BLESSED ARE THE PEACEMAKERS //

The image on this post is from me sitting on my kitchen floor waiting for a cake to bake, I brush a spider off of my shoulder (minor freak out moment), while a cool breeze makes itself at home through the screen door. I can see our crab apple tree and the tiny but ever growing veggies from my containers.

I have sat down to write this post a handful of times over the month and couldn't quite find the right words, but this seemed good...

Six years ago at the beginning of July, I was woken up by my frantic father asking me

"What was Nate's last name??"

As I half asleep answered, "Nate Henn, why?"

He choked back tears informing me that Nate Henn had been killed in a terrorist attack in Uganda.

And really nothing has ever been the same.

My dad told me, days following Nate's death, that he blessed me going to work for Invisible Children, even if it meant the same fate for me as it did for Nate. He wouldn't hold me back.

At the time I was planning on going back to school. I was one year away from a bachelor's degree and finding a way to finish school had seemed like the responsible move. It was why I so strongly turned down Nate's encouragement to volunteer for Invisible Children, even though he tried so hard to convince me to do so.

And, well, six years later, I still don't have my bachelor's degree.

I did work for Invisible Children, sharing Nate's story on the same stages he had stood on just a year before, and I wouldn't have traded that honor for anything in the world.

I firmly believe that the experiences I have had over the last six years are more valuable than any degree I would have completed in one.

So here I sit, in my comfy home with a lake view, with my hot husband, dopey dog, and all of the luxury and more that a 20-something with no degree could ask for.

And every July is like a check up. Taking a step back and looking at all that has happened, all that I have, all the choices, good and bad, that have rippled their effects throughout my life and the lives of others from the panicked wake up call I received that morning.

Nate had told our family at the dining room table over dinner that he would willingly give his life for these kids. Not numbers on fact sheets used to emotionally manipulate supporters, they were his friends, his brothers, and they were who he died for.

What would you willingly lay down your life for?

Maybe you won't have to step in front of a piece of shrapnel from a bomb, maybe you won't have to change your life plans and give up finishing your education, maybe you won't have to sell your house and move yourself and your family to another country... maybe you'll just have to be uncomfortable, maybe you'll just have to honor someone else above yourself, maybe you'll have to stand on the subway instead of sit, maybe you'll have to congratulate someone else's success when no one recognizes yours, maybe you'll have to adjust your schedule a little bit...

There are hundreds of ways each day that we have the chance to lay down our lives for others. And even though my pursuit of justice and freedom has not cost me my life, I pray I never loose sight of the ways I can be a living legacy by simply loving others as I have loved myself and daily laying down my life for them.

& then he said // blessed are the peacemakers