Share your life more and gain so much more!

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Acts 2:46 NLT

They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord’s Supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity.

Everytome I read this verse my heart grieves because deep down it seems so right and yet deeply troubling to actually live out. I long for it, both Alexis and I do, it’s exactly what we feel is the core to our mission in Poland. But the “how” is enormously bigger than us. Which it’s that very reason we contend for it.

Imagine life in constant connection with fellow believers, the support, the encouragement, the love. You might be thinking “yeah right, I can hardly stand an hour in church!” This might be true but let me provide some perspective.

You see, we’re not talking about living in a commune, we’re talking about living intentionally. Living near one another, meeting daily for mutual encouragement and teaching. That could be 2 people for coffee/tea or that could be 20 to pick up garbage around the neighborhood. It could be having a discussion about God on Facebook or it could be sharring our arts and talents with our surrounding community.

I think we have a hard time imagining such a life because we live in the world on a day to day basis and meet together once for an hour. So the majority of us are surrounded with world influences which drain us and bring us to our ends. Having our passion fanned by fellow believers each day, while different and probably at times difficult, at least will allow for God to move (assuming we are genuinely surrendered to Him). It’s kind of scary, yet who can be against us when he is for us?

Be intentional, love, give, live. Then we may be equipped to reach our world, energized, in love, and full of love that is beyond this world’s understanding.

and His kingdom come…

Just about every day, my thoughts are invaded with the idea of “His will be done and his Kingdom come” and I always start to think what on earth does that look like?  I think I get the “His will be done” part – for the most part, listening, and obeying what I hear him ask me to do.

But this “and his Kingdom come…” part is what I get stuck on.  Now someone could easily “go logical” on us and say, well if you are letting his will be done (listening and obeying) then his kingdom is advancing…  Yes, that makes sense, yet I believe there is a lot more than just a simple cause and effect formula to this kingdom thing.

For me the Kingdom of God here on earth “as it is in heaven” is well beyond my understanding, it’s more emotional, more carnal.  The Kingdom is the Church, the people, the relationships, all of which are connected by the ribbon of God flowing through our lives.  The Kingdom is here on earth when I stop and take  a moment to pray for my friends, when I have coffee with someone, when I text a word of encouragement.  These things to me are letting the Kingdom come.  Yes those things are also His will living through my life.  For the Kingdom to come, his will must be done.  For his will to be done, the kingdom must come.

If a day goes by and a relationship isn’t touched, a soul not encouraged, a person’s thoughts not effected, or a prayer not offered up on behalf of another – then I wonder “have I let the Kingdom come today?”

Let his kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven…..  as it is in heaven – that’s my next idea to ponder.

Being real

A while back I wrote about how much I loathe the fund raising process, the ups and downs, the stress, and everything else that goes along with something based on faith.  Still, I have a philosophy about my Christian walk that I believe is important, and it’s being real.  While it may have a whiny tone, it may be jaded at times, I find it freeing to express myself (without slandering, hurting, or otherwise giving bad connotations about others), my doubts, my concerns, my opinions, and in this I find blessing from God.  I find that my relationship is something based communication and love, not just “knowledge”, pat answers, and “should haves”.

I believe too that because of this, this creates a relationship with God that I feel is real.  I am always aware of his voice, because I’m always telling him things, and hearing back how (at times) rediculous I am in my rantings.  Yet, it’s always a fatherly kind of thing (and sometimes motherly, in fact).

So what’s the result of all this?  Amazing trust, and a God who never fails to build my faith in Him.  Over the past 24 hours we have recieved four donations to our trip (which we leave on Saturday for) totaling, get this, $1,950!  I know it’s because I keep putting my faith where it belongs, even though my mind doubts, God knows our weaknesses, and He knows our stregnths, and he works in both!  Amen?  YES.

Two years from now

God willing, two years from now we’ll be on our way out of the United States and on our way to Poland, permanently.  September 2010, is the month we’re looking at for moving to Kraków.  There’s just one last item to be passed through our Church council for us to begin perma-fundraising, and for us to start putting away into our departure fund.  I certainly feel (as does Alexis too) split on this, one part of us is very excited, and our spirits rejoice that what God is calling us to do is becoming reality, the other part of us is slowly grieving, our friends, our small group, our church family, all of it, to be less in touch, and so far removed.

Then there’s the reality of reering children in a foreign place, schools, friends, church, etc… our church family here is amazing in these areas, and we’re going some place where it’s very minimal, if at all.  In the end though, with each trip, it is harder and harder to leave, Kraków feels more and more to be the right place.

God has spoken!

I know this is long, but it’s a huge revelation for me, if you want to know where I am, to know more than just a tweet or facebook status update, take the time to read this.  Shall we know each other for the love we show to each other?  Are we known for the love we have for each other?  Let’s start, one person at a time.

Last night as I was laying in bed, attempting to fall asleep, I could not stop thinking about our upcoming trip to Poland.  Then I felt the Lord telling me, stop, be at peace, do not fear, everything will be okay.  Then I thought to myself, that’s just the pat Christian response, thinking I’m not trusting or having enough faith in God… 

And then I “really” heard him say “go throughout your day tomorrow and do not talk about, nor dwell on this coming trip” and so I tried my best, I had a few wondering thoughts, and did my best to think of other things (such as driving, doing my job, etc).  It has been really hard, very hard.

The other thing I heard God say was “I’ll have an answer for you tomorrow” (that being today) and that answer I believe came in my morning devotion, but in a way, could still be coming.

In my devotional I read Jeremiah 51:20-23:

20 “You are my battle-ax and sword,”
      says the Lord.
   “With you I will shatter nations
      and destroy many kingdoms.
 21 With you I will shatter armies-
      destroying the horse and rider,
      the chariot and charioteer.
 22 With you I will shatter men and women,
      old people and children,
      young men and maidens.
 23 With you I will shatter shepherds and flocks,
      farmers and oxen,
      captains and officers.

I felt God say to me – that is you, you are my battle-ax, you and your wife, your family, I will use to battle the enemy’s schemes, lies, and strongholds in Poland.  Wow, thanks God!  This is just what I needed, exactly the motivation.

But wait!  There’s more!

The next passage to read in my devotion was 3rd John, and verses 5-11 answered exactly the question I’ve had about fund raising (what’s right, what’s wrong, how do we fund raise?  Is it right to ask so much? etc, etc, etc).  You see, verses such as Acts 20:33-35, and 2 Corinthians 11:9, have plagued my thoughts, and made me doubt the whole fund raising process.  Then I think “we’re not asking from those we’re serving, from those we’ll be ministering to” (Paul made it clear not to ask or be a burden to those whom he was ministering to, for some reason people miss this distinction, and see that seeking support from your own church is in the same vain as what Paul says in those scriptures).  Still the enemy attacks, and brings doubts to my mind…

Then in 3rd John: 5-11 I read the following:

5 Dear friend, you are being faithful to God when you care for the traveling teachers who pass through, even though they are strangers to you. 6 They have told the church here of your loving friendship. Please continue providing for such teachers in a manner that pleases God. 7 For they are traveling for the Lord, and they accept nothing from people who are not believers. 8 So we ourselves should support them so that we can be their partners as they teach the truth.

 9 I wrote to the church about this, but Diotrephes, who loves to be the leader, refuses to have anything to do with us. 10 When I come, I will report some of the things he is doing and the evil accusations he is making against us. Not only does he refuse to welcome the traveling teachers, he also tells others not to help them. And when they do help, he puts them out of the church.

 11 Dear friend, don’t let this bad example influence you. Follow only what is good. Remember that those who do good prove that they are God’s children, and those who do evil prove that they do not know God.

HOW FREEING!  I can be free from the shame, guilt, whatever it is/has been that has been discouraging me from seeking people’s partnership in our ministry.

God has spoken!  And I know he speaks into your life as well!

Fund raiser

As everyone is aware airline prices have been skyrocketing, and this has affected our budget for our trip in October to Poland. We have always had a contingency built into our budget, but now we are in need of increasing that. Right now our trip has increased from $1500 a person to $1800 and each week it rises. Due to the urgency in purchasing our tickets before prices increase any further, we are planning a fund raising event. We will server a Polish dinner and desserts, have a video explaining all things about REACH Polska, and a Q&A time.

If you are unable to attend but would like to donate please see donation information on our blog. A $45 offering (please tithe to your home church) from 200 people pays for the entire team’s expenses.  Thanks, in the Lord’s name, amen.

Getting things done.

Alright, I have so many things to do that I’m now at my overwhelm point. The two biggest things with lists are Small Group and our Poland fund raising. So, I will now be delegating much of this, since I must get regular house and work things done. Thankfully I know of key people who I think will be willing to help me out on these things.

Lord, please help me to express your heart for Poland, may your words and heart be heard in our fund raising efforts.  May you give us new and unique ways of raising funds, may we continue to hold onto the truth that we are not to be under stress, and instead rejoice in your love.  Thanks for your patience, and peace.  Amen.

OIL

Okay, so I have some strong opinions on what we need to do about oil, so I am far from un-bias on the subject. However, I feel that I am trying to be balanced and moderate in talking about it as well. Recently I received a letter from United Airlines, it was an open letter to all airline customers and written by all of the major US airlines. It talked about how oil speculation is taxing on $30 to $60 per barrel of oil. Well upon further research the evidence seem to be there. So I followed the link in the email to Stop Oil Speculation NOW, which by clicking this link, brings you to a very easy form that will send either an email or letter to your state and national representatives, you can even customize it. I added a couple of paragraphs on how this is personally effecting my family, and how I also see the need for our government to somehow use oil industry profits, and put more of its resources towards renewable resources and clean-burning (it’s out there, – sorry must register to view, but great article!) oil-based energy.

Portland Polish community in the news

Was just searching the internet and found an article in the Portland tribune on the Polish community here. I was looking for the hours of the Polish Cafe and found an article dated June 12th, 2008! Some friends of ours and us are going there today, hopefully we’ll be able to check out some DVDs from the Polish library right above the cafe.

Learning Polish

Alexis and I are trying to teach ourselves Polish, and we can tell you it isn’t always easy. There are times where we play an audio track over and over trying to figure something out, and other times where we can’t even figure out the directions in our text books.

There are so many things that are different in Polish from English, such as 7 cases… who can tell me what the heck a case is? I only know because of learning Polish… So good luck.

Thankfully I have found some software for our Windows mobile phones, one is a talking dictionary/translator, another one is a flash card program. These are good for the beginning steps, but as time goes, we’ll need lots of Patience.

Can’t wait for our trip in October where we’ll take intensive lessons for two weeks while in Krak