The End of Junior Year

As the end of another school year dawns on me…there are many mixed emotions that I feel. I am filled with excitement and joy at the thought of leaving for Zimbabwe in a few days…the excitement and joy there is in seeing my amazing man and spending three whole months together over joys my heart. I can’t wait to be there serving the Lord with him, laughing with him, talking with him, loving him and simply soaking up each and every sweet moment with him.

Although there is a huge amount of sweetness ahead, there is also this bitterness that lies in this up coming season, not a resentment type of bitterness but rather a bitter-sweetness. As this year comes to an end, I only have one more year until I have my Social Work degree and until I return home, those two things fill my heart with great excitement. However, there are some goodbyes that lie ahead. I have spent three(soon to be four) growing, challenging and beautiful years at APU with some amazing people that will forever be a part of my life. However, some will not and I will be saying goodbye and even the ones that will, it doesn’t make saying goodbye any easier. I remember the very first time I left Zimbabwe and someone said to me the goodbyes will get easier each time, oh how they were so wrong. The goodbyes on both sides of the world get harder and harder each time. My life seems filled with goodbyes, well I guess more like see you laters, but boy oh boy are they extremely hard see you laters. Having three countries in the world that have some very special people, is a hard place to be, Zimbabwe, England and America. Zimbabwe and the people that are there, my Rob, is my home, it is the place my heart yearns for. England has my very precious family, my mum and my brothers. America has the place I have developed my skills, passions, and where I have made the most wonderful girlfriends that I get to do life with each and everyday. We have walked through heartaches, deaths, family separations, betrayals, as well as great achievements, jobs, celebrations, awards, leadership opportunities, and huge God moments in each of our lives. These girls have become more than my friends they have become my sisters, my family. Then there are the woman that have poured into my life in ways that I could never have imagined or dreamed of, that have gone to doctors appointments with me, sat by me in the hospital, had lunches and coffee dates with me, have walked through trying times and rejoicing times, these woman have been salt and light in my life, they have sat quietly with me and they have spoken words of truth over me. They are woman that have been used by God to continually shape and mold me.

I know I still have a year ahead of me filled with great moments but this past weekend I went to watch some of my beautiful friends graduate and got to partake in the bitter-sweetness of that moment with them and my heart for the first time truly felt the weight of the season that lies ahead for me. It’s not a negative weight or a negative season, it truly is a bitter-sweet one, which is beautiful. You see there wouldn’t be any problem if this was hard because it was negative, the difficulty lies in that this is beautiful that the relationships I have in many parts of the world are deep and real and genuine and that that is why saying goodbyes is hard, because we have some special. I am so very blessed to know and be known by all these beautiful people. I am blessed to have something to grieve over saying goodbye to. I am blessed that walking out of one season and into another is both beautiful and extremely hard. I am blessed because my life is deeply enriched through all of these moments I have shared and will continue to share with people over the next year and then the years that are still to come too. I am blessed.

Thank you God for beautiful people, for beautiful moments, and for beautiful seasons. Thank you that the bitter-sweetness of life is a beautiful and hard thing and thank you that I have an enriched life through the people that you have brought my way. Thank you that as we embark on another part of this journey and another season, that you are there with us, in the bitter moments and in the sweet ones. Thank you that you are ever-present. Thank you for life, friends and family. AMEN.