I'm goin' back to Cali

On the flight to Medford, OR right now, headed to Grenada, CA. I haven't set foot on California soil since we moved from CA 17 years ago!! Actually...it was around this same time in 1994 that we moved to Michigan. Whoa!!

So I just saw a fly flying around this woman's hat on the plane. That is a smart fly. He's getting a free trip to Oregon from Denver right now. If he had to fly that himself, he probably wouldn't even make it.

Seeing a fly on the plane is weird...it's not a normal passenger.


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Famous

This week there've been a lot of elementary school field trips passing thru the Capital (were I work). I like to come out of my office and offer to sign autographs.

Ok that last line is not true.


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Psalm 145:1-12

"I will exalt you, my God the King;
I will praise your name for ever and ever.
Every day I will praise you
and extol your name for ever and ever.
Great is the Lord and most worthy of praise; His greatness no one can fathom.
One generation commends Your works to another;
they tell of Your mighty acts.
They will speak of the glorious splendor of Your majesty—
and I will meditate on Your wonderful works.
They will tell of the power of Your awesome works—
and I will proclaim Your great deeds.
They will celebrate Your abundant goodness
and joyfully sing of Your righteousness.

The Lord is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and rich in love.
The Lord is good to all;
He has compassion on all He has made. All Your works praise You, Lord;
Your faithful people extol You. They tell of the glory of Your kingdom
and speak of Your might, so that all people may know of Your mighty acts
and the glorious splendor of Your kingdom."


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epic step

disclaimer:  I write this post only to boast in God’s strength, for His glory – because on my own, I could never accomplish any of this.  so when I say “I did this” or “I did that”, I mean by God’s strength.  I thought I should set that straight so that I don’t have to say “by God’s strength” over and over again. :) not that that’d be bad…but…um ok I’m just going to move forward with this post now… ;)

this past Sunday I did something I’ve never in my life done before.  something I’ve been asked to do many times and have always said “no”.  I did a song in church this past Sunday.  like, not leading a song, but doing a song while everyone listened.  that kind of song.  on top of that, I played the keyboard while I sang – also something I’ve never done before (in public).  Paul played guitar and backed up with vocals.  we did “Like an Avalanche”.

I still can’t believe I lived through it.  hahaha :) I battled fear from saturday afternoon (when I found out I was supposed to do it) up until the minute before starting the song.  it’s in those moments that all I can do is constantly refocus back on God, seated on His throne.  I am singing to Him, I am not singing for anyone else.  I am playing for Him, I am not playing for anyone else. and my prayer is that, somehow, God draws others to Him through that.

right before we started the song, Paul read a passage from Scripture.  I didn’t know what he was going to read, but I sat at my keyboard, eyes closed, completely focused on the Truth he was going to read.  the passage he ended up reading was incredible – Phil. 2:5-11 (The Message):

^“Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn't think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn't claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst kind of death at that—a crucifixion.

Because of that obedience, God lifted him high and honored him far beyond anyone or anything, ever, so that all created beings in heaven and on earth—even those long ago dead and buried—will bow in worship before this Jesus Christ, and call out in praise that he is the Master of all, to the glorious honor of God the Father.”

it lead up to the song perfectly – praise God for the guidance of His Holy Spirit!

anyway, anyone who has known me thru the years knows this is an epic step.  nothing compares to doing something that forces you to completely rely on God’s strength and not your own.  I am so weak.  He is so strong.

2011 has been epic for me.  fully alive.  I used to have an ache in my heart – I felt like if I were to stand before the Lord, He would ask what I did with the gifts He’s given me.  and I wouldn’t be able to say anything.  yeah, I’m a lot late on using the gifts He’s given me.  but by His grace, I am using them now.

I was telling a little part of my story to a worship team at a camp we were at this past summer.  I mentioned that I finally led worship for the 1st time in my life this year in Norway and someone stopped me and was like, “in NORWAY??”  -- it reminded me of how crazy awesome God is.  and it was on my birthday.

1 month

I've been here 1 month now - wow. Feels like longer but at the same time the past week and 1/2 have flown by - literally. Thankful to have income, thankful that I work with nice people and the work isn't bad. I stay so busy at work that the day/week flys by. It's insane. Missing some of the freedom with time that I had while I was unemployed. :) haven't made time to blog. I have a huge epic accomplishment that I have to share, but too much to type on my phone. Maybe tomorrow night.

Tomorrow's Thursday already?


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Henri Nouwen quote

"...we move through life in such a distracted way that we do not even take the time and rest to wonder if any of the things we think, say, or do are worth thinking, saying, doing. We simply go along with the many 'musts' an 'oughts' that have been handed on to us, and we live with them as if they were authentic translations of the Gospel of our Lord." - Henri Nouwen, from his book "The Way of the Heart"


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The Ultimate Sacrifice

Jesus gave up all authority that was rightly His and, in an act of humble servanthood that has never been & will never be matched, allowed Himself to be the Ultimate Sacrifice for you, for me, for every face that you see today.

Oh how He loves us!!


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a day of blessings

today was full of great things!

I woke up this morning feeling like maybe I should put an “end date” on my time here, like if I don’t have a job by a certain date, I’ll head home.  in other words, jen started (once again) getting nervous about the depleting money situation that occurs when you aren’t working.  I fail so easily at remembering God’s faithfulness that He has shown me time and time again in the past.

today I got to babysit my cousin’s daughter - she’s 2 and completely adorable.  but she hadn’t really warmed up to me yet – except I did get a “pound it” out of her one time this summer.  that was monumental.  so I wasn’t sure how today was going to go but I was excited to help out and get to watch her (and her 3 year old cousin from the other side of her family).  we had so much fun!  i think we’ve finally established that she’s cool and I’m cool and we might as well just be cool together.  ;)

then I got to go with Paul to meet Larry, a house church pastor who’s phenomenal on the guitar and is passionate about teaching others guitar.  did I mention that he roasts his own coffee?  yeah.  totally rocks.  today we had coffee from papa new guinea.  and we all played guitar together for a couple hours and he gave me pointers and encouraged me to stick with the right-handed guitar since I can already play it, instead of learning the left-handed guitar.  not only that, but he gave us this guy’s # in town who works on guitars and can make pretty much any guitar (cheap or expensive) sound great.  I had been thinking I needed to upgrade to a better guitar if I was going to stick with a righty…which means $$ that I definitely don’t have right now.  but this guy works on guitars for like $30 and makes them sound great!!!!!!  dude – totally stoked because I love my red gitter.

I left Larry’s really encouraged.  not only did I learn a lot, but he also loves God and loves people and as soon as you meet him, you feel like you’ve been friends for awhile.  he offered to continue getting together with us to teach once a month or so for free – um…hello.  that would be amazing and so generous of him!

while I was at Larry’s, my Aunt called me to tell me her friend may have a 6-week temp job for me!!!  starting immediately!  I’ll be getting in contact with the woman first thing tomorrow morning to find out more.  TOTALLY STOKED!  praise God for such a huge blessing that has restored my hope once again!  I def will update on if this works out or not!

tonight I went for a run and really pushed myself – well…I pushed myself for awhile but then needed to be pushed to keep going (thankfully Paul was feelin’ good).  some days I really miss living at sea level.  :)  this 6,300+ ft elevation kills me when it comes to long-distance running.  I’m improving, but slowly.  plus there are hills here.  double whammy.  but it feels good to have had a good run tonight.

oh – note to self – eating a full dinner of spaghetti and going running immediately afterwards does not come highly recommended.  I nearly left my dinner on the side of the road a couple times.  and it’s taken me about an hour after the run to not feel like I was going to see my spaghetti dinner floating in the porcelain bowl.

dude…God has overwhelmed me today with His blessings.  He never gives us more than we can handle.  right when I was starting to lose hope, out of His grace and everlasting love He threw blessing upon blessing on me today.  Praise Him!

epic discovery: the library

I’ve always steered clear of libraries since maybe 3rd grade.  I used to love going to the library when I was younger, picking out tons of kids books or documentaries on the ocean and surgeries (yes, I was THAT cool of a kid.  recognize.)

but after probably 3rd grade, the library was no longer “cool”.  it was a place to go to get books for research papers.  once in awhile in college I’d go sit in the library with my computer and coffee and get a stack of books and work on research papers.  just to feel sophisticated.

now: the library rocks my face off!!!!

I’m just now discovering how great the library can be!!  there are so many books, ones that you see in real bookstores that cost lots of money.  that’s like the best thing about the library: it’s FREE!!!

you know how sometimes you go to a store and buy something (or multiple things) and you walk out, feeling the tension of “ooh I’m so excited I have this now!” mixed with “I shouldn’t have spent that money…”?  buyer’s regret?  yeah.  like even with books – how many times have we bought books and then never read them?  totally have done that many times. but this doesn’t happen with the library!!

it’s this wonderful concept of going to a huge “bookstore” (the library), picking out as many books as you want (the limit at this one is 100…wow), and walking out with them without paying a penny.  seriously??  how could it get any better?  instant gratification.  no buyer’s regret because it didn’t cost you anything.  no feelings of “where am I going to put these books after I’ve read them??”  nothing. just pure excitement of “owning” a new book (or…100), gaining knowledge and insight from reading it, and then returning it and not getting overtaken by stacks of books at your house.

confession: sometimes I’ve checked out books just to feel studious and sophisticated and then flipped thru them, maybe reading a paragraph or 2, and then returning them a couple weeks later.

come to think of it…I haven’t actually read a whole book I’ve checked out yet (since getting to Cheyenne 2 1/2 weeks ago).

but one day I will.

in the meantime, I will continue to enjoy checking out books, feeling like I got them for free (‘cause I did) and then returning them.  especially while I’m unemployed and getting poorer by the day.

ooh this is fun (though costly so I can’t do it often) – there’s a cool coffee shop attached to this library so I’ll check out a few books, then go sit in the coffee shop with a coffee (well, a dirty soy chai) and work on my laptop.  I usually pull at least 1 of the books out that I checked out, even if it’s just to read the back cover and put it back in the bag.

the library rocks!

:)

oh the discoveries of the unemployed…

speaking of which – I’ve gotten 6 resumes/apps out over the past 2 weeks of being here.  nothing yet.  pray for me if you think of it!!!

Los Canciónes

With my free time lately, I've been working on learning Hillsong songs in Spanish. :) I will use them someday. I know it.

I have "This is Our God" ("Es Nuestro Dios) memorized!! Working on "Hosanna" and "Desert Song". Ooh - just remembered I need to go back and learn one of the verses to "Revelation Song" and I'll have that one down too!!

¡Le alabaré! Praise Him! :)

What happened to Barney?

Watching Barney right now with a 1 year old. I've only watched a few Barney episodes (not on my own, I promise - they were all while baby-sitting) but I know for a fact that this is not the original Barney voice. This one's a fruity, nasal-infested creepy voice.

I wish I could record his voice to share with you.




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