I’ve started blogs before. When I was younger, about 17, I found a website called opendiary.com, and I joined as “superbrianna.” I wrote and played with my layout and got into the community. It was early blogging, in the early 2000’s, and I loved it.
Various times since then, I’ve started blogs through wordpress or blogger, but every time I started, I didn’t last long. I’d delete it, sometimes after one entry… sometimes after a year. Somehow I always felt funny about it, like something was off.
Other people blogged, most notably my best friend and fellow open-diary-ist, Tasha. She blogged consistently, for years, and I would read her blog and feel… well, envy. Everything she wrote was lovely and Truth and Hope and fun and creative and I wanted to do it SO BAD.
Oh, I could have blogged. I could have been writing and tweeting and prettying up things all this time, like so many people. I could have networked and pursued blogging, and writing, all this time.
I could have.
But I didn’t.
I didn’t blog, I didn’t really write much, I didn’t… well, do much, honestly.
Now, before you start thinking this is a regret post, let me clarify a little bit.
I didn’t not-write because I was lazy, because I didn’t “feel like it,” because I was busy, because I pursued other things. I didn’t not-write because it was hard, or because netflix was so compelling.
Okay, sometimes that was why.
But there was a bigger why.
Because I wanted to- I wanted so bad to throw myself into SOMETHING. To pursue, wholeheartedly- SOMETHING. To blog or write novels or be on American Idol or make viral youtube videos… I wanted so badly to pursue, and succeed, at SOMETHING.
But the Lord said, “No.”
So, so many times, the Lord said, “No.”
I was on twitter- it was fun! The Lord said, “No.”
I started a blog about homemaking and crafty things- The Lord said, “No.”
I did videos about homesteading. I started a few novels, I wrote poetry and articles and devotionals.
No.
I painted, I drew, I made comic books. I wrote a few children’s books… I illustrated a few children’s books.
No, no, no.
I learned to play guitar and piano, I played flute, wrote songs, made a few short videos.
No.
I kept hearing it.
It’s not that anything I was doing was wrong- and that was the hard thing! Over and over, I would pursue something that someone else was pursuing- and the Lord was blessing, for them, and the Lord would say, “No, it’s not for you.”
I grew to realize- that so often I pursued things with this inner hunger. I wanted SO, SO badly to be known. To be admired and respected and valued and honored… to have what I said matter somewhere.
I wanted to prove myself.
Somehow I felt that if I was successful somewhere, at anything, blogging or writing or creating, it would mean that I was worth… something.
But the Lord kept saying, “No.”
So the years went by, and I played around with music, and writing, and art. I had three children and worked in the garden and read books and went to bible studies, and made friends, and had depression, and got better.
I struggled with my identity- I grew up just ACHING for the time when I’d be on Broadway, or have my Ph.D., or be on the NY Times Best seller list. For the time when I’d finally make it, be… well, Me.
And instead I was no one. I was a wife and a mother, and not a particularly good one. I wasn’t rich, or beautiful, or popular or influential, as far as I wanted to be.
Periodically I’d try something- vlogging, Lord?
No.
Okay, I’ll write a novel.
No.
So instead, I lived. I homeschooled and homesteaded and loved my husband and fought with him. I watched my friends and family grow up and marry, and not marry, and some divorce. I watched some go to church, and some leave the church, and some go to bible school, and some go to prison. I moved to a new town, and left my comfy large church for a tiny one that did things differently than I was used to.
I began to realize that the stakes are so high. The Truth is so good, and so real, and life in Christ is so abundant and free and such a different plane than life outside of Him- but so many, SO many people, people I love, don’t have it!
The more I live, the more I see it- the sorrow of what is, compared to what could be.
I believe in the power of the Truth. I believe that the Truth, the good news of Christ- has answers for anything on this planet that has a question.
I believe that the Church is the body of Christ- and is the instrument of hope for the world– and that He longs to spread his Hope and Truth through us to every hurting heart in the world!
And I’m so, so sick of seeing the Enemy and His lies prevent that!
I’m so sick of seeing families being torn apart. Men hooked on porn and women captive to bitterness. Children at the mercy of blue screens and Disney values. Young people playing with drugs and sex like matches, while getting on the road to the “good american life” of debt and consumerism and emptiness.
I’m so sick of watching young mothers feel empty and lonely and burnt out and wasted instead of passionate and excited and loved and hopeful!
I’m so sick of seeing young men pour their lives into high scores and late nights and naked women instead of standing up like men of integrity and honor, fighting for their homes and their children and the injustices of the world.
I’m sick of being a nation that has the Word of Life but doesn’t read it or teach it or live by it!
I’m so sick of us being enslaved by corporations and banks because we’re all too spoiled to stop buying iphones and Nikes walmart plastic and the sweat of foreign women and children.
I’m sick and tired of it! I’m sick and tired of our lives being run by screens! By full days taken by Candy crush, and whole weekends by netflix!
I’m SICK and TIRED of being a slave to electronics, and entertainment, and debt and SIN! I’m sick of it!
I’m ready to fight! I’m ready to see our generation stand up and do what’s right! I’m ready to see us throw off our silly entitlement mindsets and look around for the things in the world we can DO something about!
And I’ve come to understand… You know what? my talents and my ability to pursue anything is so, so much less about me, making a name for myself- forging my identity and building my reputation, and so, so much more about me, using the talents I have to do something about the darkness that’s pressing on us!
I’m ready to do my part with what the Lord has given me- to take my place in the Church!
A church that has ANSWERS when your marriage is failing, that has HOPE when your daughter is floundering, that has CHRIST on our lips, and a FIRE in our bellies, that has warm food for the hungry and a soft bed for the hurting, that has open doors and open arms, and billions of people on their knees for the dying and hungry and lost of the world!
So here I am, blogging. For the twentieth time, starting a blog. But not like the other nineteen times.
Because I’m not here to build my kingdom.
I’m not here to impress you or sell you me, Brianna. I’m not here to make you laugh with my little drawings or get you to follow me or buy my books or watch my vlogs or vote for me for President.
I’m here to throw my talents at the feet of our Lord and say,
“Here I am, use me!”
And I don’t know what that looks like! I don’t know if I’ll be blogging every day or even every week. I don’t know how many books I’ll write or how many vlogs I’ll do. But I know this- whether I’m doodling a silly post about writing problems, or tweeting about homeschooling, or writing fiction, or telling stories for children- I’m here to use my talents in any way I can to point every single person I can to the HOPE and the TRUTH and the LIFE that’s available to them!
That’s why I’m here.
I’m here to tell stories that reveal Truth. I’m here to share hope! I’m here to be a friend and an encouragement and a warrior for The Lord, to help you to find a little more of that abundant life I was talking about.
And this time, finally, I hear the Lord saying, “Yes.”
briannasiegrist.com 
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