So what exactly are we looking for?
We are looking to be loved. needed. wanted. admired. adored.
We want to make a difference...we want to be beautiful. something different. remembered.
We strive for. greatness. value. success. happiness. joy.
We are made in the innate imagine of God, and God himself...knows each and every desire of our heart, for he has that same desire for us.
Lets flash back to May of 2009.
Life was good. College was easy, friends were overflowing, money was coming in, and I was what you would consider...definitely on the “right track”. I found myself at the center of everything, and what at the time was my greatest desire, became my biggest downfall. I spent all the time loving myself, pleasing myself, doing what made it me happy, what made me look good. Truth is, I was selfish, and I was in a season of destruction, a season of void, a season of looking for all the right things, but in all the wrong places. I could not stop for directions, because I didn’t even realize I was lost.
I found my value in the eyes of man, which in an honest way....led me only into what I wanted the arms of man. In the midst of this, I stumbled into the arms of someone that will forever be remembered as the person that with Gods help started my life.
In life, you’ll find yourself meeting that person that divides it. Life before this person, and after...and when you find that person. The journey to what your looking for will never, ever be the same.
My journey to johno, begins with tyler. At the time, I did not believe I could fall in love, or that it was necessary. I believed in having fun, and doing whatever I wanted at the moment I wanted too, not really caring who it affected in the process. I was carefree, I was on my own, I was looking for something I didnt even know was missing.
Tylers eyes were blue. His smile contagious. His heart of Gold. In a short amount of time, he became my best friend, my exception to EVERY rule I had put on my own heart. I found him to be everything I always knew I wanted, and I wanted him to be mine.
We spent our summer nights staring at the stars, then each other, then the stars again. We found ourselves on the beach in the middle of the night in sleeping bags, on long drives to no where, backyard BBQS, ambulances, and even a funeral. Tyler in the midst of our love story, reminded me that death is always the spring of new life. He cried with me, laughed with me, cuddled me, fought with me, and completely brought me to a place of peace. He told me, “ You have to go after what your dreams are, You have to fight for them “ I fell in love, and I could no nothing to stop it.
God on the other hand, tried everything to stop it, and I didn’t listen. I lost myself with Tyler, the way a lot of people do when infatuation happens. All caught up in the affirmation, believing that truly identity could be found in another person. what a lie, identity..true identity would never be found in the arms of man, but instead in the heart of a father, a heavenly father.
God spoke to me in September a night I drove way from Tylers in tears, he said it’d be the last time I’d see him. I couldn’t believe God would take away something that I thought was sent to me from him. I confused, hurt, I knew it in my heart. GOD you sent me Tyler, why would you want me to walk away from him? especially into the arms of HER.
Tyler broke my heart, and when he walked away, I couldn’t help but let him leave. my pride was my barrier, my wall, and I shut down. I cleaned up the mess I made for myself, and told myself I would never...ever fall in love again. I told God I just didn’t understand, and my pain didn’t let me do much else. The next couple months I found myself numb, alone, and angry. Memories remained, and my heart stayed the same.
6 am came too early Halloween morning. In a dead sleep I was awakened abruptly by my phone....seeing that it was Tylers sister on the phone. As soon as I saw her name, heard her voice, and heard the voice of God even before she could say anything....
I knew Tyler was dead.
LIFE. you just truly never know what it will bring you. Even writing this right now, all I can think is...MY GOD MY GOD...you are oh so faithful.
I entered into the most devastating season of my life. A season of sleepless nights, days without eating, tears that I thought would never stop. A heart that was so broken, I didn’t ever think I could be whole again.
But in that season...I found God like I never had before, I found life, I found true love in the arms of my healer, in the arms of my father, in the arms of my Jesus. He turned every mourning moment into dancing, and showed me that in his faithfulness was his protection. A protection I never thought could come from a loving God, while I was too busy being selfish, he was busy being selfless. My god My god. your so faithful.
Tylers death brought a brand new understanding to my life, and it was in that moment that I absolutely knew that I had two choices, I would either choose to walk in the pain, loss, and desperation for love in the path to destruction....Or I could choose to understand that ALL of GODS ways are good, that he knows what he is doing, and that it is only him that can bring healing and comfort through any storm...and I wanted to dance in the rain...I really did.
You never find what your looking for in MAN, you find it in God. It is through God that he brings you into the right arms of a man. A man you know he has knitted together in his mothers womb perfectly created to be the representation of Christ that he has called him to be.
I was so lost in myself, that I was too busy to even think of what he was doing in a man 3,000 miles away that he would have for me a year later. That year, although the hardest year of my life, brought me to such a place of deep intimacy with Jesus I could never ask for more, and when I finally found what I was looking for in the Lord, he introduced me to an amazing man named Johno, who absolutely turned my world upside down...while teaching me to love again. My God, My God you are so faithful.
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