to be grown up.

I didn't watch the 2013 VMA's over this past weekend, but like most Americans, my twitter and facebook feed blew up over Miley Cyrus' shocking and over-sexualized performance.  I wasn't surprised when I read the comments, knowing the direction her music had been heading in over the past couple of years and so I shrugged most of it off.  Usually when I hear gossip over celebrities I don't turn on the television, partly because I've never been one to follow celebrity drama and partly because I know that continuously immersing myself in our sex-loving culture every time a celebrity does something jaw-dropping probably will add up to be a stumbling block for my walk with Christ.

But for some reason, I youtubed her performance today.  And for once, the entertainment culture didn't beckon me to stumble and didn't make me day dream of a worldly life.

For once, I sat heartbroken, eyes glazed over with tears, feeling the heart of God for His daughter on that stage.

Not long ago, Miley was a Disney Channel superstar and a role model to so many young girls.  Now she seems to be doing everything in her power to let the world know that she's 20 years old and that she's all grown up.

I am a campus minister at The College of New Jersey, a missionary to students ages 18-22 years old.

Miley, at age 20, is the average age of my students.

I sat on my couch, cringing and mourning over the images that I was watching on my computer, thinking of the thousands of ~20 year olds that I see walk past me every day on campus.

Miley wanted to grow up and, in this culture that we live in, sex is the way to do just that.  She never heard the message that God created her to be a woman and that He has plans and a purpose for that womanhood.  She never heard the message that to be a woman, in the way God intended, is to follow Christ.  The message that is portrayed in this day and age is that if you want to be a woman, you must become a sex object.

So who can blame her, really?  Miley responded to the culture that she grew up in.  Sex, to America, is what draws the line between being a girl and being a woman.  Not the biblical Truth that God created man and woman in His image, to be like Him and to glorify Him.  Not the biblical Truth that there is a God who loves her and gave His life because He couldn't bear to not make a way for her to be in a relationship with Him.

And she definitely hasn't heard in this culture that even through the sin and the ways she's refused Him, He stands with open arms of grace, eager to welcome His daughter home.

The only difference between Miley and the average 20 year old in our society is that she was raised in the fame and money that allowed her to strut her "I'm a woman" announcement on stage at the VMA's.  The reality is that the average college student is raised in that same exact culture.  Maybe the women on campus aren't going to class in their underwear and promiscuously dancing on stage in front of the whole world.  Maybe they aren't as public or outlandishly jaw-dropping in their actions, but those once-little-girls are sent the same message as Miley that to be a woman and to be liked is to be about sex and fame and independence.

The average college student is a version of Miley Cyrus:  a person who was raised in a culture that tells them their value is based on their sex appeal and their independence is based on their ability to break every social taboo without caring what people think.  They are 20 year olds searching for ways to explore this new start to adulthood, wanting to be desired and loved and heard.

But there is a God who desires them and loves them and hears them.  There is a God who created them and yearns for them to turn to Him, and who delights in blessing them.

The culture we live in is rapidly progressing in what it considers to be it's sexual norms and ideals, which means that the average 20 year old experienced a lot more of this sexual revolution growing up than the average 20 year old five years ago did.  The culture we live in traces easy pathways for females to go from girls to sex objects in an instant.

I want to see them go from girls to women of God.

I want those 20 year olds to know that life isn't about what the media says it's about.  It's not about money and sex and fame and drugs and fun and success.  It's about saying "yes" to Jesus because He's already said "yes" to you.  I want to invite them into a deep encounter with God that will transform their lives, rather than watch them stumble into false promises of fulfillment that will instead leave them empty inside.

The average American receives the message every day that this Miley-pattern of growing up is good and normal.  I'm not talking about prostitutes or strippers or porn stars, but the average American 20 year old is on a trajectory that is headed toward spiritual death because of the lies that this culture feeds her daily.

Today I wept for Miley.  And for every 20 year old at TCNJ that thinks she has to be like her to be grown up.  Today, more than ever, I was reminded of why I am a missionary to college students.

[partner with the mission.]
www.donate.intervarsity.org/support/Alyssa_Dembrowski

You captivate me.

I'm here,
     Listening.

It took me awhile, but I'm here (now).

Simple obedience,
     how sweet it is,
To sit in Your presence,
And hear You speak to me.

That's what I live for, really.
     (I can't believe I resisted for so long.)
These moments with You.

Nothing more exciting,
     adventurous,
     and peaceful
          than hearing directly from my King.

You speak,
And every hair stands on the back of my neck,
     so aware of You.
The air is thick and beautiful,
     like it is when I hear a new harmony,
Chords blending and moving and I,
     am lost,
     in Your song.

Nowhere I'd rather be,
Than right here with You.

                    See, I am doing a new thing!

                         Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?

                    I am making a way in the wilderness

                         and streams in the wasteland.

                                     [Isaiah 43:19]

the art of grace.

lately, i've been an advocate for creating.
     [newness in the debris.]

building friendships in the midst of brokenness.
piercing a nose through the sunburn.
cooking dinner with random scraps of leftovers.
receiving love from a Savior when my heart beats with rebellion.

i remember learning in chemistry about entropy,
that a system naturally goes from order to disorder over time.
meaning that unless energy is put into something, it just gets messier.

in this world, there's always going to be disarray.
and according to these laws of science, our environment is bent toward the chaos.

so i think there's something to creating in a world where there is always messiness.
i think there's something about picking up broken pieces and crafting something else,
not continued attempts at gluing back the original,
but designing something new.

i think, that maybe, that's what Jesus does with me.
He takes my heart that's so prone to messiness and continuously molds it into new artwork.

i'm not the same today as i was yesterday.
and i'll be different again tomorrow.

i'll be messy in another way from this entropy and sin that i live in.
yet i'll be more holy from the Potter always having His hands on me,
always kneading this clay of His.

i think that participating in my own acts of creation reflect my Maker's heart just a bit.
i think that's my favorite. and i think, just maybe, it might be His.
     [sculpting in the mess.]

crafting life from beauty is easy.
but life from the debris?
well, that brings Him the glory.
2 Corinthians 12:9

that's the art of grace.

what is grace?

Tonight I was sitting with Jesus as I journaled through my good friend Aletheia's comtemplative art journal.  I came to this piece where she prompted my thoughts with a question next to the painting:  What is grace?

Grace is
     having this dance with You,
     moving in step with this new routine of familiar patterns,
          as You hold me close in gentleness.

Grace is
     feeling Your heart beat in time with mine,
     sensing You flutter all around me,
          embraced by Your love so abounding.

Grace is
     the sea of love that swirls in Your eyes,
     vast shades of blue interacting,
     color with more depth than anything I've ever known.

Grace is
     us.
     this love story.
     and Your passion that never gives up on me
          with a magnitude that's incomprehensible.
     [You never stop loving me.]

Grace is
     everything that first brought me to You,
     and everything that keeps me where I am,
     and everything I live my life for.

Grace is
     this stillness,
          this love.
     it's here,
          and now.
     and there,
          and forevermore.

Grace is
     written in the story of my life,
     splattered in the paintings of my soul,
          the harmony that rings out as You pursue me,
          [undeserved and unending.]

Grace is
     beautiful.
     healing.
     enchanting.

Grace is the heart of my Savior.

I'm writing again.

The most vital piece of my connection with God was missing this year.  Lack of energy, lack of time, and lack of creative juices caused the longest writer's block I've ever experienced.

This year entailed a lot of transition, a lot of growing pains, a lot of being exposed to old wounds that I never let heal.  I did a lot of snapping at people that I love dearly and a lot of praying through frustrations that I have with myself.  And with this season, my soul felt dry a lot of the time.  I knew that I was growing, I saw the new-ness every time I looked into the mirror or chatted with a friend.  But I didn't know how to express it, to friends or to Jesus, and so I felt like I was the only one seeing growth.  I felt like friends were unable to see through my soul's dryness and pain, and I wasn't sure they believed me when I tried to explain that I was indeed being made new.

But I'm writing again.

And not just posting blogs.  About a week ago I started writing a book again, my favorite release since I was a little girl and my favorite way of connecting with the King.

Usually fresh notebooks would cause excitement and anticipation to rush through my veins, but this year, blank journal pages and word documents haunted my every moment.  They made me nervous and aggravated and worried about why I felt like I had nothing to say.  I forced blogs once a month and generally gave up on journaling in my own privacy.  I had nothing to write (or perhaps, too much to write to know where to begin).  Too many times I sat with a blank blog post open, hands poised on the home keys, begging God for something, anything, to say.

Nothing.

But now, my fingers can't fly over the keys fast enough for my thoughts and every day this week I've come up with multiple illustrations for this new book project that the Lord has laid on my heart.

I'm writing again.

These blogs and this new book are my prayers, my way of processing and praising the way Jesus is moving in me, my way of connecting with Him.

The words that have danced across my computer for this book over the past week have caused so much healing and redemption to already take place.  It's like there is a connection between my soul and my written words, a direct pathway that if broken, processing ceases to happen and my mind spirals into weeks of confusion and arguments with loved ones and strange, misplaced tears.

But by His grace, He's released me from this writer's block.  By His grace, I'm invited into closeness with Him via metaphors and word documents.  By His grace, I'm writing again.

So here's to renewed intimacy with God.  Here's to creating art.  Here's to the process.

Here's to writing again.

celebration series. [intervarsity staff.]

For the intro to this series, click here.

Celebrating the year.
That's what I'm doing in these recent posts.
Arms high in praise, eyes focused on Jesus, I am celebrating.

For those of you who don't know, I'm on staff with InterVarsity at The College of New Jersey (TCNJ).  In basic terms, this means I'm a missionary to college students.  To tell my entire journey this year about coming on staff would entail me writing a novel, so I'll spare you the pain and keep it short.

I was a student in the Blue Ridge Region (The Carolinas & Virginia) but felt the Lord strongly calling me to staff in the NY/NJ Region about a year and a half ago.
*When it comes to InterVarsity, you apply to the region, and honestly switching regions when you come on staff is almost unheard of.

Joining a new region was hard.  Like really, really, really, really hard.  The cultures between the two regions were vastly different and while all regions have the same heart for students being transformed and leaders developed, I had to learn new methods and tools and even some new language.  I tried my very hardest to embrace the differences and engage myself fully in them, but as an ENTJ who needs tangible proof, I wasn't there yet at the cognitive level because I simply just needed more time to see the methods play out.

Not to mention I basically didn't know anyone.  I remember going to Basileia (the region's end of the year conference) last year and not being able to keep track of schools in Upstate New York that I had never heard of, let alone remember the names of all of the staff and students.  I felt lonely and confused and I wondered if I had heard Jesus correctly when he told me to go be staff at TCNJ.

Over this past year though, something shifted in me.  I'm not sure exactly when it happened, but about a month ago I could finally verbalize what I was feeling.

Wholeness.
Absolute, complete wholeness.

I realized that very quickly after stepping onto TCNJ's campus in the fall, I fell in love with those students.  Utterly, head-over-heels in love with them.  My heart broke over the lost on campus and rejoiced when I saw hearts transform and leaders develop before my very eyes.  Very quickly my co-workers at TCNJ became like family to me and very quickly my calling was confirmed that InterVarsity Staff was indeed what I am anointed to do.

That all?  That took place within the first few weeks on campus.  That was easy.
The switching regions was the hard part.

I can now say, with 100% honesty, that I am so glad the Lord brought me to NY/NJ.  Though it maybe took me a year to catch on, I'm in love with this region, too.  Every cell in my body jumps for joy about how well this region does mission, prayer, and multi-ethnicity.  As a person who was a student in another region, I feel like I can easily pinpoint that those are [some of] our region's strengths.  The students understand how to start new things and take ownership of mini mission fields on campus.  They seem so spiritually mature for their age and so in-tune with the Spirit.  And living in a diverse part of the county, we have students with so many different ethnic backgrounds and they all get the radical importance of that.  Also, I've grown so much as not only a staff worker by being in this region, but as a disciple of Jesus.  This region has equipped and stretched me and continues to do so and I count myself so very blessed to be hired here.

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.  I am so proud to be able to wear the NY/NJ hat!
[Figuratively speaking; I look terrible in hats.]

And what's even more, I now feel like I know staff all over the region.  Like really know them.  And they know me.  Yes, there are still handfuls that I have yet to sit down and really chat with.  But I've made so many good friends who know deep things about me and who I talk to even when we are hours and hours apart during an average work week.  I have such very good friends and I am a better person because they are in my life because they are friends who consistently point me to Jesus.  My last celebration post was entitled "koinonia part I" because this is my koinonia part II.  There is nothing like having deep friendships with people on InterVarsity Staff.  There's nothing like being in the same room as fellow co-workers and having people who really and truly get and understand the work you do.  There's nothing like having people who share your giftings and passions and quirkiness.  I love that I can turn around and say a statement that involves a student, myers-briggs, and theology and I don't have to give any background information.  We get each other.

But above all, I feel wholeness because I am right in the center of God's will.  I was talking to my friend who is still in college and I said to her, "I cannot wait until you start working in your career because there is nothing like doing the work that God has prepared in advance for you to do."  It's exciting and peaceful all at the same time.  Whether I'm discipling a student, filling out a google doc, giving a talk, or at a staff training, I feel whole.  When I'm working on InterVarsity things, I feel like everything is right in the world.  Like I'm swinging, eyes closed in a hammock and I could just rest there forever.

I feel such wholeness when I'm doing the work that I am anointed to do.

So I'm celebrating working with college students:  The population of people that I feel called to.  The population of people that get my heart beating faster and that I find myself constantly dreaming about and for.  I'm celebrating working for an organization that I so greatly love and affirm.  I admire so much about InterVarsity--our vision and purpose statements, the time we spend developing world-changers, and the way that we are so eager to learn and grow (which is something that the Church at large historically does not have a good track record of).  I'm celebrating working in NY/NJ, with so many new life-long good friends and so many people mentors on the Regional Leadership Team that have strengths in all different arenas.  I'm celebrating having a clear calling that stretches me and grows me.  A calling that gives me a sense of excitement and peace and wholeness.  I'm celebrating that Jesus saw it fit to use me to impact these students' lives.  I was and am the most unworthy sinner to work in full-time ministry, but by His grace I am here.  By His grace I get to wake up each morning, excited to go into work.

I love my students and my staff team.  I love InterVarsity at large and having the opportunity to work with college students.  And I love all of my partners in this--all of you who pray for me and/or financially support me.  You guys make it possible for all of this to be a reality.  You guys have so tangibly played a role in letting these dreams of mine come true.  You've said yes to Jesus and being used by Him and He's said yes to redeeming and using me.

And that discussion will be continued in my next post...

celebration series. [koinonia part I]

To read my previous blog post--the introduction of this current celebration series--click here.

Moving back to New Jersey after graduating from college was one of the hardest things that I had to go through in my life.  After my mom died during my freshman year of college, Virginia became home for me.  It was where I healed and met Jesus and lived in deep community.  Most of my college friends stayed in Virginia, and those that didn't moved to even farther places like Tennessee and Kentucky while I crossed the Mason-Dixon line once again.  I spent the better half of my first year in New Jersey praying for friends and feeling lonely.  Making friends in the real world is much more difficult than as a college student, and even making friends in the local church is much more challenging than making friends as an InterVarsity student.  I was learning that in the real world, people have very limited time to hang out, and so it takes months and months to finally feel like you know somebody.  As an InterVarsity student, my life was filled with instant best friends every semester and guaranteed groups of people to eat every meal with.  Being an InterVarsity student meant automatic koinonia [that rich, deep fellowship that Scripture references in Acts 2], with little or no effort at all.

Moving far away meant I had that community void to fill and as an extrovert, this process seemed to take forever.  A lot of tears were shed and a lot of emotional outbursts to God occurred over craving that missing koinonia.

I'm not exactly sure how it happened, but at some point this year, koinonia became a reality once again for me.  But this time, it was so much deeper and richer than what I had in college.

Let me try and explain myself, before I come off as offensive to my dear college friends.

In college, you live intimately with one another.  You are experiencing the same life transitions and for us as InterVarsity students, the highs and lows of doing ministry together.  You have common goals and interests and maturity levels.  In college you live in a bubble of people all within four years of your age and of similar economic statuses and intellectual abilities.  In my opinion, to have some type of like-minded community like this is vital.  But it's not complete.

Don't mistake what I'm saying.  I still have those friendships.  There is a group of us that still update each other regularly on our lives and ask for prayer requests.  There are some friends that I still talk to weekly or bi-weekly on the phone or on FaceTime (and actually I have a friend that I talk to daily...).  This love and intimacy still exist through the world of technology and social media, even if we're states apart.

But what that community lacked was diversity.

My college friends are some of my [hopefully!] life-long best friends.  I hold them so very near and dear to my heart.  Nothing will ever replace my relationships with any of them.  But my koinonia has gotten bigger since leaving Building 10 of the UMW Apartments.  My koinonia consists of friends that feel like a full and complete family.  I have a spiritual mom and dad, aunts and uncles, older and younger siblings, and sisters that feel much like the same age as me.

The body of Christ, as it was meant to be, was incomplete in college.  It only consisted of siblings the same age as me, which while necessary and fun and amazing, lacked completeness.

Entering into a relationship with Jesus means you enter into God's family (Ephesians 1:5).  This means that this spiritual family that I speak of isn't some daydreamy concept.  It's real.  These are people I've laughed with, cried with, been admonished by, and offered my own challenges to.  The mothers and fathers and aunts and uncles offer their wisdom in the Lord and love and challenge us at the same time.  They care for us young ones in such tangible ways like home cooked meals and offering to pay for dinners out.  The older siblings offer much of the same things, in their humble I'm-still-just-starting-this-journey-too type of way and affirm us in the ways we've grown--like good older sisters do.  I tease the littles with love and wrestle them in the pool, just like any sibling would, and offer up my own wisdom when the timing is right.  We function just like members of any blood-family function, but the thing that ties us together isn't our blood--it's His blood.  I'm blessed because I have a very large family--some that are legally related to me and some that feel just like family because we are adopted sons and daughters of the King.  My spiritual family doesn't replace my blood-family, it just adds to it.  And blesses me with a plethora of people that love and care for me.

Being in the family of God, my definition has been expanded.  Family is a friend dancing into your house singing happy birthday as she hands you one of her huge original canvas pieces of artwork (that probably costs hundreds of dollars) as a gift because she remembered you being awestruck by it at her art show.  Family is going to visit a friend and her turning on her computer to watch a show while you read a book because well, it didn't matter if the conversation ceased for an hour.  It was just important to be there, together.  Family is spending an evening in silence when you both study Scripture and take breaks to tell each other what Jesus was saying to you.  Family is a spiritual dad telling you he's proud of you and a spiritual aunt decorating your house with birthday balloons while you were at work.  Family is you feeding your spiritual older sister's baby for 7 hours upside down during a car ride while she blasted the Dixie Chicks to "make everything better."  Family is a spiritual mom hugging you tight, even when you act uninterested, because she knows what makes you feel deeply loved and knowing exactly what to pray for you, even when you don't ask for a prayer request.  Family is laughing until you can't breathe and letting the tears come when things feel heavy.  When you are in the body of Christ, the definition of family suddenly gets extended and an influx of people are added to the one you were born into.

As I've been celebrating these relationships over the past couple of weeks, I've paid attention to some of these friends' eyes and what I saw astounded me:  They all had the same look.  One pair of eyes sat in the dark on my patio with me and reminisced about how we met.  One looked over at me during a pretty heavy conversation on a long road trip.  A few pairs peek at me Friday evenings at home fellowship and Tuesdays during the Truth Project.  These eyes all have that glazed over look with that far away twinkle; the one that says without words, "I love you.  And you're important to me.  And I'm so glad the Lord has brought you into my life."  The most profound time I've encountered that look in a friend's eyes was yesterday over some froyo and in between roars of laughter.  In that moment, her expression spoke deeper into my soul than any amount of words could that I was deeply cared for and loved.

That look that these friends give me is one I carry with me every day because it's so authentic and unable to be faked.  It's one that I imagine Jesus gave to every person He encountered while living on earth.

It's a look that expresses the richest koinonia.

Some of my friends live close by and some live far.  Some are in their 50s and some are in the single digits.  Some have the same profession as me and some don't.

But all of them love me.  And challenge me.  And care for me.  And pray for me.  All of them stare back at me with that same expression in their eyes.

I've grown a lot this year in my walk with Christ, and some of that is thanks to all of these people that make up my church family.  This variety of people has added to me being stretched and has helped transform me over this past year.

While I've been aware of these rich relationships for awhile now, it wasn't until recently when I could fully say that I would have it no other way.  As much as I miss pieces of college, I would never trade living in that college bubble for the richness that I have in the local church.  I may not be living with 100 of my best friends that are all my age, but being intimately connected with people older, younger, and of the same age as me is infinitely better.  Recently I contemplated switching small groups from the mixed ages one I attend now to one for only young adults and I couldn't bare the thought!

And so I'm celebrating that!  I'm celebrating being in a place of deep friendships that I wouldn't change for the world.  I'm celebrating no longer grieving college.  I'm celebrating koinonia.