Same Field, Different Purpose

When I was younger, between ages 15 and 20, I spent a lot of time partying in a field. Like a LOT. It’s just what we did. Heavily drinking every weekend, hanging out with men in their 20s, and somehow always managing to make it home. Looking back, I honestly don't know how...

It’s a common joke with my generation that teenagers today would’ve never survived our teen years. They have cell phones and tracking apps while we had quarters and payphones.

I joke that my kids could never get anything past me because I’ve seen and done it all. Some things are things because of my generation. We ran, now they have to walk.

There are so many things about that time in my life that I look at differently now. Things that seemed “totally cool” back then that, as a mother now, I cringe at.

Something on my mind today is that since my late 20s, when I really started seeking a relationship with God, I've had this dream of attending a worship service in a field.

Not in a church or any other building surrounded by walls. Just an open field. People gathered together, music playing, voices singing in harmony all worshipping God under the same sky He created.

And trust me, the irony of that isn't lost on me.

The time in my life when I stood in open fields doing things that could have easily destroyed me and now, all these years later, I dream about standing in a field worshipping the God who carried me through it.

Same kind of place. Completely different reason for being there.

I don't know that I ever really made that connection until yesterday at church when our worship pastor was speaking on Psalms 23. You know, the one that starts with The Lord is my shepard... 

He was reminding us that God is with us always and it truly doesn’t matter where we are. Even in an open field...

Maybe it's because the older I get, the more I recognize God's presence in places where I didn't even know to look for Him. I certainly wasn't looking for Him in those fields when I was 15 but that doesn't mean He wasn't there. There were so many nights I shouldn't have made it home safely. So many situations that could have ended differently. So many decisions made by a young, dumb girl who didn't care about the danger she was putting herself in. And yet, here I am. Not because I made good choices. Clearly, I didn't. But because, even when I wasn't seeking God, I believe He was watching over me.

Maybe that's why the thought of worshipping in a field means so much to me now.

Because I think there's something beautiful about returning to a place that once represented recklessness and turning it into a place of worship. Not to erase the past, not to pretend it didn't happen, but to recognize how far God has brought me.

The teenage girl who once stood in those fields looking for a good time grew into a woman who wants nothing more than to stand in one and praise God. There's something about that that almost brings me to tears.

Maybe one day I'll get to stand in that open field worshipping Jesus and when I do, I'll remember that teenage girl.

The one who had no business being out late at night drinking.

The one who had absolutely no idea where life would take her.

The one who didn't know how much she would need God's grace... And I’ll thank Him.

Because what once was a place where I could have lost everything has become, in my heart, a place where I long to worship the one who saved me.