All Saints' Lydia Pedersen gains new perspective after tearing her ACL

Excerpt from an article written by David Fawcett at Inside NOVA

Then, something unexpected happened. When [Lydia] Pedersen entered the cabin [at the summer Anglican camp], she overheard a group of middle-school girls deep in conversation about challenges they faced.

Their exchange resonated with Pedersen. Here at perhaps her lowest moment were others sharing their struggles. It didn’t matter the circumstance. It only mattered that they battled the struggles together with God at the center of their discussions.

Something clicked.

“I’m not alone,” Pedersen remembered thinking.

Prompted by an overwhelming sense of peace, Pedersen chose to stay and ask some hard, but necessary, questions of God during her quiet time. For the first time at the retreat, she let Him in and allowed herself a moment to present her need without a self-imposed agenda or timetable.

In particular, she wanted to know whether basketball was in her future. Pedersen didn’t receive a specific answer, but she realized something else: Basketball was a part of her life, but there was life beyond basketball. And He promised to show her the way. She just had to let go.

David Fawcett is a parishioner at All Saints’ Church in Woodbridge, VA