I went home monday night and stayed until tuesday evening. I spend the whole time hannging out with my family and old friends, catching up and laughing hysterically. I feel really blessed by the time I got to spend at home. I saw so many people that used to be such a huge part of my life!! It was nuts the way I ran into people. And all day tuesday was spend with my two best girlfriends from high school and we laughed and cried and acted like crazy people the whole day. It was so perfect, I love those girls so much.
Anyway now i'm back in grand haven. I was supposed to spend time with some friends last night but was just so exhausted and feeling a little overwhelmed by the amount of things that still need to be done so I actually went to bed. What an amazing concept, bed. haha. I never go to sleep on time and I regret it EVERY day.
On a side note... plans for my life have changed, yet again. I found out yesterday that I got accepted to indiana wesleyan for the fall term. I wasn't expecting to get accepted or hear from them before I left but apparently I was accepted the 19th, no one contacted me until yesterday though. So weird. So I am just going to roll with it. I was a little confused at what God's plan for me was and if this was an answer to prayer or a really random occurance and a friend gave me a better way to look at the whole situation tell me that God doesnt have only one road for me to walk and if i miss one turn then I'm just left hanging, but that He will bless me and work in my life no matter where I am as long as I'm persuing him and then she added, plus why wouldn't He want you to be at Indiana Wesleyan? haha.. so I'm going to fill out my housing form today and get that sent in along with my tuition deposit. pray for provision!
I leave for bosnia in 4 days. FOUR DAYS WHAT?!
5.24.2006
5.22.2006
Quick Sand
Well... it's finally sinking in that I'm going to Bosnia for the summer. It's weird how you make plans to do something like this and you spend months preparing and raising money yet you still don't really feel like you're leaving until... a couple of days before you're really going. It's so strange! So it is starting to sink in a little, more because I've started packing. I have so much to do in the next week it's going to be really crazy. Pray that I get everything done that needs to be done and I don't stress out a ton.
I was asked this weekend what my long term goal of this summer program was. I had to think for a minute, but I quickly realized that I am more excited about what God is going to be doing here at my home and in my community. Don't get me wrong, I'm really excited to see how God moves in the villages I'll be working in- but I feel like He will do just as much, if not more, in the lives of the people around me every day that don't know Him as their Lord and savior yet. I've made a commitment to pray HARD every day for my family. I try to do that now, but I get so lazy and I dont have any kind of a routine. I know that we will have a required "quiet time" every day which is perfect becuase I really want a consistant time.
It's so easy to be complacent with you life and just settle for the relationship you have with the Lord if you don't have to work for it. I can't go around professing my faith to every person i interact with over seas and I feel like since I have to be somewhat "undercover" that it will give me a greater appreciation for faith.
I'm just so looking forward to see God and growing so much in my relationship with Him this summer. I love that total "on fire" feeling you have when you're pulled away from your normal atmosphere and put into one with a small group of people with the same faith as you. It's empowering in a way.
Anyway, I leave on sunday the 28th. Please pray for safe travels and while I'm gone, just pray for my family.
I was asked this weekend what my long term goal of this summer program was. I had to think for a minute, but I quickly realized that I am more excited about what God is going to be doing here at my home and in my community. Don't get me wrong, I'm really excited to see how God moves in the villages I'll be working in- but I feel like He will do just as much, if not more, in the lives of the people around me every day that don't know Him as their Lord and savior yet. I've made a commitment to pray HARD every day for my family. I try to do that now, but I get so lazy and I dont have any kind of a routine. I know that we will have a required "quiet time" every day which is perfect becuase I really want a consistant time.
It's so easy to be complacent with you life and just settle for the relationship you have with the Lord if you don't have to work for it. I can't go around professing my faith to every person i interact with over seas and I feel like since I have to be somewhat "undercover" that it will give me a greater appreciation for faith.
I'm just so looking forward to see God and growing so much in my relationship with Him this summer. I love that total "on fire" feeling you have when you're pulled away from your normal atmosphere and put into one with a small group of people with the same faith as you. It's empowering in a way.
Anyway, I leave on sunday the 28th. Please pray for safe travels and while I'm gone, just pray for my family.
5.17.2006
Encouraging the weak
My heart is breaking right now... I cried over a person that I don't even know. Just relating to their situation, knowing exactly what it is they have been though... I took their situation and the discouraging remarks against them very personal. Maybe it's not healthy to take things so personal, but I really feel like God was moving, stiring me up.
I'm really passionate about people who are searching. People who are there, they know that it's God they need to seek and they want Him, they want to please Him, but are still weak and end up taking two steps back for every step forward. I know those people, I was one of those people and I love it when God puts them in my life because I feel like I can encourage them from experience. So many people discorage though. So many christians discourage those who are tyring to walk with God, those who are in the beginning of their faith and fall a little more than others. I just want to cry out to those who are placing the judgement- We should be rejoicing in this situation!! Someone who has been under the hand of satan for so long is changing course! Your brother or sister is coming to their Lord. Rejoice instead of judge! Encourage them! Walk with them! Be an example and a leader! Greet them with love as Christ would.
So many times though, people are judged for the poor decisions made in their past. It's just so real for me because I have been in the place where people could either take me seriously or they could look back at my actions and say I'm fake. I've struggled out of satans grasp and ended up in the hands of christians who, in so many words, told me to go back where I came from.
How is that going to build God's kingdom? How is that going to bring in our generation? So many people have been down the paths of drugs and alcohol and sex and lies. It's common, it's cool. So why aren't we trying harder to love on those people rather than make them feel like less because of the life they once lived? Didn't God promise them the same thing He promised everyone else? Did we suddenly forget that we are a community of CHRIST? Not a community of defeat. I pray so hard that we all will try harder than anything to accept people for who they are and with whatever baggage they are bringing with them because no matter WHAT awful things a person has gone through, no matter how many people they have hurt, no matter what lies they have told, no matter what road they walked... God is going to use those experiences for His glory and we should be welcoming any and every new christian with open and loving arms.
romans 12:
1Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters. 2One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. 3The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him. 4Who are you to judge someone else's servant? To his own master he stands or falls. And he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand.
I'm really passionate about people who are searching. People who are there, they know that it's God they need to seek and they want Him, they want to please Him, but are still weak and end up taking two steps back for every step forward. I know those people, I was one of those people and I love it when God puts them in my life because I feel like I can encourage them from experience. So many people discorage though. So many christians discourage those who are tyring to walk with God, those who are in the beginning of their faith and fall a little more than others. I just want to cry out to those who are placing the judgement- We should be rejoicing in this situation!! Someone who has been under the hand of satan for so long is changing course! Your brother or sister is coming to their Lord. Rejoice instead of judge! Encourage them! Walk with them! Be an example and a leader! Greet them with love as Christ would.
So many times though, people are judged for the poor decisions made in their past. It's just so real for me because I have been in the place where people could either take me seriously or they could look back at my actions and say I'm fake. I've struggled out of satans grasp and ended up in the hands of christians who, in so many words, told me to go back where I came from.
How is that going to build God's kingdom? How is that going to bring in our generation? So many people have been down the paths of drugs and alcohol and sex and lies. It's common, it's cool. So why aren't we trying harder to love on those people rather than make them feel like less because of the life they once lived? Didn't God promise them the same thing He promised everyone else? Did we suddenly forget that we are a community of CHRIST? Not a community of defeat. I pray so hard that we all will try harder than anything to accept people for who they are and with whatever baggage they are bringing with them because no matter WHAT awful things a person has gone through, no matter how many people they have hurt, no matter what lies they have told, no matter what road they walked... God is going to use those experiences for His glory and we should be welcoming any and every new christian with open and loving arms.
romans 12:
1Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters. 2One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. 3The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him. 4Who are you to judge someone else's servant? To his own master he stands or falls. And he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand.
5.16.2006
5.15.2006
It's all in.................
Today is the deadline for me $4250. Now let me tell you that on Friday when I found out I had about $600 left, I was getting a little nervous- my faith was definetly being tested. On saturday i went into my work to see if the owner of the store might support me a little.. I had literally missed him by 3 minutes. The people of the store also told me I was crazy to ask him for money so I left a little discouraged. Later that night though, one of my friends gave me a check for $213. I was really excited and moved to see God's provision from such a strange place!!! The next day nothing came and I was going through my personal financial situation trying to figure out how to take the rest of the money out of my pocket. Well today, the deadline(!), I got a phone call from Josh's mom. She asked me how much money I had left to raise and i told her- she told me not to worry about it, she would write a check for the remainder of the money. Okay... now if that's not amazing I don't know what is!
I'm just so grateful for how the money was provided in the end so quickly, especially for my family because they doubted and they didn't believe in the power of prayer- but I can tell them now that it came and it came ON TIME and I really hope that they will see that is was all God and He provided it for me. I really hope that it will begin to show them how big He really is!
So now i'm going to Bosnia for sure :)
I will be leaving on the 28th of May, in one week and 6 days. It's just so cool how God has allowed things to fall into place so perfectly at the last minute. Even my family is all coming to drop me off in Kentucky for training... it's just such an amazing day!
Rejoice!!
I'm just so grateful for how the money was provided in the end so quickly, especially for my family because they doubted and they didn't believe in the power of prayer- but I can tell them now that it came and it came ON TIME and I really hope that they will see that is was all God and He provided it for me. I really hope that it will begin to show them how big He really is!
So now i'm going to Bosnia for sure :)
I will be leaving on the 28th of May, in one week and 6 days. It's just so cool how God has allowed things to fall into place so perfectly at the last minute. Even my family is all coming to drop me off in Kentucky for training... it's just such an amazing day!
Rejoice!!
5.07.2006
PROVISION!!!
So the Lord has so graciously provided us a house to live in this summer :) This is the most beatiful house too! (Maybe it's just because im really excited about it, but its nice!)
It's surrounded by foilage (!) So its a little hard to get a picture of apparently, but its exciting that we have a place to stay.
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