And Then: CtRl+Alt+Delete

No sense in beating around the bush. Here it is, my “big announcement” :

I’m pausing business as a professional photographer — to focus on other things.

A lot has shifted over the last 18 months — am I right?

You feel it. We all feel it. More than just a pandemic, and masks, and vaccines, and government shut-downs, and (just yesterday) the cause of politics (and its very, very real effects) of America pulling out of Afghanistan and ending a 20-year war (at least for America, for now).

There are heavier matters to be dealt with. There always have been. Weightier things are what propel the little things we do; meatier things are what push us into places that are deep and richer, with more nuanced purpose.

I’ve been a professional photographer for almost ten years — but it’s always been a place holder … an important place holder, certainly, one that taught me so much about life, and entrepreneurship, and creativity, and photography, and even humanity. Being a professional photographer has even been a sort of Calling, albeit a temporary one. It’s been educational and experiential and (I’d be lying if I omitted it being) exceptionally meaningful.

But it is time to Ctrl+Alt-Delete: the command to clear all software and data and reload from that deeper well of weightier, more meaningful things.

Reboot

Redirect

I’d be crazy if I didn’t say I know I sound crazy in saying I have been “Called to Ministry”.

Yes, I know how that sounds. I’m a Believer … and even I know how that sounds.

And I know how it feels: utterly preposterous and ridiculous — who am I, of all people, to think I can go out into the world and actually make a difference and show Love to others?!?! — and (let’s be frank here) utterly inconvenient. This was NOT what I’d had planned in this 21st Century life I’ve been living. I was going places, people …

And then I realized (ironically) that my favorite Bible verse, Isaiah 55:8-9 (which has been my favorite Bible verse these last 20 years, even as I’ve planned my plans and schemed my schemes) has been hinting all along at what I’ve known all along:

“My plans aren’t your plans,
nor are your ways my ways,” says the Lord.
“Just as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways,
and my plans than your plans.”

I’ve always derived such comfort from these words. As the world has come crashing down around us all — on September 11th, through personal marriage struggles, during F4 tornadoes in Alabama, through postpartum depression (twice), walking amid anxiety, and on into The Year That Shall Not Be Named: 2020 with it’s various and sundry emotional difficulties — these words have always been there, as a promise from God, that God alone is in control and Knows and Loves and (above all else) Plans in ways we cannot understand … but which we can trust.

And even now — standing as I am on the precipice of Big Life Altering Decisions (notice I capitalized those words, as is proper), I recognize the same God is propelling me forward into plans and ways I cannot understand —

But which I am no less compelled to go.

I know it won’t look like anything that I am afraid of, nor will it look like anything I am certain of. It will be all-together something unique, and probably radical (and I truly hope) messy and complicated and holy and terrible and wonderful. Because that, I have discovered, is how God works, in all of those ways.

So I will be finishing up my already-booked photo sessions and honoring my commitments to clients — and I may, from time to time (if the timing is right) accept future fine art photography commissions, and I will absolutely be working on some personal projects (because artistry is in my blood — and I do believe it is part of the Ministry I have been called to) —

And I will be sharing my personal work here, on my website, along with my faith journey (and boy how it promises to be a journey), as well as my adventures along the way —

And starting in January, I will dip my toes into the business of earning my Masters in Divinity and Pastoral Care, probably a two- to three-year process …

And then …. I don’t know what then. But God does.

I know. I sound crazy writing all of this out like I am. (Believe me, I know.) But —

Ctrl+Alt-Delete

Reboot

Redirect

Repurpose