a lot has been going on, maybe that's why i haven't blogged. its probably that i haven't been able to articulate what i really want to articulate. so i'm just going to let you know what i've been up to, maybe that would be interesting. i hope it is.
a little more of my future is "figured" out, i got my pre-acceptance to staff [yay!] so i will be going to training this summer. i also checked out a seminary in orlando and i really would like to go there at some point in the future. maybe start taking classes when i get back from support raising. it has opened my eyes to some new possibilities, but as i explore the idea of really doing it i get so excited. so maybe its worth considering more.
last weekend i went to peoria, il to see two of my friends/teammates get married. it was a 21 hour roadtrip with six other friends and it was a really fun whirlwind of a weekend. then i headed to indiana for a week long fun fest culminating in the joining together of two other dear friends. i have been back in muncie, the city i went to school in and i interned here.
i have only been gone a year, so a lot seems the same, but everything seems different too. i have loved getting to reconnect with friends and making new friends. but as i've talked about my year, it is even more evident to me that i made the right choice in going to orlando and that my job is the right job for me. so its been pretty fun.
but it is strange that when i get back to florida 10 of the people that were there when i left are going to be gone. i know that people leaving is a big part of the life that i have, but in light of the travel schedule being light, especially with some of these girls, i haven't really had to say long goodbyes. but that time has ended and now, we say goodbye again.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
april fools
i was totally going to pull a prank today. but then life happens.
someday.
and it'll be awesome.
someday.
and it'll be awesome.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
maybe
i read this book that has led me to some maybes.
We Really Do Need Each Other its a great book, by Reuben Welch. pretty easy read with great Biblical principles.
one of the ideas i love from the book is that God doesn't need us to tell Him how much we love Him (although, I think it naturally overflows out of our lives), but we can show how we trust and believe His love by the way we love others. Its like if we are convinced that our lives are caught up in Christ, then we are FREE to lay them down because we believe that they will be raised up with Him. so we can be spent loving people. seeing people. really seeing people.
we are free to love because we know that Jesus loves us.
if we don't think the love, the life will run out, then we are free to love and give life. Jesus says, "what good is it for a man to have the whole world and lose his soul?" what good is is to have life saved up when we die?
maybe saved up life is more like manna then money. maybe everyday God gives us more than enough life for the today and if we try to save some for tomorrow it will be rotten like the Israelite's manna. what if our "saved up" life won't gain interest and earn us more like a bank account, but will spoil like yesterday's manna. maybe we need to believe God when He says that He cares more for us than the sparrows and meadows which are abundantly cared for.
maybe its not just the physical, maybe its everything.
We Really Do Need Each Other its a great book, by Reuben Welch. pretty easy read with great Biblical principles.
one of the ideas i love from the book is that God doesn't need us to tell Him how much we love Him (although, I think it naturally overflows out of our lives), but we can show how we trust and believe His love by the way we love others. Its like if we are convinced that our lives are caught up in Christ, then we are FREE to lay them down because we believe that they will be raised up with Him. so we can be spent loving people. seeing people. really seeing people.
we are free to love because we know that Jesus loves us.
if we don't think the love, the life will run out, then we are free to love and give life. Jesus says, "what good is it for a man to have the whole world and lose his soul?" what good is is to have life saved up when we die?
maybe saved up life is more like manna then money. maybe everyday God gives us more than enough life for the today and if we try to save some for tomorrow it will be rotten like the Israelite's manna. what if our "saved up" life won't gain interest and earn us more like a bank account, but will spoil like yesterday's manna. maybe we need to believe God when He says that He cares more for us than the sparrows and meadows which are abundantly cared for.
maybe its not just the physical, maybe its everything.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
greece!
i'm currently in athens, greece. and let me tell you, they are not lying when they say its breathtaking. its been a fun day and a half. people sometimes hate the play-by-play but i'm going to do it anyway, so now you've been warned. but i thinks its been a pretty unusual/funny couple days.
we arrived at the airport on saturday morning, our flight was early (like that ever happens), so our ride wasn't there to greet us, so we waited and then he came. this nice staff guy from texas left his usual saturday with the family to pick us up. he told us the things we needed to see and the areas of town that might be a little shady and even where to go to church. super helpful.
we checked in to our hotel, the pictures online give it a bit more credit than it deserves (its still really awesome and i'm so thankful to be staying here). then we decided to make good use of our day. we were told that the sunset from mars hill was amazing, so we planned our day around that. we walked up this street that has all the "galleria" shopping. carnival began this week, its the weeks leading up to Greek Orthodox Lent, so for carnival kids (and some crazy adults) dress up like princesses, pirates, cowboys, the three wise men(grown-ups), bumblebees, and other random stuff. so here we are in greece walking up this street that has random people in costumes, stray dogs sleeping where ever, native americans dancing, standing basses playing, refugees selling weird toys, the smell of sesame bread, its not what i thought of when i thought of greece. but i love it. so after finding this little cafe and having some lunch we walked toward the archeological sites. but it was still early enough that we didn't want to go up to mars hill, so we went to the national garden. it was a nice garden and the sun was shining, so we decided to take naps on the park benches. it was so funny. i was awakened by lisa telling me that turtles were fighting, we went to watch. the bigger turtle was running itself into the smaller one. the bigger one then was biting the neck of the smaller one. then the big one got on top of the little one and began making some strange noises, we are convinced they were mating and all of a sudden i felt like i shouldn't watch it, especially with a creepy greek dude watching it with us. then we went onward toward the sites. we stopped outside the gates of the old olympic site, the temple of zeus, the theatre of dionysos, the acropolis and finally made our way to the top of mars hill, the very place where Paul made his address to the "Men of Athens" in Acts 17. we watched the sunset over Athens from this incredible vantage point. so we returned to our hotel through the bustling streets of athens. then sunday morning we went to the international church. it was good, fun to see so many people from so many cultures worshipping together. after the service we briefly met a few of the stinters here. then we were off again to see this city (we got to see all of the archeological sites for free, because in the off-season on sundays, they are all open). we grabbed lunch at another cafe on a busy street, then headed straight for the acropolis, on the way we bumped into hadrian's library and roman agora, so we stopped in. then up the hill to the acropolis. we took pictures next to pretty much every ancient column in the city. it was fun, but now there are a lot of pictures of each of us standing by ourselves in front of some old marble stuff, we got a few pictures together though thanks to the mono-pod. its amazing to be at the top of the city on the acropolis because you can see the whole city, the mountains on three sides and the ocean on the last side. also very fortified in case greece has any enemies :) our last site to see was the filopappou hill. this was amazing to see the acropolis from another high spot in athens. then we hiked back down the hill in search for some good food. we stopped by many little restaurants, but just weren't feeling them. we walked around this busy little corner to find a small, fairly vacant restaurant. it seemed to have some stuff that looked good so we sat down, ordered some coffee and food. the owner was talking with another american in the patio area about how he was moving to wisconsin. we were intrigued and asked him where he was moving, turns out he is moving to a little town where a friend of ours went to college. through out the night we talked with the owner and the other american woman, it was just a nice little spot to enjoy a laid back meal. the food was excellent, as was the coffee. then the owner brought out this great greek dessert. lisa didn't love it, but i thought it was really good. it was a greek yogurt with honey. sounds strange, but it was good. then a nigerian refugee (there are lots of refugees here) came to our table and tried to sell us dvds. when the sale wasn't going well, he decided to try to flirt us into a sale. that didn't work either. in the end he walked away from our disinterest. i like this city. anyway, i recommend athens. and its fun to have a fun friend with you.
we arrived at the airport on saturday morning, our flight was early (like that ever happens), so our ride wasn't there to greet us, so we waited and then he came. this nice staff guy from texas left his usual saturday with the family to pick us up. he told us the things we needed to see and the areas of town that might be a little shady and even where to go to church. super helpful.
we checked in to our hotel, the pictures online give it a bit more credit than it deserves (its still really awesome and i'm so thankful to be staying here). then we decided to make good use of our day. we were told that the sunset from mars hill was amazing, so we planned our day around that. we walked up this street that has all the "galleria" shopping. carnival began this week, its the weeks leading up to Greek Orthodox Lent, so for carnival kids (and some crazy adults) dress up like princesses, pirates, cowboys, the three wise men(grown-ups), bumblebees, and other random stuff. so here we are in greece walking up this street that has random people in costumes, stray dogs sleeping where ever, native americans dancing, standing basses playing, refugees selling weird toys, the smell of sesame bread, its not what i thought of when i thought of greece. but i love it. so after finding this little cafe and having some lunch we walked toward the archeological sites. but it was still early enough that we didn't want to go up to mars hill, so we went to the national garden. it was a nice garden and the sun was shining, so we decided to take naps on the park benches. it was so funny. i was awakened by lisa telling me that turtles were fighting, we went to watch. the bigger turtle was running itself into the smaller one. the bigger one then was biting the neck of the smaller one. then the big one got on top of the little one and began making some strange noises, we are convinced they were mating and all of a sudden i felt like i shouldn't watch it, especially with a creepy greek dude watching it with us. then we went onward toward the sites. we stopped outside the gates of the old olympic site, the temple of zeus, the theatre of dionysos, the acropolis and finally made our way to the top of mars hill, the very place where Paul made his address to the "Men of Athens" in Acts 17. we watched the sunset over Athens from this incredible vantage point. so we returned to our hotel through the bustling streets of athens. then sunday morning we went to the international church. it was good, fun to see so many people from so many cultures worshipping together. after the service we briefly met a few of the stinters here. then we were off again to see this city (we got to see all of the archeological sites for free, because in the off-season on sundays, they are all open). we grabbed lunch at another cafe on a busy street, then headed straight for the acropolis, on the way we bumped into hadrian's library and roman agora, so we stopped in. then up the hill to the acropolis. we took pictures next to pretty much every ancient column in the city. it was fun, but now there are a lot of pictures of each of us standing by ourselves in front of some old marble stuff, we got a few pictures together though thanks to the mono-pod. its amazing to be at the top of the city on the acropolis because you can see the whole city, the mountains on three sides and the ocean on the last side. also very fortified in case greece has any enemies :) our last site to see was the filopappou hill. this was amazing to see the acropolis from another high spot in athens. then we hiked back down the hill in search for some good food. we stopped by many little restaurants, but just weren't feeling them. we walked around this busy little corner to find a small, fairly vacant restaurant. it seemed to have some stuff that looked good so we sat down, ordered some coffee and food. the owner was talking with another american in the patio area about how he was moving to wisconsin. we were intrigued and asked him where he was moving, turns out he is moving to a little town where a friend of ours went to college. through out the night we talked with the owner and the other american woman, it was just a nice little spot to enjoy a laid back meal. the food was excellent, as was the coffee. then the owner brought out this great greek dessert. lisa didn't love it, but i thought it was really good. it was a greek yogurt with honey. sounds strange, but it was good. then a nigerian refugee (there are lots of refugees here) came to our table and tried to sell us dvds. when the sale wasn't going well, he decided to try to flirt us into a sale. that didn't work either. in the end he walked away from our disinterest. i like this city. anyway, i recommend athens. and its fun to have a fun friend with you.
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Is Jesus Enough?
So I was in church this morning and the pastor was talking about the call to discipleship. It is this series entitled "Come, Follow Me" and I'm all for following Jesus so I was looking forward to what he was going to say. The sermon was not what I was expecting, not that I know what I was expecting. The bottom line was based on two questions, the first was, is just Jesus enough, and the second, what are you holding on to that you need to set down to follow Jesus?
The first question seemed to strike something within me. So with the first question the pastor asked another question, if Jesus were not in heaven, but you got all the other things would you be happy there? and i have to admit part of me thinks that it wouldn't be bad, it wouldn't be great, but not bad. seriously, though, no illness, no death, no brokenness, no sin, no war, plenty of all the good things, lots of love, happiness, friendship, music and dancing. But I guess what I am beginning to realize, as the larger part of me says I could not be happy without Jesus, is that Jesus is what makes all those things. He puts the beauty in them, so if He were not there to make them what they are, then it would be empty. So is Jesus enough, just Jesus? if the answer is anything but yes, my entire paradigm is lost. if Jesus is not enough then I can never follow Him the way He requires. how can I lose my life, give up every hope and dream, if Jesus is not enough.
Paul writes in his 2nd letter to the Corinthians, "For all the promises of God find their Yes in him (Jesus). That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory. (1:20)"
I totally recommend reading 2 Corinthians, its rocking my world.
oh and on a totally ridiculous note, go see Be Kind Rewind. This is Jack Black's new movie with Mos Def and Danny Glover, directed by Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind). There is no lame romantic story line to make it marketable, there are limited special affects, it is just so different then most of what is being produced these days. The movie is feel good, funny and fresh.
The first question seemed to strike something within me. So with the first question the pastor asked another question, if Jesus were not in heaven, but you got all the other things would you be happy there? and i have to admit part of me thinks that it wouldn't be bad, it wouldn't be great, but not bad. seriously, though, no illness, no death, no brokenness, no sin, no war, plenty of all the good things, lots of love, happiness, friendship, music and dancing. But I guess what I am beginning to realize, as the larger part of me says I could not be happy without Jesus, is that Jesus is what makes all those things. He puts the beauty in them, so if He were not there to make them what they are, then it would be empty. So is Jesus enough, just Jesus? if the answer is anything but yes, my entire paradigm is lost. if Jesus is not enough then I can never follow Him the way He requires. how can I lose my life, give up every hope and dream, if Jesus is not enough.
Paul writes in his 2nd letter to the Corinthians, "For all the promises of God find their Yes in him (Jesus). That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory. (1:20)"
I totally recommend reading 2 Corinthians, its rocking my world.
oh and on a totally ridiculous note, go see Be Kind Rewind. This is Jack Black's new movie with Mos Def and Danny Glover, directed by Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind). There is no lame romantic story line to make it marketable, there are limited special affects, it is just so different then most of what is being produced these days. The movie is feel good, funny and fresh.
Monday, February 11, 2008
sky.
i love the sky.
its so vast. the whole of space is right there above my head. here in florida there are no mountains, so it just goes on forever. i love the feeling of being really small compared to something.
i love that sometimes a cloudy sky makes me all melancholy, the sunshine makes me feel so alive, it all causes me to marvel at how great the Creator is. i love the puffy white clouds and the stars at night, sunrises and sunsets.
but i can't help but think this is the corrupt fallen version of the sky, because Paul writes in Romans 8:22 "For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now."
so this beautiful vastness that causes me to loose my breath on occasion is just a gross version of what it was supposed to be. is that possible?
i cannot even imagine the beauty that we have to behold in creation, when it is all redeemed, but even more than that, the Creator. I am looking forward to the day when we see Jesus face to face, when the veil is lifted. I want to live in light of that day.
its so vast. the whole of space is right there above my head. here in florida there are no mountains, so it just goes on forever. i love the feeling of being really small compared to something.
i love that sometimes a cloudy sky makes me all melancholy, the sunshine makes me feel so alive, it all causes me to marvel at how great the Creator is. i love the puffy white clouds and the stars at night, sunrises and sunsets.
but i can't help but think this is the corrupt fallen version of the sky, because Paul writes in Romans 8:22 "For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now."
so this beautiful vastness that causes me to loose my breath on occasion is just a gross version of what it was supposed to be. is that possible?
i cannot even imagine the beauty that we have to behold in creation, when it is all redeemed, but even more than that, the Creator. I am looking forward to the day when we see Jesus face to face, when the veil is lifted. I want to live in light of that day.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
process.
i am becoming more and more convinced that the Lord calls us to move forward on things He does not intend to bring to fruition. for example, i am convinced that God sometimes calls people to the application/interview process for a job or a graduate program that He does not want that person to actually enroll in. i say this because i think it applies to a lot of areas of life. i don't know if its cultural or if its just me, but i do not want to enter into things that take up time and energy without the ends in mind. but i am beginning to think that sometimes Jesus just wants to use circumstances as a backdrop for what He is doing in our lives.
so i guess what i am saying is that i want to enter into process with my whole self. i have to believe that He is the one who is pushing me into these processes and i have to hope that the risk is worth it.
i guess the whole point of this blog is i don't like risk. i don't want to risk because it leaves me hurt and i have to believe that Jesus can take care of my hurt.
can He?
i am thinking about this ministry that i would love to be a part of, but i am not sure if i want to do it or if the Lord wants me to do it. it seems like if He doesn't want me to be a part of this, then shouldn't He in His infinite wisdom, just let me know that it isn't for me? but then no, He doesn't do that, He even seems to prompt me to move forward. so, i move forward.
this leaves me with a question: is it all for nothing?
i lean towards saying there is great purpose in the process. but i think it might be in more than just the job/education search.
i just think that process can be such an incredible time to seek the face of Jesus and that's pretty much the point. i am learning to be okay living in the gray of life because it is giving me incredible opportunity to look upon what God is doing and how He is doing it. so all in all i'm thankful for the time of process.so i guess what i am saying is that i want to enter into process with my whole self. i have to believe that He is the one who is pushing me into these processes and i have to hope that the risk is worth it.
i guess the whole point of this blog is i don't like risk. i don't want to risk because it leaves me hurt and i have to believe that Jesus can take care of my hurt.
can He?
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