it is none of your business. period.

 I crave time away. I look for places to retreat. Corners tucked away, small roads winding to gardens, cafes off the beaten path…wherever it is, you'll find me as far back and deep in as I can possibly get wherever I am. This is why I fell so in love with Italy. The way time slowed, where cathedrals held times gone by, where cafes offered you a place to not rush in and out of, but to stop, press pause, and simply be. To savor that sip of cappuccino, that dark and bitter espresso, the smile he cast you across the room, the way her eyes lit up when she smiled and told that one story about that one time. Moments caught and forever held deep within steaming cups of caffeine and powdered pastries.

Everyone told me I'd be glad to come home…but, at the risk of sounding very unpatriotic, I wasn't. Yes, there were so many things I missed, but in general, I fell achingly in love with that place that held so much that I crave. However, I did come home (obviously) and now, nearly ten years later…I'm aging myself again…I seek out places I can escape to.

And at the end of a little strip mall (they don't have those in Italy) there is a little cafe in the heart of a very american city. A little cafe that is so European it hurts. I have NO idea how I stumbled upon it…except (at the risk of over spiritualizing everything) I truly think I was directed here. That because our God is so incredibly personal, He knew that as I'm having some very serious conversations with Him, this is exactly where I needed to be. Dimly lit, Vivaldi drifting through the air around me, espresso and a scone beside me, my heart has taken a deep breath and the knot in my stomach is slowly releasing.

So many thoughts, so many things dancing here and there. So many things I yearn for and ache for and generally have to release with every breath that I suck into my lungs. I long for the salty marshes of the state that birthed me and runs through my veins, I ache for the rocky, foggy, hauntingly sad beaches of the pacific northwest, for days drenched in rain cold and cool and still. I yearn for Europe, for countries I've yet to go to and people I've yet to meet. For food I've never tasted, and souls that will glance at mine and recognize a reflection there that is not my own. I think often of hot tea and cottages, of fairies and ogres, knights and their ladies, of star shine and moonlight, fireflies and rivers that run through mountains leading to countries in different realms. I want babies to raise, whose feet will be strong and spirits will be wild and beautiful through the love of a God that has given them as arrows to fill a quiver. I want their eyes to look into mine and hold within their depths worlds waiting to be awakened.

I ache, I long, I yearn. I scream at the sky and the moments and the air around me, asking when? I think and ponder and dream. And through the stillness I hear only one thing: It is none of your business. Be still. Wait. Take the words given and put them down onto a screen that will allow others to know they are not alone. 

This: I wonder often how I can hear Him so clearly and think I know exactly how things will turn out and precisely what they'll look like, only to find out that more often than not, what I thought would be a certain outcome was not what He'd ever been planning. I've heard more often than not over the last few weeks, "Jade, that is not your business. What I'm doing in his life, what I'm doing in her life, what I'm doing in whomever's lives, what that looks like for them, this is none. of. your. business. What I'm doing in the future in yours, this is also none. of. your. business. If nothing turns out the way you thought it would, it is none of your business. If you are taken far away or if I keep you where you are, it is none of your business."

And more often than not, I scream back, "Well, then what IS MY BUSINESS if my OWN life in the future isn't?!"

And the answer comes, "Your business is to pursue me. Period. To take the next step I've put before you. Not the one twenty steps away, the one before you right now in this moment. Period."

I'm learning this lesson daily. Heck, I'm learning this lesson as I type out the words on this screen, sitting in a little obscure cafe in a city I don't know. I am learning. I am screaming out to a God who has fashioned this journey before me and who is teaching in greater depths than I could ever imagine, that truly, it is about the journey, not the destination. At least not while I'm residing on earth. Earth will always be about the journey and when I get to Aslan's country, then and only then, will it be about the destination. Until then, I am not my own, my life is not my own, my moments and days and months and years, are not my own. The very breath I take into my lungs is not my own. It is His. I am His. Being His, this is my business. Doing exactly what He's asking in this moment, this is my business. Taking the next step in the journey, this is my business. Period.

I think often about the future. I love to dream with Him of what it could be like, but I would rather be fully present in this moment than constantly living in the future, caught up and tossed about by desires that are for the future alone and not for this moment.

 It is none of my business. Period.

"Lord, I give up all my own plans and purposes, all my own desires and hopes, and accept Thy will for my life. I give myself, my life, my all utterly to Thee to be Thine forever. Fill me and seal me with Thy Holy Spirit. Use me as Thou wilt, send me where Thou wilt, work out Thy whole will in my life at any cost, now and forever."  ~Betty Scott Stam