Learning

So I think it is so funny that now that I dont claim to post anything at all, I post all the time now…oh well I guess the pressure of everyone seeing this is off since I don’t publicize my posts on facebook anymore. Anyway, I  feel like God it teaching me so many things about life and people, and teaching me so many things about myself.

I will admit that life is going in a way that I would have planned, but now even though it is hard so much of the time God’s teaching has become so apparent to me. Maybe this is a time is sort of like  a rest from leadership, constant intentionality, busyness, and a time to focus on the foundation God is trying to build. I was talking to one of my mentors/brothers the other day and he was telling me all the things he had learned throughout his ministry to others. And then today in church we were reading passages out of corinthians talking about learning from our forefathers mistakes. In service and small group today we were talking about being in the wilderness, and what it feels like to be there. If anyone knows me really well they know my life has been consumed with being pushed into the wilderness(valley), but me running from it. Pretending to be ok when I am not, trying to smile to hold back the tears of my broken heart. And then having friends(whom i consider family) break down those walls and force me into the wilderness and walk through the dangerous journey with me.
I have friends who have sat with me while I just wept. Friends that even though I told them it was ok to leave my side refused because they knew I was lying. Friends that called me out and challenged me to be better, to deal with things in my life. I have also been able to do those things in other people lives. But along the way I have gotten feelings of being overwhelmed because so many people had things to talk about and wanted to go deep, and though I am eternally honored to have been able to listen to people’s stories and be a small part of their  redemption, it had become hard to just sit and be ministered to myself. I did not take enough time to be a part of something and not let my leadership tendancy take over.

I realized this Sunday that after singing and helping lead worship at my home church, it felt so good to go and to be a part of a worship service somewhere else. To feel like someone is breathing life into me, and to go to a small group where I don’t lead anything, I am just part of the group. And this feeling is new! I have never just decided to live life with people I have never known before, but it is so good. I am still moving slow and sharing parts of my story as I feel led too, but being in a group and not feeling the need to try to move forward with people, to bring out deep issues with people has been so amazing. My role is to be part of the group and sometimes that is what we all need to take time to just be a part of the group, still offering realness and truth but allowing one your brothers to lead for a while and allow yourself time to be ministered too. Please don’t misunderstand me I feel called to people and building relationships, but I am learning don’t let your God given gift become a weakness because you lean on it. Take time for yourself, be in the word, be in prayer, and be a part of a community. If you are in a leadership role make sure you have a community where you are just you without a title, rank, and mask up. Take time to be a part of some not the leader of something. Anyway thanks for reading my thoughts! I am learning and am hoping that in the future when I screw up and forget the lessons I have learned this will be a place to come and relearn. Take care!!

 

Life…

When you grow up you have dreams. Dreams of being successful, powerful, you want to be someone who has importance.  You want and believe that your life will have meaning and that you make a difference in this world. In college hopefully through the experiences you have, hopefully you gain direction as to how you will impact the world around you. So you juggle through a series of majors in search of a way to be all that God intends, and to be honest all that you intend to be also. But when college is over sometimes life does not move in the way that you dreamed it would. That has been my experience. I feel called to relational ministry and God has confirmed that time and time again, and yet I am working in a customer service job that I feel has nothing to do with my calling. Although I am so grateful for my job,  and know that I am blessed to have full time work in this economy, I can understand a little more how the dreams we have can be smashed and how we just feel like we have to just move on and just life as it is. It is easier to accept like as it is and keep a little hope that your dreams will come true, than to go for it all or completely let go of it. I think it ok to be not be ok with your dreams/calling not falling in place,that is how I feel and it is ok to be discouraged, and it ok to mourn and grief life as it was. I miss my friends, going to youth camps, and the family I made while at SWU. I am also learning patience and also that where I am at now is a ministry, titleless but I can be a light to the people around me. I can come along side my co workers and let them vent to me, share their fears, share their frustrations, and share my own with them. We all have stories and we carry them around wanting to share them but too scared to move out of the fear to move into the light. Some days I feel like I have stepped in the past and the last four years have meant nothing if I am still where I don’t want to be, but I have to realize that I am moving forward and I am still searching for Jesus, and in my time of weakness he is strong, and then I realize that is never about being strong it is about dependence on Jesus at all times. Because to be honest how often are we really truly strong? If I am honest with myself I feel weak much more often than I feel that I have any strength in me. Anyways,  life is changing seasons and right now it feels like winter, but we don’t stay in one season forever! Thank God(seriously)! If anyone is actually reading this keep me in your prayers as I walk this journey and traveling in uncharted waters. I hope you sense hope, loss, pain,and faith in this post as I have all those feelings in my heart. Take care

Changes

So I know I am not a regular blogger, and I won’t tempt you with empty words saying I will blog regularly. When I get the urge to blog I will and if I don’t…well the months between blog posts tell you the rest.

So I am now apart of the working world. I have a job!! I work for FujiFilm Printing Services. I am working in the customer service department and that means if you go to Wal- Mart to pick up pictures and something is wrong with them you get to talk to me!!! Many people ask me if I like my job…and to be honest I have no idea! I have been working for almost a month now, but we are still training and we are not yet up and running. So if you ask me if a like training; it is ok.

I am also back in Greenwood and that was not part of my plans, but God has me here for a reason, and he gave me this job for a reason and he shows me little things everyday. Here is some things i have learned.

• You do not need a title to do ministry- Yes people with titles who are in ministry are good, but I am learning that ministry happens in everyday life. It happens when you let your soul show for a second when you think no one is looking or listening. It happens when you show someone the love of Jesus and the love of community
• Not being content living at home is healthy- i think that wanting to be on your own is healthy. I mean I went through college making my own choices paying my own bills, learning to be independent and wanting to be on your own shows me that I learned, grown,and am ready to fly solo…once i make enough to move out(hopefully when I get hired on permanently I will)
• Keeping up with college friends is hard!!- Having friends in college is so hard to keep updated. Life is going so crazy for them, but life seems to slow down once college is over  for you and not for them…it is sad when I feel that I put more into friendships than they do…but then again I remember I was the same way
• Keeping up with friends who are out of college is easier- Yay there is hope!
• Meeting new friends is hard- really really hard but I am learning you have to really seek out people. Hopefully I will get better at it

Anyways, If I feel like it soon there will be a more detailed life update with the lessons I am learning. Peace out!

Opinion

Ok so I hardly ever blog….we all know this and one thing that I really never do on a blog is state my position on something but I guess I am feeling bold tonight.

After reading all these news stories on Kanye West and watching his interview I just had some opinions that I wanted to share.
Kanye is no worse than any of us. He is a person who is hurting and trying to soothe the pain he carries. And, what does a person who is hurting usually do, they hurt the people around them. They are desperately longing to be seen. To be really seen, and waiting for someone to enter into the pain. After seeing the Leno interview my heart went out to him. He has never gone through the mourning process and therefore he eases his hurt by hurting other people to ease the pain. I am not saying what he did was right(or any of his other incidents), it was wrong (though the right or wrong issue is not the point of this blog post).

But, I want to leave you with these thought….if your every move was being televised, written about, and played for the world to see, how would people view you?

Would you want them to be forgiving, loving, caring, or would you want them to just write you off, call you names, and treat you like an outcast?

Why are we so obsessed with lives of celebrities? Aren’t they just suppose to make good movies, plays , and music? Why has today’s culture made people in the public eye give up their right to have private lives, to make mistakes, to learn, to find grace and redemption. I know I wouldn’t want my sins displayed for the world to see, or  have to pretend that I am perfect all the time, because I am not I fall short.

I think it was an eye opening moment in how I should love people. I don’t have to agree with what they do or how they live, but let them know whose love I strive to represent. There are many people out there who are carrying around so many burdens and they lash out. What if the lashing out was just them crying out? I am gonna think about that you should too….goodnight

Let’s keep in touch

As you can tell by now I am not a habitual blogger but I will try to do it once again to keep everyone informed about my summer adventures. But right now I am going to pitch an idea of how to keep in touch with friends this summer and here it is and let me know it you like it:

• Make a agreement with a friend for both of you guys to call each other once a week.
• Just one phone call if the person answers then great! You guys get to talk, but if the other person doesn’t answer  then leave a detailed voicemail of what is going on in your life
• The idea is a kind of covenant; it keeps the pressure on you to keep in touch regardless of whether the friend keeps in touch or not. You do you part by calling and keeping the other person involved in your life
• I think it will help eliminate phone tag because people are busy and even though you may not always get to talk, but your friends can still know what is going on in your life
• You get to hear the other person’s voice, text messaging is great but I know I feel really good sometimes just hearing one of my friends voices

Give it a try and see how it goes! I hope it helps somebody out!

Little Update

So life has been a little crazy but mostly good I guess so here is what has been happening:

• Classes are actually interesting (even the ones that frustrate me)
• I made homecoming court and won Senior Attendant (runner- up to king)
• My mom and my sister came to up to visit me and my sister was my escort ( it was great to see them!!!!)
• I am going to IWU for fall break ( no worries my loyalties are with SWU)
• I little worried about life after SWU (pray for me as I figure things out)
• I am tired so I am going to go to bed night

God bless!!!

Funny News story

So I was reading Kindel’s blog and she was talking about how she would cook and clean as long as Cody does the dishes. This story should give him( and men everywhere) encouragement to do the dishes. Check this story out!

Wow it has been a while

I was kindly told by many people that I had not been updating my blog so I figured I would start back up. Originally, I had decided to only do this for the summer of camps (sorry I did not have much Internet access for the rest of my summer so I could not update for the latter end of the summer), but I have decided to continue. I can’t promise that I will have any deep insight but I will try to keep you all updated in what is going on in my life.  So let’s start with talking about my weekend.

• I was on duty this weekend… yeah, but it was better than I thought it was going to be and I got to play a lot of ping pong fun!
• I went to the cross country meet in the lovely town of Greenwood ( my hometown), and both the guys and girls did pretty well!
• I road with Jason to the XC meet and we talked about living boldly and what it looks for each of us. The spiritual emphasis speaker was definitely bold for Christ, but I don’t know  what bold would look like for me. So I am analyzing my life and trying to understand what that will look like in my life.
• Today we are making dirt in my apartment so it is going to be a fun day.

That is all for now and I will try my best to update this blog!

Ohio Camp

As soon as we left Tennessee we were on our way to Ohio. So made the marathon trip to Ohio and made it there around 8:30 that night. To greet us was Kristen, the camp director, to show us around and to show us where we were going to be staying. Along with getting us settled we had a counselor meeting of sorts and learned all about the invisible tree and dish duty.  So first we get the girls in their dorm and get them settled, and then Kehl and I head to our dorm. The first thing we noticed was that the whole inside of the building was covered in permanent marker. People from ages ago had written on the walls of the boys dorm. I mean we found a signature from 1958 Wow! This building was old but with lots of character. Soon we asked so, ” where are the showers?” With a small chuckle they let us know that there is no indoor plumbing in the guys dorm and that the showers and restrooms are across the camp grounds. So this week I learned as long as there is a bed in a building and I am dry that is pretty much all I need. It was not bad at all not having indoor plumbing because we were out of the dorms so much I barely noticed at all.

Anyways, we arrived during the first service so we did not get to meet the kids until after the service was over. So after the service we had a meeting where we could meet all the teens. This was a small camp and there were only about 21 teens so we got to know them really well. Upon meeting the teens I knew that we were going to have an experience that was totally different from the first camp. Because we had a opportunity to really get to know all the kids, and that is what happened. The days were planned out really well but there was also ample time for hangout time with the kids.

We started out each day with a devotional in which each counselor had the opportunity to give one each day. I think it was a great way to start of the day. It is great to see how each camp has really emphasized the importance of bringing Christ into every part of your day. After devotion there was breakfast and breakfast dishes in which each team alternated meals. After breakfast was the morning counselor meeting, which I loved because we got to pray for the campers and tell stories of how we saw them growing. After the meeting we had morning worhsip.

Worship was like aerobics. Each song had cool moves to go with it and involved lots of jumping around. It was a really cool way of making sure the kids were awake. But about half way we would slow things down and really get into singing and having time to just focus on the words we were singing.

After worship our speaker, Roger (Doc) McKenzie got to speak to the campers. He did a amazing job that week. I learned SO MUCH from him being at the camp. I was really blessed to see how he interacted with the teens especially at the altar. He even included our team into his services.  His sermons were exactly what the teens needed to hear and I could tell he dreally listened to what God was telling him to preach on. I felt I got to really learn so much about ministry from him. I am really glad that he was there.

From there we had lunch, games, dinner, service and afterglo. The kinds of games we did depended on how much it was raining. We had a mystery place day where we went and played video games all day a churches youth building. The kids loved it I think they could have played all day.

The teens at the camp were such good teens. I got really close to them really fast. The second or third day of camp an bunch of the teens found out that some of their friends got into a really bad car accident and the prognosis did not sound good. So it was an emotional night for them and we were just had to be there for them. Their friends are going to be alright, but they have a long road of recovery for them so please still remember them in your prayers. The teens were so open to me and I loved hanging out with them. I felt honored that they would share their stories with me, and tell me things about themselves that they would not tell complete strangers, and yet told me. I got to play and grow with them daily. I got to pray with my guys at the altar and discuss what their prayers meant.I just hoped I could show them what a Christ follower looked like.

God worked in those teens lives. We had one service where many of them went down to the altar and just let go of the chains that had been weighing them down. They wanted so much to be back into relationship with God. Some of those kids already knew how gruel the world could be, but they also knew how good God could be. Many of them were reconciled with God that week. I felt so blessed to be a part of that process with them, I got to pray with them ,have discussions with them, and got to encourage them as they took new steps in their journey. God was truly amazing at that camp!

Many other funny things happened that will be posted hopefully later this week. Anyways we are headed to North Carolina in the morning for our next camp. Pray for safe travels and safe Urgent Care team members. Take care and I will try my best to keep you all updated!!

Random Stories

I met this old man named Roy at camp and I got a chance to listen to his life story. He told me about how he lived in the times of segregation in Nashville, Tennessee. He told me that it was so segregated that the school districts wanted to bus his two boys an hour and a half away from their home just to make sure they would go to a white school. This was when intergration was legal but people were still reluctant, and sending white kids to a black school was unheard of. But Roy and his wife ( whom I met and she just told me to call her Granny), decided that it was just stupid to put their boys through that and decided to send them to the black school. Not only did they send them to the school, his wife applied for a teaching job and worked at the school. It was really awesome to see people that were part of the struggle of intergration, I mean they really help paved the way for intergration in there area. I felt honored that he shared that with me!

Roy also told me how much he valued education and how he made sure his sons got an education. But one of his sons did not listen to him and decided to go to work at an electrical company digging ditches after high school. But after two and a half days of working he decided that college was the place for him. So both of his sons got degrees and are working good jobs. Roy also wanted his wife to go back to school to get her doctorate, but she said she would only go if Roy began to learn how to play piano. So he told me when he goes home he knows a lady that will teach him to play piano so his wife will go get her doctorate. Then he looked at me and said as soon she goes I can quit though. He was real funny. And to end this story I will write my favorite quote of the conversation, “Been married 47 years we haven’t always had the most money, but at least we didn’t argue.”

Now the Skunk Killer story.

At the Tennessee camp there was a youth leader named Josh. Josh was definately from the south. We went to the creek the first day of camp and he caught (forgive my spelling of this word) crawl dads, and scared many girls and Luke with them. But the most interesting thing he would do was after all the campers had gone to bed, he would take his gun out and kill skunks. He did catch a couple in a bucket too. I never knew people hunted skunks, but one less skunk in the world to spray on me is not a bad thing. Anyway Josh was a really cool guy and it was really cool to see his heart for youth ministry.

So, Check back to see my Ohio camp experience. God was there through many trials and it was wonderful to see how he worked there.