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Blessed are they......who hunger and thirst for righteousness. 12月27日 Gimme a (longer) Break!So I totally had one of those moments today where honesty totally sucked! Don't get me wrong, I def appreciated the honesty, but man, it sucked hearing the honest truth. So lesson of the day? Honesty really IS the best policy, but it doesn't mean it won't hurt...ouch... Well, I am officially halfway through my Christmas break and let me tell ya, getting to actually sleep for more than 3 or 4 hours a night is A-freaking-mazing!!! I'm lovin' it! And it makes me super sad that I'm going to have to be back in school in a week and a half. No fair! But then again, it's going to be my VERY LAST SEMESTER. Come May, I am graduating!!! Woohoo!!! Man, I can't believe that I'm actually graduating...that's just crazy! But I am so stoked and I am SOOOOO ready to be done with school. As for what's next, I honestly have no idea what I'll be doing after college. Interior design in San Diego? Interior design in Chino Hills? Interior design and/or youth ministry in Ireland? It's all up in the air...all in God's hands right now. And I think it's right where it needs to be. Sure, I still freak out about it sometimes since I'm totally one of those type A personalities who likes to know exactly what is going to happen when and with who. But I've come to a point in my life where I'm just enjoying life as it comes, taking things in stride and just going with the flow. God will take care of after graduation. I just need to focus on finishing up school and things will fall into place. So that's what I'm doing. Where God is leading me, I have no idea, but He'll let me know when the time is right. So here's something that I've been learning lately. "...exercise yourself towards godliness." ~1 Timothy 4:7. The notes in my study Bible say that the word exercise used here is the same type of exercise attributed to Olympic athletes, meaning that just as becoming an Olympic athlete requires a lot of hard work and discipline in training, so it is with becoming godly. Being a Christian isn't easy. It requires work. It requires training...reading the Bible daily...worship...prayer...developing our relationships with God. And training requires discipline. It's not something that comes natural to us. It's not something we just do on a whim, not something we take lightly. It takes a motivated and determined effort. It's gotta be something we work for and strive for. Doesn't matter how tired we get, how much pain we may be in, how much we feel we can't go on, we must continue to press forward. And just like when you finally return from a long run that you didn't want to go on in the first place, you feel refreshed and renewed. You feel strengthened and revitalized. And all that hard work is completely worth it. It's always worth it with God. Well, that's all I have to say for now. I'm gonna go back to enjoying the remainder of my break! Much love ya'll! L8s! ~Jack 12月8日 Here's the Latest!So here's a recap of the days that I didn't talk about highlights and low points because, uh, trust me, every day had some very interesting highs and lows this week. So here we go...
Tuesday: highlights - Finishing that 8 page paper by 12:45 in the afternoon, giving me time for a nap before class! - Going to my very last Abnormal Psych class! w00t! low points - Having my car window just out of nowhere break on me. Not break in the "shattering glass everywhere" sense, but more in the "it will no longer roll up and is forever stuck inside my car door" sense. So I've basically been parking my car all over San Diego with my window "missing". And get this...I still lock the freaking doors...cuz yeah, that's totally gonna keep people from reaching inside and just unlocking it by hand...haha...I'm lame... - Walking into my psych small group and realizing that those letters we were supposed to have written for each other were due that day and not on the day of the final. - Realizing that I pretty much suck right now because I'm as far from being the woman I want to be as is possible. Wednesday: highlights - Finishing up my last day of my internship at Robin Wilson Interior Design - Getting free lunch and a freaking $50 gift card to an art store from all the girls at RWID as a thank you for my hard work during the internship. I love those ladies! - Finding out that my sales final is this friday and not next friday, meaning I only have finals on Monday! - Cranking out a 3 page paper and an entire presentation with Liko in about 3 hours and breezing through that class that night low points - Finishing up my last day of interning at RWID - Getting a phone call from Stephen with the words "I'm in the hospital" thrown in there. But he's ok, he just had appendicitis, so he's all better now. I love that guy! - Forgetting my Lomativities pass when I went to Adal's...no discount = wah! Thursday: highlights - Only the most ginormous Boba party ever with like half of Goodwin present...ok, not really half, but half the people that matter to me anyways - BSing my way through one of my psych finals - Finishing all those darned letters on time for my small group low points - All the Goodwin guys leaving TapEx after like 10 minutes, forsaking the entire reason we do boba runs...the fellowship, guys! Come on! It's not so much for the amazing Boba as it is for the hang out time! - Waiting like half an hour to get my boba and spicy chicken...sad days really - still not having my car window fixed - having to go to work at Hallmark...lame... So yeah, that's my week in a nutshell...for the most part... Today's highlights and low points shall be interesting. I can start you with this low point...having to go to the one part of the computer lab where AutoCAD is NOT present on the computers because there's a class in the other lab and I have butt loads of work to finish before my final in this class on Monday. I do hate CAD...which is bad...cuz interior designers use it a lot...therefore...I'm screwed... But I'm done with classes for the semester...so YAY!!! And now it's time to waste my day until work tonight...suck... L8s! ~JackE P.S. Check out the xanga for more frequent updates...in case you care...
9月27日 On My Heart... So I just got back from a mission trip to Saint Petersburg in Russia. And for some reason I thought that things would be different here when I got back. I dunno what I was really expecting. An email from someone special. A change in a relationship. Haha...maybe even a relationship in general. But I got back...and everything was the same...just as when I left...
...and I was disappointed... ...even angry... ...and I've just spent the last 2 hours wrestling with myself and with God a little bit over all this...over all of my emotions and my thoughts and my feelings. I've been questioning God. Asking Him questions. Seeking His will. Desiring for Him to reveal Himself to me. I've poured out my heart. I've told Him I'm tired. I'm weary. I want to fight. But I want to quit as well. I'm tired of struggling. I'm tired of holding on to the little faith that I have left. I'm tired of feeling like I'm grasping for air. I'm tired of being patient. But I know God has more than this for me. I refuse to believe that this is all there is. I know there is more to what God has in mind for me. And I know that there is more I need to learn. There is more I need to struggle with to fully realize and understand that really none of this is about me. This is about Him. This is all about Him. It always has been. All He has been doing and continues to do in me is to mold me into what He wants me to be so that I may glorify Him all the more. Trust...so much I struggle with trust. I want to do things my way. I don't want to wait anymore. But I will. A song comes to mind. "God's way is the best way..." It's from an episode of Veggie Tales. From a children's video. Funny how that works. I need to take those words to heart just as a child would. I need to trust that God's way is the best way. Faith like a child... "Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing. If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking. But when you ask him, be sure that your faith is in God alone. Do not waiver, for a person with divided loyalty is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is blown and tossed by the wind. Such people should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Their loyalty is divided between God and the world, and they are unstable in everything they do." ~James 1:2-8 (NLT) I ask. But is my faith in God alone??? I think a part of me is still trusting in myself to answer my own prayers. I cannot be divided. I will not. Will you? In God Alone Jackie 8月29日 Senior Year at Loma! Ok, so even though I have more access to the internet, you'd think that I'd be updating more often...HA!!! Not that I haven't meant to update or anything, but seriously, life has been such a whirlwind for me these past couple of weeks, it's hard to believe I'm even still functioning at this point. But the cool thing is that even though my life has been in-sane since getting back from Europe, I have been having the time of my life. LEAD week went amazingly well for me, especially since the student life committee (SLC) basically just hung out the whole week instead of doing that hard core focus group meeting stuff. For us, training meant bonding over ice cream in OB, going to the beach, and just hanging out in general. I love being on SLC...seriously...they're the greatest group of peoples ever and we have so much fun everywhere we go. And we get to hang out all the time since we're always together working on the next school activity, so we're pretty much always having fun. NSO was pretty fun too. Selling Lomativities passes to unsuspecting parents as their freshmen students are checking in...sooooo much fun! Parents will buy anything to make sure their kids have a great freshman year experience. Haha. But seriously, it was cool. And once again, SLC didn't have to do anything really except sell Lomativities passes and then set up for the GAP (Get Acquainted/Awkward Party) where we scooped out yummy ice cream to the freshmen as they mingled amongst themselves trying to meet people whose names they'll probably never remember. Seriouly folks, fun times. And even now that classes have started, it's still fun times all around. I'm enjoying my classes, my professors are great, and I get to see my friends all the time. Two major bummers though: 1.) In the one week that I've had classes, I already have 2 presentations and 3 papers due within this next week, and 2.) I'm back to working both of my jobs, which are taking up a lot of my precious free/workout/study time. As if I'm not busy enough just trying to breathe! But like I said before, FUN TIMES, even with the work and the homework and the busyness. Honestly, I have never been more excited for school than I am this year. Maybe it's just because I'm a senior and graduation is right around the corner, but whatever. I'm stoked for this school year and I know it's going to be great, no matter what happens. I love my classes, I love my new dorm (Goodwin! what what!), I love my new roomie, I love my friends, I love our new RD and his school spirit, I love SLC, I love being involved, and I love being back at Loma! Now I never thought I'd say that in a million years, but it's true. God has truly blessed me with an amazing enthusiasm for this year, and I'm excited to see all the things He is going to do this year. As for other developments in my life...well...there are none really. I guess I should mention that within one month I will be on my way to Russia with a team from my church (including my mommy and daddy) and we will be spending ten days in St. Petersburg doing street outreach and evangelism, reaching out to the Russian people and telling them about the love of Jesus. I am so excited to be going on this trip! It's going to be amazing! So please pray for that as this type of ministry is going to be VERY different from what I'm used to doing with SportQuest. But I'm excited to step out and do something different for my Jesus. Also please pray for me as I make a decision regarding a deeper involvement with SportQuest. Last Thursday, Kent rang me and asked me to consider becoming the new Director of Alumni for SportQuest. This is a huge time commitment and will require a lot of hours and hard work, keeping in touch with every athlete that has participated on a SportQuest team and encouraging them. It's something I would love to do and feel I would be good at, but I'm just not sure I can make the time commitment as I am already loaded down with school and work, plus I will be starting an internship soon as well. This is a big decision for me and I want to be sure I make the right one. And finally, I want to end with something God spoke to me earlier today as I was having my Jesus time. It's pretty intense... "Then his people believed his promises. Then they sang his praise. Yet how quickly they forgot what he had done! They wouldn't wait for his counsel!...The people refused to enter the pleasant land, for they wouldn't believe his promise to care for them. Instead, they grumbled in their tents and refused to obey the Lord." ~Psalm 106:12-13, 24-25 (NLT) How many times do we refuse a greater blessing, how many times do we miss out on something so much more amazing than what we have or where we're at because we refuse to trust that God will take care of us? I spend way too much time sitting on my butt worrying that I'm going to mess up something, and so I'm missing out on the greater things God has in mind for me. I'm so scared of being outside of God's will sometimes that it brings me to the state of inaction. And that is not a state I want to be in. I don't want to be like the people of Israel, refusing to enter the Promised Land because of fear and unbelief and lack of trust. I want to step into what God has promised me despite my fears and uncertainties, because I trust that God WILL take care of me. Let's not hold back any longer because of fear. Let us trust in God to take care of us. Let us take that step of faith. Let us enter into the Promised Land! 8月15日 God Speaks...and I'm put in my place... So right before I read this from Spurgeon, I was writing in my journal whining to God that I just don't understand why I had certain experiences this summer that I thought would result in something, but they haven't. And God totally spoke back to me... Just read it... You'll see what I mean... "...shall we not be comforted as we discern that our dear Friend and tender soul-husband knows all about us? 1. He is the Physician, and if He knows all, there is no need that the patient should know. Hush, thou silly, fluttering heart, prying, peeping, and suspecting! What thou knowest not now, thou shalt know hereafter, and meanwhile Jesus, the beloved Physician, knows thy soul in adversities. Why need the patient analyse all the medicine, or estimate all the symptoms? This is the Physician's work, not mine; it is my business to trust, and his to prescribe. If He shall write His prescription in uncouth characters which I cannot read, I will not be uneasy on that account, but rely upon His unfailing skill to make all plain in the result, however mysterious in the working. 2. He is the Master, and His knowledge is to serve us instead of our own; we are to obey, not to judge: 'The servant knoweth not what his lord doeth'. Shall the architect explain his plans to every hodman on the works? If he knows his own intent, is it not enough? The vessel on the wheel cannot guess to what pattern it shall be conformed, but if the potter understands his art, what matters the ignorance of the clay? My Lord must not be cross-questioned any more by one so ignorant as I am. 3. He is the Head. All understanding centres there. What judgment has the arm? What comprehension has the foot? All the power to know lies in the head. Why should the member have a brain of its own when the head fulfils for it every intellectual office? Here, then, must the believer rest his comfort in sickness, not that he himself can see the end, but that Jesus knows all. Sweet Lord, be thou for ever eye, and soul, and head for us, and let us be contenet to know only what Thou choosest to reveal." ~Charles Spurgeon, Morning and Evening I guess it's time for me to stop questioning God and to just start trusting and obeying. Not easy to do, by any means. But what a learning experience this will be! Lord, teach me! |
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