Meet Carmen:

I’ve been in radio over 15 years. It all started at Q105 in Tampa with the Cooper & Ritter Morning Show.  My degree is actually in Public Relations, but when God called me to “the public” – I never knew it would be so . . . well, public. I love all genres of music, but have found my home in CCM (contemporary Christian music).  I live my life on the air much to the chagrin of my family. Just kidding! They’re totally supportive.

I love a good cup of coffee (Starbucks Cafe’ Americano) along with good, meanigful conversation with a friend. It may also be surprising to some, that I require a lot of solitude! On those days, you can find me with a good book, my laptop, or my bible study. Of course, a cup of coffee is nearby on those days too!  And YES! I LOVE football, and my favorite afternoons are spent sitting with my family watching as many games as we can surf and find.

Life:

It’s my last morning on the beach. Everybody has gone home. My girlfriends back to Nashville. My family back to basketball practice and jobs.

I went for a run yesterday afternoon on the beach. As I was jogging (running would be an exaggeration!) along the shoreline, I glanced out at the ocean as far as my eye could see….and then I’d glance back down as a few waves here and there would run up over my feet. Half laughing/half shaking my head, I said, “God, you really did tell the ocean to stop right here.”

Think about that for a minute. The God of the universe not only told the water where to stop, but He’s also the author of every single heavenly light in the sky, too. The sun. The sunset. The stars.

And yet He knows every single thing about us.

Reflecting over the many conversations I’d had with my girlfriends the last few days….all being at different stages and places in life…one common theme prevailed: He truly does work it all for our good. He can be trusted. He is merciful. He gives good and perfect gifts.  And He knows exactly how it’s all gonna work out.

I am grateful my friends have chosen wiser and have done/and are doing things the right way. I am grateful for the influence they are over my daughters!  I will confess at times, I have regret. I wish there was a do-over button I could push. I wish I had known better. I wish, I wish, I wish….

BUT….on the beach yesterday, I was reminded that every good and perfect gift comes from the Lord. I think sometimes we get the good part. But we don’t necessarily get the perfect part. Beth Moore says it this way: “His perfect gifts are perfecting us.” I needed (and still need) a lot of perfecting!! With age comes wisdom, and I can look back over my life and see how even in the middle of the hardest and darkest times – some of my own doing. some not – He was still there. Beth Moore says this about her own life. I can identify.

I can look at my life in retrospect and see how several of those things morphed into gifts. I am convinced that desperation became a gift to me because if saved me from a life of medicroity. Gray wasn’t an option for someone as self-destructive as I was. Looming disappointment from some key people in my life also turned into a gift. I couldn’t get anybody to mend or tend to my tattered soul the way I craved. A lifetime of snuggling up to folks with scissor-hands scars you, but those scars become a road map that leads straight to Jesus. There He becomes the uncontested love of your life and the unexpected fountainhead of cleaner affection for others. Every gap in your life makes room for the Lover of your soul. God uses time to unwrap presents that appear as curses. 

Gratefully, God has been merciful on my memory. He truly has turned ashes to beauty. He sees me very differently than how the enemy of my soul wants me to see myself. God did not come to condemn us. He came to give us life. And that we live it fully.

One of the good and perfect gifts God has given me is to allow me to do life with you. Tears fill my eyes each time I think about what an absolute privilege it is I get to do this journey with so many of you.  I almost can’t stand it! I love our community so much. I love the honesty and realness we share. I love that our eye is on the prize …. Heaven awaits! We may crossover bruised, battered, blistered, and broken. BUT…we will cross the finish line!

I have to pack up now, but I want to leave you with this….no matter what you’ve done, or where you are in life, or how you view yourself, you are NOT too far gone from God’s saving power. He loves you, He wants you, and you – yes, YOU! – are His most prized possession. Listen to Him. Choose to believe Him. Accept Him. Let His love, grace, mercy, and forgiveness wash over you. Accept His good and perfect gift….Jesus.