and this is life

I would like to tell you that my road trip with Jesus was amazing. Peaceful, joy-filled, fun, adventurous, packed with intimate conversation with the Lord.

It was all of those things.

But it was also incredibly hard.

Spend 4 days alone in a car with Jesus, and it's pretty likely that eventually you'll run into yourself, in all of your miserable, sin-tainted fallenness. And I did. It was pretty hideous. But oh, the grace with which He met me there!

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I suppose I should start from the beginning and go from there...

I think I left with a bit of fear that this year's trip would not be as amazing as last year's trip. It wasn't. And it was. And it wasn't. There really isn't a comparison to be made, except that they were both road trips with Jesus. But if last year's trip was about rest and learning to abide in Him at all times, being at rest, no matter what the current pace of life, this one was about life being a journey, and taking it as it comes, good, bad, and in-between. It was also, I think, about finding peace. I'm not sure. I think, as with last year's trip, I will come to understand far more a few months out from here than I could possibly understand now.

But it was good. Amazing. Terrible. Great. Breathtaking. Heart-breaking. Perfect. Confusing. Wonderful. Beautiful. Long. And way too short.

It was what it was.

And this is life. It's a journey, long and far too short - full of heartbreak and trial and breathtaking moments of beauty.

Just before I left, my friend Amanda and I took a day trip up to Michigan to get coffee at J.P.'s and pick apples and buy donuts (yes, seriously, that's all we went for) - and we found this sign at a store that said "The journey is the destination."

"You should get that. It's so you," she said.

"I know. How much is it?"

"It's $42.00." (moment of thought.) "But you could totally make that."

I really might.