Accepted

Sometimes in life you get news that flips your world upside down. Maybe it's good. Maybe it's not. Either way the world flips and usually your stomach does a few somersaults of it's own too. You get that shaky feeling that everything you know is about to change.

It is interesting the mix of emotions that can come with a single word. Just one word can bring laughter, sorrow, peace, fear, or any number of other emotions and they all come crashing together in a cacophony that overtakes all your senses briefly.

I had that experience this week. I opened my email and there it was "accepted".

I'm not sure what reaction I expected from myself, but I can tell you that I just looked at the screen, felt for my chair with my hand, and trembling sat down and just stared. Pretty sure I took a few deep breaths, swallowed hard, and opened it. I couldn't even read the email because I couldn't comprehend it.

I felt like Melanie in Sweet Home Alabama when Andrew asks her to marry him and she says, "Are you sure?" Possibly not the best of analogies since they don't make it, but you know what I mean. I think somewhere in me, all this time, I've been expecting an "I'm sorry, but no" or something. Then I could look at God and say, "Hey I was obedient. I did the process, not my fault they didn't accept me."

And so I'm sure He was wearing a huge grin when I saw that e-mail and I whispered, "God I don't know that I can do this." But isn't that true? I can't do it. Physical fitness and bold actions aren't generally my forte. Asking people for support is reallllllllly not my idea of a good time. But showing the world that there is an indescribable God that loves each and every one more than we could ever grasp is on my heart, no matter the amount of excuses I try to front.

So I draw encouragement from Moses. The man who first said he was no good at speaking and needed someone to go with him and speak for him, and who became the man that went up into the dark cloud of thunder and lightenings to meet with God face to face on behalf of a people God had chosen and loved.