Month: August 2003

Today I realized, that I can’t swear anymore. I just can’t, I hate it. I’m not sure when this happened, I know a few years ago I made the decision to stop swearing, but I never thought it would get like this. It’s not a bad thing by any means, but even when it slips in my head, I hate it. Today I was working on a server at work and things just were not going well, and I was getting really frustrated, it was getting the point where I was raising my voice at it (do remember, that no one is in the room, so if someone was watching, I’m sure it was pretty funny), and instead of saying other choice words I was just like “grrr, rar, fudge, stupid thing, and Lord fix it I quit”. Well after I calmed down, and started looking up the error messages it was quickly resolved. I just though it was weird that I didn’t even mutter a curse word, this is just so different from who I was just two years ago.

Today I also realized that I just really don’t like working by myself, I’ve said this before, and I know I’ve mentioned it people, but I do not like being the only tech person for about 750 computers, 3000 students and 300 staff/teachers. This is not what I call fun, and I really hope that who ever they higher for my replacement is Christian, and has a lot of patience, these people need someone with patience. This reminds me, I need to call Justin and have him take a look at the application. So, now I’m off to pick up Alexis and go to dinner at her mom’s house.

That’s what I’ve been writing, crap? I know, it sounds a little harsh, I know it’s not all “crap” especially the stuff to “her”. But I realize it isn’t interesting for anyone to read except me, and maybe the ones which are directly mentioned in the “crap”. So, I’m starting something new, which is going to help out a lot when I get to Poland. I?m going to write about my day, but not like a chronological list of events of my day, but my feelings and my experiences? hopefully this is more interesting and enriching. Thanks.

Check this out. This is exciting, this is real, this is God.

“Don’t be troubled. You trust God, now trust in me. There are many rooms in my Father’s home, and I am going to prepare a place for you. If this were not so, I would tell you plainly. When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am. And you know where I am going and how to get there.”

“No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We haven’t any idea where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me. If you had known who I am, then you would have known who my Father is. From now on you know him and have seen him!”

Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and we will be satisfied.”

Jesus replied, “Philip, don’t you even yet know who I am, even after all the time I have been with you? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking to see him? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I say are not my own, but my Father who lives in me does his work through me. Just believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. Or at least believe because of what you have seen me do.

“The truth is, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done, and even greater works, because I am going to be with the Father. You can ask for anything in my name, and I will do it, because the work of the Son brings glory to the Father. Yes, ask anything in my name, and I will do it!

[John 14:1-14]

1 – Jesus is preparing a place for us to be with him.

2 – Jesus is the way, know him, know God, be with God forever.

3 – Even if you have doubts, the evidence is there, Jesus was and is God, you know what he did so believe because of that.

4 – If you truly believe in him, then you will do the same as Jesus and even greater, because Jesus, God, and Holy Spirit are all working for us, with us, and loving us.

Yes, that’s right I love her. I love her smile, her hair, the way she gets sleepy, I love everything about her. But I love her heart the most; it is so evident that she love’s God more than me, or any other human. She is everything I ever wanted, and that’s a good thing. But we completely believe in not “awakening love before its time” (from the Song of Solomon), so we wait, with my time in Poland quickly approaching I know that God is going to lead us into better pastures. I know, I must remain realistic, and begin to focus on my time in Poland. I know God has chosen this timing for a reason, and I must set my sights on him before her, and before Poland, so that I may serve both and all others with the best of my abilities.

So here are my (mostly random) thoughts Alexis.

Does she love the Lord? ? Yes it is evident in the way she loves children and others.

Is she supportive of the Poland mission? ? Yes, in fact she’s excited for me, and is very supporting.

Where does she see herself fulfilling the great commencement? ? Working as an elementary school teacher, and working with children. To fulfill her namesake of “Helper of man kind”

Favorite book of the bible ? Joshua

Mysterious ? Yes, and this is a good thing

Random Thoughts on myself.

Am I in love with the Lord? ? Yes, and if I ever show anything else, seriously let me know.

Am I ready and prepared to leave Alexis, my friends, my family and my life here for Poland ? Yes, I’m excited, but truthfully a little scared about meeting new people and having them understand my love for Christ, but I know the Holy Spirit will be strong, if not more than it is here at home, because I’ll be in a place where I need to depend on God.

Where do I see my self fulfilling the great commencement? ? Eventually teaching high schoolers about network administration, and architecture, most students interested in this area have social skills which are not “popular”, and therefore a lot of these students need Love and attention? I feel God’s gift to me as a computer/network support specialist can be used to make relationships with those kinds of people ? the kind I use to be, I have a connection.

Favorite book of the bible ? Ever changing, but Mathew is still at the top.

Am I mysterious? ? Not so much.

My goal right now for the two of us ? Show God’s powerful love to everyone through our relationship with each and our individual relationships with Christ.

Must be some mistake

‘Cause I’m not worth the price you paid.

With every passing hour

I convince myself that you saw something in me.

But I can hear them still,

As the whispers laced with hatred fill the room.

Guess I’m wasting my time

How could you love a man like me?

Lord I need your strength

‘Cause I am weak and falling to my knees.

Who is on my side?

‘Cause I can’t tell my friends from enemies.

Filling up with pain.

Bitterness controls the air I breathe.

What am I fighting for?

Do you have a plan for me?

Must be some mistake

‘Cause I’m not worth the price you paid.

With every passing hour,

I convince myself that you saw something in me.

But I can hear them still,

As the whispers laced with hatred fill the room.

Guess I’m wasting my time

How could you love a man like me?

Must be some mistake.

‘Cause I’m not worth the price you paid.

Artist: Seventh Day Slumber

Album: Picking Up The Pieces

Song: My Struggle

Now, doesn’t that say it all! Those are the words I wish I could say when I say “I just can’t explain it”.

What do you think of the new look? I know? I finally moved away from the blue, but I’m not making any promises, I like blue. I’m going to bed now, it’s late.

I have finally resized, and optimized all the pictures I took at Creation, this isn’t all of them, I took over 80 pictures! These are just the ones which came out right…

Click on a picture to get a larger version.

This is most of the group, from left to right- Eric, Lauren, Me, Brandie, Gregg, and Miles. I was just learning to use my camera and so this picture had the wrong settings of “landscape” on, so things up close were blurry.

This is Ashley and Lauren (R) (not the same as the one above… no really Travis…) silly girls, hiding from the sun.

Eric and Lauren, how cute.

Ladies, and Gentlemen, Jon Johnson, I had coffee with him today.

In the center with the orange vest is Josh, he was working on staff with Creation, as was Jon (from above). If you ever get to meet this boy, consider your self blessed.

This is Kyle going crazy to Pax217, he is Carly’s brother.

This is Lauren, Eric (open your eyes boy), and Brandie…

Here is Matt and Tisha, they both surprised me and showed up later in the week, also people to get to know!

Me and Tisha on the hillside.

Newsboys, as much as people are “tired” of them, I still love them. Not the greatest picture, but it was fun!

Another Newsboys picture, in between each song, one of the band members sang a verse or two of an old hym, it was beautiful.

All the people rocking out to Pax217!!! This one is for you, Alex! Wish you could’ve been there 🙂

A better picture of Pax217, on the jumbo tron.

This little guy landed on some kids soda can, and then decided to make his home on the Kid’s Dad’s hat, so there he stayed, and at the time of the picture he had been there for over a day, going with him wherever the hat’s owner went…. it’s a praying mantis for all you non-bugy type.

And now I present to you, SWITCHFOOT! They rocked, as usual, but no 24…. AGAIN!

A great picture of the Thirdday show. Which was a great show, and a great way to end Creation.

More thirdday, and God’s glory is going to blind all darkness, how rad is that?

The Toby Mac show, it rocked, the entire ampitheater!

See I told you so! Even the old guys!

Tree 63 – on the fringe stage… sad times, but a great show!

A view from the hillside of the Gorge ampitheater, God’s creation is magnificent!

Me on the hillside, the mainstage, and Pax217 rocki’n out. Check out the view again!

Another amazing view of the sun setting at the Gorge.

This is me trying out the delayed shutter option on my camera, now if I just had a tripod stand, it would’ve been great.

Worship time at Creation, one of the most amazing times of worship, 30,000 people all worshiping our Lord Jesus Christ!

More worship, God is amazing. Creation is just a hint, 1 billioninth of what God’s glory is like.

I am so full of excitement right now! I am so meant to go to Poland I received a huge confirmation today, and basically yesterday too, although yesterday’s wasn’t much of one at the time. So let’s start from the beginning (yesterday).

Yesterday at work, I had a meeting with my supervisor at 10am; we went over some projects I need to get done, and some other work related things. After all of that, we moved onto the business of me, I needed him to write a letter to excuse me from Jury duty, and then we went onto the subject of my leave of absence request for one year so I could go to Poland. Well, he didn’t want to tell me this, but they (him, and the other administrators) decided to deny my request for the leave. The reason being that they felt they would not be able to higher someone of quality for a temporary position, which I understand, but the second reason was that “classified” employees (which is what I am, since I do not teach) are not normally given leaves ? Thanks for leading me on, and getting my hopes up, now I have four weeks to figure out how to resign and when. I had already made the decision that I was going to resign if they denied the request, but I guess I hadn’t really thought of it being a real option, so I reacted rather emotionally. But after talking to some great people, Leanne, Matt and Alexis all is okay, and I know that God is just leading me to other places. But of course it did put some scary insight into the future?

So today, I go to work, all is normal, I work on getting some of our servers back to working functionality, and I talked to Alex for a few hours while I hammered away at some problems with our middle school servers. It was a pretty good day. When I get home I realize that I haven’t received the email I normally receive from the Mission Dispatch people (the people handling my support money) with an update on supporters and deposits. I email him asking him what’s up? Then I go online to Washington Mutual’s online banker, which is where I have my Poland Missions account. I notice that a deposit of $3,600 was made yesterday! WOW! I figure that my letters to everybody, stating that it will only take $10/month for 12 months really worked, and people just donated the entire $120 for a year. Well I get a reply from the guy at Mission Dispatch as to who donated? and to my surprise only two checks were sent for the month of July. One from my old youth pastors for $100 (which in it self is awesome!)? and one from someone I use to be in youth group with, who has already donated, who I was never all that close to, donated $3,500! Praise the lord, but $3,500, if I had something to give I would, but I don’t! This is just amazing! God is amazing, and I realize that I am being blessed and guided just as I have been praying. Even though I am falling into sin, here and there, and I am far from perfect, God is still graceful and merciful! What do I do now? I’m looking for his phone number, and I’m going to type him up a special thank you letter, which I’ve been sending letters in the past to my supporters, but this is just unbelievable, not to mention he’s a College student at Northern Arizona University!

Even with this amazing donation I still need $5400 more dollars, or 45 people to donate $10/month for the year i’m away, or $120 flat.

See also Part I and Part II

First my definition of “believe” ? Believe, I know as absolute truth, with out any doubt, but because I’m human, my beliefs could change, but not without much counsel and research.

I believe God longs for us to be like him ? Putting the needs and cares of others before yourself. I believe God is our perfect heavenly parent, perfect because God is unconditional. I believe we serve others because we love them, not because we want something out of what we are doing, but God does bless us for serving w/o condition. Because we love God, we love his creation, which is everything in this universe; we should go out of our way to take care of what God has given us. Don’t just serve other “believers” serve the world, Jesus served the sinners, went to the poor, talked to the prostitutes, and healed those who others would not touch. Your true parent lives in heaven and created everything, so why be afraid? We have real power in Jesus Christ, the son of God and the son of humans.