I know that I just posted a couple nights ago, so most of you will be surprised to see me posting again. This post is different than the updates that I have given you recently... this post is to share with you my heart. So, here's me... being real. I'm not sure who will read this, but I trust that God does. I feel compelled to write, and hope that by sharing it will help some of you to better know how to pray for me. For others, I suspect that where I'm at right now might resonate with your own experience. I pray that we can be an encouragement to one another through the difficult times. This is what the Body of Christ is about.
My heart hurts. It's hard to explain why... I'm not even really sure myself. I've been able to do little else tonight but cry. I came home, pulled up some songs on my computer, and just lay before my God crying. Every word of every song seemed to touch some part of my already tender heart, causing the tears to become like a waterfall. As I listened to the words of "It is well with my soul", I wondered to myself... 'but what if it's not? '. Today, it does not feel well in my soul. I "feel" far from "well". My heart is in a state of turmoil. And yet, I am certain that in the midst of my brokenness, God is here.
I think that many of the tears came from the feelings of frustration, confusion, anxiety, disappointment, and perhaps even anger toward God. After being here for three months, I still feel like I am no closer to knowing the plan that God has for me... the reason he has brought me here. That frustrates me. I found myself crying out to God, "Why have you brought me here?". Even wondering if He really has brought me here. Has He really brought me here only to find myself feeling so alone and often unsatisfied? Why did He bring me out of the safe and comfortable, only to be lost, confused, and afraid?
I understand much better now why the Israelites grumbled against God in the desert. It's so easy for us to look at the Israelites and say, "They should have trusted God" or "God was performing miracles to protect them and bring them to the Promised Land, and all they can do is complain. What a bunch of ungrateful dummies!" We read the story and it's so obvious to us. God gave them the pillars of cloud and fire to guide them, parted the waters of the sea for them to walk across, and sent food from heaven for them, among other miracles. Man, if we were the Israelites, we sure wouldn't have missed what God was doing! We wouldn't have grumbled! Really? I realized tonight that I have a lot in common with my Israelite ancestors. I grumble. I don't understand what God is doing. I feel like I embarked on this journey with big hopes and dreams, and yet now I feel like those things are so far out of reach... much like the Israelites must have felt about the Promised Land.
As I read the story of the exodus from Egypt tonight, I noticed some things that had never stood out to me before. Exodus 13:17-18 says, "When Pharaoh finally let the people go, God did not lead them on the road that runs through Philistine territory, even though that was the shortest way from Egypt to the Promised Land. God said, 'If the people are faced with battle, they might change their minds and return to Egypt'. So God led them along a route through the wilderness toward the Red Sea, and the Israelites left Egypt like a marching army". Interesting. The shortest distance between two points is a straight line, but God knew them. He knew His people well enough to know that they would turn back if they were faced with battle. So, he took them the LONG way around. For their own protection. To keep them from turning back on their dream of seeing the Promised Land. By taking them the long way, God was looking out for their best interests.... lovingly protecting them from themselves. Hmmm. And yet to the Israelites this seemed like cruel and unusual punishment. Perhaps God has brought me the long way for a reason as well. Perhaps he is protecting me from myself. He knows me. Often I'm sure that if God had not spoken so clearly to my heart back in November I wouldn't stay. I like it here, but this is the hardest thing I've ever done. However, I am convinced that God has me here for a purpose, even if I don't understand. He knows me. He knows the desires of my heart and His plans for my life. But still, I question how long I will have to wait before those desires. Will I ever understand His plans for me? How do I learn to be content here in the here-and-now when I feel like there's something so much bigger? How do I keep from grumbling and continue to trust God in the wilderness when all I really want is to see the Promised Land? These are the questions running through my heart and my mind tonight. Please pray for me. Love you all.
Monday, April 30, 2007
Saturday, April 28, 2007
Long awaited updates
I realize that it's been almost two weeks since I've last posted anything, so I figured it was about time for a quick update...
I leave on Thursday after work to go to Virginia Beach for the weekend for my graduation! That is the most exciting thing on the horizon this coming week.
Today was a beautiful sunny day. I wore flip flops and carpis and spent part of the day down at the beach with Reine. It was lots of fun.
On Wednesday night, Reine and I had a dinner party here at our place. She invited some of her friends and I invited a few of mine (of course I had to do a lot of narrowing down, since I have SO MANY friends here in Vancouver ;). Deric and Amber came too. In total we had 16 people in here. I didn't think that we could cram so many people in our tiny apartment at one time, but we managed, and we had an awesome time! Her friends got along great with my friends. Everyone had fun... it was a big hit! I think we'll definitely start entertaining more often.
I spent a great deal of the evening talking with one of Reine's friends about an exciting job opportunity with his company (it's not exactly counseling related, but it's something that I think is definitely worth looking into). I'll fill you guys in on more details when there's more to share. In the meantime, continue to pray that God would give me wisdom in making decisions about jobs.
I've been enjoying volunteering with Urban Promise after work on Tuesdays. It's nice to be around kids. This past week the director was having some problems with the older girls in the group. Knowing that I have a counseling degree, he sought me out for some help dealing with the situation. The events of that day led to a conversation at the end of camp. The result of that conversation is that I will be taking the older girls (grades 5-7) on Tuesdays during homework time and running a group with them. I'm going to use the curriculum that my group created in our group counseling class which deals with various life issues for girls that age. I'm excited to have the opportunity to run a "counseling group" and excited to get to use the materials that my group and I put together. I'm a little nervous though about how these four girls (I think there will only be four participating) will respond. I don't expect a great reaction from them... and I'm not even sure that they will be very active participants. I also need to figure out how to take the eight week curriculum and condense it into six weeks, since that's all the time we have left for the after-school program. I could just choose six of the sessions, but there are valuable things in all eight, so I may try to do some "cutting and pasting". I think that this group could be very valuable for these girls. So, if you think of it between now and Tuesday, pray that God would give the girls receptive minds and hearts and that in the next six weeks, God would use this group in positive ways in each of their lives. Pray that He will give me wisdom and discernment in preparing for the group and that He would give me all that I need to relate with the girls and lead this group effectively.
I've decided to learn Chinese. I realize that it's a huge undertaking... but I want to try it. I guess now that I'm done with school, I'm feeling the need to take on some sort of academic challenge. I've always thought it would be neat to learn more languages, and since Chinese is the second most commonly spoken language in Vancouver, it made sense to me to learn it first (Roughly 30% of Vancouver's population is Chinese). I signed out a few books and CD's from the public library this week, and I'm ready to get going. Self-discipline. I need more if I'm really going to do this. There is a neat website for language exchange. Once I've learned some Chinese on my own, I might check out that site more. Basically you can post what language you know and which you want to know and find someone in your city who is looking for the opposite. So as a native English speaker wanting to learn Chinese, I could connect with someone my age in Vancouver who is a native Chinese speaker wanting to learn English. You both help each other with your skills, and neither have to pay for a tutor or language lessons.... and the best part is, you might make a new friend in the meantime :)
I recently went and printed a bunch of my digital pictures and got to work on my scrapbook. It's been so long since I've had time to work on it. It's nice to get back to it. I've also been reading a little more lately and thoroughly enjoying it.
Work has been going well... still enjoying eating all that soup :). I've been getting to know more of the mall staff and regular customers as time goes on. I know more people by name and have lots of people that I regularly talk to. I have friends at the mall. I find that very fulfilling... it makes my day so much nicer. It amazes me how much connecting with people really does make a difference in our lives.
The Canucks won their game last night! I am excited! This city is just buzzing with hockey excitement... it's great (except for when that excitement turns crazy and destructive). It seems like everyone has either a flag on their car or a jersey. Even the city buses say "GO CANUCKS GO" on their flashing signs. In fact, this week I saw one of those orange flashing construction signs that between flashing bits of info about sewer work on the road, read "Go Canucks Go"! Yeah Canucks!
Well, I should probably wrap this up and head to bed. For all those of you in VA Beach... I look forward to seeing y'all in less than a week. For the rest of you... I wish I could see you in a weeks time too :(. Pray that I'll have a safe trip to VA Beach and that I won't miss my bus to Seattle or anything crazy like that.
I leave on Thursday after work to go to Virginia Beach for the weekend for my graduation! That is the most exciting thing on the horizon this coming week.
Today was a beautiful sunny day. I wore flip flops and carpis and spent part of the day down at the beach with Reine. It was lots of fun.
On Wednesday night, Reine and I had a dinner party here at our place. She invited some of her friends and I invited a few of mine (of course I had to do a lot of narrowing down, since I have SO MANY friends here in Vancouver ;). Deric and Amber came too. In total we had 16 people in here. I didn't think that we could cram so many people in our tiny apartment at one time, but we managed, and we had an awesome time! Her friends got along great with my friends. Everyone had fun... it was a big hit! I think we'll definitely start entertaining more often.
I spent a great deal of the evening talking with one of Reine's friends about an exciting job opportunity with his company (it's not exactly counseling related, but it's something that I think is definitely worth looking into). I'll fill you guys in on more details when there's more to share. In the meantime, continue to pray that God would give me wisdom in making decisions about jobs.
I've been enjoying volunteering with Urban Promise after work on Tuesdays. It's nice to be around kids. This past week the director was having some problems with the older girls in the group. Knowing that I have a counseling degree, he sought me out for some help dealing with the situation. The events of that day led to a conversation at the end of camp. The result of that conversation is that I will be taking the older girls (grades 5-7) on Tuesdays during homework time and running a group with them. I'm going to use the curriculum that my group created in our group counseling class which deals with various life issues for girls that age. I'm excited to have the opportunity to run a "counseling group" and excited to get to use the materials that my group and I put together. I'm a little nervous though about how these four girls (I think there will only be four participating) will respond. I don't expect a great reaction from them... and I'm not even sure that they will be very active participants. I also need to figure out how to take the eight week curriculum and condense it into six weeks, since that's all the time we have left for the after-school program. I could just choose six of the sessions, but there are valuable things in all eight, so I may try to do some "cutting and pasting". I think that this group could be very valuable for these girls. So, if you think of it between now and Tuesday, pray that God would give the girls receptive minds and hearts and that in the next six weeks, God would use this group in positive ways in each of their lives. Pray that He will give me wisdom and discernment in preparing for the group and that He would give me all that I need to relate with the girls and lead this group effectively.
I've decided to learn Chinese. I realize that it's a huge undertaking... but I want to try it. I guess now that I'm done with school, I'm feeling the need to take on some sort of academic challenge. I've always thought it would be neat to learn more languages, and since Chinese is the second most commonly spoken language in Vancouver, it made sense to me to learn it first (Roughly 30% of Vancouver's population is Chinese). I signed out a few books and CD's from the public library this week, and I'm ready to get going. Self-discipline. I need more if I'm really going to do this. There is a neat website for language exchange. Once I've learned some Chinese on my own, I might check out that site more. Basically you can post what language you know and which you want to know and find someone in your city who is looking for the opposite. So as a native English speaker wanting to learn Chinese, I could connect with someone my age in Vancouver who is a native Chinese speaker wanting to learn English. You both help each other with your skills, and neither have to pay for a tutor or language lessons.... and the best part is, you might make a new friend in the meantime :)
I recently went and printed a bunch of my digital pictures and got to work on my scrapbook. It's been so long since I've had time to work on it. It's nice to get back to it. I've also been reading a little more lately and thoroughly enjoying it.
Work has been going well... still enjoying eating all that soup :). I've been getting to know more of the mall staff and regular customers as time goes on. I know more people by name and have lots of people that I regularly talk to. I have friends at the mall. I find that very fulfilling... it makes my day so much nicer. It amazes me how much connecting with people really does make a difference in our lives.
The Canucks won their game last night! I am excited! This city is just buzzing with hockey excitement... it's great (except for when that excitement turns crazy and destructive). It seems like everyone has either a flag on their car or a jersey. Even the city buses say "GO CANUCKS GO" on their flashing signs. In fact, this week I saw one of those orange flashing construction signs that between flashing bits of info about sewer work on the road, read "Go Canucks Go"! Yeah Canucks!
Well, I should probably wrap this up and head to bed. For all those of you in VA Beach... I look forward to seeing y'all in less than a week. For the rest of you... I wish I could see you in a weeks time too :(. Pray that I'll have a safe trip to VA Beach and that I won't miss my bus to Seattle or anything crazy like that.
Monday, April 16, 2007
Just some thoughts
I had a bad day today... at least I thought I did. I hardly slept last night... I spent the weekend in Bellingham, Washington with Deric and Amber and their staff team. They had a staff retreat and I went along to babysit Ava while they had meetings. It was a fun weekend away. I was really tired by Sunday night, so I stopped at the 7-11 in Bellingham for coffee before driving home. I knew better. I knew when I bought the coffee that I wouldn't sleep, and yet I drank it anyway. I guess I wanted to make sure I stayed awake the whole way home. And so, I didn't sleep. I gave up trying at 1:30am. Finally by 4:30 I was tired enough nod off. Let me tell you... two hours flies by when you're sleeping. After hitting snooze a couple times I decided that I could skip taking a shower (showers are highly overrated when you're tired) and instead sleep until 6:45 (I believe it was 6:39 when I made this decision). So in my half conscious state, I reset my alarm. At 8:43 (an hour after I should have been at work) my boss called. She wondered why I wasn't picking up the store phone, so she tried my cell. Her call woke me up from a deep sleep. I explained to her that I wasn't at the store yet and then darted around like a pinball to get out of the house in record time (without the shower I might add). My alarm went off at 8:45 (apparently setting an alarm when half asleep... bad idea!). Days like today I really wished I lived closer than 30 minutes from work. I made it to work, albeit late, but already my day was off to a bad start. I guess I had already convinced myself that it was going to be a bad day. I was tired, late, and to top it all off sick... the cold that I thought was getting better seemed to have taken a turn for the worst.
When I got home today from my not so great day at work, I found out about the massacre that happened at Virginia Tech earlier this morning. I cried. I don't know anyone who goes to Virginia Tech, but still, hearing the news of the shootings shook me. Thirty-three people dead and many others wounded. What started as a normal day getting up and going to classes ended in an unimaginable tragedy for the students and staff of that university, their families and friends, and the surrounding community. Monday morning. There were probably lots of students who slept in, skipped showers, and rushed off to their morning classes. Probably some who, like me, got up on the wrong side of the bed and just knew that it would be a bad day. And it was. The worst kind of day. A day that will forever change the lives of so many... in just an instant. Parents receiving the worst kind of phone call. Families torn apart. Siblings, friends, classmates... gone. It hurts my heart. Most of us will not remember Monday April 16th in a year's time, but for so many people, this day will never be erased from their hearts and minds. Perspective. Reflecting on today's events helps me to put my life in perspective. On this "bad" day of mine, I managed to find lots of things to worry about, dwell on, and complain about. However, in light of the events at Virginia Tech today, those things seem so minuscule... incredibly unimportant. Today reminded me that none of us know what lies ahead... I am grateful that God saw fit to give me another day on this earth and that in this day I have not known pain, loss, and suffering. The little annoyances are just that... little annoyances.
When I got home today from my not so great day at work, I found out about the massacre that happened at Virginia Tech earlier this morning. I cried. I don't know anyone who goes to Virginia Tech, but still, hearing the news of the shootings shook me. Thirty-three people dead and many others wounded. What started as a normal day getting up and going to classes ended in an unimaginable tragedy for the students and staff of that university, their families and friends, and the surrounding community. Monday morning. There were probably lots of students who slept in, skipped showers, and rushed off to their morning classes. Probably some who, like me, got up on the wrong side of the bed and just knew that it would be a bad day. And it was. The worst kind of day. A day that will forever change the lives of so many... in just an instant. Parents receiving the worst kind of phone call. Families torn apart. Siblings, friends, classmates... gone. It hurts my heart. Most of us will not remember Monday April 16th in a year's time, but for so many people, this day will never be erased from their hearts and minds. Perspective. Reflecting on today's events helps me to put my life in perspective. On this "bad" day of mine, I managed to find lots of things to worry about, dwell on, and complain about. However, in light of the events at Virginia Tech today, those things seem so minuscule... incredibly unimportant. Today reminded me that none of us know what lies ahead... I am grateful that God saw fit to give me another day on this earth and that in this day I have not known pain, loss, and suffering. The little annoyances are just that... little annoyances.
Wednesday, April 4, 2007
I'm going home to Virginia for graduation in one month (and counting)!!!!
I booked my flight ticket tonight... I'm officially coming back to Virginia for the weekend of commencement!!!!!!! I'll be leaving from Seattle at 11:30pm Thursday May 3 and arrive in Virginia at 9:30am Friday May 4. I'll be there Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I leave early Monday morning. It will be a short visit... I'm sure the weekend will fly by, but I think I need this weekend, even if it is short and sweet. I'm very excited... I'm starting to count down the days already... 29 more days!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)