I had a pretty mind blowing conversation with a friend today. She's a new friend who for whatever reason I already feel like I have a long history with. The conversation began on the phone and was continued via text--yes, I know, I've become that girl--but it was mindblowing nonetheless.  We were talking about the amazingness of friendship and acceptance--real acceptance--and how liberating it is to have those things in your life. We talked about how easy it would be to explain God's love for us if everyone could experience that kind of love in the form of friendship.

It got me to thinking about how I have so often distorted my understanding of how God loves me simply because I was struggling to live out this love in my own life. I have failed at friendship so many times--the giving and receiving of it. And somehow along the way, in the midst of hurt feelings, broken promises, and heart scarring wounds, I began to think that maybe I was only worthy of giving friendship, but not receiving it. And no matter how you look at it, this is not healthy.  Safe, but not healthy.

Maybe this all wouldn't bother me so much if I hadn't less than a week ago stood up in front of over a hundred people and told them to stop believing the lies Satan tells us about who we are and what we are worth. About what our broken relationships and woundedness means in the story of our lives. Maybe had I not talked about our redemption story and how there is an abiding, enduring love that is ours for the taking, I wouldn't be all worked up right now. Who knows?

But in the interest of cutting myself some slack (an interest I've been trying to cultivate for a few years now), I think I'm just going to choose to believe that God chose for me to speak those words that night. I mean, seeing how none of them came out the way I planned, maybe those were the words He meant for my heart as much as anyone else's. Maybe they were His gift to me because I refused to accept it any other way.

But I accept it now and I can't wait to see what this is all going to look like.