changed.

this morning we went to learn some hebrew songs at the church we've been attending. as we sang (they were beautiful, btw) i felt as if i was falling in love with the language. and not just with hebrew, but with language and words and communication in general. when i'm home, i never really think about it. it's just easy.. everything is so easy because it's the same. it's all english. it's all so.. normal. but here, it's another world. there are several different languages that i hear on a regular basis each day.

hebrew.

arabic.

english.

spanish.

it just comes so easy when we speak in our native tongue.. it's like breathing.. it's simplicity at best. but, it takes years to master another language. it's so interesting how that works. words are so effortless when you know them, and they are terrifying when you don't. it's second nature until you get out of your comfort zone and step into something else. hearing an unknown language just reminds me of how huge this world is and how incredibly diverse it is. it's crazy to think about how truly small and seemingly insignificant my perspective is.. it always seems to be the center of the world until the minute i step away from what i know and become an outsider for a short time.

maybe this is why trips like this are so often referred to as life changing. the entire life, the very essence of everything you have been and known is changed and will never again be the same as it was. you will forget much, but always carry the stories, the faces, the images, the words.. things that impact and alter the very core of your being. it truly is life changing in every sense. the life that you knew dies, and a new one will be born.. you will never be the same as you were when you stepped foot into that foreign place.

and may it be so in my life.

en gedi.

This heart is a desert
Dry, cracked and barren.
I yearn for your rain, like a flood from heaven.
I cry out to you from this darkness,
My spirit is empty.
God of Israel, breathe life once again.

I thirst for your grace.
I breathe in, gasping for your air.
My arms reach out for your hands.
My heart longs for the love it once knew.
Yet, still I wander, through this broken land.
God of Israel, breathe life once again.

In the silence, I heard your voice.
A small whisper, but perfectly clear.
“Wake up my daughter, let me shine on you again”
For I was blind, so you gave me your eyes.
I was deaf, and you opened my ears.
I could no longer walk, so you carried me.
I couldn’t breathe, so you did.

Out of death you have rescued me
I cried out to you and you answered.
My heart restored.
My vision repaired.
My lungs refilled.
No longer will I wander in this desert.
God of Israel, you have breathed life once again.

new.

i think my favorite part about being here in this place is that i've been able to escape my thoughts, the ones that i am never really able to put to rest when i'm at home and comfortable. i've spent the past two weeks literally walking in freedom and pure, complete peace. i have really never known anything like this, and it's a miracle that any of this is even happening at all. i'm free from the thoughts and the worry of the future.. the constant questions i have about my summer plans, or the fall, or graduation, or the semester after.. the things i can never seem to escape no matter how good or content i may be in the present.

i have succeeded in living in the moment, for the first time in my life. i have been able to get away from myself, really, and embrace this moment for everything that it is and all that it has to offer. i am walking through history in every sense of the word and it's more tangible than i ever could of imagined.. everyday i see something new, brand new. everyday i learn another person, another place, another story. i've never been more in love with anything or anyone else and it's the absolute best feeling in the world.

god is absolutely real here. i've even thought so far as this may be the first time i've ever truly known god for all that he is. i am quite sure that i haven't known joy like this before, and i haven't felt the closeness and the reality of god anywhere close to the way i feel it here. it's as if the past five or six years i've spent walking with him were all veiled. they were watered down and unrealistic.. and here, it's completely different. i can see it, taste it, feel it. i know that he is right there with me at every moment. the bitterness, the doubt, the cynicism, the pain, the jealousy.. every negative emotion that i have carried with me for so long has almost disappeared.. to the point that i'm terrified to leave, because i don't want to leave it here. i don't want to leave this place and this family that i have acquired. i am joyous for the first time in my life, i have peace for the first time, i have contentment more than i ever have. it's a beautiful feeling, it's so much better than anything i could have imagined.

it was the baptism in the jordan that did me in. i was covered in tears before i got down to the water, i was so overwhelmed with every emotion imaginable. it was the moment that i have been dreaming of for months, it was the moment that was promised to me.. the restoration that i had been waiting for and hoping for. the symbolism of baptism has never been more clear or more meaningful. i waded into that cold water a broken, dead soul. the heaviness of my heartbreak followed me in.. but it did not come out with me. i stepped out of that river a new soul, a living thing. i could breathe again, i could see again, i could feel everything around me. the death stayed in that water and the new life that i have been searching for came out with me.

being here is indescribable.. there are literally no words that even come close to accurately describing how amazing it is. nothing is ever good enough.. but i think i like it that way. it's mine.. it's my experience and my life and i can't really even share it with anyone else.

shalom.

i'm keeping another blog for israel stuff. http://yahfakeshet.blogspot.com/ it's mainly for my family to read. i guess i'll still update this one but i'm not sure if i will or not.. so if you care about my travels.. read the other one :)

scumbag with a golden heart.

packing for israel.

my last night in this country for several weeks. i honestly... don't really know how to feel yet.

all i know at this point is that this is the most content and the closest i've ever been to "god's will" for my life. this is the closest to being exactly where i am "supposed" to be that i ever have been before. i am so ready to embark on this new journey. i am so ready to say goodbye to all that has been my life for the past several months.. years even. i am ready to turn my back completely on the old and embrace the new for all that it is and all that i believe it can be.

i am ready. i am ready.

i just need to keep telling myself that.

goodbye all that i once was. goodbye to the old kristi. goodbye to the brokenhearted girl that i have been for so many months. the anger, the bitterness, the sadness, the pain, the doubt, the anxiousness.. everything. goodbye.

i will emerge new, fresh, restored. and i am believing that with every once of faith that i have stored into these bones (which, honestly, may not be that much at this point)

it sounds so ridiculous and so crazy that just stepping foot in this country could erase all the brokenness inside of me. but i really believe that it can.

here i go. wish me luck.

the flowers you gave me are rotting and still i refuse to throw them away.

things i am currently loving:

1. my halfway packed suitcase for ISRAEL in ONE WEEK!!!

2. i get to see my best friend tomorrow!

3. john legend, nickel creek, and kanye.

4. the fact that aaron has 510 pictures of me in his iphoto. bahahaa.

5. the fact that i've been on the same page of my last pentecostal movement paper for at least 3 days.

6. vanessa.

7. poker every night. i am really going to miss it a lot.

8. david james cripps.

9. my wall to wall with kenny. it seriously makes me really happy. i wish all dead relationships could turn out the way ours is.

10. dinner date with my dad tonight!

11. watchmen midnight premiere.

12. the fact that i have guy friends again. and the fact that i love my beautiful girlfriends very much.

i wish i were better at poker.

writing used to be therapeutic for me, now it's becoming a chore. perhaps because it's just much easier to internalize all the things i'm thinking and feeling lately.. or because i don't feel quite safe writing those things.

i think i'm so independent and i want so badly to deny any feeling of normal womanly desire to be wanted and romanced and loved and wooed that i just repress and repress those desires that are, in fact, inside of me, just like they are inside all the girls that i claim to dislike! i'm the worst kind. i am that girl, i just pretend not to be. i get so upset when i feel like i'm doing all the right things and still, i don't get any play. i look cute, i dress well, i'm funny, i'm outgoing, i'm nice, i'm smart. but.. nothing. i get no crushes, no date offers, no phone number exchanges. and my friends.. who yes, are equally cute and all of the above, get all the action. and the boy that i like is, of course, all about my best friend. and she's into him, of course. and she always gets someone, she always has someone, she is always favored and loved and is always in a relationship of some form.

and i'm angry with her for being like that. it's not fair. it's so stupid of me to be mad at her for that.. it's just jealousy. it's consuming jealousy and fear that i may never find anyone. it's unnecessary. it's unfair.

and i'm still broken from him. i'm over him, completely and utterly, but i still battle those feelings of worthlessness and rejection and inadequacy. and i hate him for it. i hate him for ruining my confidence and stealing my joy. (ironic). i hate him for making me do the stupidest things i've done in my life and committing the biggest crimes i've ever committed. i hate that he got away without scars and without being seen as the asshole that he is. ugh. ugh ugh.

i'm starting to think that i'm just not cut out for this.

this post was not supposed to be about him. i'm just venting. it wasn't supposed to be about any of this meaningless and petty bullshit.

ugh.

okay- moving on.

i decided that if last semester was the semester of death and destruction.. this one must be the semester of life and rebirth. and so far, it has been. the end of christmas break was the end of my old life. everything from that point on has been a climb uphill, and it has been difficult and dirty, but it has been so good and so fulfilling.

the last day of christmas break i said goodbye to everything and burned all of it in my mind. these months at home have been some of the best of my life.. i've been so restored and so renewed. my relationships with these girls who i would die for, the entrance of the piersons and the beautiful and loving individuals that i share bible study time (and a lot more) with during the week, the girls in the youth group who have given me hope and humor, my long distance friends who are still there.. always there, and my family who i am hopelessly in love with. each of these people have changed me, and they have all been aides to the rebirth of kristi.

israel will be the capstone. i can feel it and i know it. not that it will make me complete by any means, but i think it'll have a great deal to do with the completion of this restoration i've been going through. god has given, and will give, so much to me.

/end rambling.

for now just let it be known that i love corinne bailey rae and kanye west.

i love, you love.

Come and share my house, my home, and all I own.
I'd love to give to you.
Aren't you tired of going along this lonely road?
It takes it's toll on you.

Give me your emotion, your heart's devotion.
Give anything you like.
And I'll give understanding. Life's so demanding.
I'm all you need to get by.

And I...
I love, I love, I love
Love hurts sometimes
But this feels right.

And You...
You love, you love, you love
Though you've been burned
You still return.