MEET THE TEAM: allie rice
Today I want to begin to introduce you to the team of women who design, create, implement, administrate, manage, and advise this blog we call He Speaks In The Silence. These are women who pray, asking God for wisdom, then use their gifts to craft beauty for all of us. And I think you need to know them!
So… for the next many weeks we’ll be posting a fun profile of who they are, what they do, what they love, who they love, how they live and lots more delicious details.
If you want to take a peak at the list of questions we all got to choose from, here it is.
ALLIE RICE
I live in:
Northeast Portland, in the Irvington neighborhood.
I contribute to the blog by:
Creating and maintaining the space where all these words and pictures live. In partnership with the team, I designed the layout for the blog, and I keep the technical behind-the-scenes pieces working smoothly.
This year, God is revealing himself to me as:
Redeemer. That was the name of God that I received at the women’s night in prayer this year, and he is showing me his desire to redeem things — things in me, things in my life, things in others — that I thought would be forever broken. The specifics of how he will redeem are still unclear in places, and I don’t know what it will look like over the weeks, months, and years to come — but I’m awed by the relentless, extravagant grace of God and his heart for sanctifying us to holiness, reconciling us to faithfulness, and restoring us to wholeness. His story is always the same: He is in the business of taking broken people and giving them life. “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you... For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.” (Isaiah 43:1-2, 19)
My favorite Portland spots are:
Too numerous to count! I’ll try to narrow it down to three in each category...
Breakfast: Petite Provence, Tin Shed, Waffle Window
Food carts: Grilled Cheese Grill, Native Bowl, Pyro Pizza
Coffee: Costello’s Travel Caffe, Barista, JoLa
Sweets: Salt and Straw, Swirl, dessert at Irving Street Kitchen
Happy hour: Casa del Matador, Meriwether’s, The Station
Gifts: Ink and Peat, Branch and Birdie, Canoe
Casual date night: Por Que No, Kennedy School, The Blue Olive
Moderate ($$) date night: Nuestra Cocina, Toro Bravo, Piazza Italia
Fancy ($$$) date night: Veritable Quandary, Park Kitchen, St. Jack
One of my life scriptures is:
Zephaniah 3:17. I know this is a favorite for many, and with good reason; it speaks powerfully into every season of life. “The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.”
My Myers-Briggs/Enneagram/love languages are:
I’m Enneagram Type 2 (“The Helper”) with a 1-wing (“The Servant”). On Myers-Briggs, I’m an INFJ (“The Protector” or “The Foreseer Developer”) — with a maxed-out, yes-to-every-question J. My primary love language is Words of Affirmation.
When I was young, I wanted to grow up and be:
A veterinarian. When other kids were playing doctor on their dolls, I was playing vet on my stuffed animals, complete with Ace bandages and a stethoscope.
The person who has had the biggest influence on me is:
My mom. She is a woman truly after God’s own heart and has set an amazing example of godly motherhood and wifehood since I was a little girl. She gave me freedom to be my own person and security in who I am as a woman, a daughter, and a child of God. Her heart is filled with a joy that I will spend my entire life trying to emulate. I assign such high value to generosity, humility, family, beauty, and grace because of my mom and the way she holds these things as sacred. There is not one thing in my life that would be the same had she not prayed big, honest, faithful, life-giving prayers, day in and day out, for the last 28 years — and I know this is only the tip of the iceberg. Prayers that I don’t even know about, that she has already prayed, and that she continues to pray, will define my life every day of every week of every year for the rest of my life.
My lifestyle, in three words:
Thoughtful, graceful, grateful.
What I really want every woman to know is:
You are a dearly beloved child of the living God. That is your identity — not your sin, not your flesh, not your past. He made you, he knows you, he sees you — and he pursues you, not because of who you are or what you’ve done but because of who he is and what he has created you to be. Stop striving to live up to your identity; you’ve already received it. Instead, live in your identity in the Spirit. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” (2 Corinthians 5:17)
Where you can find me: