waiting...

I got word today that I've been given medical clearance for the Jman process, so that means they can now review my file. I guess now I wait until late February/early March to find out if I get to go to conference in April.

Pray for my patience for waiting and that I will continue to seek God's guidance in this next chapter of my life.

Working on Sunday

Last week, through a series of events, I wound up working on Sunday. Sunday has been my intentional day off ever since I started working "outside the bubble" of Christianity. Basically, it's the only day I ask off for any reason besides classes. Because of this, Sunday has become my favorite day of the week. My grades do not depend on me being in class, and my paycheck doesn't have to depend on me being at work. Sundays, I choose what I want to do when I want to do it. Most Sundays, I choose to go to church.

I love my church almost as much as I love my mission family in Guatemala. There is just something about being a part of the Body of Christ that makes me know I'm in the right spot. I love my church because it feels like home. More than that, I love my church because it is full of people that love eachother, love others, and love God. It is the only church I have ever been to in the States where I felt welcome the first time I stepped foot in it.

So missing church for work on Sunday was a very interesting experience. I never intended to work on a Sunday, but this week I inevitably had to, as I said, because of a special circumstance of events that I won't go into. It's not pretty. While I felt like something crucial in my week was missing, it was fun to see our regular customers at Starbucks, seeing who was dressed up like they were going to church, and seeing who dwindled in like it was a Saturday. I was pleasantly surprised by several, and was glad that they did get to worship with their church body that day.

I did have to realize, too, that going to church is not the only way I can fellowship and worship, it's just a form of being obedient. I'm not trying to minimize the importance of fellowship, because it is SO important, I'm just saying it was not the end of the world for me to have to miss church on Sunday just to work.

Needless to say, I missed seeing my church family on Sunday, but learned from the Lord nonetheless.

Learning....

This week, I'm learning again to not let Satan steal my joy. I've had to learn this so many times in the past several years, especially in high school and a few times in college. This has been one of those weeks. The kind of week where I wish I could tell the people closest to me how I feel, but knowing that if I did it would expose all kinds of "ugly" inside me that I don't want people to see.

One time, in high school, in the discipleship group I was a part of, our leaders gave us wooden blocks and had us write words on them that gave us problems. All of us wrote things like boys, loneliness, rejection, etc. They made us carry these bricks around in our backpacks all week long, and then the next week we talked about them to the group and burned them, as a symbol of giving them up to Jesus. I don't remember exactly what I wrote on my bricks, but I remember one of the girls looking at me and saying, "Ang, you hide so much." I have remembered that moment so clearly ever since then. And it didn't make me mad, it just made me reflect on how much I actually do hide.

So this has been another week of "hiding." I feel like I need to carry around more bricks this week. But I don't want to. I just want to give them to Jesus and not carry them because I know that only He can take care of them. But I also want to talk about them to people, except doing that would make people know how much more I'm hiding, and I want to keep hiding it. Not that I want people to think I have it all together, but I also don't want people to feel sorry for me and start doing things differently out of pity.

I hope this makes sense. If not, I'm sorry. I know that only Jesus can take care of my bricks, because He is the refining fire.

I Finished!

Praise the Lord! I finished my applications to the IMB for the Journeyman program. The autobiography was the hardest thing, because they ask for so much detail, but won't accept more than 10 pages double spaced 10 point font. That sounds like a lot of space to fill up, but with the detail they want you to cover, and since you're writing about your own life, it is hard not to make it more than 10 pages. I had to mess with the side margins and make them smaller to make it all fit on 10 pages. Go me.

The only thing I have left to do is to go to the doctor tomorrow and have her write a letter to the travel insurance place telling them that my asthma is not bad enough to keep me from living overseas. Ha. I also will be calling in the morning to make sure they received everything I've turned in, as well as the references that are needed.

If you think of me, please pray that they have received all my paperwork, that I will get invited to the April interview conference, and that the Lord would continue to show me requests that He could potentially have me fill. Pray that He would cause me to fall completely in love with the one that he wants me to answer so that there is no doubt in my mind that that's where He wants me.

I'm completely loving this phase of my life, because it's the first time I've ever made a major, life-changing decision completely independently of my parents. Yes, I have asked them for advice because they are wise people, but I look to them mostly for support, and they have supported me and encouraged me in this process. I'm looking forward to May 15 when I get to walk, get my diploma, and look forward to what's next in God's plan for me.

Random items...

So last night at almost 2 am I sent in the final draft of my 10-page long, 10-point font, .5inch margins autobiography to the IMB. Glad to have that checked off my list. Now I have two more things to get turned in by Tuesday, and hopefully I will receive an invite to the April conference.

Last night before I finished my draft, I went with some girl friends to see 27 Dresses. It was a cute movie, funny, but definitely not the best or funniest movie I've ever seen in my life. I was afraid to see it because I was worried that it would turn out being prophetic of my life, considering that I was in 3 weddings in a row last summer. But I'm not too worried, because I don't have a sister that will try to steal any guy from me. whew.

I've been loving my last days off school, despite having to work and miss out on my apartment's active social life some, but it's been fun being able to sleep in in the morning sometimes and still have the apartment to myself when I get up because the roomies are still sleeping.

I'm looking forward to being able to give my 2 weeks notice at Starbucks, but that is not for another six months. I hope I do not get super lazy as I know the time approaches, an I hope I can make the best of being able to work so I can save save save!

Have a good one!

13 years ago...

13 years ago today (technically yesterday, since it's past midnight), January 12, 1995, was one of the most defining days in the life of my family. We were living in Xela, Guatemala, I was 9 years old, in the third grade. We still traveled every so often back to the village we lived in before, but we did not live there permanently anymore.

My father had traveled to a town about an hour away from Xela for a pastor's meeting. It was around 8:30 p.m. and he was driving home from the meeting on a dark, curvy highway. He came upon a blind curve, and his headlights shone on what looked like a woman wearing a blonde wig trying to flag him down for a ride. He had decided not to stop for anyone after dark, so he didn't. But the next thing he saw was a man on the curb raising a shotgun. The next thing he knew, he was yelling, and didn't know where his right arm was. He contemplated pulling over, but he knew that if he did, he would probably bleed to death. He was driving a Toyota Land Cruiser, and had it in second gear, which allowed him to continue driving the next five kilometers into the small Mayan indian town that is normally closed up by this time of night. He pulled into the only gas station in that town, where there was a man pumping gas. He yelled for help out the window, and the man hopped in the car and shifted gears for my dad, directing him to the basketball court where the Red Cross volunteer basketball team was practicing. They got my dad into the back seat of the car, and drove him, he says, faster than he ever wants to go again in his life, in to Xela. We lived on the outskirts of town, right on the highway, so he was able to tell them where we lived so they could pick up my mom and she could guide them to the hospital. My mom and I had gone to dinner that night with another missionary family, and even though we had gotten home in time for my dad to be home, I had gone to get ice cream and pick up clothes with my friend and her dad, because she was going to spend the night. My friend's mom stayed with my mom at the house, and while we were gone they pulled up and got my mom. Once they arrived at the hospital, our family doctor was there helping a Mormon missionary who had dislocated his shoulder.

When my friend, her dad and I got home, her mom came out of our front door, looked at me and said, "Angela, your dad is going to be ok." and I said, "What happened to him?" She said, "Your dad has been shot, but he will be ok." I was nine years old...so I related being shot with dying. "Is he dead?" I asked. She repeated, "No, he's going to be ok." That night, the other family stayed with me at our house, since they did not have a telephone and they needed to call our mission family and find out how to notify my brother, since he was in Guatemala City at a Soccer tournament.

There are several things about that night that I consider God's way of displaying His love to us in ways that we don't understand. First off, He knew that my dad was going to get shot, and he placed the right people in the right places at the right time in order to get my dad he help that he needed. The man at the gas station, the red cross playing basketball, me not at home when they came to get my mom, and our doctor at the hospital when she was supposed to be on a date. Another thing was that my mother had considered going with him to this meeting, but had decided to stay home with me. Had my mom been in the car with my dad, the gunshot would have gone right through her head. My dad was shot with bird shot, and the main impact was right in the crease of his underarm on his back. If it had gone any higher or lower it would have damaged vital organs, or killed him.

For a month after the incident, our doctor would come to the house and clean out my dad's wound, dead cells, and getting out as many of the lead pellets that she could. He still has 100 of them in his upper torso, since they were only able to remove about 20.

My dad is alive and well today, and lives to tell his story. I can't tell it the way he can, and I've only really heard him tell it once in depth. This entry doesn't do his point of view justice. I can only tell the story from a 9 year old girl's point of view. But from that same point of view, I can say that I am so thankful that my Daddy is still here, God was not finished with him on January 12, 1995, and he's still not done with him in 2008. He is my hero.

Recently

Last week was quite possibly one of the best weeks of my life. Why? I only worked one shift, had the rest of the week off, and didn't even fly anywhere! Yes, I did go out of town, to Oklahoma, to visit Jenn, Robert, and Emma again, and it was so fun. But it was also just super fun to be able to sleep in and not do anything at any certain time because I didn't have to. It was pure bliss. Then this week it has been back to the grind, though I feel quite refreshed and new since last week. I'm back to work, not quite ready for school to start back but oh so ready to get it over with and walk across that stage.

On another note, Here are my goals for the next two weeks:
-finish my IMB application, because this is what will determine the next chapter in my life
-work on getting ready for my trip to Honduras over Spring Break, which will be an amazing mission trip with my church. I am taking leadership in doing some women's ministry, so I have to get some craft ideas and stories together for that. I can't wait. I'm so stinkin' excited.