lead her small group that year.  The small group met at her parent's house, so I got to know Abby and her parents so well.  My class schedule kept me from staying with her small group through high school, but my involvement with youth group and the love I had developed for her family kept me close to Abby.  I got to see this beautiful, bubbly 13 year old grow into a remarkable, poised, faithful woman.  Our friendship grew and changed so that one of the last years we both lived in Greenville, we met together weekly to study the Bible - truly the Hebrews picture of "spurring one another on in love." I will never forget our honest, open conversations.  Our mutual frustrations with dating and fears about the future.  The prayers for big decisions and life changes.  It will always be my favorite memory with Abby, and I am so thankful God gave me the opportunity to know her.

Below are her words.  I hope you find them as special as I did!  

Well, it is officially January 2, 2016 and I have managed to fail miserably at almost all of my new years resolutions. I have managed to drag all of my bad holiday eating habits right in to the new year, I have not made it to the gym (and I even work there) and I am pretty sure I have spent the entirety of 2016 stressing out about things way out of my control. It is so crazy how quickly we can become discouraged by our shortcomings. 48 hours and I am already ready to throw in the towel. 2015 was nothing like how I would have imagined it would be and I am certain that 2016 will be filled with its fair share of upsets and surprises, but I am eased by the reassurance that God has a great plan for not only the next year but my for life.

Don’t get me wrong 2015 was an exciting year. I got to spend the first year of marriage with my best friend. We spent great time with our family and friends, we went on a couple of great vacations, and we shared in a ton of laughter.  However, in this first year of feeling such closeness with another person I felt the most internal struggle. There were times this year that I felt like life had just punched me right in the stomach, moments of complete discouragement, times were I could not see even the slightest glimmer of direction in my life.  I felt like I had drawn the short straw and I was upset with God about it. It seemed like everyone was thriving and excelling except for me. I was surrounded by the most uplifting and wonderful people encouraging me and telling me it was all going to work out and everything was going to be okay and I knew that was the case but I just couldn’t see what God was working in my life, I hated being so out of control of the situation. I prayed so many prayers for clarity and understanding. I wanted to see “The Plan”. 

I had been doing so well checking off the boxes in my 5-year plan, up until now. I spent a lot of 2015 in this back and forth struggle of not understanding, frustration, prayer, and more frustration. At times I considered giving up on my passions, I constructed new plans and made new goals, but in the end I still didn’t feel any satisfaction.  I set my worth in worldly things, in education, in a career and I kept coming up short.  

God continued to shift my story; put me in places that were not apart of my plan. That’s when it hit me.  One of my favorite scriptures is Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. “I had taken comfort in that verse many a time, but I don’t think I had really even taken the time to really think about it.  I just kind of skipped over to the part about plans hope and a future. The key part I was missing was the, “For I know” part. It doesn’t say for you and I know the plans. All this time I was praying for understanding and knowledge of his plan when I needed to just be enjoying watching it unfold right in front of me. 

Looking back on the past year I would not trade it for anything. I have grown and started friendships, and had amazing opportunities that I never could have imagined possible, but it was not with out its far share of tears and pain. 2 Corinthians 12:9 states, But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.  In a couple of weeks I get back to eating right, working out regularly and hopefully being stressed less, but there will be days that I will have a bag of M&Ms for dinner and miss a couple workouts. I can also be pretty sure there will be days that I will become overwhelmed with stress about the future and maybe even discouraged, but I will rest easy knowing that his grace is always sufficient.