It’s been a while since I wrote the words that have been on my heart. I’ve stayed quiet because for so long I didn’t know how to overcome the fears that other people had put on me. It’s the middle of February and lately the only thing I keep hearing is “What’s your plan after college?”, “What job opportunity are you going to take?”, and “You have to start settling down and get a big girl job now that you’re almost done with college”. For so long I’ve kept quiet because some part of me believed the lies that I had to get my life on track in order to be successful. That for some reason I was going to have to start making even bigger decisions for myself like getting a full time job and move out of the house and so on. We live in a world where people will always set that bar high for you. People will always voice their opinion on what you’re lacking but those are the moments that we have to stop and reflect on what heaven is saying. It’s in the middle of our doubt that God longs to make himself known to us. One of the biggest misconceptions I had about God was that I had to be perfect all the time. I couldn’t ever allow myself to break down or have bad days because I thought that we had to represent the best version of God in this world, and God was perfect. This is the biggest lie you could ever tell yourself! God never created you to be perfect all the time, nor does He want you to. All He wants is our hearts. The good, the bad, the ugly. He wants us to not push him away when life gets hard because He’s the only one who knows how much it hurts. These past few months have been a rollercoaster of emotions. I’ve had incredible days, and days where I didn’t want to get out of bed and face this world. What’s funny is that He wants to go through it all with us. He doesn’t care how messed up you think you are, or the situation your in is, He just wants to be present.
I graduate in 2 months and I’m not worried. I don’t really know what my life will look life and I’m okay with it. The good thing is that God doesn’t care how much money you make, or if you have your whole life planned out because He already does. For the longest time I’ve wanted to travel and walk in the fullness that God created me to be, but there’s always been things that arise that take up my full attention. For some reason even after I push God away He never leaves. He’s always there in the quiet, waiting until we realize we need him and want him back, and then He points us north again.
Why Phoenix
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I’ve never been one for a plan. In fact I used to hate planning because it meant that I had to have everything figured out. The other day I was at the lake watching the sun shine on the horizon illuminating the water in a way i wish I could engrave in my mind. In that moment I reflected over the past 4 years I’ve had in the desert. When i first found out I was moving to Phoenix I was excited to get away and make a life for myself, but I did’t know how what that would mean. I didn’t know how many things I would have to sacrifice, how many nights I would spend angry that God chose the desert of all places for me to call home. Now that my time is almost up it’s almost sad that I’ll have to leave the place I found myself. There may not be an ocean, or cold weather during the winter, and extremely hot summers, but this was where I learned more about myself. It’s funny how the name (Phoenix) is a bird that built its own pyre and then was reborn from the ashes. I’m learning to understand the way that God works. With Him there is no room for coincidence, and He creates everything with purpose. He sent me here to rebuild my life from the ashes and to find who I was created to be.
What’s Next
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Up until last Thursday i had no idea what my life would hold after April 26th, and to be honest I wasn’t really worried. I’d been offered a job opportunity to move to Amsterdam to do what I love most, but something did’t feel right about this opportunity. Another option was to move back to LA and to work in the film industry, but that too felt like I would be settling. In December I decided to apply for Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry in Redding CA. I had been waiting for 4 years to finish college to finally apply, and now that the time was up I wasn’t sure if this was the fullness that God wanted for me. I had been so filled with the doubt that people had subconsciously placed over me for the past few months that I didn’t want to take a step into any direction out of fear of missing out on the greater, the incredible. This past Thursday I had my interview and during the interview I knew exactly this was the place that God had called me to be. Four hours later I got accepted and just like that I have a plan. Through this process God is showing me that His ways will always be better and higher than our ways. God can change anything in a moment if you will only say YES.
In September I will be moving to Northern California with no plan, but with a longing to see God move in ways I’ve never seen before. Thousands of students will be sacrificing everything to go to a small town to have their lives changed forever, and I could not be more excited.
xoxo
Karina
eyesofwander 