I forgot how big You were

It kinda crazy to think that last year this time I was in Africa serving the Oku people through promoting and learning their language. My heart and mind were in the missions mindset. Now with a year passing and much occurring it's easy to fall back into the regular routine without much thought and I have unfortunately fallen into this rut. Over the past few days in reading through Luke I have been convicted of doing this and failing to realize that I should have never left that mind set of missions or the place that my heart was in when I was leaving and on that trip.

The story of the Centurion in Luke showed me the lack of faith that I had put in Jesus over this past month. The Centurion knowing how much authority he had over his soldiers realized that it was nothing compared to the authority that Jesus had. The centurion knew that simply speaking Jesus could heal his servant and he did.

I have just like the song says, boxed God into my mind as smaller then he is. Forgetting the authority he has over all things and the power that he has. So as I move forward I am challenged to trust in this authority and power remembering that he can do all things, and I can trust that he will help me do the things I can't.

What I Started, Finished and Learned

I wrote a blog a while back about my mystery interview and I have noticed that I have not filled in the details. So lets do a recap. My mystery interview turned out to be with a water company.

I was hired by a water company as a in home sales person selling water conditioners and purification systems. At first it was sounding ok, but as I worked there longer I was finding it harder and harder to find satisfaction in my job or even how I could honour God in what I was doing, my heart was never in my job. In the end, less then a week and a bit I quit. To be honest I did a lot of wrestling with this job whether or not to quit and how I was fitting God into the equation.

Doing something that I was doing was never easy and I definitely learned a lot and made some mistakes. Here are my take-aways.

1. I am still a people pleaser.
I forgot what it meant to look only for acceptance from God.
I was looking to impress my boss by doing a good demonstration of the product, looking for my customers to like me and be impressed and I was looking for acceptance from those who I was working with and from my boss. I put on the back burner who was supposed to be first and that the only person that I need acceptance from was my king. I have come to learn that looking acceptance for my king will be a challenging thing do but knowing that I am doing it for him will help.

2. I struggled in trusting God resulting in much stress and frustration.
We were required to drive to each person's house that we were going to and find our own way there. Now because I don't have a GPS or Internet on my phone I had to resort to using paper maps which worked great when I had one, but when I didn't.... well that was another story. I failed to trust God that he would get me to each house safely and in good timing. It amazes me how easily our futile minds forget that our God is taking care and has control.

3. I struggled with hearing God's voice.
Since I had so much anxiety everything I went to work I was blocking out God's quite voice and was unable to hear him, leaving me starved for him.

4. I struggled with persevering through.
James 1:2-8 makes a very good point that persevering makes us stronger in our faith but a make who doubts God who gives wisdom will be unstable in what he does. I was doubting God that he would get me to where I was going, that he could through me do this job and so on. That left me really unstable, I could see my self constantly going back and forth on an emotional level and I knew that it was not healthy.

5.I think I made the right choice.
I decided to quit because this job was not drawing me any closer to God but rather it was pulling me away. I read a book once and it talked about the differences of trials that bring you closer to God and Satan trying to intervene and pull you away from God. I think that this job was doing just that, pulling me away from my creator and forcing me to rely on my own strength.
I understand that one can honour God through everything that they do but I did not understand how I could honour God through my job and how it this was bringing me closer to him.

So right now I am waiting for a job as a PSW to come up and I think I do have something promising. I understand that I will face these same challenges working as a PSW but I also know that my job I am able to serve and help people. Something that aligns much more with my nature. I am grateful that I could walk away and thankful that God is indeed taking care of me.

ID is Required

 It's required at a lot of places, at gas stations to pick up the cigarettes, the pub, club, bar to get into and the police station when that police check is due.

Having self identity is also required for life. Everyone has their own identity of who they are. The thing that I have come to realize is that identity is always placed in something. We define ourselves by something that is outside ourselves. Now this can range from something that we do, something we are a part of or a goal that we want to obtain. For myself I have found to have placed some of my identity of being an outdoor "camp" person, being smart and having good grades. Others place their identity in the idea that they are beautiful, or great at art/crafts, or the job that they do. The problem in placing our identity in these things is that they are fleeting. We get a new job, we change what we do, how we look and how we act because life is fleeting, changing and always moving. So people often change or lose their identity because of circumstances are changing around them.

The thing that makes my head spin a little is that our identity defines who we are, so if it changes are we really the same person? How can we find identity if it is always changing? I don't really know how to answer those questions, or if they really need to be answered at all.

And yet another place that people find their identity in is their religion. For me I am a christian so I find my identity in Christ. It took me until last year with a late night brainstorm in order to determine this but I did. Everything that I do (or want to do... see Romans 7:14 on) is because I have placed my identity in him. Now the interesting thing for me is that because my identity is in Him, and He does not change then my core essence, the most intimate and deepest thing of who I am doesn't change.

Grounded, when I think of who I am I think of being grounded. Grounded in Christ and knowing that I know where I can find my ID, in Him.

Corny Moments Missed

I have discovered that I am a corny person. I love to say corny lines, do corny things and have corny moments. Now some people think that corny moments are corny and are often missed. But for me these corny moments are the best! They bring an extra smile to my face and some extra delight in my day!

I think my favourite people to share these moments with are the people that I am closest with such as my sister, my boy and my closest friends. Mostly because they can put up with the corniness of it too and it often either brings a good laugh or a smile to their face too!

Try it out sometime, and maybe your day will get a little brighter too!

Weird.

I am actually not a huge fan at all of the word. I don't know for certain but I don't think you would really find it in my vocabulary. I heard of story of a friend who had really peculiar opinions of strange things so I thought I would write about one of my own.

Weird: involving or suggesting the supernatural, unearthly, uncanny, fantastic, bizarre.

I got this definition from dictionary.com and was actually surprised about what I found. The way that many people use this word doesn't really match what it actually means. When I hear people use this word the first thing that comes to mind is that, that person thinks what ever is weird is not normal. Now although no one can actually describe what normal is within each culture there is a certain set of standards that the population follow and when one steps out of those standards they step out of the norm.

I think what frustrates me even more is when people use the word weird when they see people do different things because they are from a different culture. For certain these things are not supernatural (well for the most part) and yes they may be out of our North America norm, but it does not mean that it is out of their norm. When people do things differently we often tend to say that they are weird. Looking down on them for stepping out of the norm. Instead we should find ourselves doing either a) asking the question why they do it or b) trying it ourselves.

Now this is only one opinion about one word but in my world simply words can make a world of difference.

Floating Clouds resembling Vague Thoughts

Second day in a row of going for a run, I don't know if I will do an everyday thing but I definitely plan to stay active this summer. I think I will make it a goal to get my gym membership by the end of this week. Right after I have my mysterious interview. I will give updates about that too when its over. I have to say that I am resume spent. I hate job hunting and praying that despite my hatred for them that I will get some kind of job. To be honest I have been applying for all of these PSW jobs but I really don't know how well I am equipped for them. I have all this head knowledge but very little practical knowledge. I do though have confidence that God will help me do that as well. I just need a job that will pay for the future.

The real reason for me writing this blog was to reflect on some ideas that have been floating around in my head. Going for a jog and thinking always makes the time go faster and is a good time to reflect in the midst of remembering to breath and not trip over something. I was reflecting on how when school stops and nothing overly important is pressing it gives me more of an opportunity to reflect on how my relationship with God has developed and progressed over the past while.

Here as some conclusions

1. I need to develop a better understanding of what prayer is.
Something that I have been challenged with recently especially. I have several friends going on missions trips this year in different parts of Canada and around the world and all have asked me to pray for them.
To be brutally honest over this past year esp. when someone asked me to pray for them I would shot one small little prayer up and then never think twice of it--obviously feeling guilty afterwards.
So I think this summer I am going to try to gain a better understanding or at least some better consistency of bringing others to God in prayer.

2. Been challenged recently to spend more time with the King.
Something that I have come to release is that when I have more time on my hands I often find myself wasting it on things that are taking too much of my time such as facebook and email and random googling. I have been reminded that this is God's time that he has given me and since I have it I think I should spend more time with him. Much easier said then done.

I thought was thinking about a ted talk that I watched recently but I think I will leave that to a separate blog because it needs a little more thought and a few more lines drawn to make some connections.

Summer is here in full swing so that means more Floating Clouds of thoughts. I am excited to see what the clouds portray!