I briefly mentioned my “squad” when I got to talk to you about Sara. Sometimes I love new buzzwords and sometimes I hate them (I still think “on fleek” needs to die). I don’t love the overuse of the term squad by college and high school students, and so to spite me (the fun endearing kind of spite) Lindsey renamed our friend group message SQUAD. Urban dictionary (obviously a super reliable source) defines squad as “crew, posse, gang: an informal group of individuals with a common identity and a sense of solidarity.” The insignificant term is secretly growing on me, shh, don’t tell them. One of the many things I would say about us is that we have a common sense of solidarity. Our solidarity is freedom from sin and shame. And it’s beautiful! The one and only Lindsey was the initiator of our squad.

You’ve heard about my gospel family a lot (and they’ll be getting some posts too). We’re a missional community style church plant focused on being the family of God and living on mission together. Part of being the family of God involves not just going to a worship service and seeing each other on Sundays and Wednesdays, but getting messy in each other’s lives. We do a lot to help facilitate that, and one of those things are DNA groups – small accountability groups of 3-5 same gender people. Lindsey and Anna (you’ll get to hear about her tomorrow!) are interns at our church. Right around the time they joined us, we relaunched DNA groups to help accommodate the new people we’d acquired who weren’t in pre-established groups. As a person who is not the best with change, I WAS STRESSED! I just wanted to be in a DNA group with EVERYONE! I avoided trying to figure out who I was going to meet with as much as I could, and one Sunday morning we (Sara, Anna, Lindsey, and I) were all standing around and Lindsey in her excited bubbly tone said, “hey! want to be in a DNA group together??” I like to think our lives changed forever that day. (I have a flair for the dramatic, but really, they did!)

We dove in heart first, built trust quicker than I’ve ever seen a group do so, and never looked back. When the Holy Spirit unites a group of people, it’s just pretty dang hard to tear them apart. I’m ridiculously thankful for that! We celebrate everything – birthdays, first day of fall, holidays, good days, bad days that need cheering up, etc. We watch a lot of TV shows together – PLL, Nashville, Once Upon a Time, Gossip Girl, Gilmore Girls, etc. We eat A LOT of meals together. But best of all, we love each other through everything! Every bad day, every good day, every hard season, every sinful moment. It’s messy, beautiful, and worth it. Most of my favorite moments from the past year involve Lindsey and these girls! The most beautiful freeing moment that I’ll never forget was a night in DNA group. We got pretty real pretty fast, but we still were somewhat vague about our sin struggles. One night when I was being elusively vague about mine, Lindsey just boldly asked what I was referring to. It was a moment I’ll never forget when we all genuinely felt free to talk openly about our sin struggles. You don’t know what freedom is until you’ve been able to confess your sins to your people and have them love you exactly the same. Try it! It’s beautiful.

But you’ve heard about Sara, and tomorrow you’ll hear about Anna. Today is Lindsey’s day! This girl, y’all. Her joy and enthusiasm for life are contagious. Her love language is words of affirmation, and good grief she’s an encouraging soul. The way she lives life and loves others is enchanting. She’s ridiculously talented! Seriously. She’s a gifted and anointed worship leader. You KNOW I love my gospel family and always have. But the frequency that I’ve been lead to the throne room by singing praises to my God since Lindsey has been leading us is VAST. She’s also gorgeous and so fashion savvy, seriously I text her for outfit advice all the time. She loves cats more than anyone I know. She collects weird things like socks with food on them and old lady stuff. She’s so endearing and quirky, anyone would be crazy not to adore her. She’s sassy and creative. She an unbelievably brave soul. She’s recently embarked on the journey of being obedient to a call on her life to write music, and again I repeat, UTTER TALENT! I can’t wait for the day that she shares her songs with the world. She’s funny, an amazing wordsmith, intelligent, and wise beyond her years. She’s my go-to editor (she will find all the typos in this post), one of my favorite people to process with because our brains work so similarly, but by far my favorite thing about her is the way she loves Jesus.

Lindsey’s love for Jesus is real and untamed. She’s so vulnerable and transparent and it brings so much glory to her Heavenly Father. She’s so giving of her time, talents, and love to others. She’s so sensitive to the Holy Spirit it’s ridiculous! She sees opportunities everywhere and in everything. She feels conviction deeply and always strives to make her wrongs right. She basks in the love of her Savior and it’s evident to anyone who encounters her. She loves the people in her life so, so well. She pushes me to love and trust Jesus more. She reminds me of truth on a daily basis. She’s a fierce fighter of lies and goes to battle not just for herself, but for her people, DAILY.

She’s currently my squad, and will forever be a sister of solidarity for me. AND to top it all off, her family is pretty great too! As you know or may have picked up on, I usually don’t have plans for Christmas. This year was extra stressful and I wasn’t having luck finding somewhere to go. At the time Lindsey had only known me for 6 months, but she invited me to do Christmas with her family! It was fun, hilariously loud, and unbelievably gracious. Her dad is a hoot and genuinely one of the funniest people! Her mom is sacrificially giving. Her sister is one of my favs and I wish she’d come visit every weekend. Her Nana is the most Godly grandmother I’ve ever met. Her Pawpaw is as funny as her dad and talked about the chupacabra non-stop. Her uncle insisted on calling me Special K all weekend and prayed over me before we left (I cried, duh). She’s great. Her people are great. I’m so glad I get to call her friend.

This is part of my 31 People(s) I Love series. I’ll be writing about 31 people/peoples that I adore! Click here if you would like a list of all the posts in this series.