going outward...

rise up.
be bold.
be about ME.
wake up and look around.
act!!

these are words that i hear God speaking to my heart.  my heart is bursting with passion, but don't know where to start.  i am going to start with ending my blog.  this will be my last entry.  i will close out the blog soon (when i learn how).

God has been revealing so much to me... a whole summer of illuminations as my professor calls them.  and i need to now act.  and sitting at home writing blogs just doesn't seem to me NOW (whereas before it was a place to express my raw feelings) as more than a way for me to connect with whoever is still reading this.  i did at one point wonder if my blog could help those in need and maybe it has, but honestly... i feel like it's just about me and what i'm going through... a way to get sympathy... some attention even maybe.  i desire real relationships!!  phone calls, e-mails, letters... i want to connect with people on a deeper level... have a covenant relationship with grace, empowerment and intimacy.  speak into each others lives and be humble enough to be sharpened and then to sharpen others.  i don't want to keep blogging about it, hoping that someone will understand my heart and do it with me... i want to act upon it and have it.  i honestly don't even want to have artificial friendships on facebook.  i look at 400+ friends on facebook and think those aren't real friendships because when i look at that, there are really only a handful of people that i would consider having the covenant, grace-filled, empowering, intimate relationships that i desire.

i guess you could read into my frustration a little bit.  this is the thing... i want realness... genuineness... in depth rawness and the ability to stand naked and unashamed in front of people... especially my brothers and sisters and Christ.  i feel that the church should be that and instead there is more slander, gossip, put-downs, distance within... it saddens me.

this closing of my blog is not all of a sudden.  i don't want to come across impulsive.  i have been writing less and less... i've been praying about ending facebook as well.  it's my desire to connect...

four more days

listening to the sounds of the singing cicadas on my squirrel free balcony (we had a squirrel living in our tomato plant, now gone) as i think of how i have four more days before school starts for both A and me.  i am very sad that i will not be able to take A to her first day of school because i have classes that day, but am thankful for God's provision in having my sister's school go through construction so she doesn't have to start school until after labor day, making it a little easier for me to be okay since she will be taking her to school and picking her up.

as a single mom, i think you give yourself a little bit more pressure to do everything right and be there for everything.  when you can't you feel like a failure... you want to make up for the loss that your child has so you try extra harder to make it even better.  i know in my mind that if P was here it would be different and i probably wouldn't have felt all these little things are so meaningful... but it is what it is and as much as i tell myself it is okay... i still feel the pressure and feel like i'm letting A down and that she will feel the missing piece.

the thing is, no matter how hard i work at it, she'll always feel the missing piece and that's what's going to make up her story... but as a mom... as a parent, you can't let it go so easy.  so i give my sister the day to fill my missing piece with camera along so i don't have to miss it...

so four more days... i haven't finished one book that i wanted to before i start class and the pressure is on.  i have 14 credit hours of classes, but i have more classes that has to do with theology this semester than previous, so a little nervous about that.  those professors are much harder.  :)

i just wanted to say a little something on this balcony as i sat here before i start my reading.

let the semester begin!!

in kansas on the boat... please pray for us as you look at the picture.

Not What I expected

What day is it?  What time is it?  What do we have to do next?  This is not what I wanted from this summer.  I wanted my last relaxing summer with A.  I guess I should have guessed that wasn’t going to be the case when I signed up for an internship.  Yet my hopes of a fun filled summer was high since I was only doing the internship three days a week.  Unfortunately, it became a summer of busyness.

Days at the pool were scarce.  Meeting people was rare.  Riding our bikes hardly existed.  All things I was hoping to do a lot this summer ended up being something that really didn’t happen.  I really wanted to spend time with families from A’s class and build relationships.  I wanted to do fun things with my friends and I think I got one movie in with JM and a paddle board date with RP.  

In all of the things I did not expect, something else unexpected happen.  God started planting seeds of what my future may/could look like.  It’s so crazy… It came in the most unexpected, last thing I thought could ever happen type of way.  I’m still praying about it so I won’t go into detail, but I just know that what I have been running from may be the one thing that brings joy into my life in serving the Lord.

Another unexpected thing God has been doing in my life is growing contentment in me.  I have been for years wanting to get out of being single.  I didn’t want to raise A alone, I didn’t want to be a widow, I wanted to share my life with someone else…  but this summer God has given me the gift of contentment.  I really am content and satisfied at the life God has given me.  I have been doing this a little over four years and God has walked me through all of this.  Life has been good and God has been faithful.  So this summer I have realized my contentment and how even though my desire still exists, my dire need to have someone has gone down.  

The good thing is that if the Lord is truly leading me in what I think He is, I’m so glad He has also worked on my heart to be content.  A is doing real good as well… of course she still misses her daddy and asks for a new one, I have been reminding her how God has been with us these years and when it’s time, He will provide, but for now… He wants us to be the P girls…  

I currently am sitting on the deck of the P cabin in the middle of Kansas.  It is absolutely beautiful.  I see and unending stretch of land, patches of green and brown/yellow.  I see hawks flying in the sky looking for food.  The wind is blowing making the trees and dry grass dance to its beat.  I wanted to go to this hill that P used to go to with his high school friends and pray, but I decided to spend a couple hours with grandma instead.  And now I find myself in the middle of nowhere listening to the wind blow and nature whisper sweet nothings to each other.  

This summer was nothing like what I expected, but God is everything I wanted.  Through these unexpected times in my life, God has been good and faithful.  He continues to lead each step of the way and I continue to wait in anticipation at what He will do.

Please continue to pray for us…

1. As we start school on August 22.  A is starting first grade (unbelievable) and I will hopefully be finishing my last semester.
2. As I continue to seek God’s will for us.
3. As we grow in Christ… I pray for purity, holiness and a passion for Him, that we may be called righteous before our King.
4. As the busyness of the school year starts that I could make sure to do things for myself and give A space to grow as well.

from my walk around the cabin

sunset at the cabin

I love Jesus because...

i love  jesus because he tacscar uv me and dide on the cros to tace uwa are sins.

a new creation

these past couple weeks, God has been planting seeds into my heart and some are growing deep roots as i spend time reflecting  and meditating on it and examining who i am in Christ.  i am a new creation in Christ... the old is gone and the new has come.  satan likes to make me think that i'm not this new creation.  not every day, but at times he likes to remind me of who i was and make me doubt myself.  during those times, i struggle to let truth sink into my heart.  but a couple weeks ago i heard of a story that made the truth of me being a new creation root deep into my heart.

a friend told me of this girl who started dating (a girl i know) and as we were talking about what kind of guy he was, she told me how this girl had a past of a true non-believer before committing her life to the Lord.  so as she started dating this guy, she began telling him that she's not who he thinks she is that she has this past... and he told her that it didn't matter because in Christ she is a new creation and the  past does not define who she is.  Christ has redeemed her.  that is mere man speaking to an equal sinner... how much more does our Savior say that to us... "I've done the work for you... it's all cleared.  you don't have to keep thinking about that and dwell and muddle in that.  be the new creation i have made you to be."

i love counseling and i love helping people in their struggles.  one area i feel that counseling could be dangerous for believers is the fact that it could let us dwell in the old and not let  us stand firm in the new.  counseling lets you go to your past and dig up all the reason why it went wrong or why you are the way you are, which i think is valuable, but the danger comes if you decide to stay there.  i like how my friend put it... she was told by an older wiser godly woman that when the spirit leads, it's good to go back to those places and have the spirit reveal what He needs to (because there could be new insight that He wants you know understand) and then come out... don't dwell there and stay longer than the spirit would have you.  we don't have to keep going there... it's the old and we are the new in Christ.

we have to hold fast to our identity in Christ.  the thing is, the world is going to ask us, "who do you think you are?" and if we don't know who we are, then we will shrivel and not stand up to the truth that Christ has made us into a new creation who has authority to speak truth, rebuke and sharpen those around us, in truth and love.  i don't mean to slap people in their face, but stand firm on who you are... we who believe in the work of Jesus Christ are God's sons and daughters.  we should not waver from that.

as i think about this... i have this new confidence of who ERP is!!  and this new creation is continually being shaped and molded and torn apart to be made into the creation God wants me to be.  i am all open for God to do this in my life!!

alpha and omega

have you ever watched a movie that you've already watched before with someone who was watching it for the first time?  i think it's the best when it's like an action movie, but love stories work this way as well.  so you're sitting there watching the movie and in the beginning it's just setting the tone and sometimes the person who is watching it for the first time will ask you questions and you just smile saying, "watch..."  then the plot starts to thicken, it's getting intense, the good guy seems like the bad guy or the couple breaks up or someone dies or a new character enters that turns the whole plot upside down and you don't know what to think.  but the thing is you know how it's going to end.  i really like watching the person get excited, sad, mad or whatever as they are trying to figure out what's going on... i just smile because i know what the end is going to be and it's going to be good.  you just want to tell them something, but you don't want to ruin it for them, so you just watch their heart clench, release and hurt as the story plot goes...

yesterday during my date with Jesus, i read isaiah 46 and a verse stuck out at me... the verse that stuck out was 10, but i'm going to write 8-10...

"Remember this and stand firm, recall it to mind, you transgressors, remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done."


declaring the end from the beginning...

i have been praying for God to open doors for me as i think of next steps.  i could see myself doing so many different things.  teaching children, moving overseas, being a stay at home mom, counseling, working with a church, being in a ministry, doing discipleship with new believers, running programs, translating, i speak three languages fluently and i know God could use that some way, etc.... and sometimes i get all flustered and feel antsy thinking about it, but as i read this verse, i felt a peace come over me.  my God... my heavenly father declared the end from the beginning.  He is God and there is no other and this God declares the end from the beginning.  it was so reassuring to know that my God knows.  this is the thing... i knew that... i tell A that all the time that God knows everything, things of old, things today and things tomorrow... but for some reason this verse spoke a different volume for me.  interesting huh??  i love it!!

so i imagined God and me on this life being like when i sit with someone who hasn't watched the movie i have watched before.  God knows the end and every time i say or ask things like, "seriously this is how it's going to end?" or "he isn't really going to be a character of this story is he?"  or "what is that person in the story for?  s/he seems so irrelevant."  God just smiles and says, "watch and see..."  sometimes He could even say, "it'll get better i promise..." or maybe even "this is just the beginning..."

the thing is this, some times i have friends who are like, "i can't believe you like that movie, it was so bad."  even though it's like a movie i really like... or "wow that's not what i expected, i'm a little disappointed."  anyway the point is... God tells us the end of our story... Jesus' return to take His people to eternity with Him in heaven... the suspense of getting there is what gets us, but does that have to get us... we know the end and it's a beautiful ending, which means that the story line in between will reflect that...

i need to remember in life when i get frustrated or just want to know... that God declared it from the beginning and that i don't have to get flustered over it... it will become clear when it's time.  it's like the verse in psalms that i enjoy... i can't remember right now where it's from, but it says that God ordained the things in our life... ordained it...

this is the food for thought that i had.

my sister's church is having a VBS this week and A has been going to that, which leaves my time before my internship pretty open.  it's been good quality time with my God.

please continue to pray for us... especially me as i do pray continually and look into options as i look into the future to see where the Lord would have me invest a season of my life.  who knows i could be here for the next 20 years of my life... in indonesia for the next 5 years of my life... in new york for the next 10 months... in school for another 4 years... no one knows, but i'm open to anything that He would have for me.  i've been praying for God to open doors for me in the direction He wants me to go and that i will have a discerning obedient heart as i take steps forward.

when are we going to work?

this is the question that i have been hearing in the morning when A gets up.  that's what she calls my internship... work...  and she loves going.  she's been a great help and is enjoying the program herself at "work".

our schedule has been so weird and this is our first full week at this that it's taking a bit to get used to.  by next week hopefully things will be good.  we go to "work" on mondays, tuesdays and thursdays.  we leave the house around 11:15 and get home anywhere from 6:30-7:30 depending on what the activity was that day.  so we've been getting to bed later and getting up later.  this week, again being the first week and having the fourth in between it's weird, but i want to get into some kind of pattern that we could actually start hanging out with people...

today during my quiet time i read psalm 105.  having just finished a class on evangelism and reading this i was reminded of what my professor said in our class... "you must rediscover the gospel every day".  i prayed that the gospel will be real in my life today...

Oh give thanks to the Lord; call upon his name;
     make known his deeds among the peoples!
² Sing to him, sing praises to him;
     tell of all his wondrous works!
³ Glory in his holy name;
    let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice!
⁴ Seek the Lord and his strength;
     seek his presence continually!
⁵ Remember the wondrous works that he has done,
    his miracles, and the judgments he uttered,
⁶ O offspring of Abraham, his servant,
    children of Jacob, his chosen ones!


we are to make his deeds known about the peoples... tell of all his wondrous works... so i share a story...


today i heard a story... Y is an adolescent who lived 12 years in a refugee camp without the chance to go to school.  Living in two different refugee camps in a country that is hostile toward his people... he told me his story.  my eyes filled with tears and my heart grew heavy.  the peoples that psalm 105 talks about that we need to make his deeds known to are right here in our midst.  they have lived a life that is unimaginable to us.  they have a story that they want to tell.  are we willing to listen and share THE STORY with them??  let us not grow lazy in telling people about Jesus!!  He is the only hope to those around us.  


a resource that i liked from my class is www.viewthestory.com  .  look through it and see if it could help you tell others about Jesus.  it has an app for your phone as well.


here are some pictures of our week at "work".

pray for these peoples!!