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"But you're SO young!"

This past Wednesday, I got a Facebook message from my aunt, Carla. She said something on the lines of this: 

"Hey Ash, just following up on a conversation we had back in September...I haven't said anything to anyone, but I'm curious how everything is going. Let me know!"

You can imagine my confusion when I read this cryptic message. I responded telling her I had no idea what she was talking about and she then asked me to call her. When I called her, she basically told me that she had received a call on her landline [who even has one of those anymore??!] back in September from someone who sounded just like and claimed to be me. And this person told her I was pregnant! She said she even asked how Casey felt about it and what my parents thought, to which they responded that Casey was thrilled but that I hadn't told my parents yet. 

So my poor aunt had been thinking for the past 2 months that I was pregnant and that she was keeping my dirty secret! She'd spent 2 whole months biting her tongue from asking my mom about it and waiting for my news to come out. 

HA!

After I consoled her and swore that I was definitely NOT pregnant and that it would literally be impossible for me to be so, we had a pretty good laugh. I'm not sure if she dreamt the whole situation or someone played a very cruel joke on her. Nonetheless, I think my aunt definitely deserves the #1 aunt award for keeping that secret so well! Even if it wasn't a real secret...

As funny of a conversation this was, I'm pretty sure this probably wasn't the only time someone questioned if I was pregnant when I got engaged in September at the age of only 20. Why on earth would anyone want to get married so young?! 

Casey and I met October 5th of last year and honestly, I could have never seen him again after that first night and I wouldn't have thought anything of it. At this point of my life, I was experiencing for the first time what it was like to be satisfied by my relationship with the Lord so much, that I had ZERO interest in having a boyfriend. So when Casey called me the night after we first met and asked me on a date, I was baffled when the word "Yes" escaped my lips. The conversation I was having with myself looked a little like this:

"jfkdls;afjdsoijpvdfsnafeaofjdsiopafjdkslafndsoaYESNOMAYBENOOKAYYESjdkls;afjkdlsjfklsa;fjdklsajfkjfkldsjafidjsklfndsklajfld;sjflkja"

I would give myself pep talks before every date about how I was going to let him take me on the next date, but that at the end of the date I was going to explain that we couldn't date anymore. I just wasn't interested in a relationship. I was too focused on other things. Turns out when a guy is pursuing you in a way that looks just like Jesus it's not very easy to turn down...We dated for about 4 weeks before he officially asked me to be his girlfriend and kissed me a few hours later...

Within 3 weeks after that, he dropped the L bomb and I said it too. I couldn't believe how quickly things were moving. For months after that, Casey would continue to pursue me so boldly and I would continue to go back and forth between whether he really was "the one" or not. I remember the sweat I broke out in when he first told me his plans of proposing around Christmas time 2012, and then marrying me the next summer. I almost wish we could have gotten that 
moment on tape. My face probably looked a little something like this:

 It sounded insane to me. I was NINETEEN, far from graduating college and had just watched my parents marriage of 24 years fall apart right before my eyes. Marriage wasn't even close to being within my 5 year plan.

But like I said before, when a guy is pursuing you in a way that looks like Jesus, it's not very easy to turn down. One day I woke up and I wasn't scared anymore. This, I knew, was the clarity I'd been praying for.  

So finally, in April, we began to seriously put some things on a timeline and think of what our future together would look like. He proposed in September and we will be married in June! 

I'll be 21 when we marry and Casey will be 23. 

And much like everything else in my life, getting married at 21 is absolutely nothing I ever thought I would want or would happen. If you would have told me a year ago that this is where we'd be, I would have laughed in your face. But also like everything else in my life, my future husband is way better than any dream guy I could have created in my imagination. He is the most honest, sacrificial, noble, sexy man I've ever met in my life and he pushes me towards Jesus every day. 
I can't really help when we met. Turns out God doesn't really ask our permission when he places your future spouse into your life. He just kinda does it!
So please, person with all sorts of thoughts and opinions, please, please, please stop telling me that I'm "SOOO young" to be getting married.

Oh, and because I just can't get over how awesome our engagement pictures turned out, here are a few of my favorites:

 

Be a tortoise.

Last night I had my Campaigners girls over (er...just one girl came this week, actually).

Campaigners is a time for Young Life kids to "dig deeper" into what they hear on Monday nights when we tell them about Jesus. It looks different at every school. In past years, Berkner has had Campaigners with all grades combined, but this year we decided to have them individually for each grade. This Thursday night event has become my favorite time of the week for more reasons than one. My group of 8 girls meet at my house at 7:30 for girl talk, Bible study, venting and the occasional treat. Last night, I made "turtles":

This is my third year leading now and I am a completely different leader than when I started.

Every year, I begin the year by realizing how crappy of a leader I was the year before. 

First off, I was eighteen when I first started and barely out of high school myself. I was leading at the school that I had graduated from just 3 months prior to that and had no idea how to talk to the freshmen girls. You'd think I would have been a pro at it since I myself had been one much more recently than any of the other leaders. But that was definitely not the case because I was so awkward!

Now, I definitely don't claim to be a super-star by any means. I know for a fact that there are plenty better leaders out there than I am because I have the privilege of leading alongside some of them every single week. I have, however, learned valuable lessons in my experience so far that I wish someone would have warned me of when I first started out. 

And so, I was inspired this morning to write a "top 9" {I know 9 is random. I tried to stick to 5, but this is what it turned into, and then I couldn't think of a 10th} of tips I wish I could write in a letter and send to myself 3 years ago, when I first became a Young Life leader. {Why yes, I did steal Brad Paisley's idea about the whole letter thing.} Here's what I've got:

1. Be present. Latch onto a leader that has been there longer and follow them around to all of the events they attend. I was lucky enough to have already had a great relationship with Kate Habicht {who just became Kate Quinn a few weeks ago!!!}, our Young Life staff person for Berkner, and she became that person for me. Just let them notice that you're there at their events and then reach out to them for coffee or dinner.

2. Learn the art of small talk. 

TalktothemaboutschoolTalktothemaboutboysTalktothemaboutgirlsTalktothemabouttheirfavoriteshowsTalktothemaboutsportsTalktothemabouttheweatherTalktothemaboutMondaynightclubTalktothemabouttheirfamilyTalktothemabouttheirfriendsTalktothemabouttheirenemiesTalktothemabouttheirhairTalktothemabouttheirhobbiesTalktothemabouttheirgoalsTalktothemabouttheirdreamsTellthemfunnyjokesTelltheminnapropriatejokesTellthemaboutyourjobTellthemaboutyourfamilyTellthemaboutyoursignificantotherTellthemaboutthethingsyou'reproudofTellthemaboutthethingsyou'renotproudofTalktothemabouttheirsuccessesTellthemaboutyoursucessesTalktothemabouttheirfailuresTellthemaboutyourfailures.

Just talk--even if it's about the most insignificant things. Sometimes the beginning stages of building relationships with teenagers feels a lot like dating. At first, conversations are very surface level and sometimes awkward. But after some time, you eventually get to the conversations that really matter. There is a proper order for everything, and conversations are no different.

3. Demand honesty. Both years that I've been to camp as a leader, I begin our first cabin time {Preface: At camp, they have club every day where they obnoxiously sing songs, play games and then a speaker stands up to share a part of the Gospel with them. After each talk, kids go back to their cabins to discuss what they just heard with their leaders. Hence, the name "cabin time".} by laying out a few ground rules. I make them all agree that everything that is said remains confidential and that we're not going to talk about anything that's said with anyone else once we leave the cabin. I tell them it's a place where they can ask any questions they want, even the dumb ones. And if I ask them a question, they are to respond with blunt honesty -- even if their response is to tell me they think I'm an idiot and they think I'm full of crap {or even the other word for crap}. I don't want them to put on a show for me, or to feed me answers they think I want to hear. I just want to know them: the real them, not the "them" they present to everyone else. I want to know the things they're proud of and the things they're not proud of. I want genuine relationships.

4. Avoid sarcasm. This one might sound strange, but hear me out. Teenagers are fragile. They will take anything and everything you say personally. A teensy tiny joke about how they're a pig because they had 4 helpings of mashed potatoes at dinner might be intended as a friendly tease, but what they're hearing is, "You're an ugly fat ass." Lack of self confidence isn't a struggle for girls alone. Boys deal with it too. And you, as their leader, need only to be building them up with compliments. You can never ever ever be too careful when using sarcasm, because they're going to believe that every joke you tell carries a little bit of truth.

5. Show them your confidence. Teenagers thrive off of confidence. Their souls salivate at today's celebrities and supermodels because of one thing -- their confidence. No teenager is going to believe you have anything to offer them if they think you're just as fearful and self conscious as they are. The cool thing is that you can let them know of your confidence in many ways. I was blessed with being a disgusting human being, so I fart and belch in front of the girls to deliver one message -- I don't give a crap! I rock it. And luckily I found a man who loves me despite my grossness. 

One of my best friends, Taylor Quesada, was sharing with me a couple weeks ago about her experience so far leading Young Life in College Station. She told me that when she sees a kid that she hasn't met before, she asks someone else what their name is, obnoxiously calls them out and follows it with a compliment or an invitation to be friends -- in the middle of a crowd, without fear. I've never seen her in action over there, but I know the kids love her because she is one of the most confident people I've ever met in my life. Our senior year, she danced around in a blow-up fat ballerina costume at a pep rally in front of our entire school. Who wouldn't want to be best friends with someone like that?!

So be loud and crazy, and dance like an idiot at club on Monday nights. Be over the top. Shove invisible microphones in their face and demand that they sing louder as you scream Miley Cyrus lyrics at them. They are going to think you're insane, but secretly they'll want to be you.

6. They won't let you in during the bad times, if you're not there for them in the good times. This is a life-changing realization I just came to last week. I used to believe that you earn the right to be heard with people through being there for them when they're in a rough spot, or going through a tragedy. It's exactly the opposite, though. No teenager is going to give a crap and want you there for them when their parents divorce, or when someone near to them dies, or some other tragedy happens if you aren't there to celebrate with them before that. You earn your right to be heard by people by genuinely celebrating with them -- which is a lot harder to do than you might think! Genuine happiness for someone looks like that psycho, overenthusiastic mom that's screaming at the top of their lungs as she cheers on her kid at their soccer game. It's that dad that loses his mind and charges the umpire when they make a bad call at his 4-year-old son's tee-ball game. It's knowing their sports schedules and showing up to every single one -- just to be a face in the audience. Genuine happiness for someone is so rare and valuable in gaining trust from teenagers. Show them that you have this, and you just might earn the right to be that person they call when they're in a crisis.

7. You can't achieve #6 if you don't have this one: Be consistent. In the words of my friend, Todd Tramonte: "Teenagers have enough inconsistent people walking in and out of their lives." It is impossible to earn their trust if you look like every other figure in their life. 

8. Forget about the numbers. We say this all the time when talking about attendance at club. It really is about quality, rather than quantity. When I first became a leader, I was more concerned with making sure I knew every single one of the kids in my assigned grade {which is an impossible feat at a school of nearly 3,000}, rather than latching on to the few girls that I first met, and growing those relationships. I was so consumed with the numbers, I can honestly say that I failed at truly discipling any kids until my third year. I wasted half of my kids high school years being overwhelmed with the numbers. In the words of Andy Stanley, "Do for one what you can't do for all." After all, Jesus called us to make disciples, not to know the name of every kid at _________ High school.

9. And with all of that comes the most important thing I've learned so far: Be a tortoise. Ever heard the tale about the tortoise and the hare? It begins with a hare challenging a ridiculously slow moving tortoise to a race. The hare quickly leaves the tortoise in the dust, and takes a nap in the middle of the race to show his superiority. When he awakens, he opens his eyes just in time to see his competitor slowly creeping across the finish line. 

Slow and steady wins the race.

Don't get discouraged if you don't immediately have kids reaching out to befriend you. Sometimes teenagers are like scared dogs {Please don't take offense to that, guys}. Approach them too strongly and they'll run away. Stand there and let them sniff your hand first, and they'll let you pet them.

Don't be discouraged if your relationships with kids comes about slowly. It takes time! The more damaged the kid is, the less likely they are going to be to open up to you and let you see what's inside that heart of theirs. You can't get to the guts though, without spending some time digging. You have four years. Start now.

I hope this is helpful, interesting, or at least slightly humorous to any new leaders out there reading this! Happy Friday.

Real

Growing up as a middle child of three daughters who looked like triplets and all played the same sport, I was always trying to find ways to be different. So when I was 6 years old, I asked my mom to chop off my long hair and to give me a bob. I played with bugs and bit my nails to be like my dad. I would do anything and everything you told me to do if the words double-dog-dare preceded it . . . especially if my sisters weren’t going to do it.

I wanted to stand out.

But when I became a Christian I just wanted to join the club. I thought that the name of the game was conformity and the rules were simple:

Look this way.

Wear this.

Don’t wear that.

Talk like this.

Hang out with these people.

Have this opinion about this, and that, aaaand that.

Start going to church every single Sunday and Wednesday and if you don’t, you will be judged.

And above all, make sure everyone thinks that you are this perfectly even tempered, peaceful, ridiculously happy person at all times. In other words “Fake it till’ you make it.”

I tried so hard to fit in and be someone I thought the church wanted me to be. I quit asking questions as to why we did certain things or believed certain issues and I assumed everyone knew better than I did. They themselves had played the game longer than I had. They had parents who were members of the club and they had actually been raised in it. They must know more than I did. I just got used to speaking in someone else’s voice and thinking someone else’s thoughts.

So I went out and bought a bunch of cardigans to cover up my shoulders when I wore my skanky spaghetti-strap dresses. I cleaned up my language and adapted a new lingo. I wore a cross around my neck every day so that people would “see that I’m a Christian”. I got a purity ring and I wore it on my left ring finger so that people would think I was a virgin still. I made friends at church and stopped hanging out with the "heathens" I used to hang out with. Doing these things wouldn't have been bad in themselves, but I was doing them to make myself look like someone that I’m not. And obviously, no one told me to do all of these things, but I was living off a make-believe checklist that I had made for myself out of my own insecurities. I desperately wanted to be liked, accepted, well thought of and . . . loved.

I don’t know when, but at some point I stopped looking at what the members of this club were doing, and I started looking at Jesus--that dude that broke all the rules.

I watched as he interacted and lived life with the sinners and the socially unacceptable. {Matthew 9:10-13}

I watched as he braided a whip for himself and went all Indiana Jones on a bunch of scumbags who had created a marketplace inside the House of God. {John 2:13-17}

I watched as he showed honest emotion and cried when the people he loved didn’t remember his words and trust him. {John 11:35}

I watched as he told stories with normal language about normal crap to communicate the true story of God to normal people who needed to hear it.

And I started to realize that he wanted me to do the same thing. I started to realize that he had absolutely created me with a unique story and a distinct voice and he was calling me to use it, whispering to me “Just be you, Baby Girl. I knew you even before I knit you together in you mother’s womb. I have a purpose for your existence and a plan for your future. Follow me and let me lead you through that. You were meant to speak the truth.”

What a relief! What a precious, precious gift to know that I can be myself, and I can leave behind the false expectations that I had made for myself. It’s okay to not be okay. It’s okay to ask questions. It’s okay to struggle, and be honest about your doubts, your fears, and your furked-upness. And to do so in a way that doesn’t glorify yourself or your sin, but in a way that points to the awesomeness of God’s grace.

What a gift!

Because when I stop worrying about whom I think my boss wants me to be, and who I think the parents of the kids I lead think I should be, I begin to have real life conversations about real life things. In reality, these expectations are made up in my own crazy head anyways! I don’t omit certain issues and pretend they don’t exist. It enables me to relate to kids by sharing my story without editing out certain struggles that I’ve had and temptations I still fight through today.

I am an imperfect person stumbling and failing to serve a perfect God every single day. And I’m okay with that. Because as I gladly boast in my weaknesses, I am allowing the power of Christ to work in my story. I am trusting in Him that even though I have done things that I am not proud of, I believe that Jesus has redeemed me and made me clean in the eyes of the Father. I believe that even though I am incredibly unworthy, God can use me anyway. And that speaks to how awesomely loving and powerful He is, and not to how disobedient and filthy I am.

Too often, we shy away from admitting to certain sins. We make a secret list of “sins we talk about” and “sins we don’t talk about”. I know that there will be people who shutter when I speak of them because they see that type of honesty as dangerous.

And to that, I say “okay”. I don’t care. I don’t care if I don’t fit perfectly into how you think a member of the Christian club should look like. I will continue to live out loud in a way that makes me the person who God wants me to be – one who worships Him in spirit and in truth (John 4:24). And as I do I will carry out my duty to proclaim His name and live out His call on my life that He gave me when he nudged me so long ago, whispering…

Speak up.

That one time I thought I was a Spartan

This past weekend, me, Casey (fiance) and his old roommate/best friend, Allen, decided to road trip down to Illinois to compete in an 8-mile Spartan Race. It was an experience.

I don't know if you've ever done one of these, but they're hard. Basically, it's an obstacle race inspired by the movie 300, and it is as challenging as it sounds. You run 8 miles through mud and dirt, and run through a series of obstacles. If you fail, or chose to skip any of the obstacles, your punishment is to do 30 burpees. These obstacles are things such as: army crawling under barb wire, climbing over 10 foot walls, carrying a 20 pound sandbag a certain distance, etc. Most of these obstacles were not made to cater to little-old-5-foot-3-inch-stubby-legged-me. Oh, and it's pretty much all through mud. Did I mention that it was in 8 miles long?!

We began the day at 7 AM volunteering to help out because if you do that, you get to run the race for free. Casey and I were stationed at the Monkey Bars (which were not your ordinary monkey bars), which was toward the end of the race. I watched as person after person went through and they looked dead. One girl even had to quit the race once she got to us because she was obviously close to hypothermia. Oh yea, did I mention it was 30 degrees that morning? Yea. I grew more and more intimidated by the race as the morning went on, but with Casey's encouragement, decided to run the race anyways.

At 2:30, our heat took off. It had warmed up to around 40 degrees, but still felt pretty cold to us Texans. At first, I was pretty confident. We started out going at a decent pace, and Casey and Allen helped me out on the obstacles that I couldn't do by myself. For one of the obstacles, we had to drag a 30 pound cinder block with a chain for some hundred yards around a track. Casey, being the man that he is, didn't hesitate to grab hold of mine when he saw that I was struggling, and drug both of ours by himself the majority of the way. You could say it was one of his more attractive moments. Again, for one of the obstacles we had to carry a sandbag around an even longer track. I'd say it was close to 2 or 300 yards around. Casey and Allen grabbed hold of theirs (which was probably twice as heavy as the girl one that I was carrying) and took off. I was halfway through by the time Casey had finished, dropped his bag, doubled back to find me, and carried mine for me the rest of the way. He was literally carrying my burden as I struggled through the race. (Cue cheesy Jesus parallel)

And then the calf cramps set in. Two hours into the race, the sun began to set, and it got significantly colder. At mile 7, we approached a series of obstacles where we were jumping in and out of chest to waist deep mud, and waiting through long lines to complete other obstacles. We were running along a straight between obstacles when I was paralyzed by the twinge of my muscles preparing to clench. I stopped to stretch them out because I knew the excruciating pain that would happen if they fully cramped up. Casey stopped with me and Allen ran on. I tried to walk to the next obstacle, but when I got there, my calves fully cramped up and I knew I wouldn't be able to finish. Casey's body was apparently more prepared to handle the cold than me and Allen's. Allen and I had to quit at that point, only a mile from the finish line because we were nearly hypothermic, and my legs weren't going to go any further. The combination of the cold and being coated in freezing cold mud was just too much. I had literally pushed myself as far as my body was going to let me go. They picked us up in a 4 wheeler and drove us to the medical tent where they covered us in blankets and sat us in front of a space heater.

Casey finished the race because there wasn't any room on the 4 wheeler for him, and also because he was perfectly fine (which made Allen and I feel pretty lame). Once he finished, he raced to heat up the car and drove us to the nearest hotel, where we had the best showers of our lives.

One might say it was a disaster, but the trip really was an overall success. It made me admire Casey even more with how well he took care of me. I was literally a damsel in distress and he came to my rescue. It was great to just have a weekend to spend time with these boys because we always have so much fun together. Since Casey moved out to Hallsville, Texas in June, we hadn't spent that much consecutive time together.

I will, however, think twice next time I think it's a good idea to test my spartan-like characteristics in weather like that. I think I'll stick to attempting races like this in warmer weather.