Make Time For the Lord

Ok… bare with me here as I write this blog that is very close to my heart and is causing me to be super vulnerable. As stated in a previous blog, I want this to be a space that other resonate with and I feel that this one will hit close to home with most of you. But it begins with a relationship with the Lord, and how I have made Him a priority in my life, but really he has been shining through in this past year or so and really answering my prayers in ways that I have never seen before.

To start this I want to give you guys a forefront of my relationship with the Lord growing up. For the most part my family and I went to church every Sunday until about high school when school and sports began to get really crazy. I always enjoyed going to church, but it was never something I really put effort into because it was just kind of something that my family and I did. I had spent some time praying here and there but I never really felt the connection with Him like I wanted to, and I never really understood the idea of “leaning on him” to guide my path. I constantly found myself longing for this relationship with the Lord, but I couldn’t figure it out. He was always just something I knew was there, but I never really understood how to really connect.

College came, I enrolled in Belmont University. A private Christian school – a place where I thought my faith would strengthen in ways that I never understood. Now, it is such a great school & faith is always apart of our learning tactics, but it is also not something that is shoved onto us and if you don’t want to affiliate yourself with the “private Christian school,” idea you don’t have too. What I didn’t realize is that having a relationship with the Lord takes effort and realization that He is there, always, he has this path laid out for us and we don’t even realize it, but my freshman year of school I found myself very distanced from religion and God because I was SO occupied with just getting on my feet, 8 hours from home, and trying to find new friends, learn the campus, and just so many different things that I didn’t carve out any time for the Lord. I didn’t talk to him like I do now.

I started coming to realization with this and found myself going to church every Sunday with my roommate which was good, but still never made me feel like had the connection with him that I wanted too. After spending sometime at school getting on my feet, I was finally starting to feel this connection with the Lord, I began reading my bible and devotionals a few days out of the week and began developing this relationship that I always wanted but I wasn’t quite at the point I felt I wanted to be or felt I should be. Then…. my Grandpa Dale – the sweetest man to ever walk this earth past away VERY unexpectedly. I was lost. I was SO devastated. My whole family was just in disbelief, and I started screaming at God asking WHY. Why now, why when I’m with no family, no one that understands what I’m feeling, why take him from us. I was so mad. I was frustrated, sad and grieving the loss of him. I distanced myself from the Lord, I wanted no part of something or someone who would take someone from my life who is such a huge part of my life and just this walking ray of sunshine. I was so hurt. So, I stopped involving myself in scripture, talking with the lord, praying. Everything. I stopped committing myself to the Lord. Which in my head, I also knew that in times like these, you should be leaning on Him more than ever, but I was so angry. I was grieving.

Fast forward about a year. After some healing and acceptance, I finally began to want to reconnect with the Lord, I started opening up to the Lord more. Talking to Him a little more about my day, my feelings, my anxieties, my good, and my bad. It felt good, it felt like I had a sense of guidance again. I started praying about everything, everyone, anything that I was struggling with, and I told Him about my accomplishments. I found myself once again, finally, in good spot with the Lord. I reconnected and felt okay, but I knew this wasn’t where I wanted to be with him.

I still spent some time with the Lord daily – I would pray often and read my daily devotional, but then I started to struggle in Nursing school. Clinical’s were hard, I was upset and scared to do things that others did not seem to be bothered by, school was hard for me to understand & the test taking part was HARD. I was struggling, I was studying – HOURS upon HOURS. And still I didn’t get it, I couldn’t quite wrap my head around what I was learning, and all I could think was what kind of a nurse will I be if I don’t even understand what I’m learning and I don’t love clinical’s. I talked to my parents and my roommates and all they could say was “you got this” or “you are meant to be a nurse.” I was like the heck I’m NOT. I wanted to close my eyes and shut the world off, but at the same time I was 3 YEARS into school and didn’t see a way to make a change. I wanted to turn away from the Lord. Everyone. I was like no way am I here, in this situation. Struggling.

Instead of turning on the Lord, I started praying. Praying hard. I talked to him every night. Every day. Every hour. I kept praying “if I’m going to be a nurse, if this is your path for me, I will pass my tests, I will succeed, please guide me in a direction to show me what my calling in life is. Show me. Am I supposed to be a nurse? Is this what your path for me is?” Over and over again, I was asking him to lead me. Before my final exam, I was praying pretty much every minute of the day. Asking Him to show me what the right direction was for me. The exam came, I think I blacked out during the whole thing because I don’t even remember going to the exam, but sure enough… FAILED. I failed. And that was the moment, I felt a sigh of relief. Weird right – A SIGH OF RELIEF. Who feels a sigh of relief after failure. It was ONLY because I put ALL my anxiety, worries, everything I was feeling, I pushed onto the Lord & I said. He’s got me. He has me in His best interest.

Now after this weird moment of failure, I feel that my relationship with the Lord is stronger then ever because in my most vulnerable moment I pushed everything on Him. I let Him lead my path. My message to you today is that you should make the time for Him, let him guide your path because in the end He knows where your supposed to go in life. All of our directions, trials, tribulations are different, but we have one thing in common and that’s the Big Man upstairs guiding our path. He knows where you are going and where you will end up. Trust him. Talk to him day in and day out. He’s got you. Always. Make time for Him – I’m not saying you have to go to church every Sunday, it begins with you simply talking to Him everyday. Spend 10 minutes in scripture. Read your devotional. Be vulnerable with Him. If I can do it, so can you. Make Time for Him.

Lean on Him. I would not be where I am today without the ability to trust in Him. I am now thriving in school – graduating slightly late, but I LOVE what I am learning. I recently got accepted to grad school to get my MBA, and what I want to do in my future is still slightly unclear. I feel a sense of relief knowing I had Him to continue to push me forward.

My prayer for you today:

You never promised me that I would never be weary, but you did promise that where my own efforts fall short that you are with me. To lift me up and strengthen me according to your promises. So that I won’t grow weary or faint. I pray that you replace my weariness with the strength that only You can give.

Psalm 119:28