Exciting News
I have some exciting news to share. The Celia’s are moving to Austin! I have accepted the call to serve at Bethany Lutheran Church. We are very excited about this new chapter, but we are also grieving the end of 13 wonderful years at Water’s Edge. As we begin the fury of selling our house and buying a new one and all that goes with that awful process, we are also trying to create space to say goodbye to the people we love here in North Dallas. As we have begun saying our goodbyes, I have become painfully aware of how many amazing people we are saying goodbye to who we never spent much intentional time with. We have all experienced this. We meet a new friend or family and both parties have good intentions to get together but then life happens and the next thing you know 5 years have gone by and that dinner or cup of coffee never happened.
If you haven’t been able to tell from my previous posts, I am a creature of habit. I find beauty in ritual and ordinary routines. But as we begin saying our goodbyes to all of the people we wished we had been more intentional with I am a bit sad because at times I let ritual and routine get in the way of a last-minute dinner or an unexpected cup of coffee with a friend.
As beautiful as I find ritual and routine, I am being reminded that those practices aren’t the end goal. Living an abundant life is the end goal. And a truly abundant life is centered around deep relationships. And deep relationships take intentionality, which means sometimes our routines and rituals need to fall by the wayside.
As we move down to Austin one of my goals is to be more intentional with the new people we meet. That means that we may have people over even though the house isn’t as clean as we’d like it. Or I may not be able to get to bed as early as I like so I can wake up before everyone else to be alone with God before I start my day. When it comes down to it when I meet someone new and we agree to get together I am going to try my hardest to make it happen. I know there are only so many hours in a day and I can only give so much of myself to other people. But I want to try to be intentional with what time and emotional energy I do have.
So, maybe there is a person you have been trying to connect with for way too long. I encourage you to pick up your phone today and set a date with him or her. Make it happen. Because the only regret I have from the past 13 years is that I didn’t connect with some amazing people.
Grace and peace ‘til we rise in glory.
