Holy cow-- where did November go?Christmas is creeping up and it's been nearly six months since we married and moved-- what happened?!
A quick update on our life here in The Fort (that's what the cool kids call it): Purple Rain has officially moved out... so there goes the free entertainment, I am love-love-lovingggg my job, Luke graduated from puppy class and Garrett continues to play paintball.
God has blessed us like crazy over the last 6 months, answered so many prayers but I think the most unexpected blessing was the community we found here.
I have had so many people to love and do life with the last 22 years, but when we moved to Fort Wayne, those people weren't here. Our church is awesome, please don't hear me complaining. But sometimes when you are young and brand-new married and hamburger-helper-poor you want to hang out with people who are in the same place, struggling with the same things, using their mom's old couch.
We found our community through what could seem like an accident, Beth had a daughter Charly, Charly had a friend Steph, and Steph was looking for community too. Within a month of moving to Fort Wayne, we met people we could do life with.
I've heard a lot of sermons in my life-- a lot. One really stuck out and challenged the way I do community. At the Passion Conference in 2013 Judah Smith preached on the importance of community-- he said it was essential to surviving Shark Week.
I hear you --weird analogy-- but apparently sharks have a tendency to attack the lone seal over the group of seals. The lone seal. I'm sorry to tell you this, but you are not the shark... you are the seal. If you want to survive Shark Week, you need to get with a group of other seals.
Life for me at the time included really good things like an awesome boyfriend, a fantastic job and leading a small group in Edinburg; it did not include a community of my peers. After hearing Judah speak I decided I needed to change so I went home and I joined a Christian Student Fellowship small group. This is how I met Lyssa, then Hayley and got involved and invested with the entire CSF community-- and there were things (BIG) things in my life that changed because I was no longer swimming alone on Shark Week.
And then we left.
There I was all over again: a lone seal in shark infested waters. What is a shark? Depends. Sharks come in all shapes and sizes: the lies we tell ourselves to make sin okay, the lies we hear from someone who has us isolated in a relationship, depression, addiction, loneliness, arrogance, selfishness, church ladies-- you name it. It all comes down the fact that sharks are not friendly to baby seals.
Here's the thing: people are scary.
Seriously. Meeting new people is so so so so scary. It's like the first day of Kindergarten but you can't just say "hey, I like you hair-- let's be friends" doesn't work that way in the adult world. Maybe it should, but it totally doesn't. There are so many opportunities to look stupid, for your inner nerd to slip out, to say something politically incorrect, or to disagree on major life-defining beliefs-- sometimes it's better to just stay inside. Because people are scary. They have the ability to not like you, to reject you, to laugh at you, to betray you, to disappoint you and ultimately the worst part is: they are all definitely people, and people mess up.
I'm with you. I get it. I'm scared too. But the longer I'm an adult trying to make and keep adult friends the more I learn just how many people are lonely and in desperate need of community. You need community. You were designed to thrive in it, and I know no matter how much you don't like people you still desire to be known and to be loved.
This month has been a month of community for us. We've spent the past week with our family and friends in Iowa and Illinois, and what a sweet moment to be known and to be loved and to be hugged. Long car rides, so much laughter, getting pancakes dropped on me at IHOP and the feeling that I am known by these people and still loved. Crazy.
Then there are the friends in my life who just keep coming back. This month alone I've had coffee with my sweet Mo, a sleepover with my Mrs. Drent, and really really precious time with Hayley and Lyssa. Talk about being known.
Garrett and I have felt a renewed desire to focus in on our community here; to love them and to know them. God does silly things like providing married friends who love board games, people who laugh at our stupid and geek out with us over Mockingjay Part 1 [but omygosh her hair though]. God has provided for us in ways we didn't think to pray for, with a community that's been here to do life with us and I am so thankful for them.
So I want you to know that I miss you, in a way that fills up my whole heart. I want you to know that God provides for his children, even when you forget to ask. Mostly I want you to know that I know people are scary. But you need them. You need a community if you want to survive Shark Week.
With Love,
Emily LeVault
P.S. This is Garrett eating a burrito.
P.P.S. This burrito is not part of the Daniel Plan.
