The Lord pursued me my whole life and I, naive and proud, played with the idea of committing myself to Him for years. It was not until 2014 that I truly broke before the Lord and came to accept Him as my Lord and Savior.

By His providence and merciful grace, I graduated the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in three years with a degree in English and a minor in Communication. I had seriously considered dropping out near the end of my freshman year after relapsing — I could no longer write with pen or type on my laptop due to shaking hands, let alone eat, sleep or think properly. Nothing I thought made sense (I understood that perfectly well) but the feelings that came from it were enough to drive a person mad. I thought that was the end.

On one particular night, as the entire campus slept, I wandered the hallways of my dorm, trying to pray and console myself. I was tired and exhausted for not having slept 3 weeks straight even though all I wanted was to close my eyes and shut off my brain. The physical/mental deterioration was at its peak and I was beginning to lose it. Yet as I stared at the bathroom mirror, I resolved to never kill myself no matter how badly I wanted to. The hurt it would cause my family was motivation enough to lay that thought to rest. But I also silently prayed to God that if I just so happened to die for whatever reason, I would be completely at peace with it too. My mindset was this: “Dead before 30? I’ll take it. Better than living like this still at 30.”

Those were very dark and bleak days and although the trauma of it all still lingers, and I have no certainty that it will remain in the past, my desire now is to serve faithfully, live divinely dissatisfied and fight for His purpose and will. May everything I do and say be done with eternity in mind. May everything in this world fall so incredibly short and pale in comparison to the beauty of His covenant love and redemptive story. I cling to the world as though my life depends on it, but my hope is to desperately hold on to the Word that has never failed me.

I am by no means a professional writer. Whatever exists on this page is a glimpse of God’s faithfulness in my life and His undying love for my soul. As you read, please discern for yourself the text before you as I most certainly do not have all the answers or correct interpretations.

I pray these string of words may be used to glorify Him and my desire to type and create will only be sustained by His grace alone.