Busy (Fun) Weekend

Let's see... Saturday morning was errands and cleaning. Saturday afternoon at Celebrate Freedom, we handed out Free Books and talked to people about child sponsorship. There was a steady stream of people for our three hour shift -- it was good we didn't have to talk much longer than that. We almost went hoarse from trying to yell over the noise of the bands. I shared the story of Nibun with two ladies that visited the table. One of the ladies sponsored a Bridge of Hope child and the other sponsored a native missionary. Praise God!

Sunday morning, I ran a 5K with my coordinator's 14 year old son. I hadn't trained at all and hadn't run since the last 5K on the 4th of July, so we took it easy and finished the race in about 31:29. I'll still be sore tomorrow. But it was a good race - ran solid, didn't walk, kicked it at the end... they've tagged me in some photos on facebook.

I attended late service and had an awesome conversation with my pastor. It seems the Lord had been teaching us the same lesson from the same verse during the last two weeks! We were pretty amazed.

We had a pool party at a staff family's home this evening - soccer, tetherball, hamburgers, pool... I tried playing basketball in the deep end for a while - and that completely exhausted me. And I was reminded: "The Lord is in control." It's basic, I know. But I needed to hear that.

Next week is the RYP conference - you can pray for me for details this week as we get everything set up to print and assemble the thousand+ nametags. I get to coordinate that and then I'll be helping with registration/general information during the conference. Oh, and please pray that my local pastor will be able to attend the conference!

Bible Study Thought

1 John 5:3. And this is the love of God that we keep his commandments.

What? God's love is for us to keep his commandments? How about something like, "This is love for God - we should keep his commandments."? That I can get.

Pastor Damian Kyle shared about how God's love really is shown to us in that He set up commandments to guide us and help us know and do His best. And like a parent enforces a rule because they love their child, God disciplines us in his commands because He loves us.

I liked the idea and understood it better than I can type it. Oh well. Maybe it's just something to think about.

Lightning Flashes

I'm working on supper plans for tomorrow (bierocks) and watching the lightning out my window. Jes and I walked to the post office this evening - just so I could watch some more lightning! I love to see God's power in nature! (Oh, and Big K - thanks for the surprise!)

We had all the interns at our house this evening as one of the ladies in the ministry shared her testimony and some things the Lord was teaching her.

*pauses to stir the cabbage and meat*

One of the verses she mentioned was Jonah 2:8 - Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.

It made me think. What worthless idols am I clinging to?

His Spirit Within Us

I haven't been on my computer at all much in the evenings - leaving my blog suffering as well as my personal correspondence. These few weeks are the calm before the storm. Although Jes was gone the last two weekends and Caz is gone the next weekend, the "busy-ness meter" is generally down. My room is clean, my laundry is...party done, and we made do-nuts last night from Grandmother Coulter's "Best of Washington County" cookbook. Yum, yum!

We're going through 1 John 4 in Bible Study. How do we know God's love? What is the difference between knowing it and believing it? Do we really believe it? I mean, do we LIVE like we believe it? And the whole God-dwelling-in-us-And-us-dwelling-in-God thing that is repeated three times in five verses? Does that "just happen" as a result of being a Christian or is there a daily choice on our part to dwell in Him? Just questions we've been discussing...

It was a joy to see college friends Ed and Andrea and Jeni and Michael briefly last week. Although our vists were brief, it was good. I had never seen Ed and Andrea's youngest three kids. We talked small towns and community and real church and the tornado that took a swath through Chapman, KS (nowhere close to my family). But Anna does have some awesome pictures there. You can see the path of the tornado through the town.

And my family started wheat harvest in KS. I talked to my Dad on Sunday and he reminded me of God's faithfulness and grace in all situations. I love my daddy. He reminds of God.

Unrest in Sri Lanka

Twenty people have died from the monsoon rains in Sri Lanka so far and over 300,000 are homeless. Then just caught this news of a bombing in Colombo with 21+ people dead and dozens injured. I know that's a small number compared to some things, but still - they could use your prayers! Also, pray for the missionaries and pastors who are already involved in flood relief work here.

Sri Lanka country overview

If you want to Change the World...

If you use computers much, you've probably used what we call "buggy software." It's software that never seems to quite run right. It crashes or refuses to print or doesn't do what you tell it to do. It causes your computer to crash and your blood pressure to rise. And it can be really frustrating.

What if you had a task to change the world? And what if the only software you were able to use was buggy?

“That’s ridiculous!” I’d say. “You can’t expect me to change the world using this stuff!”

But that’s what God does. He uses “buggy” people to change the world.

Isn’t God amazingly patient with us?

Missing ICCM

I overslept this morning. Not because I didn't hear my alarm clock - I did! But I stifled it under my pillow so I could return to my dream. I dreamed I had driven three of my co-workers up to attend ICCM in Indiana. I had dropped them off and I had to catch my flight back to Texas. But I had a couple minutes, so I was running around Mitchell Theatre, trying to find everyone quickly before I had to leave. I only had time to hug Adrienne and spot Dan and Greg and Tim and the Open Doors guys before I had to catch my flight back to TX. I couldn't miss my flight because I needed to do IT Training when I got back to TX.

In real life, Matt, Josh, and Dave leave for ICCM tomorrow morning while Eric and I hold down the fort. Matt and Josh don't know what they're in for yet, so if you're an ICCM attendee reading this, make sure you help Matt and Josh feel at home. Thanks, guys! :)

And if this post somehow shows up on the ICCM jaiku page - ICCM, missions - know that I miss you guys and hope you have a great week at ICCM.

Now - off to print my IT Training docs.