The word that most readily come to my mind when thinking about what my soul craves right now is intentionality.

As I have become more accustomed to my new home, it has become easier to float along with the plans or choices of others and more difficult for me to say no— even when I can identify them as unhealthy for me.  

I have allowed the weight of feeling clumsy or unknown in this new environment drive me to surrender intentional time in order to try to gain acceptance through reluctantly partaking in group gatherings: something that usually leaves me empty, drained and angry at myself for not choosing to rest.

To clarify, group events themselves are not bad or unhealthy, they just often are for me personally. I am aware that I can idolize them as an instant method of social connection: both from the ease that I can assume the mask of the lively, likable “party-girl” and from the pain I still carry from being an outsider for so much of my childhood spent moving around.

I have felt myself being swept along with the current of community and my own fear of missing out under the guise of trying to build relationships.  

However, the reality is that we can choose where we dig down our roots, where we make our home.

I want to invest my time and energy intentionally feeding life giving relationships, rather than unintentionally feeding superficial community and my own insecurity.

Yet it goes deeper still.

I not only want to embrace intentionality in reference to how I pursue relationships. While I obviously wholeheartedly agree with this usage, I also think that we too easily cheapen the word if we use it in this context alone.

I wish to be intentional with how I use my time, both with regard to time spent with other people as well as toward my time spent alone. I hope to be intentional likewise in my spending, eating habits, work and rest.

I aspire to craft my life in a way that is deliberate with my choices. I want to consciously make space for God in each moment and decision, inviting the sacred to dwell within the ordinary.

I want to be intentional in my time with God, not allowing the precious moments spent in His divine presence to be overtaken by busyness, whether from commitments themselves or from the consuming haze of exhaustion I often bring to the table when I go to open my Bible as a result of them.

This means feeling free from the pressure to accept every invitation I receive. It means being careful to invest in activities that are life giving and God glorifying rather than wasting time on those that aren’t.

The deliberateness of God in the Bible is a constant source of awe and inspiration to me. Throughout redemptive history, He chooses to make His home with His people, whether alongside the unfaithful Israelites or the sinners and tax collectors.

I want to be intentional with where I will make my home, realizing that the kingdom of God is my truest place of comfort and belonging.

I want to embrace this God of intentionality. I want to intentionally make Him my home.

For the Lord has chosen Zion; he has desired it for his dwelling place: “This is my resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it. I will abundantly bless her provisions; I will satisfy her poor with bread. Her priests I will clothe with salvation, and her saints will shout for joy.” Psalm 132:13-16