In 2015,
I got so busy with UNI DM, I forgot to spend time with some of those that mean the most to me.
There were days where I didn't think anybody wanted to be my friend. Silly, I know.
I barely spoke to some great friends for a few months because I wasn't honest about my feelings.
I spent the first few months of the year saying "no" to God at every turn because it was easier then saying "yes".
This year, when I wasn't doing the greatest, these were some of the things that I tended to focus my attention on. I would forget about the good times that I had and dwell on the bad.
On December 31, I posted a photo on Instagram - a collage of some of my favorite moments of 2015. As I scrolled through the camera roll on my phone, I found hundreds of pictures from this past year that I had totally forgotten about. As I scrolled my way back to January, I was reminded of how many cool things I had done over the past year.
I finished up a year of working with an executive team that was so selfless with their time and constantly challenged me to be better.
I travelled to Chicago 3 times with my best friends and spent days exploring the city and drinking A LOT of coffee.
I graduated from UNI and couldn't stay away, so I started a graduate program here too.
I got to teach middle school kids all about who Jesus is and watch them grow in their faith at a camp that taught me the same more than a decade ago.
So why tell you all this?
Well, the good and the bad times that 2015 brought were inevitable; good and bad things happened and the same is going to be true for 2016.
These past few months though, I've been recognizing that God is always there. He is always present. He is always working. Now it's not to say that I didn't already know this, but these past few months, I've accepted the truth behind the statement.
There's a song that I've really enjoyed listening to the past few months called I Will Follow by Vertical Church Band. One of my favorite lines of the song goes, "In the good things and in the hardest part, I believe and I will follow You."
This song perfectly encompasses all that 2015 was for me. 2015 was a year that I grew a lot in my faith. It wasn't perfect, and the journey that I took to get to where I'm at wasn't the smoothest in the world, but through it all, God was there. Through the fights with my friends that I just didn't understand why they were happening, God was there. And through all the adventures I had the chance to take, God was there too.
God never leaves us. God never stops being God. Even when I chose to say no to Him, God was saying yes to me. 2016 is going to be a lot like 2015, but through the good and through the bad, I am choosing to follow Him.
“I believe everything that You say You are
I believe that I have seen Your unchanging heart
In the good things and in the hardest part
I believe and I will follow You”