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After six long years, I FINALLY graduated with my Master of Divinity degree last night. But this isn't about me. It is about the people in my life who made this a reality: starting with my Dad who taught me how to be both a parent and a student when he started his undergraduate education in 1988 and finished nine years later (the day I graduated from WWU) with his second Masters degree. Those first few years of my seminary life when the kids were too young to stay home alone, Dad babysat the kids every.single.week so that I could go to class. There is the patience of Jamie, who now juggles the role of breadwinner with a sizable load of household chores--none of which he dealt with when I was a SAHM. He stepped up and increased his workload so that I could succeed in the classroom and has always encouraged me when the going got tough. He never doubted that I could and would do this crazy thing, even when I didn't think I could. And of course, my kids--I've been in school for more than half of Cassie's life and she honestly doesn't remember life before seminary. Neither does Chase. Both have been dragged along to Eden's campus on various occasions when I was frantically juggling grad student life with motherhood. I hope I've taught them something about perseverance these last few years.

And then there is my tribe: the friends I had going into this journey and those I've made along the way. I've heard it said that you are the sum of those who you surround yourself with and if that is true, then I am overflowing with love, support, and genuine joy. Seminary taught me that God created us to be in community with one another. My beloved family and friends have taught me HOW to be in that community. This morning Bishop Michael Curry PREACHED at the marriage ceremony of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, the newly minted Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Early in his homily, Bishop Curry said, "There’s power, power in love, not just in its romantic forms, but any form, any shape of love. There’s a certain sense in which when you are loved and you know it, when someone cares for you and you know it, when you love and you show it. It actually feels right. There’s something right about it. There’s a reason for it. It has to do with the source."

The source, of course, is God. And so, I am grateful for those who have loved me and allowed me to know their love and in doing so, allowed our still-speaking God to speak through them. Last night the M.Div chapter in my life closed. A new chapter is beginning and  I look forward to carrying this love and all the lessons learned into that new chapter...

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