One of my favorite aspects of myself that God decided to give to me is an incredible need for passion in my life. I never do anything and have never done anything with half of my heart or half of my soul, seeing the world in vivid color and brilliance and in strong winds and beating suns. But, for all the sunshine I see, that same passion also means that I see pouring rains and clouds that will never part. For as strong as my highs are, my lows are just as powerful, and when I find myself confined back to the rains, it is hard for me to get back to the light.

The month of January, for me, is a month of rain.

For whatever reason, January makes me sad. Perhaps it is the unrelenting cold or my desperate need to feel the sand in my toes, a sensation long-forgotten and far away by mid-winter, but I find myself more consistently sad during this month. I struggled a little bit more with the anticipation of the month this year. While I love being at college, being away from my family is difficult, and I knew that all I would want to do is snuggle up with my mom and my puppies and watch a movie in the comfort of my home rather than sit under the florescent lights of a freshmen dorm.

So I did something a little different before the month began: I prayed about it.

I used to think that God showed His love through miracles, that God only appeared in the rescued face of a beaten child or in the beating heart of the man who survived a car crash. It was something I really struggled with, feeling like I couldn't hear God and that He only made an appearance to the hipster Christians drinking their coffee in oversized flannels who somehow found a way to get through a static hotline to God, but now I know that God does a really unique thing: He dates us.

See, God doesn't need us. He is completely and utterly His own, the Creator of the universe and the maker of creation. He doesn't need us, but He wants us desperately. And the funny thing about that is we don't always want God, but we desperately need Him. I desperately needed Him this month. I needed Him to show up so I could know He was there, and when I prayed about it, it truly was a prayer of desperation, of "God I need you this month a little extra, and I really want you to show up for me."

And after weeks of anticipation, of waiting for a miracle in a coffee cup in my oversized flannel shirt, I realized that God doesn't always work through miracles because a relationship isn't built solely upon the big moments but instead, in the little everyday things that remind the other person of the love that is shared. It's in the surprise flowers sent to the office, in the hours spent talking after a long day and in the "I love you's" after a fight. Love is in the little things, and that's where God shows us how much He loves and cherishes us as His beloved.

Now I don't know about you, but I've never received surprise flowers from God with a little notecard saying: "Caroline, I love you, and you're going to kill this upcoming week, Love you, God." But, where an earthly love would send flowers or make dinner reservations, God shows His love for us in a carefully-painted sunset, in a summer breeze blowing over the treetops and in a 75 and sunny week in the little town of Athens, Georgia in the middle of January. He dates us by removing toxic people from our lives because He took an eternity to mold a heart and refuses to see it grow bitter. He dates us in the little things, in the not-always-fun things, in the "can't you see how much I want you to be mine" things.

He chases after us fiercely, in the littlest and most secretive ways.

God gave me a week of 75-degree weather when the forecast said it would be rainy and 45 because He knew how much I love the sunshine and how much I needed it. He gave me the removal of two close people in my life because He knew what was better for me than I did and protected my heart before it could be broken. He gave me an unlikely friendship that I already know will last a lifetime and introduced me to a girl in my sorority that I was not close with previously, but I now know will become an unbreakable bond. He answered my prayer and my desperate need for Him in the time of difficulty for me, not in the way that I anticipated, but by being transparent and revealing to me what He has been doing for me this entire time: chasing after my heart.