At Nana's House

The kids play with a miniature ceramic tea set with broken handles on my nana's green shag carpet.  I remember the silver tea set I played with as a child, but I know it must be tarnished and hidden in the basement.  I have half a thought to go looking for it, but when I open the door to the basement, the steps are blocked with boxes that she has tossed down.  She can no longer climb the steep steps and has no way to store what won't fit upstairs.  We find trash frozen in the freezer so that it won't stink up the house until someone can come to carry it off.  I think about how fastidious she was when she was able, how we would tease her about how she wouldn't sit and talk after family meals but had to be up washing dishes and straightening up her already tidy house.  I would bring back cheap trinket souvenirs for her from our vacations until she started "hiring" me to come and dust all of her knick knacks.  Lesson learned.  But on a recent visit, she handed me a familiar plastic Shamu coffee cup for me to take home.  When I took it from her frail hand, it was heavier than I expected, and she explained that she had been filling it with her spare change for her great grandchildren.  I'm reminded of how she and my papa used to give me my weekly allowance, a five dollar bill folded neatly in thirds, and my weekly school lunch money in change in a brown paper bag, again folded in thirds, and secured with a rubber band.

My husband and I are the ones to slip them money now for the groceries and bills that Social Security doesn't fully cover.  My mom tries to refuse it, guilty and ashamed, but I remind her of the years she worked and struggled to take care of me, working multiple jobs and barely getting by.  She had nothing to put away to save as it all went to living expenses and the opportunity to provide a better future for me.  As a child I pleaded with her to give up a job so that I could see her more and wouldn't have to camp out some nights on my grandparents' pullout sofa while she worked the late shift.  I even promised that I wouldn't ask for anything for Christmas.  I realize now that must have broken her heart as she was working to pay for the roof over our head and the meals on the table.  Now I assure her that we have enough to share, that it is our pleasure, while also feeling guilty and ashamed myself that the little bits we offer aren't enough to replace her leaking roof, to provide a better life for them, to be more present and close in their lives.

Nana gave up driving years ago, but I remember having to call her when I missed the school bus in middle school and she would reluctantly drive the few miles to our house to take me to school.  It made me nervous how she would keep her feet on both the gas and brake pedals as she drove, making for a jerky ride.  She preferred to walk anyway and try to entice me for walks around the block after we ate meals at her house.  I, a chubby kid, would plead that we could drive around the block instead; pushing the pedals would be exercise, after all.  I wonder if she misses getting out.  She stays at home except for the occasional doctor's appointment.  We say she is lucky to have relatively good health and still such a sharp mind at 92, but she is longing for something better, the "golden years" she says she never really had since my grandfather died twenty years ago.

I have watched her and my mother grow closer over the couple years they have lived together, relying on one another and caring for each other in their weaknesses.  They have learned how to communicate better, to show the love that has come more easily between them and me but that has been difficult between the two of them.  We are a family of women, mostly matriarchs.  My grandmother is the oldest of six siblings, with just one baby brother among six girls.  My great-grandmother died in her nineties after outliving several husbands and lived independently until her death.  My grandmother has been widowed for over twenty years now, and my mom, my grandmother's only living child, has been alone since my dad died in his forties (I was five and my brother was eighteen at the time).  There has been much hardship, but it has born a gritty determination, a strong faith, independence, and strength in my grandmother.  I feel grateful that this, along with her love, is her legacy to me.  She is proud that I have always loved to read and learn and takes credit for this (where credit is due).

She wants me to take her dishes, the dishes I wished for years ago when we still gathered around the table regularly for family meals and holiday dinners.  They are totally impractical for our life--you can't put them in the dishwasher or microwave, they are delicate and fragile, and difficult and expensive to replace.  We have small children and a small house, so fine china has never been a necessity or even a good idea.  While I long for this connection to tradition and memories, I have resisted boxing it up.  It is a goodbye that I'm not ready to say, a marker of transitions that remain unspoken.  But there are other things I am collecting and packing up as I think about our stories and what makes up a legacy.

A Day Off

On Monday I took the day off.  It doesn't sound so revolutionary, but it was the second day I've had off in over a month.  I work at a university, and when I tell people this, they usually reply, "Oh, that must be so fun!  And you get the summers off!"  I try not to laugh.  My job is fun, and summers provide more breathing room, but I do work year-round.  There are weddings to officiate, reunions activities to coordinate, and I started a doctoral program this summer as well.  The summer is intended to be my catch-up time for reports, planning, and organization, but by the time the whirlwind of the spring semester ends in early June, I'm practically a zombie and spend a couple of days just staring off into space.  The quiet is as comforting as a warm blanket and I think of all the rest I'll catch up on as soon as I finish the reports and clear off my desk.  In the beginning, the summer seems to stretch endlessly ahead.  I'm not sure how it happens, but I get caught off-guard at the end of July every year.  How have two months passed?  What do I have to show for the time?  I worked full days most every day, and yet not a single item on my to-do list has been completed.  I start to mildly panic but promise myself I'll get on track.  I make charts and lists and set calendar reminders about the tasks that need to be completed.  And I ignore every single one until the middle of August.  August, then, becomes a frenzy of last-minute preparations and anxiety dreams of forgotten exams and standing naked in public.  I start to have feelings of dread and worry that nothing will work like I've planned, that I will be inadequate.

September is non-stop activity and chaos from meeting new students to catching up with old friends.  There are a ton of orientation events that I'm involved in while also restarting my programs and student groups.  The days, evenings, and weekends are full of programs and unexpected crises and before I know it, I can't remember the last time I had a break.  But the exhaustion is incapacitating, and I realize it when I start to lose my filter and my impatience shows in my words and on my face.  It's not a good attitude for a chaplain.  But what can you do when you're faced with unrelenting pastoral needs, an unexpected death, and the expectations continue to mount?  Chaplains are always on call.

I know I'm not indispensable and I'm certainly no superhero.  I need breaks and I need to take care of myself just like I encourage my students to do.  I bemoan the system that is so unnecessarily busy, and yet I fall into its trap every single time.  Some of it is unavoidable, but many times it's of my own choosing.  I like to feel needed.  I want to be accomplishing things.  Busyness becomes a bad habit that makes me feel important.  My identity is often wrapped up in what I do, an unfortunate side effect of being the people-pleasing straight A student in my earlier life.

But I realize that I desire something different.  Not something more, but something less.  I want space between my appointments, time to process and reflect.  I want walks with good friends and savoring meals instead of just using them as gripe sessions.  I long to enjoy time with my family instead of just being stressed about making time for togetherness like it's an inconvenience.  I want Sabbath time to truly be grateful for work that calls me and exhausts me, even as I'm filled yet again with the sacredness and joy of it.  I need to be reminded that it's not about what I do, but who I am.  As I use my gifts to serve God and others and I hope to be a model that we don't have to do it all.  We are valuable, we are accepted, we are loved as we are.  We are enough.

The thing about pushing on without a break is that you start to think that it's never enough.  There's always one more task to accomplish, one more way to better yourself.  Exhaustion becomes a status symbol, until it becomes a liability.  It was only in stepping away that I realized that it's not about me at all.  I cannot control things by my presence, regardless of how I think otherwise.  My absence shows me that the world continues on, and that's actually freedom.  I can take care of myself and that doesn't make me weak, but can be a model of strength and faith for those I serve.  In my work, I talk a lot about finding sanctuary in our busy lives, but I'm realizing that the most important thing is finding it within our selves.  Most times it means stopping what I feel is the "important" work and just doing a little less.

Spiritual Autobiography

I grew up in a small, conservative town where NASCAR was prime entertainment, and pickup trucks filled my high school parking lot. Church was just expected of all "good" folks, and if there were churches outside of the Southern Baptists, I was scarcely aware of them. I entered church as a baby in the "cradle roll" nursery, and the congregation became family early on when my father died. I spent the day of his funeral with church friends as my mom feared me being present at the funeral would scar me too much, as I was only five years old. Many men in the church stepped up as "surrogate" fathers, and I always felt safe within the church walls.

My baptism at age six brought the first twinges of fear as I was anxious to avoid the flames of hell that peppered the sermons and revivals I attended. I was scared of the water, too, as I couldn't swim and worried about being submerged. But there were welcoming arms to receive me and it felt like home. I took on leadership roles early on; leading children's church shortly after I "graduated" from it and asking permission to join the youth group early at age 12, around the time I also joined the adult choir. I went on to teach the youth, occasionally teach the adults, attended every Bible study, and volunteered for every Vacation Bible School.

While I worked so hard at church, I was also striving at school to be the top and to earn a ticket out of town.  While I understood in part that faith was a gift, I latched on a little too strongly to the “faith without works is dead” verse from James and in my perfectionist nature, I felt that I could earn recognition, control, or salvation at least from the difficulties my family faced.   I knew that with our financial situation, scholarships to college would be my only opportunity to break the cycle, and to leave behind the narrow-mindedness that I felt characterized my hometown. For the first time, though, I felt I didn't have the wholehearted support of my church family. They seemed confused about why I would leave, and I was one of the first to go away to college. Wasn't the Bible enough for me? Wouldn't a secular school draw me away from God?

Perhaps it was rebellion (my first minor attempt) that led me to choose science as my course of study, but still a "good girl", my first excursions at The College of William and Mary were to the Baptist Student Union (BSU). There I found Baptists (and others) like I had never encountered. They drank, danced, joked, and most surprisingly, were open to discussing and questioning their faith. This did not send them into a crisis (or into the hands of the devil), but instead, seemed to deepen their walk with God. I started to understand that it was okay to search, to question, to wrestle, to doubt, but to also embrace the mystery of what I could not understand.

I found myself secure within a community again, which was comforting as I detached myself from home. As I experienced independence, I grew to love being responsible for only myself and for the freedom to think for myself. My relationship with God grew with me. I felt at home in my faith (which continued to evolve) and in my developing understanding of who I was and who I was becoming. My struggles came, though, as graduation neared and the future I had dreamed of was not falling into place as I had planned. My years of goal sheets and to-do lists, of picturing myself as a scientific researcher, and believing that I could "be anything I wanted to be" seemed fruitless as I was ill-suited for research and was despondent over how much I abhorred it and the time I had wasted pursuing it. I was graduating from my dream school with my coveted degree and without job prospects or aspirations.

I followed a group of BSU friends to Richmond, where they were moving to attend seminary. I roomed with other seminary folks and found at couple of menial jobs (at Kinko's and the mall) to pay the bills while I continued to commute weekly to Williamsburg to volunteer with my church’s youth group. I found that I was spending all my free time (and my job time) dreaming of youth ideas, planning lessons, and praying for these teenagers that had grabbed my heart. During a week of camp with them that summer, we reached the emotional pinnacle of the event, the last altar call. I remember praying to God with passion and confusion, "God, I love this so much. Why can't I do this all the time?" And the still small voice within me (which can be surprisingly snarky) answered, "Well, why can't you?" And with that, I answered the call to ministry and was filled with a peace and excitement that I hadn't felt in months.

In my enthusiasm, I imagined it would be all light and glory. It was for a while. My family was thrilled (my grandmother commented, "I always pictured you as a missionary!" even though that was the farthest thing from my mind). My church was not so enthusiastic, however. Although they didn't talk about it with me (perhaps because I was still keeping my distance from home), I heard about the pastor arguing with my mom and grandmother about how women weren't allowed to be ministers.  I was encouraged by the way my mom, normally submissive and self-conscious, defended me and my calling. I was proud of the way my grandmother exhibited her feistiness and Biblical and church knowledge in her vocal support.

Seminary for me was another time of coming home to community. I dove in with enthusiasm and passion. I loved the classes; I loved the people around me. I loved how my faith was tested, challenged, and strengthened. I loved working towards something that was more than an interest, but was a passion and a calling. I had the opportunity to experience many kinds of ministry from youth work to college ministry, and church ministry to non-profit. I felt a strong calling to work with young women outside the church, but had no idea of what form that would take in my vocation. For the first time, I had no plan, and yet, there was still peace.

The greatest gift of seminary, though, was discovering a different Call, my John Call, the man I would marry. From the beginning of our friendship, a deep connection was formed. It took only a couple of dates to realize that God was drawing us together. After six weeks we were engaged, and we married a year later on the quad of the seminary, with the dean playing our processional on guitar, our (female) internship and preaching professor officiating, and a small handful of friends and family as participants and guests. It was a lovely beginning to a chapter of my story that continues to grow more and more beautiful over the years. From our ceremony, we walked hand in hand the 100 or so yards to the first apartment we shared on the campus.

A year into our marriage, John graduated and we begin exploring our first vocational calls together. We decided to move back closer to "home" for both of us, picking a city between our two families. We dreamed of starting a family together and it seemed ideal when we both found jobs that we loved within a short time span. John served as the Associate Pastor and Minister to Youth and Children at a church for 5 years while I started as Assistant Director of Christian Education at a residential group home for at-risk youth and developmentally disabled adults, and moved to the full Director of Christian Education and chaplain over a period of 8 years. I loved the variety, particularly working with the youth in the girls' wilderness program, and offering pastoral care and weekly worship and devotions for staff and residents.

Things were not always smooth. There were stressful transitions and times of uncertainty.  As I sought ordination, there was a boycott of sorts by my associational council, leaving only two local ministers plus the supporters from my church with whom to share my call and theology. My family faced many hurts and questions as things in the church didn't end well and John was forced to resign when I was 9 months pregnant with our second child. Parenthood itself was a relentless lesson to us in sacrificing our own needs and wants (and often control) for the sake of our children. There were times of darkness when my calling seemed so hazy and my work seemed so futile. I questioned and doubted into the silence and was not comforted. I felt it was time for me to move on as I was growing stagnant in my faith and apathetic and hopeless in my ministry. And yet nothing opened up. There was no voice (quiet, loud, or snarky) from God and I felt alone and incapable of juggling home, an empty faith, and a job that no longer fulfilled any sense of calling or passion.

The darkness of depression can be overwhelming, but I continued to pray and to seek.  I had to trust that God had a greater plan since my plans had come to naught yet again.  Again and again I was drawn to the verses that I had selected for my seminary application essay:

   “When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them by the way of the land of the Philistines, although that was nearer; for God thought, ‘If the people face war, they may change their minds and return to Egypt.’ So God led the people by the roundabout way of the wilderness toward the Red Sea.” (Exodus 13:17-18)

I could definitely relate to spending years wandering aimlessly in the darkness of the desert, going round and round in circles and getting nowhere.  And then one day there was a burst of light in the most unexpected place, an oasis in the desert that would become my Promised Land.  I was visiting Hollins University for my son’s preschool play.  This was my first visit to campus, and yet, it just clicked, and once again I felt the sense of “home” that some places just naturally evoke in us.  My heart said, “It would be great to work here one day”.  After I left that day, I couldn’t get the place, or the calling, out of my mind.  I “friended” the chaplain at the time on Facebook, hoping that she might serve as a mentor to me and point me to opportunities in the future.  A week after accepting my friend request, she announced on Facebook that she would be leaving the university (after 24 years) for a new calling. 

After a moment of awestruck prayers of gratitude, I contacted her, updated my résumé, and sent it to the school the following day.  Four months after first feeling at home in the DuPont Chapel of Hollins University, I began ministering there as interim university chaplain.   It has been an amazing journey of learning, building relationships, and being inspired by passion and God-given creativity once again.  After a year of serving, feeling God’s assurance of my calling, and receiving the support and affirmation of the university, I was named university chaplain.

God is full of surprises.  I used to think I didn’t enjoy surprise, but I have to admit I like the ways that God “intrudes” into my well-made plans, wreaks havoc, and then points me to a beautiful new path that I never would have discovered on my own.  Sometimes God whispers into my heart, and sometimes God stomps loudly through the circumstances of my life.  Sometimes we wander together in the desert, and sometimes we celebrate on the mountaintop.  Through it all, I’m learning (slowly, painfully, gracelessly) how to cede control (or at least recognize that I never really had it to begin with).  Through the roundabout journey, I’ve gained strength, and I’ve learned to look beyond myself.  Ironically (or perhaps not, as God is the orchestrator of this), the Hollins University motto is “Levavi Oculos” (“I lift up my eyes”) from Psalm 121:

Psalm 121

Assurance of God’s Protection

A Song of Ascents.

I lift up my eyes to the hills—
   from where will my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
   who made heaven and earth. 

He will not let your foot be moved;
   he who keeps you will not slumber.
He who keeps Israel
   will neither slumber nor sleep. 

The Lord is your keeper;
   the Lord is your shade at your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day,
   nor the moon by night. 

The Lord will keep you from all evil;
   he will keep your life.
The Lord will keep
   your going out and your coming in
   from this time on and for evermore.

Walking Meditation

When my mind becomes too cluttered and it becomes hard to focus on what is at hand, I find I do my best thinking with my feet.  I have to step out and walk away from it all for a while to come back to myself.  The movement is like a prayer without words, and slowly the jumble of thoughts and the burden of all that is left undone is surrendered and peace fills the space that was where there was pressure.

Along the way, the light shifts.  The sun is going down, but the fogginess that clouded my mind has lifted.  There is light where there was once darkness, and it's the golden light that makes everything glow instead of the harsh and glaring midday sun.  All is quiet, even with the evidence of activity and sound--the fallen trees, the animal tracks.  There is just the sound of my steps and the awareness of the effort of my muscles and legs.  All that was dulled before is now alert and alive.  I feel full, but not in the unpleasant way in which I started.  There is now a sense of possibility and I return, inspired.  

Baptist?

We pass the baptistry font on the way in and out of the church we've been visiting.  The kids view it with curiosity and love to touch the smooth sides and peek in to see if there's water.  Maryn wonders how she will fit in it as she has been considering baptism recently, after watching me baptize her brother two years ago.  We try to explain how people don't get immersed in Episcopal churches, but our explanation falls a little flat as we're not sure ourselves exactly how it works.

We love this church--the beauty of the architecture, the people we know who attend and minister there, and the loveliness of the liturgy and music.  We appreciate the Sunday evening service that leaves most of our day free for a family Sabbath.  Even the kids have been excited about returning to church again, which has been a happy change.  I was still caught off guard when Maryn saw a drawing of the church and referred to it offhand as "our church".  We've just visited four times and although it feels right, I'm reluctant to commit.

I still feel guilty about leaving our former church and yet I'm relieved not to feel the anger and negativity I was beginning to feel each time I thought about church in general.  Old scars are easily reopened.  I miss old friends, but feel that those relationships will continue in new spaces.  I worry about the message it sends to our kids and what it means that they have left their Sunday School classes and children's choir.  As usual, though, I seem to be the only one concerned as they are quick to move on to what is new.  But how long will it take before this becomes "old" to them?  On our way home tonight, Brady asked how long we had been at our previous church, and I answered, "Since Maryn was born...six and a half years."  And he responded, "Then we can stay at this one six years, too, and then find a new church."  They are quick to pick up on what we don't want to teach them.

I've been Baptist all of my life, but I never felt that it was an integral part of my identity.  I have attended Baptist churches, went to a Baptist seminary, and worked at the Virginia Baptist Children's Home for eight years.  But I've often been more frustrated by Baptist stereotypes than inspired by Baptist freedoms.  I get tired of always having to qualify that I'm not "that type" of [judgmental, closed-minded] Baptist.  But seeing the baptistry font instead of a baptismal pool seems like a marker of all we would be sacrificing.  I would not have the joy of holding my girl under the symbolic waters and raising her to new life in Christ.  I'm sure I could be convinced by the meaning and symbolism in the Episcopalian ordinance, but it is truly a departure from an identity I didn't know my soul had claimed.

It doesn't feel like a crisis of faith, but it is one of identity.  What does my Baptist tradition truly mean to me?  Am I Baptist only because of the tradition I was born into and the prevalence of it where I live?  What does it mean to be called elsewhere?  How is my current (Episcopal) seminary reshaping my theological leanings?

As I continue to fumble through the service, learning when to stand, kneel, cross, and bow, I fumble, too, with the tradition that has shaped me, scars and joys alike.  And the memories plunge me back into the waters of baptism where I was joined with a Church family I hoped to never leave, where my small son made a commitment in innocent trust and childlike faith, where we were both joined into the family of God that goes beyond denomination and finds common ground in the Spirit that connects us all.

Perhaps that same water fills the small font in the Episcopal church.

Perhaps it is enough.

In Praise of a Small Life

Sometimes I want to feel like I have made it big (whatever that means).  As much as I believe it's all about the journey, there are moments when I want to realize that I've arrived somewhere.  I fantasize that I would like to be known, when the little bits of recognition and affirmation I receive lead me to crave it on a larger scale.  What would it be like to get that kind of attention on a regular basis?

I know it's not exactly appropriate for a minister to desire these things; I should be a humble servant of God and others.  But last night I dressed up and went to a fancy dinner.  There was wine and good conversation and names I recognized.  I thought, "I could do this."  I can be somewhat social in these moments, and I'm not afraid of speaking in public.  The spotlight is not so blinding and the stage is not so very high.  The praise goes to my head and I think, "I could be a speaker."  Perhaps one day I will be touring and sharing about my book.  But the inner critic reminds me that to get there, I would actually have to be working on a book.  Meanwhile, there is the work that I am paid to do (which blessedly I love), a calling that takes me in a different direction.  There are my kids who are growing so fast and are at the age where they still want me to be involved in their events.  I want to be there as well, and it is a gift to be able to be present with them at their school and activities.  But it is a sacrifice in other areas.  There is more gray in my hair every day and time keeps moving ahead even when I feel behind.

I've been having more conversations lately about work-life balance, about the pull between career and family. We have been told we can have it all, but it rings false when you're playing the juggling game.  What if we don't want it all?  There is so much already, good things, but there can be too much of a good thing.  Perhaps we can have it all, but not everything will be in balance at the same time.  It's a shifting scale that is simply exhausting at times even though I'm grateful for all my gifts; I'm grateful for the ability to choose a lifestyle that many have sacrificed to earn and many have not yet achieved.  I am only here because of the work and support of those close to me who make it possible.  There are still things I have to say "no" to in order to say "yes" to what is necessary and important.  I made my choices years ago, but I'm learning they are choices we make each day.

So tonight I finally felt as if I had arrived, but it wasn't at the fancy dinner.  I arrived when I came home to my cozy house with my sleeping kids and my husband waiting up watching football.  It was when I took off the painful high heels and got into my comfy pajamas that I felt like things were as they should be.  It was in thinking ahead to the weekend with the promise of some Sabbath time and maybe some books that I found fulfillment. Sometimes bigger is not better, and sometimes fullness is not about lots of activity but the peace of fully engaging in what truly matters to us.

Sometimes I just want a small life.  I want to be known.  And suddenly I realize that I have it made.

Strength in Weakness

I was done before I even started work today.  After a couple of weeks of very long days and no days off, I had lost my patience and my filter and I was in need of a break. Somehow the memo didn't get out, though, and the day was a series of unexpected issues and crises.  As needs poured in through email, phone messages, and visits, I could not escape or hide as I desperately longed to.  My only option was to take a deep breath, seek prayer from trusted friends (as I didn't even feel I had it within me to pray for myself), and push through the work of ministry that is never-ending and never truly complete.

When I look back over the day, I know that I made it through by the grace of God and the support of so many lovely people in my life.  The greatest gift, though, is the affirmation, even through my exhaustion, of the blessings of ministry.  When I wonder if it all matters, I can remember the stories I got to be a part of today, the hugs I gave and was offered, and the prayers that provided peace and strength.

Fortunately, God must have been guarding my mouth.  My filter remained intact and I mainly kept my patience in most public places.  I was able to be present and listen, offering support and encouragement to those for whom I care deeply.  But the most moving part of my day was at the end when I joined students at an open mic event in observance of World Suicide Prevention Day.  They didn't have a filter either and their stories were of crises and deep pain.  But there was such beauty in the raw words, such redemption in the tears.  There was such affirmation in the responses and such relief in being heard.  While it triggered memories and emotion, it provided the relief of release for all that had been bottled up in shame and fear. There weren't any easy answers, but there were stories of survival and tales of hope.  There was applause to support their bravery, and courage and hugs to show solidarity.

I'm not naive enough to think that it changed or healed anything.  I hope that it did more good than harm. I do believe in the power of sharing our stories.  It is story that connects me again and again to the hope I hold for redemption.  Stories remind me that we are more alike than we think we are; that we are not alone in our experiences.  Though our specific struggles may be unique, none of us are strangers to grief or fear or pain.  All of us long for love and acceptance and meaning.  There is something sacred about sharing and listening and responding "me too".

The work is not done and my to-do list for tomorrow has grown exponentially.  I'm responsible for sharing two public prayers this week when I still feel at a loss for how to pray while still carrying the burdens that weigh me down.  But there are new stories that inspire my faith and the reminder that:

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.  And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:26-28)

May the work continue, and may God make it good.