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Showing posts from May, 2021

Ten Lessons from Taylor

We're done. The days of reading Wendell Berry and worshiping at chapel and clapping way too long with a thousand other classmates are behind us. So long to the black squirrels, easy friendships, and freely crossing every street with the knowledge that cars yield to pedestrians 100% of the time. Taylor is a bubble and I know that outside this one-mile loop, cars don't stop for street-crossers, most squirrels are grayish-brown and life isn't always a worship service. Not everyone will wish me "shalom" and there will be confrontations that end in angry resentment rather than prayerful reconciliation. Life outside the bubble is about to be drastically different than anything around the loop, but it's what we're called to- it's where we must go. In the spirit of (frankly sucking at) reflection, here are ten Taylor lessons I hope I never forget. Beyond the bubble we go! N O T E  T O  S E L F : 1. Honesty isn't optional. It's not the best policy- it...

The Rollercoaster: Part 2

I had scheduled a couple of office hours the next morning as dead week culminated and I strived to make a couple extra bucks before summer. As I was walking to the admissions office, my eyes still puffy, the Spirit prompted me to call Joe. He picked up and my voice trembled so I could barely speak. I reiterated the message God had laid on my heart - the same message delivered  by Reyna, Jeff, and Steph: "Baby, I am so sorry I have never paused to acknowledge how hard your job has been."  Joe responded with such grace, such kindness, and in a powerful act of mercy, he comforted me, "You're forgiven times a million. And I don't care what that email said - I'm praying specifically that you hear today and that you get the job today. "  Peace flooded my soul. His steadfastness and confidence moved me, even more, to tears.  I was overcome with a sense of hope and joy - for the first time in what felt like a long time. The morning that followed was restful. Amy...

The Rollercoaster: Part 1

I feel like I just got off the Voyage at Holiday World: a ride that takes you from the highest heights and plummets you deep into the earth only to shoot you skyward once again.  May 5th was a low. I got an email from Westfield with an update in their interview process. Basically, they had offered one of the jobs to a different candidate and they were waiting on her response. Not necessarily a closed door, but certainly not optimistic. They kindly concluded that they forwarded my information onto another principal at a different school. That most certainly felt like a no. My spirits were crushed. That same day, I got to speak in chapel about the comfort I had found in my Taylor community (see here ). The speech concluded with all my job rejections and how people kept pointing me back to THE Comforter, the one who wipes our tears and handles our messes, and how we all had the privilege of running to him as we grieved. I had no idea I would get to live out that speech so palpably wit...

Senior Share Chapel: The Grey and Yellow Comforter

 I had the opportunity to share this message at our senior share chapel. The prompt answers the question, "What does Taylor community mean to you?"      I didn’t have Christian friends until I came to Taylor. Not until my two random roommates, Maggie and Maggie, got us all matching grey-and-yellow comforters to match the hand-painted 406 that we mounted with sticky tack on our Bergwall door. We thought that everyone got matching comforters and were shocked to find that we were the only three out of sixty on our floor who had gotten the memo. But It wasn’t long before those matching grey-and-yellow comforters were stained with We Covs from mid-day coffee breaks, seasoned with movie-night popcorn salt, and soaked by tears from the trials of freshman year – DTRs gone wrong, tests failed, jobs rejected, hard conversations, doubts and lies and tricky friendships and the time they sat me down on that grey-and-yellow comforter and said, “Cali, we think you’re a little too f...

Keep Clinging

 I was sitting at my favorite Panera booth sipping a half-dark roast, half-medium roast, half-hazelnut blend (sorry bout that math Joe) and reflecting on God's movement in my life over the past few months.  I had a rock-bottom moment with heavier tears, darker thoughts, deeper pain, and more all-consuming anxiety than I had ever felt before.  It was the day Joe accepted the job at Westfield, and even though I was giddy with excitement for him, I was pierced with fears for myself. This would be even more crushing of a blow when I didn't get the job. The devil was force-feeding me lies about the goodness of God and I was chewing on them, swallowing little by little, letting the lies leak into my body.  I felt paralyzed.  And yet God in his mercy saw me on a friend's brother's futon, four in the morning, forcing myself to try to  remember Scripture while my wicked heart wanted to fixate on fear, and He held me. I felt the presence of God tangibly, palpably, su...