2012 Already???

It's the 3rd of January 2012!!!

Are you as in denial as I am?

It's been 3 months since I last wrote anything, and it feels like it was just last week. Starting as of right now, I hope to post once a month with updates. Last year I was trying to post once a week and became so bogged down with other things that writing didn't just get moved to the back seat, it was thrown completely out the window! Once a month I can handle... I think ;) I'll see if I can get some pictures up so you can have a taste of what's happened in the past 3 months.

But in the meantime, let me leave you with a verse that has comforted me lately:

"Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened and do not be dismayed,
for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go."

~Joshua 1:9

"You Are My Family"

This weekend was a busy one- but filled with so many good things!!!

Dad and I arrived at church around 8:30 Saturday morning. As a group of us started to prep the place for the Basketball Tournament, the kids in the neighboring apartments saw/heard us and came down to help us out. Between them, the College Kids from TMC, and a handful of us from church, the place was ready in no time!

I was part of a group of girls who manned (haha) the registration table, having spectators and participants sign in and give info such as email, address and home church if they so chose. When the kids from the neighborhood signed in, almost all of them put down 'Bible Church of Buena Park' as their church. I started getting irked with it because none of them came to church on Sundays. Finally, when 9 year old Lydia signed in and put down BCBP as her church, I asked, "Lydia, why did you put this church down as your home church? You're not a member."

Lydia looked at me and said, in a matter of fact tone, "Because you're my family."

Ouch. That was humbling. All that bitterness that was starting to rise up inside of me was swept away by this one girl's simple answer, "You are my family." Sometimes I wonder how God could ever use me in these kid's lives- imperfect as I am- but then He reminds me that all He want from me is to love Him... and all the rest will fall into place. All the glory is His!

Keep working in these kid's lives, Lord!
We will plant and water Your seeds,
but only You can make them grow!

The Weekend Ahead!

Starting today- a wonderfully packed weekend! Youth Outreach tonight and Hoopla4 tomorrow!

My Church has been hosting Youth Outreach for longer than I have attended it- more than 10 years. There are apartments surrounding the church that are filled with people who need the gospel, and YO is a fun, friendly environment that draws the children out of the apartments and into the church. Games, a lesson, sometimes crafts, and Pizza- what more could a kid want? Not much more, really. But more than what they want, what they need Jesus.

As for Hoopla, that is an annual basketball tournament that our church puts on (this being the 4th year). Last year we had about 50 people from the neighborhood attend, and this year we are hoping for more! Thank God we have some students from The Master's College to help out and the Spanish church is joining us also!

With those brief descriptions, please pray for this weekend.

Pray for the people who will be working/hosting the events- that our spirits will be in tune with His, for Him to work in and through us, and that we will be pliable/flexible- focusing on the gospel and these kids and not on ourselves.

Pray for the kids and parents who will be attending this weekend- that they will not come with a stereotyped mindset, that God will start softening their hearts for His words, and that they will keep in contact afterwards.

Pray for everyone with this heat that is supposed to be coming. May we all be safe and look out for one another.

Desktop Wallpaper for October!

Tim Challies has a wonderful website, "Informing the Reforming", and if you haven't visited it yet, you should. He speaks on topics such as the 180 movie, spiritual life in this ungodly world, puritan fathers thoughts in this contemporary world, he reviews books and movies, and right now is holding a discussion on Thursdays on John Stott's book "The Cross of Christ".

All that to say- go check out his website.

And if that didn't convince you enough, at the beginning of each month he has free desktop backgrounds. Here's a taste of this month's:

Balm to My Soul

My sister and I were scheduled for offertory this Sunday, so I sat at the piano and went through the hymnal looking for a song she and I could play as a duet. It was the sweetest hours of the weekend for me- sitting at the piano, picking out the tunes, and reading these wonderful, deep hymns. Some hymns I knew, others I didn't. Now it's your turn, time for a little testing!!!

A) I will praise my dear Redeemer, His triumphant power I'll tell. How the victory He giveth over sin and death and hell!

1. Redeemed

2. I Will Sing of My Redeemer

3. Victory in Jesus

4. I Will Praise Him

B) The hand of my Savior is strong, and the love of my Savior is long. Through sunshine or rain, through loss or in gain, the blood flows from Calvary to cleanse every stain.

1. Calvary Covers It All

2. Saved, Saved!

3. Room At The Cross For You

4. What A Mighty God We Serve

My favorite of the day: Arise, My Soul Arise, written by Charles Wesley. This was a wonderful balm to my soul right when I needed it, just read the first verse! Love the command we have to not dwell in our fears, but remember Who is by the Throne pleading for us! The song you can play below is done by Indelible Grace, a wonderful group, but they didn't sing all the verses so I wrote them all from my hymnal. I hope it is an good of an encouragement as well as a reminder to you (as it is to me) of who we are in Christ.

Arise, my soul, arise; shake off your guilty fears;

The bleeding sacrifice in my behalf appears:

Before the throne my surety stands,

Before the throne my surety stands,

My name is written on His hands.

He ever lives above, for me to intercede;

His all redeeming love, His precious blood, to plead:

His blood atoned for all our race,

His blood atoned for all out race,

And sprinkles now the throne of grace.

Five bleeding wounds He bears; received on Calvary;

They pour effectual prayers; they strongly plead for me:

'Forgive him, O forgive!' they cry,

'Forgive him, O forgive!' they cry,

'Nor let that ransomed sinner die!'

The Father hears Him pray, His dear anointed One;

He cannot turn away, the presence of His Son;

His Spirits answers to the blood,

His Spirits answers to the blood,

And tells me I am born of God.

My God is reconciled; His pardoning voice I hear;

He owns me for His child; I can no longer fear:

With confidence I now draw nigh,

With confidence I now draw nigh,

And 'Father, Abba Father!' cry.

*Answers to quiz: A-2, B-3*

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