Something Beautiful

One week ago, I got to experience my second favorite thing about traveling: coming home. I love to travel to see new places and experience new cultures and meet new people, but I love coming home again. I love hearing those words when the customs agent hands me my passport in the airport. There is just something so sweet about coming home. I will give you a longer blog post later about my entire trip to Mexico, but in the mean time, just know that it was incredible. In many ways I feel like I am still trying to process all that we did and saw. Honestly, I think the culture shock was worse coming back into the States than it was going to Mexico, but more on that later. Until I post about my trip, I will just leave you with this lovely picture. I took this near a town called Zongolica where we turned off the main road to go down the mountain road to get to the village we spent the week working in. It was so beautiful!!

Tomorrow. There is just something about the promise of tomorrow that brings hope and joy to my heart. Tomorrow is a fresh start, a new beginning, a reset button. Every day is fresh with no mistakes in it yet. It is a second chance, a chance to begin anew, a chance to do something new, different, even scary. Tomorrow morning I will wake up, take a shower, put the last of my things in a bag and get in my car. I will drive several hours and get on a plane that will take me to a connecting flight that will take me far away. When I get off that plane, I will be immersed in a different culture, a different lifestyle, a different place. People will speak a language that I don't speak fluently. My soul delights that this is my tomorrow. My soul delights that my suitcase is full, not of extra sets of clothing, but of tablecloths and napkins, of pens and pencils, of baby clothes, useful items to give to others. My soul delights in the work that is to come, the way I know I will be physically

I feel like there aren't too many things in life that inspire us any more. I mean real inspiration. Inspiration that brings life and change. Inspiration that grows hope in our hearts. Things that inspire us to greatness and demand that we bring others along with us. Now before some of you get concerned for me because these are words that have been thrown around a lot in recent history connected with political figures (and this is an election year) please read this all the way through. I believe that God has gifted some people with the ability to inspire people. These people usually come along when times are bad or we desperately need to be lifted above our circumstances. Sometimes life is hard. Sometimes we need someone to say the right thing to us to push us beyond ourselves, to exceed our own expectations and those of the people around us. I know I am inspired by underdog stories, how someone who shouldn't have won something did, how the team with the odds stacked against th