Crazy Love A career in massage therapy has been on my radar for years...since before I had ever personally experienced a massage, even. Why? Practical reasons, mainly. My B.A. is in English, and there's not much to do with an English Degree except teach. I decided against teaching as a career, however, when I realized that I'm too nice to teach. I'm a big softie who enjoys having fun and being a goofball. It's just that, as an adult, I know when it's time to knuckle down and get serious. Kids don't like to switch gears, I notice. So, there is NO way I'd be able to keep order in class, especially over a period of weeks and months; it would eventually descend into total chaos. And I hate total chaos. So no teaching for me. Massage Therapy appealed to me as soon as I found out it takes just nine months to train for one's licensure. Other obvious pluses are its one-on-one nature (I like interacting w/ people, just not hordes of them at once...another strike against being a teacher.) and that it plays to my inner nurturer. However, I didn't feel passionate about it as a career...not enough to take the giant, scary step of enrolling in classes somewhere. Instead, I tried (and loathed) a stint working in retail. What finally lit my fire to find a massage school in my area was reading a book called, "Crazy Love," by Francis Chan. Actually, that book was the catalyst at the end of a string of road signs all pointing one direction: toward connecting my purpose with my passion, toward linking my future career with the good works which God has before ordained for me to walk in them. By the time I'd finished reading chapter eight, that book had opened a door I never even recognized as an option. Chan said I already had more than enough, and I realized this was true. Chan said Christians would be judged one day for heaping up their own materialistic possessions and pleasures while ignoring the deprivation and suffering of others. I felt guilty of that. I set the book down one night late last year and really considered: what has God created me to do? If I were willing to set aside the financial considerations of selecting a career and just connect my purpose with my passion, what would that look like? I thought back to what has brought me the most pleasure and fulfillment in the past: working with children. I thought of Jr. Church in Okinawa, Master's Club in VA, Patch Club in PA, bus ministry and VBS in DE. I realized that what has meant the most to me are the individual connections I've been privileged to make...not just teaching a group of children, but taking one or two of them to lunch on Sundays, having them over to my house, individually corresponding with them, forming real connections. The children with whom I've been able to form such bonds usually instigated the relationship because of something they felt missing in their own family dynamic or else they stood out to me because of an apparent lack of parental care or an obvious financial need. Helping children who need me fills me with purpose and a sort of bittersweet joy. I'm sad that they need me in the first place, but I'm so happy to be a willing vessel God can use to show His love to them through my words and actions. All at once it hit me that I could combine my love for needy children with that unsprouted seed of an idea to become a massage therapist. I could massage sick children: those with chronic pain, debilitating injuries, or even terminal illnesses. True, I had never heard of this as a potential career, but if didn't exist as a job title I decided right then and there that I would do it for free. You have NO idea the wave of relief that washed over me with that willingness. All of a sudden, all the "what ifs" that had been holding me back simply evaporated. Not having to worry if I'd be able to find a job or earn my tuition money back AND make a profit. Not having to worry about if I'd end up hating my job like I did at CTS...because I couldn't. Just imagining being able to relieve a child's chronic pain, even temporarily...what could feel better than that? What could I do that would be more worthwhile? And not only that, but I'd have the opportunity to get to know my young clients, to make them laugh, to share God's love. For the first time in my entire #life, I felt sure of God's will for my vocation, and my next step finally seemed obvious: finding a local massage school that could prepare me for a career in medical massage, specifically pediatric medical massage. As it turned out, however, this wouldn't be a simple process, and with more uncertainty and waiting on the horizon, my faith might prove insufficient to the challenge ahead of me.

"Here I Raise Mine Ebenezer" A few of you have requested me to write out what God's been doing in my #life lately, either because you're curious or because I've told you about it, and you think it's a story that deserves to be shared and preserved. I agree. That's something God taught me at Sandy Cove this past summer: the importance of creating visual, concrete reminders of God's faithfulness to help ourselves and future generations through the hard times (Psalm 78:4). A song we sing at Bridge says, "I will look back and see that You are faithful. I'll look ahead, believing You are able." Anchoring our current faith (the belief in what we cannot see) to a "Stone of Help" (a visual reminder of what we've seen God do in the past) is taught in 1 Samuel 7:12: "Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and called the name of it Ebenezer, saying, Hitherto hath the LORD helped us." This blog will be MY Ebenezer.