peace.

So it is nearing Christmas. An end of a crazy year. 7 months ago I graduated and headed off for an adventure in France. 4 months ago I started working. It is cool to look back at a year that has been filled with so many different experiences, so many dry times and recently times of questioning, and already start to understand how faithful God has been to me - how faithful He is, to all His people.

I've been getting to know some teenage girls in South Dallas through a ministry called Teens for Christ. I love listening to them and speaking truth with them, because it challenges me to hear their questions:

"So, if God knows everything we're gonna do, what's the point of living?"

"If God is so powerful, why is there so much pain in the world?"

"What if I think I believe in Jesus, but still have a lot of questions?"

"How do you know what to believe... and what truth is?"

Even in periods of blah and periods of questioning and transitioning, God is faithful. He is truth and peace. He says that when we seek Him, we will find Him. He just wants us to seek.

The peace that we talk about so much during this season, it is unlike any other peace of this world. It isn't just an absence of war or conflict. It isn't an absence of fighting or doubt, or economic or political turmoil. It is the presence of Christ in my life that gives me all peace, and nothing else. I try to turn to other things for peace so often but am never fulfilled.

Jesus says that by overcoming death He has overcome this world. Not by means of a violent overthrow, but through his powerful love for us when he died for us. It seems so simple to believe the message of Christmas in today's world... to me that's the beauty of it.

Jesus was born to a teenage virgin from a poor ghetto area that was not exalted at all. He did this for a reason: "But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise. God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are..." 1 cor. 1:27-28

God wants all of us, all of me, to seek him whole-heartedly. Even if we have questions and doubts... even if (and when) we don't fully understand... even when we feel unworthy of his love, because we'll never be worthy. He loves us because He made us, and nothing will change His unconditional love.