possibilities

This Saturday we had our last housechurch gathering. So many of us are leaving! Tessa and Genesis are moving away, Greg and Netsie are leaving for college, and Isaac is moving all the way to France to be part of an internship with a church there. Some of us will still be getting together on Saturdays, but with so many people leaving this was the last housechurch as we’ve known it.

Weird, I’ve moved so many times and I’m used to being the one doing the leaving. It’s strange to stay and watch others go. Even though it’s sad to see so many people leave, the more I think about it the more excited I get. Change is always such a huge opportunity to grow. What does God have for all of us this year? How will our characters be shaped twelve months form now? Despite the fears I have about my place in all of this, I can’t wait to see what this next year holds.

camping trip

I just got back from Immanuel's annual camping trip. As always it was awesome. There were, as Mike said, "About 5 billion mosquitoes per acre." I'm very tempted to think this was an honest estimate and not just a humorous exaggeration.

For me the best parts are the community of living together, the meals, the water fight, the swimming, the hikes, and especially the orienteering race. Ok fine, I like it all. It's so cool just about everyone in the church comes, even people who don't really like camping.

Well this year I made a mistake. We were about to start our orinteering race and were standing around getting the rules from Mike, the pastor and the man who sets up this little adventure, when I asked God to teach me some kind of lesson through competing in the race. (Can anyone remember that old proverb, "Be careful what you wish for"? Well the same can sometimes be said of prayer because God is not without a sense of humor. :P) That was my mistake. I never learn, I'm always praying these prayers of a slightly dangerous nature and then being swept up into these adventures. However if I quit praying stuff like that I'd get really bored. I'd rather have the adventure.

Anyway, I was put on a team of five, the purple team, and we were given two pages of clues to follow. We started off quite lovely and got the first two purple flags with ease. Things started going downhill from the second flag. First we got confused and went to the wrong lake (there are like a thousand in the area where we were camping, which explains the raging mosquito population). After going at least a mile out of our way and backtracking we found our third flag. At this point it had been two hours. Mike had announced to everyone that our team was the most likely to win, however he also expected the winners to return within two hours. We knew we had lost and this was made worse by the fact that we were the expected winners.

Not wanting to be quitters we continued. Rather suddenly, when we came upon a road that would easily lead back to camp two of our team members decided to call a quit and go back to camp. It was discouraging but three of us decided to keep going even though we were disqualified without all of our team members. Now it was just Josiah (our eagle-scout leader), Jessie (our energetic 16-year-old runner), and me. We got caught on the fourth flag. About two hours of exploring small lakes and mashes looking for a patch of lilies with a flag in them and we were one flag richer and one pint of blood poorer than we had been when our other team members had left us.

Somewhere in all that fruitless searching we all got quite discouraged. Though none of us wanted to quit Josiah delicately hinted that maybe we should as soon as we got the fourth and nobody disagreed. However, with the forth flag came a burst of encouragement. We realized that just because we came in last didn't mean we had to come back beaten. Since the next flag was not to far we went after it and found it much more quickly. With only two left we just couldn't quit. Flags six and seven also came faster, even if we did end up back-tracking again to get number six.

Finally, after five and a half hours the purple team emerged from the forest, wet, tired, hungry, mosquito-bitten, but proudly triumphant. Immediately we happened upon Mike, who had come to look for us since it was after 19:30 and beginning to get a little dark.

So what was my lesson? Obviously perserverance. Not quitting when everyone seems to give up and there's only a few left, and when you seem to get nowhere. I was thinking about that stuff the whole time. However, someone is begging for use of this computer so I must go and save this already long post for getting much longer.....

again

She's dead
They slowly strangled her
Lips close to her ear
Whispering love

The outer shell remains
But the inside is devastated
Emptied of all good

Through the dark
Is there always hope of morning?
Can the shattered heart be rebuilt?
Will ashes be redeemed?

Yes is the answer I see
Reflected in Your confident eyes
Is there anything else I know?

The walking dead sees a sunrise
Feels the beat of life within
Though a world turns to ash
Those ashes are still in Your hands

In Your hands life is created
Dreams once dead awake and breathe
Now more real than ever they could've been

Crippled legs learn to walk again
And then the impossible - they learn to run
Yet something will never be the same
For the death was real

But I find You waiting, smiling
To show me the joy of what You're doing
Redeeming all that was shattered

lovely pointless quiz

I put in all the silliest answers and this is what I got. Hmmm.......


The Completely Pointless Personality Quiz
You must try this, it's more fun than most. While you're at it, go see a Muffin Film.

risk

"Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once."
- Julius Caesar from Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar

At unhindered last weekend Pete talked about taking risks. People today don't risk enough for God. Everything is too neat and tidy. Sometimes when I'm reading the story of some hero of the faith that I admire I look at the risks they took and wonder if I would ever have the courage to do the same. People have told me that I'm courageous before because I've been on mission trips by myself, gone cliff-diving, or like to try interesting new foods. That's all nice, but do I really have the courage to live my whole life for God?

Maybe I shouldn't sit around asking that question. I think it might be one of those questions that just paralyzes you. I don't really know. I was reading Mere Chistianity by C.S. Lewis today and ran across this:

"If you read history you will find that the
Christians who did the most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next. ...all left their mark on Earth, precisely because their minds were occupied with Heaven. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth 'thrown in': aim at earth and you will get neither."

Maybe it's not trying to have the courage or even taking the perfectly right path. Maybe the reason that my heros could do all that they did was because though they may have been afraid or unsure they thought of Eternity and just did it. That sounds so good, but how in the world do I work it out in life?

live8

No, I haven't seen it. Unfortunately my dial-up internet won't play the videos. Quite sad. :( But we took some time during worship this morning to pray for the G8 conference later this week. We also talked about the need for the church to reach out today, it was good.

Umm...my seven-year-old sister is asking me to read her a book. I've got to go. I'll try to post more about this later.....

three jobs

Today I got a call. I applied for a position as a full-time receptionist and got it. This is great, it's in a pediatric center, and they will give me a little bit of training as a nurse. I'll be working with a mostly bi-lingual staff. I've been hoping to get a job like this for a long time. Thanks God!

Funny, most of this last month I've been struggling financially because I was only working at Gap and they were only giving me about 10 - 12 hours a week. God's really come through for me financially this last month in some ways that are undeniably Him. Now I have three jobs though, two part-time and a full-time. That adds up to a few too many hours for me to work. What a nice change. I guess I will have to quit a couple of my jobs. ;)