five

Clothed in Hope was birthed out of heartbreak right before my 21^st birthday during my junior year of college.

Clothed in Hope followed me to Ghana when I lived there for 2 months in 2011.

Clothed in Hope was there through my last sorority semi formal, and senior year memories with my best friends and roommates.

Through my new love, my last love, when I met my husband in 2012.

Through college graduation and moving to a developing nation by myself.

Through self-discovery, mistakes, successes, independence.

Through engagement, wedding planning, and the start of marriage in 2013.

Through trips to Zambia and back, fundraising, networking, becoming an extroverted introvert out of necessity.

Through a move to Texas, newlywed life, our first Christmas, and moving to Zambia together just 2 months later.

Through job and house changes, hard times, great times, program graduations.

Through deaths in our CiH family, through miraculous births of new CiH babies, through disease and recovery, through personal loss in 2014.

Through living in half a dozen places, struggling to make each a home.

Through putting myself out there to make new friends and form community, while grieving the loss of some friendships in the changes of life. 

Through the transition back to America in 2015, the hardest year.

Through marriage struggles and defeats, and later to redemption and restoration in marriage, entering our honeymoon phase 2.5 years after our wedding day.

Through my mid-twenties, discovering who I am, what I believe, what I value, how I process life. Through realizing that I am sensitive, I am highly empathetic, I am introverted, I am a lover of home yet a chaser of adventure. I am strong yet incredibly weak. I am incapable of many things, yet able to do more than my mind leads me to believe much of the time.

Clothed in Hope has been with me through the last 5 years of life, dare I say the most pivotal years of my life thus far. Through major life moments, memories good and bad.

And while I try to attribute running a nonprofit to the hardships of my life, I step back on this 5^th birthday of this organization to see that CiH has aided in my healing, in my rescue, in my sculpting of my identity, as I see Jesus so alive in the lives of women in Zambia. They don’t know it but they help me. They show me what life is about. They introduce me to beautiful simplicities in the midst of overwhelmingly daunting circumstances. They invite me to true joy, true grace, a life lived in response to what Jesus has done for me, for all of us. In my doubting and deep insecurity, they show me what confidence in Christ looks like- a deep-rooted understanding of value not earned through my accomplishments or successes, but by the words of acceptance spoken over me by my Father.

Five years on the other side, I can’t say that I’m less scared or less overwhelmed or less stressed on some days. But I can say that I get it. The fear doesn’t scare me. The feelings don’t conquer me. I can dig my feet into Truth, and put one foot in front of another to keep walking on this crazy, beautiful, challenging, testing, joyous journey. Five years later and I look back on the hardest years of my life with a deep, rich gratitude.

I praise Jesus that even the greatest defeat to me didn’t shake Him from His throne. That even my greatest failure couldn’t separate me from the love He has for me. That the greatest identity crisis couldn’t take my label as “Daughter” off of my heart. That the darkest night was never dark to Him. That what was meant for evil was ultimately used for His good, His glory, my good.

Grace, mercy, more grace, redemption, progress, grace abundant.

CiH isn’t the story. Though it has been a large part of my story.

Jesus is the story. Jesus is the motivation, the prize, the security, the affirmation, the success, the purpose, the joy, the thrill.