The following is a direct excerpt from my journal on September 22, 2016. Context: I was living in a house with 43 other 20 and 30 somethings in a small Romanian village. Being surrounded by so many people and any given moment exposes all of your insufficiencies in one capacity or another.
I was trying to serve them well with a beautiful (and perhaps unattainable) balance of patience and firmness, support and challenge, mercy and correction. And I felt like I was (…actually was) falling short.
The beautiful thing is, I’ve learned how fruitless it is to focus on my lack and bemoan my shortcomings, and how affirming it is to remind myself of the vision of who I am becoming.
It’s how the Father speaks to me. And I want to talk more like Him.
I desire to be a woman of grace.
A woman of compassion. A woman with enlightened perspective who is quick to see potential and respond with patience.
I desire to be a woman of generosity. May I, as You, hold nothing back. I desire to operate in such maturity and holiness that gaining offense and a calloused heart would be impossible.
“Make me an instrument of Your peace…” And like the strings on an instrument, may I find within the tension ideal space for a song.
“Make me an instrument of Your peace…” May I be struck and plucked and beat and strummed to produce the peace with which the Almighty simultaneously reigns and crushes Satan.
I desire to be a woman of grace.
What does the manifesto of your mind sound like?
