Compromises

Two weeks ago I decided to run the farthest I have ever ran. I got my shoes on, got in the car, and drove to Peter's Canyon. Not only was it the farthest but there are several large hills that I knew I would have to climb. I was ready for the challenge...until I started running. I hadn't even gotten half a mile (out of 6) before I started making compromises with myself. I'll only run the first part, I'll can walk when I get to the top of the hill, on and on and on and on and ON. As I realized that I was arguing with myself constantly, I started thinking about I (we) do this on a day to day basis, especially with God. This was the most challenging thing I had done in a while and all I could come up with were compromises.

I make compromises with God all the time. I wish I could have started this blog out with...Today I decided to run the farthest I have ever ran. But I didn't because I compromised with myself to write it after I took a shower, did my laundry, read blogs, read my fun book, cooked dinner....until it is literally two weeks later. SO embarrassing but true.

I've had a really hard week because I can see how compromises can get in the way of my time with God and they so have gotten in the way. My brother was here visiting from school (with his puppy) and I was dog sitting for my neighbor. I was home on average 30 min a day with work and all the events I had planned with friends and family. I made compromises to spend time doing that instead of staying in the Word and I can see the effects. I was stressed out, irritable with my brother, overeating, and not happy at all. I bummed me out because I have not been like this in a long time but it also shows me how important spending time with God every day makes the day that much better.

These are small examples of compromise in my life without trying to make my blog super long. Look at the compromises in your life...what are you compromising?

Oh, well good luck with that

I feel like every day someone asks me what I do for a job. I say substitute and they ask what subject. I tell them math and they always say I won't have any trouble finding a job next year. I offer a thank you and explain that I have chosen to move to Haiti to be a missionary instead of finding a job. Then the same thing always happens....they say, "Oh......well good luck with that." I even had a coach at a local high school call me because he heard I got a job at his school. He was very sad to hear my explanation and then the same thing. "Oh, well good luck with that. Bye." click.

I always wonder what they are thinking when I tell them that I am moving to Haiti. Some are excited but most can't grasp why I would give up everything and move there, even for a year. Just yesterday I was thinking...is this the right thing? And then God gave me a HUGE push that I am doing the right thing. It's not like he isn't ever giving me small nudges that I am doing the right thing but yesterday he wanted to push me down on my knees. In the blog before last, I talked about how God was putting on my heart to love Him and love others. Coincidentally, the Reeves family (the family I will be helping in Haiti) have the same agenda. Here is an part of their last post:

"The scriptures come alive as we see why Jesus said forget everything else and Love your God and Love others.  True religion.  Love God...Love others.  In America and on the mission field we make it so complicated.  We have to remember that we feed, educate, train, house, and heal BECAUSE we love.  We don't do it to get the right to share the gospel of Jesus.  We don't do it because we feel sorry for them.  We don't do it because we are trying to earn God's favor.  We do it because GOD has placed a love in our hearts for our people.  BECAUSE we love them, of course we share the truth of the Bible and the Living God.  We could never say we truly love them if we did not care about their greatest need... to know God and Love HIM.

...We all need and want the same thing... to know the answer to "why am I here and how do I make my life count".  All the answers are made available to us in God's word but we spend our lives WORKING and STRIVING and often miss the opportunities to just love people and find our place. "

I talked about the people around me and my friends in my blog. Thanks to God for wrapping up Haiti in it too :-)  There is such confirmation in our blogs matching up that my heart is in the right place right now, lined up with the people I will be living out the Gospel with in a little more than 3 months. Today I smiled and thanked them with a joyous heart when I heard, "Oh...good luck with that."

Lacking

So I feel like I talk about the same things every week but at the same time its what I am dealing with right now. Sorry I couldn't come up with some great thing to talk about this week. I always wish I could write a better blog than I do. So here is what I am struggling with right now. I'm looking for some advice because I lack self control. I've been doing well with my food problem/diet. I've been eating better, working out, and feeling great. A few weeks ago I realized that I needed to cut out sweets to remove some compulsion tendencies that I was dealing with. I am doing so much better now on a day to day basis but then I come to the end of the week and I have one day or meal where I blow the whole week. Sometimes I just can't say no  :-(  I know I am on my way to be totally healthy and remove all the tendencies I have but it is just frustrating. Does anyone have any encouragement or advice to help me out? I would love to hear what to have to say. And I would love it if you can pray for me. Love you guys!

Eagerly Wanting

I SOOO eagerly want to be like Jesus. If you haven't already started The Life You've Always Wanted, you need to now. I am only 3 chapters in and it is speaking so much truth into my life already. I wanted to share some of it with you 1. to get you interested if you haven't started it and 2. because I had already been pondering this theme in my life, how can I be like Jesus so that other people notice.

I want God to encompass my entire life and radiate from me. I want to be like Jesus in the fact that his "response was simply, "Love God, love people."" (Ortberg, p. 32) Jesus was one to attract people to him, not make people run away from like the other rabbi. He was so full of love that people couldn't get enough of him. I've been thinking about this with my friends and acquaintances. Do I love them unconditionally...no matter what? Right now, I can't say that I do. I always come up with an excuse not to hang out with some or give attitude when things don't go the way I planned. I have friends who only want to hang out if I drive to them (I don't want to! Why can't it be 50/50? Gas prices are killing me right now!) but that doesn't mean I just write them off. I don't think Jesus would have done that.

I want to pour into my friends the love of Christ, Christian or non-Christian, and have an effect on them. I want to make sure that they know I love them and will do anything for them. What a saying that most of us say but don't act on. It all takes more effort but I feel like my relationship with them and Christ will be stronger. We are richly blessed by God and each other here in Circles and I feel like it is our job to show how much God can change our lives by the simple things we do each week together. I am so grateful for everyone. Thank you for changing my life to be more like Jesus every day :-)

Easter Sunrise

I just wanted to use this blog as a shout out for our Easter Sunrise service that we had early this morning. It was amazing and God was sooo present. After we prayed, worshiped, and shared the gospel, we began to worship again. I closed my eyes and when I opened them again to look at the ocean there was a man with his dog standing right next to us. I thought HOW COOL IS THIS?!?!?! One of Ashley's friends talked to the man and invited him to the service. I can't wait to hear that story!

Not only that, there was a couple that saw us and climbed up to sit on the lifeguard tower overlooking us. The wife had her hand extended toward us during the whole time of worship. They were talking together and singing with us. Then it was Dannah's turn to get baptized. The couple on the lifeguard were amazed that we were going to baptize Dannah. By then we had a couple other people watching from the parking lot.

And then I thought, if God can show up and affect several people at 6:30 in the morning on the sand in Newport Beach, he can do so much more than that. in a small setting. in a huge setting. I think today was a time to help me remember that. Sometime it is hard to see the little things of the Kingdom and how we have a part in the plan.

Trust in the Lord

This weekend I was spiritually attacked. In conversation, someone asked me what I would do if when in Haiti, everything went wrong...I get sick and I'm not safe. And when I come back I don't get a job and I can't find a car, ect. At the time I was shocked and didn't know what to say and started talking nonsense. I had always considered that I will get sick and things aren't going to all be fine and dandy when I am in Haiti and when I come back home so when I was forced to really think about it, it bothered me and Satan took hold of it.

I kept thinking that it's not that hard...I trust that God will take care of me. He has prepared the way for me on this trip and if it is in His will, he will take care of me. It's to the point that I don't even want to think about what may happen because it doesn't really matter. Matt 6:34, "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." I need to live in the present and not worry about the future. I trust God to take care of me.

For a few seconds, I doubted that I trusted too much because I hasn't really given any of those thoughts a lot of time. That was quickly snuffed out by my confidence in trusting the Lord. I believe that if it is God's will for me to go to Haiti, he will protect me, take care of me, and provide for me when I am there and when I return. This was solidified this week when I read Luke 11: 9-10, "So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened."

I pray that God will show me what I seek in this adventure, keep me safe, free from sickness, provide for me when I am in need, and open doors when I return home.

I know that Mark 12:30 says, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength." I want to change that a little bit...all week something else keeps popping up in my head. In my mind I keep saying, Trust in the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.

Worldly Things

On Sunday at church, I asked for prayer. This very nice young woman came over to me and prayed over me. I've been deciding whether to live in Haiti during the school year and initially a lot of worldly things seemed to be holding me back. After she was done praying for me, she told me that she felt that worldly things were holding me back...exactly what I had been thinking since I found out 3 days earlier.

I feel like worldly things are getting in the way of everything and everyone and what I would be doing by giving it all up. Yes, I could be making a lot of money and be able to finally buy a nice new car but will that solve the struggles that I still have now? Will my life be ultimately changed in the eyes of God if I stay here? Maybe. But I think that he has greater plans for me. I want to know what it is like to give everything up and follow Jesus in what He is asking me to do.

"Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me."
Matthew 16:24