The only certainty is bad grammar

Dear 14-year-old Crystal,

You’re going to turn out pretty cool. Seriously. At 28, your footing is steady and you’ve got a lot of things figured out.

You’ve got TWO great jobs, even though the economy totally tanked. (Oh. Ya. The economy falls off a cliff, but no worries. You’ve got enough brains and passion to pull through). You’re a writer for a candy magazine and you also lead a church youth group. Pretty fun stuff.

You’ve got a walk-in closet.  What the what?! Ya. It’s pretty awesome.

I mean, you know, your twenties aren’t all cake and pie, but you do figure a lot of things out.

Like which their/there/they’re to use when. And how to buy the perfect pair of skinny jeans (Ya, those come back in style). And that you really just look best with blond hair and bangs. (Seriously. Just stick with it).

Of course, you’ve also learned some more umm, important foundational things. Like about God and stuff. (I.E. He’s real).

I know that one of the things they always focus on in church is that THOU SHALL NOT HAVE SEX BEFORE MARRIAGE!! OR THOU WILL DIE AND GET PREGNANT AND BE WHORE!! And, ya, it’s good advice not to have sex, but not for those reasons. You should wait because you don’t need to do any of that stuff to feel love. I promise. You are already loved.

Think about that for a second. It’s true. Promise.

Also, with the God stuff.  It’s not all about the rules and the regulations and the thou shall not’s. Because, while that’s all important, I promise it will all fall into place if you just focus on loving Christ. Because, when you love Him, you’ll be filled with the fruits of the spirit and suddenly you’ll just naturally choose to listen to Christian music and read the Bible all the time and pray and live a holy life. You’ll do it because God’s your friend and it’s fun to connect with a friend.

Of, course, you won’t always succeed with that. And I want you to know something really important — it’s all right to fail. And I don’t mean in the “you learned something from this so everything is cool” sort of way. But in the “you just totally made the worst string of decisions ever in your life and everything feels like it’s going to crash down on you as punishment” sort of way. Because it happens to all of us, and because I know that sometimes, when that happens, you start to feel like life is hopeless. It’s not. There is always hope — for you and the world. And if you pray and ask for forgiveness, all will be well and peace will find you again.

Also, (and this is important), don’t fight with Bob when he calls you randomly in your dorm room that one time in the beginning of your junior year in college. Just talk with him, tell him how much you care about him, and soak up every ounce of conversation possible. Please.

I know you’re worried about the future, because you just worry about things. But I want you to know that all is well here in 2011 and you really do turn out pretty cool.

Faith+Hope+Love,

Me.

I’m biologically addicted to Words With Friends. I play it first thing in the morning, before I even pee.

Oh heck. I even play it WHILE I pee.

Shut up. You do it to.

I also play when I eat, I play when I should be studying the Bible, I play right before I go to bed, and then I dream in letter tiles.

Q.

I.

S.

Triple word score.

Sigh.

It’s so fun.

For those who do not have a Facebook and/or smartphone IV connected to their arms, the game basically is Scrabble for the future. You can play people you know or random strangers, and you each take turns spelling words for points. The games can last days depending on whether or not your WWF playing schedules mesh up and whether or not you want to take some time to figure out exactly how to play your Z on a triple word score.

I love you triple word score.

Today, WWF told me I’ve officially won 10 games.

The secret is two letter words people. Ha. Jo. Za. Qi. Those are words that win games.

Also, I want to take this moment to express a disclaimer: Just because I’m a “writer” doesn’t mean I have some sort of supernatural spelling skills. Writing, and spelling are VERY different talents. Writing is comprehensive, where as spelling is memorization. True story: I got a D in spelling fourth grade and the teacher said it was only because she liked me and didn’t want me to fail. So if everyone could stop telling the whole world how awesome they are every time you beat the journalist, that’d be awesome.

And anyway, I’m totally getting better at this game everyday, so I’ll probably crush you next round. Just sayin’

Just don’t get too anxious when I don’t play a word right away. I’ve got 15 games going and girl’s gotta shower at least once a day.

Editor’s note: This post is about the decision making process I went through regarding the possibility of going on a long-term mission trip. However, I have decided NOT to go (you’ll read why) so don’t read the first line and then freak out. Thanks.

What I’m really worried about is that I wanted to go on an 11-month mission trip:

A. To prove to God how much of an amazing Christian I am.

B. To escape the extremely difficult work that is church building.

C. To leave behind all the things I think are stupid, such as: high rent, high car payments, and high student loans.

D. To seek out God’s presence because I don’t think it’s possible to feel it in a country as (relatively, compared-to-almost-every-other-country) rich as America.

To catch up everyone who isn’t my mom, my pastor or my spiritual mentor, I have been considering going on an 11-month mission trip that would take me to 11 countries.

And by considering, I mean, I applied and was accepted and have had about two weeks to decide.

Life choices are rough though man.

To get a few frequently asked questions out of the way:

1. No I would not get paid. Yes I would have to pay them.

2. $15,500 is the base cost of the trip, but I would also have to raise money to cover my health insurance and a couple other things while I was away.

3. The route would likely cover Europe, Asia, Africa and Central America.

All of that sounds incredibly amazing, doesn’t it?!

I seriously have a heart for mission work. Seriously. It’s tangible and awesome and you get to see the impact you’re having as soon as the paint dries on the house you helped fix. You get to live on cheap food, and be surrounded by the extreme presence of the Holy Spirit. You get to shower only when you’re lucky. And you get to grow really close to God. LOVE IT!

And, I keep thinking of the story in the Gospels where Jesus is asked by a man what is needed to enter the kingdom of God, and Jesus says that all he has to do is give up all his possessions, but the man just can’t bring himself to sacrifice so much, so he just walks away.

I don’t want to be that man, guys! I want to be able to walk away from everything for God. I want to be like the disciples who follow Jesus on the spot. Who walk away from their families and their jobs, but are blessed exponentially in the process.

And I’m not going to lie, there is a really big part of me that’s just downright, legitimately really, really, really scared about the idea of raising $15,500, going to 11 very poor countries and leaving behind everyone I love. And, if fear is what’s holding me back, then I should jump on the plane tomorrow.

But I’m also mostly really, really worried about A on that list up there.

It’s taken a long, hard look at myself to figure that out. I like to be the best at things I’m passionate about because I secretly never think I’m good enough and I desperately want validation.

For example: I don’t just write for the school newspaper, I’m editor-in-chief, dangit! I don’t just get a master’s degree, I get a master’s degree in 11 months and interview the governor in the process. I don’t just do youth work. I do youth work, and plan a mission trip and start new evening programming and give sermons! Huzzah!

So you see, I have this pattern. I want to give it my all all the time. And I think there’s a part of my soul that feels like giving my all to Christ means I have to literally leave everything I love and go around the world and do my very best to save everyone ever. Except, you know, that’s not right at all.

I mean, God knows I’m a good Christian. God knows that I want to give Him my all. And doing youth work ain’t nothing.

And, really just shut up Crystal brain! Even that’s not right.

God is just an endless bucket of grace so I should just stop trying to impress Him. I should just accept His love and stop striving to accomplish the impossible task of earning it.

Although I knew all that, it really, really hit me while I was looking through blog posts about (ironically?) the mission trip and stumbled on this site: http://nealmontgomery.wordpress.com/

Neal (I’m assuming “Neal” based on the url) has a post about the potential to turn Godly things into idols. And, there’s this line at the bottom of the post that hit my soul. Deep.

“He wants us to live solely for Him, and trust that nothing we can do will make us more worthy of His great love.”

And I realized that was exactly what I was striving to do — be more worthy by going on an extreme mission trip.

And I feel like maybe I have to walk away from an amazing trip around the world, so I can serve God — right here in boring suburbia. There is so much work to be done here. Hard work, like the the day-in, day-out grueling tasks that come with church building and youth mission trip planning and even just setting up and taking down and setting up and taking down and setting up and taking down chairs in the church pavilion 57 times an hour. Not to mention all the actual relationships I get to build.

Sure, there are a lot of (relatively, compared-to-almost-every-other-country) rich people here, and most of them don’t need me to supply rice and beans for them to eat, but they are also so hungry for spiritual food and tons of love that it’s kind of nuts. And I can serve them those things any day of the week and twice on Sundays.

Just because we’re in a first-world country, doesn’t mean there isn’t work to be done. Work that I can be called to.

So I’m going to say “no” to the trip and stick it out here for a little while longer. Maybe build a church or something, God willing. And then, if The Big Guy has it in His plans for me to do world-wide mission work, I’m sure He’ll figure something out later on.

For now though, I’ve come to realize that God has blessed me with a sincere chance to do His work right here.