LIONHEARTED LANDLOPER

    "Next year I will be better." She said simply, as if somehow she had disappointed me by being sick on Christmas.     But I don't need you to be better. I don't require that from you, mom. The holidays aren't for you to entertain or please me. I would rather be with you right now than anywhere else. This is time for us to be together.     After doing a biopsy on my mom's brain, the doctors were able to diagnose her with Central Nervous System Lymphoma. I never saw any of this coming. But I guess.. How could I?     Mom has gotten progressively better since they started treatment. She wears normal clothes and eats normal food. She can wheel herself around in a wheelchair and she keeps getting stronger. Sure, it's hard to see her like this -- but it's nice to see her improving.     I did not know I would be spending Christmas in a hospital this year. And no one knew the Messiah would be born in a manger -- Christmas wasn't meant to be p

    Hospitals are peculiar places. Each day in a hospital feels incredibly long -- yet somewhat like it only lasted around four hours. It feels like you entered some other dimension where the outside world just pauses until you leave.  The only way to occupy oneself and escape from the tormenting thoughts demanded by your surroundings is to stare blankly at a small table in a waiting room nearby and lethargically put together a puzzle that is most likely missing pieces.  I met a woman in that waiting room. Her name was Lily. Lily was beautiful and alone. She spoke broken English and had a broken heart. She told me about her husband who either had cancer, a stroke, or both (it was hard to understand some of what she said). Either way, she was obviously afraid. I asked her if I could pray with her, and she let me.  ~let's rewind~ Everything started when I was at a conference playing the cello in the band. I got a call that my mom was taken to the ER in Seattle (she

        Something inside of me is starting to feel restless. Partly because I don't feel very "Beccca-y" anymore, and partly because I miss the short, refreshing adventures that gave me a break from the humdrum of daily life last year.        I feel like I don't get to be myself. I feel slightly too common. All I do is go to school, do homework, go to work, and sleep. Markers, dictionaries, and journals are collecting a little too much dust. There's not any free time to set up a hammock and spend an hour doing Beccca stuff like I'm so used to. Part of that is okay and just necessary in this season of life. But also, having that time to fully be myself is very important. The lack of it leaves me feeling slightly unfulfilled and unsatisfied. I need some sort of outlet to express my manymanymanymany thoughts, opinions, and feelings. I need time to draw pictures and play with cardboard and sing as loud as possible. But I also need to understand that right now

School has been so good. I love my ministry internships, roommate, classmates, job, and the absence of obtaining student debt. I love the mountains. I laugh harder here. I feel more independent here. It's good for me, and God is so obviously working. I am confident in the fact that I am where I need to be. Also, my life is hilarious. So I started making videos with my roommate.

    So now what? Now that I have completed Pack Your Bags, what am I going to do with my life? I mean, PYB was my ONE BIG ADVENTURE, right? What even is there to live for anymore?      Well, God is always taking me on new adventures. In a couple weeks, I will start school with Canvas School of Ministry here in the Flathead Valley through Northwest University which is based in Kirkland, WA. Basically, I get to earn a degree (Ministry Leadership) and actually be able to pay for it as well as get ministry experience and connections as I go. These connections will set me up for an incredible start on the mission field when the time comes.     I have been attending Canvas Church (formerly Kalispell Christian Center) for 14 years of my life. While I was at Trinity Bible College, I was able attend Montana Youth Conference as a Representative of my school. While I was there, I was given the job of guarding a door that happened to be near two men who were having a conversation. I overhear

Me and Jaren have a holiday called "Double Eight Date Day" which occurs on the eighth of August every year. This year, we did something crazy. Something crazy awesome

a few things I love     I've been home for a couple months now, and I love it. I loved being at school and I've loved being at home. The thing is, I just love being where God takes me. God is equally at work in my life and in this next season as He was when He took me to the other side of the world.      It's nice to see mountains and sunshine. It is nice to hear the river as I sleep in my hammock outside every night. And in an odd way, it's a little bit comforting to live somewhere where people shoot fireworks at each other frantically on the Fourth of July.     I miss my friends -- and sometimes it's weird to go from being with so many people all the time to trying to find someone who will even hang out. But at the same time, I've made new friends (including two hermit crabs, Ripsnorter and Archie), and I've been able to get really involved in my church and with different areas of ministry.     Sometimes I worry about paying for school, but I know

Old Faithful Recently, I had a birthday. One of those significant birthdays that make you sit and think for a second "wow, I'm older." I turned 20. I am no longer a teenager. I'm just one of those people in their twenties who have their whole life in front of them and have to take responsibility for it. Like, there's no excuse anymore. And that's a good thing. I had the wonderful opportunity to go with my sister and camp in Yellowstone National Park and also visit the Grand Tetons. I've had so many incredible opportunities in my life this far and I cannot wait to see all the different adventures God brings along while I'm "in my twenties" I mean really, anything could happen

    Thank you to everyone who has been praying for me this year. Thank you to everyone who has been reading my blog. Thank you to everyone who helped me come to this school and see what I have seen. Because of you, I have had my worldview widened. I have figured out a little bit more of who I am as an individual. I have traveled the world. Also, I have gotten a huge rash on my face and hands in South Africa -- but I won't blame you for that one.     Thank you for giving what you felt led to give (resources, prayer, encouragement) and joining with me while God took me on this great adventure. He always does things better than I would have known how to if I were in charge. Fortunately, I'm not. Blessings, Beccca B.

   It feels like I just set foot on campus -- but now I am leaving. Pack Your Bags has been an incredible adventure. I have been to so many places, made so many friends, and bought so many cases of bottled water. I have lived with Maddie this whole school year and have taken all kinds of classes. I don't want to say goodbye. I have spent so much time right here in Ellendale as well as overseas...         And now I find myself slowly packing. It feels weird to have hardly any homework and be spending my time quietly boxing up my belongings. This place has been my temporary home, and now the season leaves as quickly as it came.     There's something sad about it. I don't want to leave the friends I feel like I just made. I don't want to lose the input and advice of professors I have come to look up to. But at the same time, there's something exciting about it. Pack Your Bags was not my only adventure -- it was the kickoff. God is holding my hand and leading me f

view of Jerusalem from the Mt. of Olives     Recently, I had the wonderful opportunity to go to Israel. I was there for almost two weeks and saw amazing things -- from the Sea of Galilee to the Weeping Wall. this trip changed my life and I don't know how to even talk about it. It's so difficult to try and explain amazing experiences to people who weren't there.     Basically, I went to the country I have always heard stories about. I went to the land and the area that God promised to His chosen people in the Old Testament.  I saw ruins of things that may have been around when my Savior walked the earth. I went in the Jordan river. I saw and learned so many things that have to do with the whole entire reason I am saved. The whole story that led to my salvation happened in areas I was able to walk around.     I experienced a culture that felt more foreign than any I had experienced prior. I rode a camel. I talked to God and I saw people who were lost. I went to cities

    Once upon a time, we decided to venture into Paris. We had a twenty-hour overnight layover, so why not? We took the train from the airport and found ourselves in a world speaking only François. We found a charming restaurant and all sat down to a three-course meal! And for the first time in my life... I had real, genuine, french fries. Actually French fries. Wow. I also got calamari and this desert that was cheese and honey. French people are so fancy. I looked to my right and watched a woman use her knife and fork to cut a piece of lettuce from her salad. Nobody cuts their lettuce.     Dinner took awhile, but we finally got out into Paris after the sun went down and started to walk around. We saw Notre-Dame and eventually found the Eiffel Tower -- but it kept being farther away than we thought. We walked, walked, and walked -- and somehow the tower was always behind a building and never around the corner we thought it was. But eventually, after walking across Paris, we found it.

    I stood in line, waited, went through security, and found myself at the Temple Mount looking at the Dome of The Rock. We weren't allowed to wear crosses or bring Bibles and our clothes had to be very modest.      Looking at the giant mosque did not feel how I expected it would. It wasn't scary. It was just... empty, I guess. There were kids outside playing soccer and women sitting in groups talking. There were older men in going places and people visiting the site from different countries. I was walking around observing when the sweetest group of young Muslim girls came up to me and said, “you take selfie?”     “Sure,” I said.       I started getting in picture after picture with these sweet girls with their joyful smiles and white head scarves.      It was so strange. I can hardly explain it. From the moment those girls spoke to me I felt like I loved them so much  — It just came over me. It was something I had never experienced before. I was simply standing t

I always wondered what it felt like to travel the world... now I know.     I woke up today and realized my life is moving incredibly fast. In fact, I  hardly know what to do about it. So much stuff has happened that I never anticipated, and it's all in the past. It feels like a couple of weeks ago I was putting together my photos for graduation -- but that was a couple years ago.      In just 80 days, I won't be a teenager anymore. Things are going by so fast and I still feel like the girl who ran around town in a cape on her sixteenth birthday. But then again, I think I simply neglect to realize how much has changed. When I look back on how I felt and the things I worried about, I don't even feel like the same person. I have grown and learned so much, and I have become more of who I was created to be. I have made more memories than I knew was possible in such little time. I always wondered what it felt like to be comfortable in who I am. Now I know. I always w

    A couple weeks ago, I woke up randomly around 5:30 AM and had to use the restroom. I got up, went to the bathroom, and crawled back in bed ready to get a couple more hours of sleep before my day needed to start. As I lay there half asleep with my eyes shut, something odd happened. I could not tell if I was dreaming or thinking. I did not feel asleep, but I equally did not feel like I was making up any of the things in my head as they happened.     It felt like an imaginary place I would invent. It had the sorts of things I would have definitely made up... but it felt like the place had been made up without me knowing, and I was only now being introduced to it all.     I was somewhere. The place had a warehouse or an abandoned-Costco feel to it. The lights above the area where I was were the only ones on, and as I looked around I could not see an end anywhere to the building I was in. I knew the place was large, but in every direction, it eventually got too dark to see if the

me and Osvaldo me and Miss Amanda my favorite marula  scrubbing the monkey handprints gotta love those butter sandwiches Osvaldo again

    We spent the rest of our few weeks in the beautiful country of South Africa with many different ministries all over the area.     I honestly don't know where to start in describing the past six weeks of my life. I don't know how to communicate the things I have experienced. I don't know what to tell you or how I would begin to do so. I am simply able to tell you what South Africa is to me. South Africa is full of children that are smiling when your knowledge tells you they have no reason to do so. South Africa is a place where servants of the living God are working hard every single day to care for His sheep and spread the good news of our Lord and Savior. South Africa is a place where the sand gets in your bedsheets no matter what precautions you take. South Africa is beautiful. South Africa is full of memories I want to always remember. South Africa is a place where the air smells different. South Africa is where God took me to teach me more of H

            After our first week in Pretoria, we eventually piled into the vehicles and moved to the Africa School of Missions campus near White River in Mpumalanga, where we will be staying for the rest of our time in South Africa. The campus is beautiful, full of mango trees, and right under the shadow of Legogote Mountain.             We spent our first couple days just settling in and helping out in the ASM library with various cleaning projects. We then spent last week helping Reverend Roger at Saint Mary’s Anglican Church with gardening and making house visits to pray for people. Rev. Roger was one of the funniest people I have ever met, and he saw every moment as an opportunity for all of us to break into song.             I have been nearly eaten alive by mosquitoes, but I haven’t gotten any diseases yet so all is well. There is a beautiful shaded place on campus full of boulders, toads, and trees, which I have set up my hammock in. It is a lovely place to spend the earl

She held the phone up to her ear a little tighter. “What do I call this feeling?” she asked him after a moment of silence. The room she occupied was quiet and dark, and it was already far into the night -- the night before her next big adventure. “I think we can call it ‘Traveler’s Anxiety…’” he paused. “It’s like ‘wow, I have to leave everything…’ mixed with ‘wow, I get to see everything...’” And he was right. ***     This adventure has really been so incredible so far.     All twenty-something of us piled onto flight after connecting flight until our lovely 10-hour layover in London. It was really cool to explore the city and see the sights and adventure for a day before getting on another plane. ***      As soon as we landed in South Africa I knew I was not in America anymore -- which is probably an expected reaction. The air is different, the trees are different, the plants are different, and the people are different. The faucets and the spoons are different

Scratch-off map of the world     I am officially back at school and getting into motion for this next semester of adventure. Just two short weeks until we leave for our month and a half trip to South Africa.     I am getting really excited for this experience and the things I will be able to see God do. Sure, I may be nervous about the petty stuff -- like the time difference or the implications of wearing so many long skirts for such a long period of time -- but even those small things add to the big picture and make it seem slightly more exhilarating. I like changes and things you can't plan for no matter how hard you try. Or, I at least like them for the most part.     Please be praying for our team as we prepare our hearts these next two weeks for where we will be going, what we will be doing, and who we will be serving.