Updates, Discoveries and Prayer Requests

Updates and discoveries...

• I'm leaving for the internship on Tuesday. 
• I'll be on the East Tour just like we prayed for! The schedule is here if you want to check it out. 12 states. 3 months. Excitement abounds.
• Packing for three months is really hard.
• My neighbor, his wife, and their grandson will be at one of the Tour stops competing. (So cool!)
• Tomorrow is my last day at work, and while the girl replacing me is fantastic, I'm going to miss the easy routine and client interaction.
• God has the best plans. This isn't really a discovery because I've known for years, but He keeps proving His sovereignty and supreme awesomeness over every detail in my life and am blessed and overwhelmed.

 Prayer Requests...

• First and foremost that God would protect us (physically, emotionally, spiritually).
• That He will use this time to minister to me and through me to others. This is a mission experience even if I'm not going to Africa.
• That I'll be placed on the East Tour. (Answered prayer!)
• A laptop with a big HD. I'll be taking three online classes this summer while we're on the tour in order to graduate from the community college and go to Murray in the fall, a laptop is a necessity. (Answered prayer!)
  
• That the people on the tour will be "good" people, and that there would be at least one true believer.
• That the online classes will go smoothly and that balance between work, school and free time will come easily.
• That God would be with my parents and help them through this time of watching their "baby" grow up and leave the home. 
• Not related to the internship but a prayer request nonetheless, that God will supply the finances for fall tuition (and every semester thereafter) at Murray. I know God wants me there so I know He will provide the means to make it happen. He never fails. (He's already doing this! Isn't He awesome?!)
• Related to that, I pray that God will grant me favor in the eyes of the people selecting the scholarships.
• Also related to finances in the fall, I pray that God would give me a good job that will work around school/newspaper. 
• An awesome roommate at Murray. 

I will praise Him if He does all this and I will praise Him if He takes me a completely different way. He has the best plans and I will trust Him with my heart, dreams, and life, come what may. He is worthy of praise despite my feelings and circumstances.

"Many are the plans in the heart of man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand."  - Proverbs 19:21

Katie's Journey

As I write this my eyes are recovering from nearly drowning in a sea of tears while reading a blog from Katie, a 21 year old who God called to Africa. Please, please, please take the time to read this blog post.

It broke my heart and healed it all at the same time.

My heart spilled...

Musical Goodness

Stop whatever you're doing (which would be reading this) and go download (for free) the Farewell album of my friends in Reset Red. They are amazingly talented and this is definitely their best project to date.

Farewell- Reset Red

Free + amazing = fantastical.

More Than Words

A few days ago we had some friends over for D&D (dinner and discussion), where my dad did a little devotional on trust. First off, my dad is awesome. Really. God has given him an amazing amount of wisdom and he embodies James 1:19 ("Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry."). He does family devotions often and always shares what God is doing in his life when asking about my Walk, but this devotional was really special to me. It was on trust, and asked the question "who do you trust?" 

It's easy to say we trust God but when the rubber meets the road those words are tested. After reading several scriptures (Psalm 121 and 37 were especially amazing) daddy read the following story; it meant so much to me that I had to share it with you.

In 1857 a tightrope walker named Blondin stretched a two-inch steel cable across the gorge of the Niagara Falls, attracting a large crowd. He said to the onlookers, "How many of you believe that I can carry the weight of a man on my shoulders across this gorge?" The crowd shouted and cheered their belief that he could do it. Sure enough, Blondin picked up a sack of sand weighing about 180 pounds and carried it across the falls.

 Blondin walking a tightrope while pushing 
a wheelbarrel over Niagara Falls

Then Blondin said, "How many of you believe that I can actually carry a person across the gorge?" Many people in the crowd indicated that they thought he could do it. Then Blondin called out, "Which one of you will climb on my shoulders and let me carry you across the falls?"

Suddenly there was silence. Everyone wanted to see Blondin carry a person across the gorge and many believed he could. But nobody wanted to put his life in blondin's hands.

Some time later Blondin did carry a man across Niagara Falls. The man was Blondin's manager, who had known the tightrope walker personally for many years. "You must not trust your own feelings, but mine," Blondin told his manager as they prepared for the crossing. "You will feel like turning when we don't need to turn. And if you trust your feelings, we will both fall. You must become part of me."

This is what faith in Jesus is: knowing Him personally and entrusting our eternal life into His hands.

(From Won by One by Ron Rand)

There are a number of things that stick out to me in this story in relation to our Walk with the Lord and trusting Him and His ability rather than our own, but I'll let God show you the application in your life. The main thing that spoke to me through daddy's devotional was this: 

I must put my words of trust into action; my Creator will never let me fall.

Blondin and his manager in 1859, walking over the falls

Little Drummer Boy

Watch this video... this kid is so cute. I want to take him home with me. Watch it all the way through even if it looks monotonous because his cute face lights up at the end and you'll see some of the cutest expressions ever.

[I don't know why it isn't showing the full video, none of my attempts to make it work is, ahem, working. Just click the title and go to youtube... it's worth it, really.]

Finals and Salvation

Yesterday was my last final (cue the angels singing) and now I am done until June 7th when I start Summer classes. Over a month to get ready and on the road for the internship and the fall semester at Murray. So exciting. But, while I was in the shower yesterday (great place for some God-time, I mean, come on- you're completely alone, take advantage of that time!) God showed me how salvation and school are a lot alike.

When we start school in the January or August we're excited about the semester (I am at least...I'm a nerd) and all the possibilities contained within the next few months. It's a lot of fun as you meet new people, settle into a routine, and become familiar with the teachers and their expectations. But as time goes on, homework piles up, tests get increasingly harder, Spring (or Fall) break doesn't last long enough and you're as excited about school as you are when contemplating a root canal with no anesthesia. Overwhelmed with books to read, papers to write, and presentations to give, finals week comes and you're ready to be done. The end is near but freedom can't come soon enough. But as you turn in that last final, get in your car and drive off campus there is a sweet relief that overcomes the being and excitement for the future returns as your commitment to the college is complete, albeit briefly.

In the same way, we start out life with excitement, energy, and sin. Lots of sin. We settle into a routine as our natural man seeks to please himself. But as time goes on our search for fulfillment leaves us, ironically, unfilled. Life gets increasingly harder as we learn to deal with heartbreak, disappointment, let-downs, and failure. Overwhelmed with sin and finding there is nothing we can do to remove it, our excitement for life has disappeared and in its place is a longing for freedom. As God shows us more of who He is our eyes are opened to who we really are. Nothing. And then, that precious moment when we turn ourselves over to the God of the Universe, the One who made us and loves us more than we love ourselves (and holy cow- that is a large amount of love), the chains are broken as the Holy Spirit enters our hearts and eternally joins us to our Creator. True freedom as our excitement for life returns because of who we have become through the cross of Jesus where He terminated the enemy and made a way for us to become what we never could without His blood. What love.

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new." -2 Corinthians 5:17

About Me

i'm a salad dressing nerd.

really. i get so excited about ALL the choices available. i love the different flavors, the packaging (particularly the glass bottles with the unique shapes) and especially the colors. it's like walking in the paint section of Lowes with all the paint samples. 

it makes me happy.

that's all I wanted to say.