on the eve of being a real Adult.

It is five minutes before midnight. Five minutes before I turn twenty one.
I am sitting in my room, in my pajamas, excited at the thought of getting into my bed before 2 AM. It has been such a busy week, and the thought of rest is so delightful!
Having just consumed a medium bar of premium milk chocolate, there are no guilty thoughts of it tonight..
The United Pursuit Band is playing in the background and bringing my focus back to the sweet presence of my Abba.
Earlier, I sat outside amidst the stars and reflected on my twentieth year. It has been utterly transforming, sweet, redemptive, broken, purging, cleansing, renewing, refocusing. The Lord has been soo faithful to my heart, and I have become a completely different person than I was at this time last year.
Tonight, I finally laid down my pride in remaining twenty and the fears & doubts of becoming older. Silly, isn't it, to have thoughts like that?
Perhaps, but the Lord was so gentle and kind to calm my fears. Since my earthly dad cannot be with me to celebrate, my heavenly Daddy reaffirmed me of His love tonight.

i am joyful to be 21! praise the Lord!

"this is my promise: my heart is YOURS forever, O Lord."

The title of this blog is a declaration I made in February 2009, the second semester of my freshman year of college.

It was uttered during worship; in the darkness of the room around 11PM, surrounded by dozens of believers who were simply enjoying the presence of the Lord. A strange song was sung in which this line was part of the chorus. I remember singing it once--then stopping. I was convicted, did I really mean it? Had I truly given my heart to the Lord? I realized that I had not. I mean, I had come to accept Him as Savior and Lord as a child, but I realized in that pivotal moment that I had never truly presented my heart to the Lord. As a woman, I had not presented my heart as a wife to her spouse; I had not willingly given Him my desire to love and be loved, to marry one day, to have kids. I had not laid at the altar my desires and longings, my attractions, my dreams, and imaginings. I had never given him my heart in the truest sense of abandonment....

I had not trusted Him.

Two years later, this topic is becoming even more meaningful, and even more significant to me. It is in the past 3 months that God has been challenging me further to trust Him. The story of the father of the demon-possessed child is ever-present in my mind because he utters, "I do believe; help me in my unbelief!" (Mark 9:24). He declares to Jesus that he does believe in Jesus' abilities, but he needs Jesus to give him the faith that he cannot muster on his own.


I do believe in the Lord. I have tasted and seen countless times how He has been too good to my family. I have seen the ways He has healed such brokenness in my own heart in the past 2 years. But I still need Him to overcome my unbelief.

In the past two weeks, so much has happened. I have given up the position of leadership that I have held and become comfortable with for almost 2 years. I have also let people go, the people that I've allowed to form ties to my heart and who crowded out the place for the Lord in my heart. I have decided that regardless of the "what if's?" that the Lord is still God.

He has been asking me where my hope lies. Who/where/what do I trust in? I'm realizing now that it cannot be in my positions, in my intelligence, in my good works, in my reputation, in my family, in people, in my own goals, money, the govt. It cannot be in stable infrastructure, or emergency back-up plans, or the slim chance that a tornado/tsunami/earthquake/volcano will not occur where I live. It cannot reside in the gifts that He has given me or the wonderful people He has allowed me to interact with, if I forget the Giver of those gifts Himself.

Sometimes the Lord takes away so that He may be first in our lives. A song from Switchfoot popped in my head the other night: "Do you love me enough to let me go," Jon Foreman crooned. The Lord reinterpreted the words to say, "Syeldy, do you love Me enough to let the other [lower-case] me's go?" Every time He asks me this, I am floored. I realize the partiality of my affections. Most of the time, the answer to that is no. Now, I truly want to say "yes!" as wholeheartedly and truthfully as I can, the first time around.

Therefore, He has been taking that desire of my heart and fulfilling it. He has blessed me by removing the possibility of my heart being compromised to another man, to another ministry, and other temporary loves by taking those things away.  These past 2 weeks have been so rich with His love, with His joy. I am truly falling in love with Him as I've never fallen in love with Him before! I am being drawn to deeper intimacy.

And it comes back to covenant. I am in a vertical covenant with the Lord. It is a relationship in which it is He that was the one to establish it and who maintains it, but I must do my part to love my Husband also. He calls me to be faithful to Himself, as He is eternally faithful to me.

He is my Pearl of Great Price...will I give all I have [willingly, intentionally, sacrificially, lovingly, wholeheartedly] to gain Him?

It is a daily decision. 

This is the beginning of Spring Break, and already, realizations and revelations have happened. It has resulted in vulnerability, brokenness, but an incredible amount of joy and peace! I am hidden in Christ, hidden in His perfect peace (Col 3:3).