Things I've Learned About Applying for a Visa

*I think this picture captures the essence of me after the
past 3 days of working on some adjustments to my visa*

1. Read the directions thoroughly! If you don't follow them it's going to take you a lot longer than normal.
2. No matter how many times your bank says, "Our money orders are the same as traveler's checks" don't believe it. The Embassy takes money orders, bank checks, and no personal checks. Also is best if you don't send cash, just to be safe.
3. Travel's checks don't work either.
4. You can get money orders at the post office! Perfect, since you're going to have to mail them. And remember to do the tracking and confirmation stickers!!!
5. Make sure your passport is signed in ink and will last at least another 6months if not more.
6. FedEx overnight is worth it. And include a self addressed, pre-stamped envelope so they can send your passport and everything else back to you.
7. Don't use two different pictures, staple 2 copies of the same picture.
8. I thank God I learned the long way, though it would have been nice to learn the short way, but now I can help others and explain in full detail why some things are not possible. ;)
9. Always call the Embassy if you have questions.

Annihilation to Me and Identification with Him

When I was little- during my Awana days- I was always memorizing verses the fastest and could spit them out like watermelon seeds. I did like memorizing, but I think a big factor was because whoever memorized the most got to throw a pie in the Director's face; which, for me, was my Grandmother's face :) Now I'm a big advocate of memorizing sections, if not chapters and books of the Bible. The context is so important and so key to understanding what the Lord is trying to say! I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir here.

One of the chapters I've memorized is Philippians 2 and lately I've been dwelling on '[Jesus] did not consider equality with God something to be grasped'. Jesus, Second Member of the Trinity, now with the human aspect, doesn't think about it. What's one of the first things we read in the Bible? The Serpent saying, "You will be like God" (Gen 3:5) and the people of Babel building a Tower to Heaven (Gen 6:3-7). We try and push so hard to be well off, successful, famous, and get the honor when Jesus gave up all that glory up to come down here to serve the people who would crucify Him.

Oswald Chambers touches on this a little in the following devotion. We must not long to become like God- and when I say that I do not mean that it is wrong to long to imitate Him, for we are ordered to do so (Eph 5:1, I Pet 1:16), but wrong to think that we are perfect, omniscient, and eternal. What we must long for is to be like Him in character- and Jesus is the best example for us in that!!!

O. Chamber's words things so much better than I ever could, read what he has to say :)

The rich young ruler had the master passion to be perfect. When he saw Jesus Christ, he wanted to be like Him. Our Lord never puts personal holiness to the fore when He calls a disciple; He puts absolute annihilation of my right to myself and identification with Himself- a relationship with Himself in which there is no other relationship. Luke 14:26 has nothing to do with salvation or sanctification, but with the unconditional identification with Jesus Christ. Very few of us know the absolute "go" of abandonment to Jesus.

"Then Jesus beholding him loved him." The look of Jesus will mean a heart broken forever from allegiance to any other person or thing. He Jesus ever looked at you? The look of Jesus transforms and transfixes. Where you are 'soft' with God is where the Lord has looked at you. If you are hard and vindictive, insistent on your own way, certain that the other person is more likely to be in the wrong than you are, it is an indication that there are whole tracts of your nature that have never been transformed by His gaze.

"One thing thou lackest..." The only 'good thing' from Jesus Christ's point of view is union with Himself and nothing in between.

"Sell whatsoever thou hast..." I must reduce myself until I am a mere conscious man, I must fundamentally renounce possessions of all kinds, not to save my soul (only on thing saves a man- absolute reliance upon Jesus Christ), but in order to follow Jesus. "Come, and follow Me" and the road is the way He went.

~Mark 10:21

Recapping the DG Missions Conference

I will put up other things on this blog besides John Piper stuff, I promise! It's just that lately he's had some pretty good things that are close to my heart and encouraging to me as I'm stateside working on raising support (which is at 45% now, by the way).

If you were able to watch some of the conference, I'm sure you were as blessed as I was; and if you weren't, watch this 5min video for just a taste of what you missed!

Keeping the Missions Flame Alive from John Piper on Vimeo.

Finish the Mission: For the Joy of All Peoples

Is this weekend!!!

This is one of the best Missions Conference I have heard or attended. Very informative of missions life, people groups, churches, missiology, and so much more! Such an encouragement and challenge to listen too :)

Call Back!

A Poem that Rosalind Goforth placed in her book Climbing. Reminds me of Hebrews 10:24-25 "And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another and all the more as you see the Day drawing near."

CALL BACK:

If you have gone a little way ahead of me, call back;
'Twill cheer my heart and help my feet along the stony track;
And if, perchance, Faith's light is dim, because the oil is low,
Your call will guide my lagging course as wearily I go.

Call back, and tell me that He went with you into the storm;
Call back, and say He kept you when the forest's roots were torn;
That when the heavens thundered and the earthquake shook the hill,
He bore you up and held you where the very air was still.

O friend, call back and tell me, for I cannot see your face;
They say it glows with triumph, and your feet bound in the race;
But there are mists between us, and my spirit eyes are dim,
And I cannot see the glory, though I long for word of Him.

But if you'll say He heard you when your prayer was but a cry,
And if you'll say He saw you through the night's sin-darkened sky
If you have gone a little way ahead, O friend, call back
'Twill cheer my heart and help my feet along the stony track.

~ Anonymous

The Librarian Strikes Again!

Did you know that Border's is/went out of business? Such a bittersweet time for Bookhuggerz everywhere! Today our family went to pay our respects to the well-loved store with one last fling. I went in with a line-up in my mind: something French- language, history, what have you- and anything Anthropologic. If there's one thing I was reminded of today, it was never go in search for something specific, you'll miss what's right in front of your nose!

After about an hour or more of slowly walking, head tilted sideways, fingering the shelves and spines, I found a few that may turn out to be treasures :) None of what I was looking for, but they still have promise.

Take a look at this line up!!!

-The Song of Roland

-Master and Commander

-Isaac's Storm

-The Borrower

-Wading Home

-Terrific Majesty

-Anthology of Western Reserve Literature

7 books for a grand total of....

$13.78!

Borders, you shall be missed, but...

Oh happy, bittersweet, lovely day!

And yes, I have already finished one of the books... :D

Finish the Mission: bringing the Gospel to the unreached and unengaged

John Piper is holding a National Conference September 23-25. It is in Minneapolis, which is pretty much impossible for most of us to get out to, but in the past they have done LiveStreaming for the Conference and I hope they do it again this year!

Here are some of the topics they will be covering:

• The Glory of God, the Lostness of Man, and the Gospel of Christ
• The Internalization of Missions: its potential and its price
• The Church, the Neighborhood, and the Nations

More info HERE

Faith Comes By Hearing

A friend introduced me to MemVerse some months ago, and it has been quite and encouragement and help to me in memorizing God's Word. This morning God gave me the wonderful idea of memorizing not only in English, but also in French! I need the practice, and what a sweet way to do it! At the moment I'm working on Colossians 3 in English and since I have already memorized Philippians 2 in English, I'm going to start working on it in French.

Free Audio Bible is going to be a great help in this endevour! You should check out how many languages they have translated the Bible in and listen to some of them! It's a great tool for missionaries working with people who can't read or don't have their language written down yet. All they need is a little MP3 player, headphones and batteries and there is their Bible! Praise God for the work He's doing through Audio Bible!

Free Audio Bible Download | Faith Comes By Hearing

You Will Be Eaten by Cannibals: John Piper on John Paton

This was one of the first biographies I ever heard John Piper speak on- and what a life!
I had read John Paton's autobiography when I was young, but the words were older and different than what I was used to and there were very few pictures, so as a 12 year old I didn't get much out of the 300 page book.

I listened to this when I was 19 and was struck at how I missed so much of this man's life when I read the book! I encourage you to listen to this man's life. Put this on as you're answering emails, doing laundry, instead of watching TV, anything!

If below doesn't work, go HERE

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Waiting When I Want to Move

Something I stole from Spurgeon that hit pretty hard when I read it the other day.

In this ever busy, up-n-at-'em, get-it-done life I rarely see people slow down- I've even heard people say they hate not having anything to do. I've been there. Feeling like my worth was in what I accomplished and not in who I was in Christ. I felt like if I slowed down I would become useless. Ha! What a lie.

So, if you have ever felt that way- even in the tiniest little inkling- you should read what Spurgeon wrote.

Even if you've never felt that way, you should still read it because it's Spurgeon :)

Ps 27:14 "Wait for the LORD; be strong and let your heart take courage! Wait for the LORD!"

It may seem an easy thing to wait, but it is one of the postures which a Christian soldier learns not without years of teaching. Marching and quick-marching are much easier to God's warriors than standing still. There are hours of perplexity when the most willing spirit, anxiously desirous to serve the Lord, knows not what part to take.

Then what shall it do? Vex itself by despair? Fly back in cowardice, turn to the right hand in fear, or rush forward in presumption? No, but simply wait. Wait in prayer, however. Call upon God, and spread the case before him; tell Him your difficulty, and plead his promise of aid. In dilemmas between one duty and another, it is sweet to be humble as a child, and wait with simplicity of soul upon the Lord. It is sure to be well with us when we feel and know our own folly, and are heartily willing to be guided by the will of God. But wait in faith. Express your unstaggering confidence in Him; for unfaithful, untrusting waiting is but an insult to the Lord.

Believe that if He keep you tarrying even till midnight, yet He will come at the right time; the vision shall come and shall not tarry. Wait in quiet patience, not rebelling because you are under the affliction, but blessing your God for it. Never murmur against the second cause, as the children of Israel did against Moses; never wish you could go back to the world again, but accept the case as it is, and put it as it stands, simply and with your whole heart, without any self-will, into the hand of your covenant God, saying, "Now, Lord, not my will, but thine be done. I know not what to do; I am brought to extremities, but I will wait until thou shalt cleave the floods, or drive back my foes. I will wait, if thou keep me many a day, for my heart is fixed upon thee alone, O God, and my spirit waiteth for thee in the full conviction that thou wilt yet be my joy and my salvation, my refuge and my strong tower."

~Spurgeon