My year of being 25-years-old wasn't my happiest or most stress free year. It tested me and stretched me in ways I never would have asked to be tested or stretched. But, God worked in me, and I emerge from this year, whole and with more peace, strength, and faith. God's goal is my sanctification, and, although I still have so far to go on my road to heaven, He changed me in ways for the better.
This year:
- We traveled to Philadelphia to take our PE, completing our last board exam of medical school, and visiting family and friends.
- I helped throw a baby shower for Meghan and Baby G.
- We welcomed our first niece, Mary-Claire, into the family! A couple weeks later, Aaron and I welcomed her into the family of God as her godparents.
- We celebrated the weddings of some dear friends.
- We took some fun trips to OKC, Quartz Mountains, and Kansas.
- We discerned the call to continue our medical training, and submitted final applications for residency match.
- We each matched to our first choice residency programs!
- We joyfully celebrated the gift of our second child when we began pregnant in February.
- We mourned the loss of our child, Francis Marie, to miscarriage in late April.
- We completed our final rotations in April.
- We marked a huge milestone by graduating from medical school in May (more on this and the below life events soon, hopefully!)
- We had time off in May and June to relax, heal, and get work done and affairs in order before...
- We started residency with orientation in June and work starting July 1.
- We had an interesting, complicated journey trying to find childcare for while we're at work so my parents didn't have to do it all anymore (long, complicated story that I won't share here, but not an insignificant part of my year!).
- We redecorated Julia's room
- We survived the first 1/12 of residency. Is it bad that I'm already counting off in fractions??
But, I've found myself drawn closer to God through these experiences in a very real way. I'm the sort of person who will not infrequently fall into a spiritual slump, getting more apathetic, maybe just going through the motions of prayer, until, after a little bit, something convicts me, and I get fired up again. It's this constant process of slowing down, then speeding up, like a teenager learning to drive and not knowing how to smoothly accelerate. I never completely quit, but sometimes I'm pretty close to idling. And, when I do realize I'm in a funk, I get all fired up about it. I realize that God needs to be number one in my life, and if I'm not progressing in my spiritual life, fighting the tide of apathy, I'm likely regressing, being pulled back stream. Aaron and I generally make a plan then of what we need to change about our prayer life to get us back on track to growing in God. A different plan for studying scripture or a new book of meditations? Too much structured prayer or too little? Best time of day in the morning or in the evening or at night? We tweak, get going again, and will do better for a while. But, this whole process of discerning how we're doing, and what we can do to grow in God, while it can be good, is also somewhat self-fabricated, self-directed. I'm not trying to discredit this process, because it's important, and something I'm sure we'll do for the rest of our earthly lives. But, the blessing of suffering is that there's nothing self-fabricated or self-directed about it in the least. It drove me into the arms of God. I was close to Him through those experiences, because I couldn't not be. I couldn't have survived without God, and I clung to Him for dear life. Living the mystery of faith. In a way, it was my most effortless year of growing in the Lord. I didn't have to work hard to devise a plan on how to best encounter Him... I just encountered Him. My encounters with Christ were often heavy, tear-laden, and raw, but oh, so real. And that is beautiful. What could be better than that, actually? Encountering the Lord and growing in holiness? What could be better? That realization really helped turn my mourning into dancing, and helped me see the purpose in my suffering.
These experiences also helped give me new eyes of faith. Believers see the world in a way non-believers can't comprehend, but I feel that my suffering fine-tuned my vision. It's easier, now, to see God's hand in everything. If I could see the way He was working in my life through the death of my unborn child, how foolish would I be to ignore the way He was working through the scribbles and laughter of my living daughter? If I could make meaning of my greatest suffering this year, I could surely find meaning in the smaller crosses? That's not to say I always do a good job, still, of embracing those more pesky crosses, but it's at least easier to see how God is drawing me to Himself in not just the big ways, but also the small ways. What a personal God we serve! So focused on each of His individual children, working in our lives in so many ways, all interlaced in such a beautiful, intricate tapestry.
It's interesting that as you grow in faith, prior experiences of God begin to seem flat. I thought I was close to Him as a child, and then, when I started reading and learning more, owning my faith, and got confirmed in high school, I looked back on my earlier faith, and it seemed so flat... that it'd mattered to me much too little. And, then, when I was in college, spending so much time at the Newman Center, attending mass, praying the hours, going to adoration, participating in and leading Bible study, I grew so much in faith. The faith deepened and widened, and I looked back on my high school faith, and it seemed so flat, so one-dimensional, as though it had been too unimportant to me, although it had been important. And now, I look back on those days, and my faith is more tested and rugged and real to me, and my college faith, while still beautiful and precious to me, has even, in some ways, seemed more flat or pale than it used to (although I certainly wish I had time for the kind of prayer life, especially frequent daily mass, that I had then! What an enormous blesssing!). And, though, with the obligations of my vocation, I spend less of my day in formal prayer, I still feel I've been learning more about how to make my life a prayer, and that God is more important to me than ever, and my lens has changed for the better, seeing all things in my life more clearly through the eyes of faith, taking on more vivid tones. I guess I'm just amazed by how much room there is to grow in our infinite God. I really hope a year from now I'll smile at the faith I demonstrated in this post, because it, too, will seem so flat, so pale, so inadequate. At all of these stages, I've been genuine and lovable to God, and my faith has always been a gift. I'm definitely not trying to dishonor where I've been, because each step is such an important part of the journey. But, it's interest how dynamic the spiritual life is, because our God is that big, and there's that much room to grow. I read about the saints and their experiences of God, and my mind is blown, because even the new dimensions I see in my own faith life still seem to be so flat compared to the completely crazy intense, colorful experiences in their spiritual lives. I think this all speaks to the fact that faith isn't a specific moment in time - it's a journey. Such an incredibly exciting/heartbreaking/terrifying/wonderful/beautiful journey.
Anyway, here's to 26! And here's to continued growth, hope, and joy in the Lord!
P.S. For a walk down birthday memory lane: ;-) 23 and 24
