Always answered, always full

The last couple of weeks have been rough. It feels like every aspect of my life has something major going on; whether it's good or bad, it's still busy.

I was lying in bed last night. My body was half-asleep but my brain was raging, which seems to be my permanent state of being lately. I was praying - praying for provision, praying for a break, praying for rest and peace, praying for my burdens to be lifted. My heartbeats were coming fast, my mind was spinning like a hurricane. I was crunching numbers, reciting Spanish verb tenses, listing out my TLD, thinking of how I can fix tomorrow. Everything within my body said "Am I to fight or to flee?" I feel like I'm in high school again, except I'm no longer a slave to the IB program but to all the other things life demands of me.

And that is when God did what He does - He let me know that He's got it covered.

"Dani, I have provided for you time and time again. What makes you think that this will be any different? Do you not realize that I own the whole universe and everything that is within it?"

I still don't know how I will pay for anything.

Mexico.

Tuition.

Lesotho.

Oxford.

I still don't know where the Lord wants me to spend my summer months.

Florida.

California.

Mexico.

Honduras.

Costa Rica.

The community I live in has such a beautiful economy. It is one in which we rotate money around among the same people. We give when we aren't sure we can, we receive when our pride tell us we shouldn't. We're all struggling to pay the same bills yet we are paying them together. I know that every time I step out in faith and obedience by giving, the Lord blesses me again - yet it is still so hard to trust. Sometimes the blessing isn't on my schedule, sometimes it isn't in the ways I had wanted, sometimes it isn't even in the form of money - but it always comes. Bills always get paid.

I live in a community where blessings come in the form of envelops of money discretely hidden by a secret benefactor, wads of cash handed over on the sidewalk, emails to half-strangers starting with "The Lord told me," homemade dinner, mass texts asking for help, laundry dried by an unknown hall-mate, bake sales, mysterious increases on bank statements, late night calls for prayer.

The blessings are always answered.

These are the things Jesus died for.

He died for me to live this life of beauty and joy that I so often take for granted.

He died for me to live this life of love and giving that I so often fail to be a part of.

He died for me to live this life of calling and obedience that I so often am afraid to follow.

He died for me to live this life of trust and peace that I so often worry over.

He died for this life that is supposed to be so full of Him, so full of His goodness and grace.