Forever 2012 Promo Video

Here is the video I made for the project I am currently working on. Find out more from www.forever2012.com

Good AND Loving?

So, in my previous blog, I wrote about God being good.  In the last few days, there have been moments of deeper revelations into areas where even though I have knowledge that He is good, everything in my prayer life and day to day living proves that I do not truly believe this and do not allow this truth of His goodness to sink into the very core of me. I am constantly giving God a loop hole in my prayers in case He doesn't answer, I won't blame Him and become bitter.  In my prayers, I almost pray expecting Him to fail me.  In a way, I'm trying to protect myself from being let down by His character.  But I am learning that His character doesn't need protecting or defending.  He is who He says He is.  He says he is good and makes all things happen for the good of those who love Him. Numbers 23:19 says "God is not a man, so he does not lie.  He is not human, so he does not change his mind.  Has he ever spoken and failed to act?  Has he ever promised and not carried through?" He is good and I can trust him!  I can pray honest prayers and believe He loves me and knows me.

 I have never struggled to see God as serious and mighty and king and ruler. I have never doubted that in his presence, there are serious issues and serious discussions and serious missions.

But love has been so much harder. Seeing God as someone that laughs with me and kids with me and wants good things for my life and provides cool friendships. Seeing Him as someone that cares about the little things that no one else notices or as someone that collects my tears in a jar, as Psalms says, has been difficult. Believing that it gives Him joy to see me writing or designing or playing sports or a million other things has been hard.

Things are changing though. He has been showing me that He is more flowers than thistles, more laughter than wrath, more open hand than closed fist. Is He serious? Without a doubt. Do I still feel like it’s a big deal to come into His court? Certainly, only now I think it’s OK to arrive there by water slide.(acuff)

His Goodness.

Recently, some really cool things have been happening in my life.  I was able to go to Texas for my cousins wedding, go to Austria for a YWAM conference, and visit my teammate's home in Sweden!  Currently, I'm on outreach playing beach volleyball and soccer with a bunch of people along the beach.  In the middle of all that, I've met an amazing friend that has been incredible and I think sometimes..it's too good to be true (this friend happens to be a boy (wink, wink, wink) but that's not the point of this post...maybe there will be another update on that later haha) Anyways, the point of all this is with good things happening around me, I have caught myself constantly waiting for the punch line...waiting for the point where this all ends, and I go back to slaving away for my master.  Waiting for God to take away these good things and put me in my place.  I was praying and reading Jon Acuff and I suddenly realized a few skewed views I have of God. 

1. The god in my head is a jerk.
The first thing I think he’s going to do when I bump into something good is take it all away in some horrific call to somewhere else.

2. The god in my head calls me to things I’d hate.
He’s not a god that lines up the unique way he created me with a unique calling. In fact he does just the opposite. He finds something I love and then acts me to do something I’d hate. 

3. The god in my head doesn’t give good things, he removes them.
When I find myself in the middle of something good, my instinct is to wrap my arms around it and protect it from the god in my head, not thank him for it.

How did I get there?

How did I get so far away from who I feel like God tries to reveal himself as over and over in the Bible?

As I’ve said before, when God has a single moment to reveal himself to Moses in Exodus 33, what does he show him? Does he show him his might or his power or his anger? When he essentially says, “When you see me, this is what I want you to see,” what does he show Moses? His goodness.

“I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence.”

He reveals his goodness. God isn’t a jerk. God is good.

And throughout the Bible, God doesn’t call people to things they’re not created for. He calls them to situations that awaken deep seated purpose and desires in people that God himself placed there before they were even born. Paul, the loud, bold, road tripping persecutor of Christians, is not called by God on the road to Damascus to become a quiet, shy, homebody theologian. He becomes a loud, bold, road tripping megaphone of hope.

God doesn’t call us to things we’re not designed to do.

Throughout the Bible, we also see a picture of God as someone who delights in giving. One of my favorite examples is Luke 11:11-13. Jesus says:

“Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

I love these verses because they’re just blunt enough to break through my callused heart. Jesus uses such crazy examples! He doesn’t say, “Which of you fathers if your son asks for an egg, will give him a piece of bread?” He says, “If he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?”

I think he uses two such wildly different things, an egg and a scorpion, because he knows we’ll be tempted to create a jerk god in our head. A god who would give us the worst thing possible. A god who’d give a scorpion instead of an egg.

I don’t know what the god in your head looks like.

But, I bet he’s a jerk. I bet he wants you to be miserable. I bet he’s got a suitcase full of scorpions with your name on it.

That’s not God though. God loves goodness. God loves mercy, not sacrifice. God loves gift giving. God loves the sick. God loves the mess-ups.

And though it may feel hard to believe if you’ve spent years with a different god in your head, God loves you.

Ultimate gift

"The ultimate gift of the Gospel is NOT the new heavens and new earth, the ultimate good of the Gospel is NOT the redeemed body, the ultimate good of the Gospel is NOT forgiveness of sins, NOT redemption, NOT propitiation, NOT justification...these are all means!! The ultimate good of the Gospel is God Himself beheld in the Glory of His crucified and risen Son, enjoyed because of His infinite beauty, treasured because of His infinite worth, and reflected because we're being conformed to the image of his son. Christ suffered once, the righteous for the unrighteous, that He might bring us to God...there is no end after that...everything before that is means" - John Piper

Eat, Pray, Love

To be honest, I’ve been talking too much my whole life, but I’ve really been talking too much during my stay. I have another two months here, and I don’t want to waste the greatest spiritual opportunity of my life by being all social and chatty the whole time. It’s been amazing for me to discover that even here, even in a sacred environment of spiritual retreat on the other side of the world, I have managed to create a cocktail-party like vibe around me. I’ve found myself creating appointments to see acquaintances, having to say to somebody, “I’m sorry, I can’t hang out with you at lunch today because I promised so-and-so I would eat with her.. maybe we could make a date for Tuesday.”
Learning how to discipline your speech is a way of preventing your energies spilling out of you through the rupture of your mouth, exhausting you and filling the world with words, words, words instead of serenity, peace and bliss. So I am not going to be the social bunny anymore, I’ve decided. No more scurrying, gossiping, joking. No more spotlight-hogging or conversation-dominating. No more verbal tap-dancing for pennies of affirmation. It’s time to change.
God isn’t interest in watching you enact some performance of personality in order to comply with some crackpot notion you have about how a spiritual person looks or behaves. We all seem to get this idea that, in order to be sacred, we have to make some massive, dramatic change of character, that we have to renounce our individuality.
So what is my natural character? My dream of finding divinity by gliding silently through the place with a gentle, ethereal smile - who is that person? That’s probably someone I saw on a TV show. The reality is, it’s a little sad for me to admit, that I will never be that character. I’ve always been so fascinated by these wraith-like, delicate souls.. Always wanted to be the quiet girl. Probably precisely because I’m not. It’s the same reason I think that thick, dark hair is so beautiful- precisely because I don’t have it, because I can’t have it. But at some point you have to make peace with what you were given and if God wanted me to be a shy girl with thick, dark hair, he would have made me that way, but he didn’t. Useful, then, might be to accept how I was made and embody myself fully therein.
This doesn’t mean I cannot be devout. It doesn’t mean I can’t be thoroughly tumbled and humbled with God’s love. This doesn’t mean I can’t serve humanity. It doesn’t mean I can’t improve myself as a human being, honing my virtues and working daily to minimize my vices. For instance, I’m never going to be a wallflower, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t take a serious look at my talking habits and alter some aspects for the better – working within my personality. Yes, I like talking, but perhaps I don’t always have to go for the cheap laugh, and maybe I don’t need to talk about myself quite so constantly. Or here’s a radical concept – maybe I can stop interrupting others when they are speaking. Because no matter how creatively I try to look at my habit of interrupting, I can’t find another way to see it than this: “I believe that what I am saying is more important than what you are saying.” And I can’t find another way to see that than: “I believe that I am more important than you.” And that must end.

Crazy. Beautiful. Life.

I wanted to sum up my life in the last 3 months in one word, but the English dictionary just doesn't have a word that can actually describe this crazy beautiful life I've been living!  First, I looked up the meaning of the word "busy" but it says, "actively and attentively engaged in work" that is a true statement, I have been busy, but I couldn't describe my time here with the word busy because it neglects the excitement and joy of it all!  Actively engaged in work? How could I classify what I get to wake up and do every morning as work? Work sounds boring!  So I thought of words like active, accelerated, and rapid which do a better job of describing the word busy with adrenaline and excitement, but still those words don't do justice to my time in England!  How about I catch y'all up on what's been going on in this area of the world, and maybe you can help me come up with the perfect word.

So, starting in March, I went to Denmark and visited my Danish friends Laila and Kirsten!  I was also able to speak on a bible weekend retreat for students age 12-18!  Laila and Kirsten introduced me to dark bread called rugbrød! I think I was addicted almost immediately and since coming back to London, I have searched the streets for a Danish Ryebread dealer!  I need my bread fix!  The time in Denmark was just incredible and full of joy while catching up with these girls and laughing about our times on DTS!  Also during the bible weekend, I took a walk with one of the youth at the conference and during our conversation, I couldn't believe how much I was learning and being encouraged by her as oppose to the other way around!

When I returned to London, my sister came to visit!  Jacee was only there for 3 days, but it was so much fun to hang out with her!  It was great to have a group of Texans in my backyard again!  Jacee came with some of my friends from Denver City and one of my best friends from Texas Tech, Katy Moore!  We sang the Texas Tech fight song and it was great to have people wearing red and black in support of the Red Raiders! We were able to see the Lion King, which was my first Broadway/West End show, and stroll around downtown London at night!  It was so much fun having them here.  I just wish they could have stayed longer, but now it just means they will have to come back to get the real tour of England!

The day my sister left, my friend from South Korea came to visit, and she helped me get to work on alot of the design work that needed to be down for the Forever team.  Together we completed 2 weeks of work in 2 days, so it was such a huge blessing to have her here!  The last day that she was here, we went on a quick tour of London and wanted to take pictures in front of the O2 arena!  When we arrived, we saw that Enrique Iglasias was performing that night, so we went to an official and asked if they had any more tickets.  The man told us they were sold out, but 3 people didn't come and claim their tickets, so we could have them for free and the VIP lounge bands that went with them!  It was so much fun and really funny because seconds before we asked about tickets Lynn had said "Who is this guy?  An actor or something?"  Maybe the hardcore fans out there wouldn't be so happy that mediocre fans just got front seats to the man of their dreams!


After the concert, Lynn left for the Airport, and I went straight to Manchester for a week where we as the Olympic Forever team ran a week called "DTS Gathering"  This is where trainees from all the YWAM bases around England come together for a week of Evangelism training and outreach (as well as sleeping on the floor and having 60 girls sharing one bathroom!)  Myself and Rebecka both led the sports outreaches.  During the week, we ran 2 football clinics, played a football game and helped with a football tournament!  Football was the key and we were able to use sport to show Christ love.  They had outreaches of Art, Family and Children, homeless ministry, and prayer walks.  It was so much fun and really cool to have such variety of ways to Evangelize.  We are already planning our next gathering for the beginning of June, so I'm excited to use the same tools we used for Manchester, but this time we will be able to do outreach with a beach as our "football pitch" hopefully we can play a little volleyball as well!

When I returned from Manchester, the next task was receiving my level 1 football coaching badge!  This meant playing football (soccer) everyday from 9am-5pm.  It was actually really fun and I learned so much about the sport!  We practiced coaching around 14 drills, and while we were not coaching, we were being coached by the other trainees!  With this training, I will go into an area of London next week and run soccer schools for kids grades 1-5!  I'm really excited because the format will be integrating football and life lessons together with Jesus being the focus of it all!  I just hope that the kids don't really show me up and make me look like a fool with their smooth skills.  I know it is highly possible to be beaten by a 6 year old, so I'm a bit nervous!  Good news is the weather has been amazing and I have a great tan which I heard was almost impossible to receive in gloomy England!

So that all brings me to this week.  I just returned from a recruiting trip to Scotland where we talked with the bases there about getting involved in the Olympics and encouraged them to begin thinking about how they can be apart of what we are doing in England.  It was an amazing trip and Scotland was incredible! It was great to see the land of William Wallace and the Lockness Monster!

So, after hearing about life in England, does anyone have a word that could describe this madness, this crazy beautiful, frustrating and stressful, wonderful life.

Robots

The robot named “me” was beautiful. At first.

Have you ever tried to be someone else? Have you ever tried to change who you are? To make yourself better, or smarter or just different? I have and for awhile it actually worked.

I built a robotic version of myself, I mentally constructed an entirely new version of me. I didn’t have any plans and certainly didn’t crack the Bible for guidance in this transformation. I decided instead to rely on what had always worked for me in the past. I built an opposite machine.

Pure and simple, One semester I was determined to be the exact opposite of who I had been the previous semester. If I was a jerk to everyone in the fall, I would be nice to everyone in the spring. Never studying became relentless studying. Constant time with bad influences became no time spent with bad influences And so forth.  I constructed my identity to be who I thought I needed to be.

I just did the reverse of everything I had ever done first semester. I played a game, I was who I thought everyone expected me to be. The results?  Life was great and everyone liked me. It worked so well, and I secretly thought inside, “Forget God, when I’m in a jam, I’ll just whip out the opposite approach.”

The opposite approach served me well for a while until I ran into problems that were just too big for that small coping mechanism.

Every trick I relied on to solve problems failed. And when I cried out to God about why he wasn’t fixing the situation, I felt like the answer was because I kept expecting the fix to come from my menu of options. I kept, qualifying my cry of “help me.” What I was actually saying to him was, “help me in one of the following ways that I’m used to and have tried before and understand and approve of.”

But God doesn’t work that way. He doesn’t take the recipes for success I’ve always tried and then just add some God flavoring. That’s frustrating, because that makes it really hard to manage him or life for that matter. Isaiah 55:8-9 speaks to this point: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” I used to rage against that idea, because I wanted God to be like me. To fix things like I would. To handle things like I would. In my time frame, in my way.

But the truth is, his way is always more patient and loving than mine would be. If it were up to me, extreme punishment and years of back breaking penance would be the first thing I received if I ever ran away from home. That’s what I tend to feel is in order when I fail. Guilt and anger and shame are the first things that jump into my mouth when I mess up. But not God, because he’s different than us. He’s not restricted to the human understanding of cause and effect, action and consequence. His way is different. His way is Christ. His way is grace.

Ultimately, God doesn’t just replace our solutions with new solutions from him. He replaces them with him. He knows that if he gave us a new list of action items, we’d worship that instead. When pushed into a corner, when darkened by stress and turmoil, we would seek comfort in our printed out list of instructions, instead of the instructor.

So instead he offers us a savior instead of a solution. He offers us a relationship, not a routine. Full of mystery, full of creativity, and yes, sometimes full of frustration. (Jon Acuff)

Not Without Love....

I tried Lord
Chin up, head high
All zeal and no joy
Thinking all my good deeds could please Jesus
Boy, was I wrong
Though I knew the right songs, all my cymbals and gongs played the melodies wrong
And it wasn’t long ‘til I saw my disease
A life spent wanting to please
On hands and knees
To make right, to appease
God help me please
This can’t be Christianity, it can’t be
The whole thing’s like insanity
Where’s the rest of eternal security?
Where’s the hope of a God big enough to cope with all my hang-ups and insecurities?
Certainly this isn’t breathing
My chest burning and heaving
It’s like my pulse is ceasing
Like my heart quits beating 
Yet this I recall to mind and therefore I have hope:
You died, Lord
You died, Lord
Assuredly, like the coming of the dawn, the Father’s love song goes on
Drowning out my bitter songs
And breaking through walls and barriers
Christ swoops in, removes sin, picks up His bride and carries her 
So I can sing in agreement with the King this thing:
There’s only one thing that pleases the Father
The God-man on the tree in the midst of the scoffers
Now I finally see that Christ is what Christ offers
And I’m finally free in the love of the Father

Forever Designs

Hey guys! just wanted to share some of the stuff I've been designing for the Olympic Forever team! Check Check Check it out. This is the front of the cards and the back of the cards have information about how to get involved!  If you want a card, send me your address and I'll mail you one :)

It's ok, to not be ok!

Here is the thing I suddenly realized today...I don't know what I'm doing! SUPRISE!  Just in case anyone out there had a misconception that I know what to do, guess what, I don't!  It is completely freeing feeling when I finally come to the realization that I am so inadequate for a job like the OLYMPICS (I put it in caps so you could see how extremely massive the olympics is!  Doesn't it look like a huge word beside the little non-capital words?  

Good, I hope my point has been proven that the Olympics is big and I am not!  I have tried for 3 weeks to live up to an image that I am confident in who I am and what I am doing!  It can almost feel like you are drowning trying to keep everything together and try to please the masses.  It all finally came crashing at dinner tonight when my friend from Switzerland who is here for the week asked me in how I am doing.  I started with a solid "great, things are good, we have contacts around London, we have cool football opportunities lined up" and by the end of the conversation I was crying in a cafeteria full of unsuspecting victums saying "I just don't know what to do,  I'm not strong, I'm not wise, I'm not creative, I'm not good at this job!!"  

Now, this is coming from a girl that has prided herself in the past for not crying in open places and being the strong one when everyone is emotional.  It was a nice humbling lesson!  I think the insensitive me would have sat in the corner mocking the emotional me on this particular occasion, but I don't care anymore, because sometimes it is ok to not be ok.  It was so great to sit there with this friend and be honest.  I came full face with the fact that I am so inadequate for this job, but that God is the definition of adequate!  He makes the capitalized Olympics look like a tiny grain sand in his big picture!  My friend reminded me that it's ok to not know what I'm doing because God does and He is going to get his plan accomplished with or without me.  That is exactly what I needed to hear today!  

I am disposable, this Olympics outreach doesn't hinge on me and will not be held together or broken apart by me.  This outreach has everything to do with God and His name and His story being made known among the whole earth and nothing to do with sports venues and football clinics and church contacts slopped together by Dondi.  I just need to write this now and hopefully get it fully embedded in my brain, so that if I do accomplish anything that looks like even the slightest form of success then I can immediately remember how much I don't know, and how much all of it had to do with the grace of God.  There will never in the next 2 years be a reason for me to ever "pat myself on the back" because I can tell you with confidence, when it's done on my watch and on my own imagination and creativity...it will be disastrous...guaranteed!  

I'm so thankful that God uses people who are so extremely unqualified for a job like this, so it will be obvious at the end of the day who gets the "pat on the back"....(which happens to be one of my pet peeves in Christian culture..."everyone, lets give God a hand!" or "Pat Jesus on the back!" so I just broke my own personal rule...but it's ok, 150 people just saw me break down over a plate of sweet and sour chicken, so today is fair game!)

Witty Jon.

Seriously, this guy Jon Acuff is hilarious!  You need to check out his blog...www.jonacuff.com!   He frequently points out some of the silliness in Christianity, but always brings truth into the situation.  I just get a good laugh out of some of the things he points out and have to nod my head and realize I am sometimes apart of these culture things Christians like. He says things like Sometimes, we fall in love on mission trips even though we know we'll break up when we get back.  Sometimes, you think, "I wish I had a t-shirt that said 'I direct deposit my tithe' so people wouldn't judge me." Sometimes, we have to give the media guy in the back "the head turn" when the slides haven't changed or a microphone isn't on. Sometimes, the stuff that comes with faith is funny  Here is my all time favorite!
  "The Jesus Juke"

Like a football player juking you at the last second and going a different direction, the Jesus Juke is when someone takes what is clearly a joke filled conversation and completely reverses direction into something serious and holy.

In this particular case, when I tweeted a joke about the guy doing pushups, someone tweeted me back, “Imagine If we were that dedicated in our faith, family, and finances?”

I was fine with that idea, I was, but it was a Jesus Juke. We went from, “Whoa, there’s a mountain of a man doing pushups next to the Starbucks at the airport,” to a serious statement about the lack of discipline we have in our faith and our family and our finances.

I don’t know how to spell it, but in my head I heard that sad trumpet sound of “whaaaa, waaaa.”

And that wasn’t even a bad Jesus Juke. I didn’t mind that statement at all. That guy seemed fine. I’ve heard much worse. I once tweeted about going to see Conan O’Brien live and how big the crowd was. Someone wrote back, “If we held a concert for Jesus and gave away free tickets, no one would come.” Whaaa, waaaa.

Chances are you’ve experienced this. Someone pulled the Christian version of the Debbie Downer, they threw out a bit of Jesus Juke on you. If you have, or even if you haven’t, there are three things we all need to know about this particular move.

1. It generates shame.

The Jesus Juke is a great way to tell a friend, “I wish you possessed the uber holiness I do and were instead talking about sweet baby Jesus in this conversation.” It’s like a tiny little “shame grenade,” you throw it into an otherwise harmless conversation and then watch it splatter everyone in guilt and condemnation.

2. It never leads to good conversation.

I’ve been Jesus Juked dozens of times in my life and I’ve never once seen it lead to a productive, healthy conversation. You might think it will before you juke, but what usually happens is just raw amounts of awkwardness, similar to how I felt sitting in a theater watching the Last Airbender.

3. I’ve never met someone who was “juked to Jesus.”

I once tweeted, “No one’s ever said: ‘The way you bitterly mock other Christians helped me begin a life-changing love of Jesus’ (Be kind).” I wrote that because I wanted to remind us that our jerkiness never led folks to Christ. I don’t think our jukes do either. I don’t really see it as a conversion technique. It’s more of a conversation killer technique.

I hope we all keep talking about Jesus. I hope we talk about him lots and lots. I hope he defines our life and conversations. But if I tell you that when it comes to My Little Pony, I tend to prefer Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie and that Toola Roola has been riding their coattails for years, please don’t respond, “You know who created ponies? Our Lord God did, that’s who.”

Has anyone ever pulled a “Jesus Juke” on you?

Cheerio Ole' Chap!

Here is a picture of the entire forever sports team!!  Myself and Rebecka from Sweden (who has made it very clear that she is uninterested in country music....I have 2 years with this girl...we will see how she feels about it at the end of 2012!) Together, we are networking with churches and sports organizations and providing platforms for people to come and join the outreach for the Olympics in 2012.  

Things I have learned in the last month in England.

-As much as I have resisted...it is hard not to naturally say football now when referring to soccer...I've CONFORMED!!

-Never trust the weatherman...so called "sunny" days are a tease...they should just do a month forecast and copy and paste "cold and rainy" on every day of the week.  I haven't de-thawed since I have arrived.

-Saying "my pants are dirty" is actually is referring to your underware...trousers, always say trousers.

-mocking the english accent by saying "bloody" and "cheerio" all the time doesn't help the whole making friends process.

-4 cups of tea in one day is a low count for the day

-Fish and Chips is the meal to eat here...sad when you have your hopes up for fish and doritos and they bring out Fish and Fries...Chips=Fries.

--There is alot of work to be done and only 24 hours in one day.

--I officially work for Youth With a Meeting.
--Having a chat with a friend over a cup of hot tea make bad days, good and good days, better!

--Football  Soccer is an international language. 

--On my own strength, I'm worthless. In my weakness...He is strongest.

--I'm not wise enough, creative enough, bold enough to do this task...God provides so much grace.

--The nations are already in London, in one area we will work there are 67 different languages spoken in one school.

--God is going to be known and famous in this City.

Gordon Keith's uncomfortable interview with Zach Galifianakis

I can't explain why, but everytime I watch this video, I just can't stop laughing!

Matt Chandler on Leading Your Church and Yourself through Suffering

Good Quotes

"Best-case scenario is that God heals you. . . . Worst-case scenario, honestly, is that you get killed in a car wreck on your way home today."

"Nothing’s really changed for you—you just get to be aware that you’re mortal. Everyone is, but they’re just not aware of it. The gift that God’s given you is that you get to be aware of your mortality."

288 months OLD and 23 trips around the sun!

Surfing in Australia

Cape Town, South Africa

Semi-Finals of the World Cup. Netherlands vs. Uruguay

African Safari.

Quarter Finals Argentina vs. Germany....Vamos Argentina!

South African Safari!

Magazine Photoshoot! We're FAMOUS!

Sydney Tower, We were in the Sydney Newspaper here!

Sydney, Australia

Skydiving!

Ice Climbing in New Zealand

Bungy Swing, New Zealand

Skiing in the Swiss Alps!

24 years old today!  I remember when I was 18 thinking…man, 24 year olds are so old, and yet here I am reaching old age and loving every minute of it!  I have decided I really like birthdays, because it means I went through one more year of learning from my stupidity and realizing more and more that I really don't know much.  At 18, I thought I knew alot and had life figured out....so now, I can look back respond back to my 18 year old self..."oh yeah, well I think 18 year olds are stupid because you already know everything!" I just pray that each birthday I can look back at the last year and see growth in wisdom and humility!  So conclusion, Birthdays are great! My life completely changed last year, so I'm challenging 24 to try and beat 23! 

I pulled a few photos from my life this last year to remember the crazy adventures of 23! I can’t believe I was able to surf in Australia, go on an African Safari, attend a few world cup games, skydive, bungy and ice climb in New Zealand, and ski in the Swiss Alps!  I look at the places I have been and it really feels like I completed a life time bucket list in one year!  I have learned so much from these adventures like Learning more of what it means to be in awe of the Creator. Watching the violent waves crash against the shores of Australia and Africa and sitting in wonder of the power and majesty just in His pinky.  Or noticing how the mountains of Switzerland and the Sunsets of New Zealand seem to be God’s way of exclaiming “This is mine, this belongs to me!” that Creation is pointing to a creator and then in turn having a desire to not be out done by a rock.  Learning what worshiping as a lifestyle looks like and learning about fear of the Lord.  While on the African Safari, the Lion demanded my attention.  I couldn’t keep my eyes off of them, there was a fear of them but not in a oh crap that animal could destroy me sort of way, but a fear as in an awe inspiring, powerful sort of way.  The term “Lion of Judah” was brought to life!

Yes, I have seen a lot of cool things this year and I feel extremely blessed, but all of those things fail in comparison when placed against the fact that I was able to know God and make Him known among the nations!  The other things were almost worthless in comparison!  The adrenaline rush fades, the soccer team I love so much will lose, the snow will melt, but the word of the Lord is eternal.  The things I was able to see God move and restore and renew was so much greater than I could ever describe on paper!  The friendships I have made this year and the people I have grown to love is what I will look back at in 50 years and remember how life changing 23 was!  I pray that next year, I will look back at this point and get to pray “wow, God, I thought I knew you then.”  That God would continue to reveal himself and overwelm me with his love that I can’t help but share it with others!  Here’s to the 24^th time around the sun! OLE!