Tons has happened since it looks like February and that seems like years ago. I really don't know how to describe or summarize what I though was going to be the best year ever. It seems like it has been a year full of growth and that has actually been more painful then joyful. Why blog? At this point it is to get thoughts out loud or on paper so I can look back at what God has done and remember where I was.
My current striving have been one of great struggle as of late. I don't know what God has been doing but this week alone it has been one hit after another that began with a time in the woods last week. I struggled through some things while in Seattle and then once I got home it only began. For one reason or another I think I have cried myself to sleep from Sunday till Wednesday with all sorts of issues God is allowing. God does not just suddenly make us certain characteristics but allows us to go through things in order to get them. Todays has turned into an actual day of rest and so this Thanksgiving I can be truly thankful.
I wish I could say oh so easily what God has been teaching me in my life but each day has brought another relationship struggle and a possibility of a move to Seattle. At this point I am reminded only of the vs. that I have tattooed on my back...my life vs...taken from II Corinthians 12:9 "...my grace is sufficient for you for my strength is made perfect in weakness...". So what God says is that when I am weak I am strong and God will allow struggles get me to my weak point to remind me of my need for Him and Him alone as the fulfilment of all things in my life. That does not come natural for me.
Now as I struggle through the rest of these issues I look to Him and to His plan because mine is continually wrong and fails. I don't know what to do today let alone tomorrow but know only that if I seek to glorify Him in all that I do then I am living as I should. If I could only stay at His feet and not run to other things and people. So, the current issue before me is Seattle and if and when and so the next few months I will be battling through that issue. There is a job custom made for me that sounds amazing and it's location also stands perfect. So, the question now is that with everything that is going on in my life...is God pushing me there by all He is doing here or is He trying to teach me not to run (which I am amazing at...been practicing my entire life in fact)? And which it is...I can not say....And so for now....I will just have to spend time at His feet and beg Him for the clarity as to the direction I should pursue.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Monday, February 18, 2008
Stirrings
Life has changes a great deal since I last spoke on the written page. I have missed blogger but have also been contented to the pages of my journal or the tongues of conversation. Tonights message spoken has completly and utterly resonated within me. As the speaker talked there were chills running from within to the outside of me and the hair (if I didn't shave it off for lack of enjoying it) on my arms attempted to stand on end. Bob Blincoe of frontiers entertained our need for humor as well as gave us some glimpses of the unreached world around us and how it all began.
Mission and mission minded somehow was stirred up early within me even before I was a beleiver. I am not sure that God calls you before He has in fact called you but there are foundations to be set for sure and by this we can look back and see though we had made plan after plan it was Him who directed and guided our footsteps. At Valley Christian High School I sat. Unbeliever I was though on the verge of being reached finally something was stirring deeply within my soul. A Newsboys song began to play and it was set to the images of a missions video and of far away places. At that moment I felt that is what I wanted to do.....It was sometime that year or the next God saved me though the two things did not collide until much later in my walk.
Now, I sit and continue to contemplate what God would have in store for me and why my life looks different in the ways that it does. Tonight, I fell in love with the ideas and the dreams that were rekindled within me. It had not died but sometime you just do and you forget easily the reason your so desperatly running agains the wind and not just letting it push you around. So, in essence I want to leave you with the ideas that he said and what those ideas led my mind to wander and dream toward.
John 10:14-16
I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
He pointed us to Acts 15 and the council and how we need to break out of our Barrio.
Barrio-holds the idea of our culture...it is our cultural membrane...something to break through.
Thoughts provoked here:
Think about the langauge we use with people. I am preparing for a summer in Morocco where I may be spending my time with three people who speak English but are from different places. Where do I fit and what will I bring? How can I share and how can I learn to use the culture I am in to share the good news? If I can not speak the language or do not know the culture what will I bring to the table?
I am excited to know and learn the simplicity of the situation by looking at a culture and using what they know from the basic level to show them Christ. It can be as simple as who is the one you call the high and lifted one...use common language not to fight or battle or discuss religion but to find a commen ground to share and to be your stepping stone. Use their culture just like Paul used in the gospels. Simplicity exists in not trying to use the fancy vocabulary and doctrine to share but use the simply truths of what they see, know and understand and then use it for God's glory.
I think so much about how God has continued to allow me to be unattached and how there is such a purpose for that. There is a lot to be done and ther is so much that can be accomplished when we allow for a stepping outside of that which we know and the places we curl up in our cozy comfort. How great that is and how it only stirrs my excitedment as I travel to do humanitarian work in Morocco this summer. It is about a love for people and a stretching not to hold on but to in fact let go. Who can I reach out to and serve and not a pursuit of the ones who can serve me will lead me to a closer place with God as well as a bigger opportunity to live it out. I see why God brings some people to singleness though we may not desire it. For the times He gives He has a purpose if only so our focus remains in the right moment and our sight set on the forward moving Cornerstone. Paul could do much more alone then He could have done otherwise. (Don't get me wrong I would really like to find someone to run alongside but for now....I get it!)
While amidst the people of this world we must also find ways to honor them though we may not agree or understand. If there are things in other cultures that our not causing us to sin then we must allow them and rejoice in the variety of people God has made taking what they do as an honored guest. We must show them not that they are doing wrong things and refusing to be a part of what they do but once again allowing God to shine through it and by being joyful in it. What a rich witness that will be when we can forget to try and conform others to what we think they should look like and when we can finally embrace them for who they are. Allow God to use and be evident in every way and culture and by every tongue. Find a way to allow your actions to say an enormous amount...and may they always say great things.
Think and be prepared for others perceptions of Christians.....how do I accel their presumptions or how can I honor them?
Bob then used these examples:
Paul to the Greeks
Patrick to the Celts
Ulfilas to the Goths
Slaves captured by the vikings
"If you can not see that far ahead go as far ahead as you can see."
~Dawson (Rodman I think)
This is so great and such an excuse fighter....go....send....play a part.
"Every arrow needs a bow."
So all in all I can not tell you how excited I left and what things run through my mind. God be praised and may He continue to allow the notes that will drive us to song! As always my conversations are usually not short and sweet but I don't want to forget these things or moments though on paper to others they usully do not hold the same electricity. If there is one thing I want more then anything from this it is that we are called to many things....I want to be a goer, we as goers need senders and God can be made evident in every culture so that every tongue will in fact confess He is God! How we do that is not in anyway conforming to the world in the ways most of us do but in fact staying true to the gospel in every aspect and allow the obtaining of culture to make God only the more evident.
Good night and may God bless your dreams and set you all uncomforably on fire until you get off your butt and flee toward what He plans for you with an incredible desire and passion...
Mission and mission minded somehow was stirred up early within me even before I was a beleiver. I am not sure that God calls you before He has in fact called you but there are foundations to be set for sure and by this we can look back and see though we had made plan after plan it was Him who directed and guided our footsteps. At Valley Christian High School I sat. Unbeliever I was though on the verge of being reached finally something was stirring deeply within my soul. A Newsboys song began to play and it was set to the images of a missions video and of far away places. At that moment I felt that is what I wanted to do.....It was sometime that year or the next God saved me though the two things did not collide until much later in my walk.
Now, I sit and continue to contemplate what God would have in store for me and why my life looks different in the ways that it does. Tonight, I fell in love with the ideas and the dreams that were rekindled within me. It had not died but sometime you just do and you forget easily the reason your so desperatly running agains the wind and not just letting it push you around. So, in essence I want to leave you with the ideas that he said and what those ideas led my mind to wander and dream toward.
John 10:14-16
I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
He pointed us to Acts 15 and the council and how we need to break out of our Barrio.
Barrio-holds the idea of our culture...it is our cultural membrane...something to break through.
Thoughts provoked here:
Think about the langauge we use with people. I am preparing for a summer in Morocco where I may be spending my time with three people who speak English but are from different places. Where do I fit and what will I bring? How can I share and how can I learn to use the culture I am in to share the good news? If I can not speak the language or do not know the culture what will I bring to the table?
I am excited to know and learn the simplicity of the situation by looking at a culture and using what they know from the basic level to show them Christ. It can be as simple as who is the one you call the high and lifted one...use common language not to fight or battle or discuss religion but to find a commen ground to share and to be your stepping stone. Use their culture just like Paul used in the gospels. Simplicity exists in not trying to use the fancy vocabulary and doctrine to share but use the simply truths of what they see, know and understand and then use it for God's glory.
I think so much about how God has continued to allow me to be unattached and how there is such a purpose for that. There is a lot to be done and ther is so much that can be accomplished when we allow for a stepping outside of that which we know and the places we curl up in our cozy comfort. How great that is and how it only stirrs my excitedment as I travel to do humanitarian work in Morocco this summer. It is about a love for people and a stretching not to hold on but to in fact let go. Who can I reach out to and serve and not a pursuit of the ones who can serve me will lead me to a closer place with God as well as a bigger opportunity to live it out. I see why God brings some people to singleness though we may not desire it. For the times He gives He has a purpose if only so our focus remains in the right moment and our sight set on the forward moving Cornerstone. Paul could do much more alone then He could have done otherwise. (Don't get me wrong I would really like to find someone to run alongside but for now....I get it!)
While amidst the people of this world we must also find ways to honor them though we may not agree or understand. If there are things in other cultures that our not causing us to sin then we must allow them and rejoice in the variety of people God has made taking what they do as an honored guest. We must show them not that they are doing wrong things and refusing to be a part of what they do but once again allowing God to shine through it and by being joyful in it. What a rich witness that will be when we can forget to try and conform others to what we think they should look like and when we can finally embrace them for who they are. Allow God to use and be evident in every way and culture and by every tongue. Find a way to allow your actions to say an enormous amount...and may they always say great things.
Think and be prepared for others perceptions of Christians.....how do I accel their presumptions or how can I honor them?
Bob then used these examples:
Paul to the Greeks
Patrick to the Celts
Ulfilas to the Goths
Slaves captured by the vikings
"If you can not see that far ahead go as far ahead as you can see."
~Dawson (Rodman I think)
This is so great and such an excuse fighter....go....send....play a part.
"Every arrow needs a bow."
So all in all I can not tell you how excited I left and what things run through my mind. God be praised and may He continue to allow the notes that will drive us to song! As always my conversations are usually not short and sweet but I don't want to forget these things or moments though on paper to others they usully do not hold the same electricity. If there is one thing I want more then anything from this it is that we are called to many things....I want to be a goer, we as goers need senders and God can be made evident in every culture so that every tongue will in fact confess He is God! How we do that is not in anyway conforming to the world in the ways most of us do but in fact staying true to the gospel in every aspect and allow the obtaining of culture to make God only the more evident.
Good night and may God bless your dreams and set you all uncomforably on fire until you get off your butt and flee toward what He plans for you with an incredible desire and passion...
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