My Story

God has blessed me beyond measure and I am so thankful for my family, friends, memories, adventures, and life God has given me.  I would literally be no where without Him.  He has made my life possible (literally).  If I was without Christ, I would be a selfish, broken girl who did whatever she wants.  I would most likely not be friendly and obviously that doesn’t sound like someone you would want to be around, I know good and well I would not want to either!  Thankfully, God has cleared my mess and made beauty from ashes.  I am now a girl who has been saved only by God’s grace, who still messes up but has grace to catch her every time she falls, and tries to see God’s beauty in all things.

I don’t know where to begin!  I was in love with dance since I could “potty” and then in the 7th grade, God called me away from dance and into music.  It was scary at the time but I knew I had to trust God.

I moved into music and started taking voice and piano lessons and have been leading worship at my church and other places in my area since.  God has given me a heart for missions and through short term missions God allowed me to lead in Honduras, Wales twice, and Guatemala twice (and through God’s grace hopefully I will be able to go again to Guate).

I have had some struggle with anxiety and fear of the future.  This past year, I used to wake up some nights, out of breath, feeling  scared, and short of breath.  One night in particular, I woke up feeling like an elephant was sitting on my chest.  I tried to wake up my sister but she doesn’t exactly like being woke up from her beauty rest.. In her defense, I could hardly get words out, she was half asleep, and she probably couldn’t understand a word I was saying anyways!  That morning I was taken to the ER by my dad and when I saw my dad pale in the face, I knew something was up.

Daddy is a paramedic fireman and has seen it all so when little Annmarie starts whining about scrapes and cuts, its more or less “Aw poor baby, come on Monkey, walk it off..”

Dad went pale that morning when I told him my hearts hurting.  I was put on a heart monitor for 48 hours and then after not hearing much from the docs, I got to thinking deep and really praying about it and God answered me.  It wasn’t an Earthly problem.  This was spiritual business.  I was so nervous about my future, college, and life period!  I wasn’t truly trusting Christ with my problems and God made that very evident.

Since then (my future plans wise), I have truly felt a peace about going to nursing school.  I  used to be scared, my hands started to sweat, and my heart would race when someone asked about my future plans.  I can honestly say I feel very called to nursing and am so excited about the opportunities that are available through that in missions.

I have had to truly trust God on my relationships.  God blessed me with my sweet boyfriend who pursued me for a good many months before I even talked to him in person.  He pushes me to Christ and challenges my walk with Christ.  And now my Zachary is in college (thankfully only about 35minutes away).  I struggled a lot the first semester.  Going from seeing someone you call your best friend everyday, to seeing them only on saturday nights and Sunday at church and lunch, it isn’t exactly… fun.  I hated the feeling of being alone.  But little did I know, God had a plan and reason being it all.

My cousin who is more like an older sister to me, Callie, has lived just about everywhere and is currently in South Korea.  She and I have very similar interests; music, missions, travel, adventure, life, family, and JESUS.  Rough time to have someone who understands you so well to live so far away.  Again, God was and is working through that and has a reason and a plan (a perfect plan that is).

My best (girl) friend who again shares a lot of interest just as I listed before, just recently moved to Australia and now of course communication is so hard because we can’t exactly meet up for “Coffee Sunday” at starbucks as usual anymore.  We can talk about anything and everything.  We are able to be real, open, honest, and vulnerable with each other and it is so hard to see her go off to college at Hillsong.

Part of me questioned God for a while.  Why would God give me so many great relationships (and more than names), and then essentially “take them away” (or at least farther away)?

“Questioning your circumstances is only questioning God”.

That statement rocked my world.  I have to trust God with EVERY aspect of my life and I have even seen that through relationships being distant, God has shown me who He wants ME to be.  He has shaped me and molded me into who He is calling me to be.  I have been able to focus on wisdom from HIM versus from friends.  I have been able to focus on council from HIM, versus friends.  I have been able to focus on HIM versus friends.

More recently, God has been teaching me a lot about grace and forgiveness.  God has forgiven me for my sins, struggles, and hurts and I know that God calls me to forgive as well.

I was feeling very low.  I felt that some friends didn’t care for me, love me, wanted me, or even saw me as important.  I was feeling so hurt and discouraged because I wasn’t invited when a small get together would get thrown together and never felt “in the loop”.  Right when I felt I was at my breaking point, word got passed along that I was not wanted at a get together(honestly this was one person’s feeling so, not all of my friends’).

Ouch….man, not gonna lie, that one stung.  In that moment hearing those words, I realized that everything I thought about myself (unimportant, not wanted, etc.), it all MUST have been true(lies from Satan).  Thankfully, I had two close friends who really spoke life into me about the circumstances, and my family to love and encourage me through the pain as well.

God showed me how to forgive.  He has taught me to forgive and that means forgive.  He told me to wipe her slate clean!  All the way.  Just as Christ wiped my slate clean and continues to wipe my slate clean because of HIS AMAZING LOVE.

God has called me to be a voice for the mute, a shoulder for the broken, an ear for the forgotten, a microphone for HIS Word, and most importantly, an advocate of the Gospel.

I want to do just that.  I want my life each day to look closer and closer to the image of God.  I was made in His image but my nasty sin destroys that image.  That is why I want to live everyday, in public and private, to glorify His name, point others to Him, and strive to live in His Will and likeness of His image.

This senior year, may name be forgotten, and His name be remembered.