Advent Reflection: Part 1

I often spend Advent reflecting on the year — not just on what happened, but on the things that shaped me, softened me, and stretched me in ways I never expected. Advent always feels like a holy pause, an invitation to look back with gentleness and ask, “Where did God meet me this year? Where did He grow me? What did He heal that I didn’t even know needed healing?”

When I look at the photo of the girl on the righ, I see 2006.

Seven-year-old me.

Little Kelsay — tender, terrified, and trying to be so brave.

She was full of joy and fear at the same time — laughing one minute, fighting homesickness the next. She didn’t know who she would become. She didn’t know how deeply camp would root itself in her soul or how many years she would return. And she definitely didn’t know what was coming.

Because if I’m honest, 2006 me could not have imagined the road ahead.

She had no idea she would experience nearly 90 surgeries.

She couldn’t have fathomed the pain, the setbacks, the hospital rooms that felt endless, or the challenges that would carve themselves into her story. She didn’t know how much hurt she would endure — or how much beauty, grace, resilience, and courage she would carry while enduring it.

If you whispered to her that she would keep showing up…

that she would keep choosing joy…

that she would survive things that would break most adults…

she probably wouldn’t have believed you.

But God knew.

And God was already preparing her.

Then there’s the second girl — me in 2025 — standing at International Burn Camp. A dream born in that tiny heart back in 2006. A dream she didn’t even have the words for, but one she felt. Nineteen years later, God brought it to life in the most unexpected and tender way.

That week didn’t feel like a trip;

it felt like a full-circle miracle.

A homecoming for every version of me — the scared girl, the hurting teen, the healing adult, the woman learning to thrive.

As I reflect on it, my heart softens at the way God moved through every part of my story.

How He lifted me through pain I didn’t think I could bear.

How He honored my journey — the surgeries, the struggles, the nights I cried, the moments I felt alone.

How He used my scars — literally and emotionally — to speak hope into others around the world.

It humbles me still.

Isaiah 60:22 says, “At the right time, I, the Lord, will make it happen.”

And standing at that camp, I could feel that truth in my bones.

For the first time, I felt the little girl in me exhale.

She saw that her pain wasn’t wasted.

She saw that the road she feared ended up leading to purpose.

She saw that God took something so hard and turned it into something healing — not just for me, but for others too.

And now?

My heart is expectant.

Not because I know what’s next, but because I’ve seen what God does with the dreams we think are too delayed, too broken, too far away.

If God can bring a 7-year-old girl’s dream to life after nearly two decades —

through pain, surgeries, resilience, and grace —

then I can’t wait to see what other quiet miracles He’s preparing.

If God can bring a 7-year-old girl’s dream to life after nearly two decades —

through pain, surgeries, resilience, and grace —

then I know He’s not done writing the rest of the story.

Because the God who carried me through hospital rooms, fear, recovery, disappointment, and breakthroughs…

is the same God who stood with me at International Burn Camp.

The same God who whispered strength into my bones.

The same God who turned scars into testimonies, and testimonies into connection, and connection into healing that rippled far beyond me.

And if there’s one thing this year taught me, it’s this:

God wastes nothing.

Not the hurt.

Not the waiting.

Not the years that felt quiet and uneventful.

Not the dreams that seemed forgotten.

Every moment — the beautiful, the brutal, and the in-between — became part of the journey that led me back to a place where my heart finally felt whole.

So as Advent unfolds, I’m choosing to lean into hope again — not the fragile kind that depends on circumstances, but the deep, steady kind that grows from knowing who God has been to me.

Hope that He is still working behind the scenes.

Hope that healing comes in layers.

Hope that dreams don’t expire.

Hope that the girl from 2006 would be proud of the woman I’m becoming.

And maybe that’s the truest gift of this season:

realizing that God’s timing is not slow… it’s precise.

His redemption is not partial… it’s complete.

And His love for us is not defined by what we walk through…

but by the way He walks through it with us.

So here’s to the next chapter —

to the dreams I’m still holding,

to the healing still unfolding,

and to the God who has proven, again and again,

that He finishes what He starts.