Last night my 3 best friends in Dallas and I met at one of our favorite Greek restaurants. These were the girls that I lived with this past year up until a month ago. Dara got married on July 7 and moved in with her hubby down the street, Jenny has moved to Waco to start a discipleship training school with our church and Kristin and I are still in the same spot on Berwyn Ln.
Jenny has had to come to Dallas every Tuesday of this month for work, so we’ve made Tuesdays our official “Berwyn Dinner Dates”. I think those sitting around us must have thought we were crazy because we were talking one million miles per hour in between bites of hummus, greek salad and lamb kabobs, getting caught up on all the recent happenings in each of our lives. Dara was telling us about what marriage has looked like in a months time… Jenny filled us in on her new home, transitioning to a new smaller city and her hopes about investing in this discipleship school, we asked Kristin a ton of questions about a guy she has been hanging out with (that’s what friends do, right? =) ) and me…. well, there’s so much change happening in my life that at this point we are just praying for God’s vision and direction to be clear.
I love these 3 friends with my whole heart. I grew more living with them in 10 months than I have in 3 years. It was actually quite messy at times – a TON of fun – but not always easy. This past year will go down in the books as one of my least favorite years of my life. Not because of them or because of our living situation, but because it was the most refining thing I’ve been through so far – and life through a ton of curve balls at me.
When you live with 3 best friends, and such quality of people like these girls, there’s an invitation to learn to love like you never have before AND to deal with all of your junk. And that is exactly what happened for me. Linnae was on display for them to see and it wasn’t pretty =)
Last night, though – was a celebration. A celebration of how God has so beautifully brought Dara, Jenny, Kristin and I to a perfect spot where God is going to use this past year of our lives to bring about His Kingdom and His glory. They stuck with me, hopefully I loved them well, had crazy amounts of fun, learned a ton . . . and now there is this invitation for us to join God for the next adventure. We are hopefully more equipped to go into the world even more confident of who we are created to be and how God wants to co-labor with us in letting others see how much He loves them.
All because of community – loving those in closest proximities to us. It’s important – How you love those that are with you the most.
I wonder if you have friends like this in your lives? People that you let in all the way so that you don’t have to live this life on your own. And people who you love without condition. If you do, I’d love to hear about them today! If not, get excited because you can begin to ask God for community and I just bet you that He will surprise you way more than you can imagine.
Thankful for community today! Can’t wait to hear about yours!
Linnae
