God’s Goodness in Many Forms

Thought I’d spend some time this morning composing a new post to update people on the last week or so of life. Birthday fortnight ended well… I received a lot of Chapters gift cards over Christmas and my birthday so last week I purchased five knitting books, some of which have been coming in the mail one by one over the last couple of days. This allowed me to spend Monday afternoon teaching myself how to increase and decrease stitches which means I can make more than just a scarf that goes in a straight line. I also discovered that there is a yarn shop in Ancaster so will be checking that out soon (although I assume the yarn will be tres expensive and outside of my price range).

Danielle, Eric and I spent the weekend at Muskoka Woods Sports Resort with 11 of our junior high-ers. It was cold and we didn’t sleep a lot but I actually really enjoyed the time there. Most of the girls that we took are kids that have been around for 2-3 years now so I know I can trust them and they’re starting to mature into semi-responsible young women (who would’ve thought?). The speaker didn’t totally relate with our kids but gave a good jumping off spot to have some really interesting conversations about what it means to follow Jesus. Some of the kids that I assume aren’t really interested had some surprising answers… God is doing some good stuff. The kids also love singing and dancing during worship. They head right up to the front to form some sort of crazy mosh pit. It’s always the highlight of their weekend.

January feels like a ridiculously busy month. This weekend we are away again for a leadership retreat with our church. The church is starting this leadership development program that involves coursework, assignments and regular mentoring. I’m excited to see what happens… even though I completed the first assignment (which is just a questionnaire about leadership style) and wasn’t totally pleased with how it was laid out. I have high expectations for the program to shape me so we’ll see what happens this weekend.

I’m reading this book right now (have been for about a month now) called Men and Women in the Church. It’s one of those books that is changing my life. I have been really blessed in my interactions with male Christian leadership throughout my life but this book is opening my eyes to some of the things I have picked up through interactions with other men (and women) that are not biblical. There is a lot in the book about how the church teaches women to ‘hold back’ on gifts of leadership because it’s not appropriate for women to be strong and confident. It’s been interesting for me to realize how these ideas about gender have shaped my personality, my identity and my beliefs. I’ve also become super aware lately of when people use gender in conversation… I realized a couple weeks ago that it annoys me suddenly that our society uses the word ‘girly’ to demean and put down men… when did being female become a put down (and when did male become defined as “not like women”?)? There are so many beginnings of questions forming in my mind. I am tempted to just become this mass of anger, offense and bitterness but, thankfully, God offers other options. He’s been teaching me that He may even have a place for me in all of this… and that I need to accept (and use) the gifts of leadership He has given me.

I’m still doing a little thinking about the future… but it takes a really different form than the stressed out thoughts of a couple of weeks ago. I don’t know what God has on deck and He’s continuing to show me things I’m holding onto that I need to turn over to Him.

Oh yeah… last night our ‘community’ met for dinner. Gloria, in all her wisdom, had suggested we take some time after dinner to just hear each other’s stories and then take communion together. It was super powerful. I think I’d forgotten that the people around me are also human and have stories that have shaped them into who they currently are. It was really neat to hear them share about their lives. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so called to the Lord’s Table either… communion just made complete and total sense in that moment. It was a neat experience. I think that’s all. I need to finish cleaning the kitchen.

(Almost) Twenty-Seven

I just put pictures up in my Flickr account of the great birthday party that was held at our house last night. My friend, Rachel, and I have birthdays that are one day apart so this year our friends combined efforts and held one pretty awesome party. Take a look at them… you’ll notice the largest pink party hats I’ve ever seen and the best filled pinata ever made. It was a good time. I felt warm and fuzzy and very loved by the end.

Tuesday’s my ‘real’ birthday. I will be twenty-seven which I feel like is a big year for some reason. I’ve been pretty spoiled on the birthday celebration side of things already. Saturday a few friends took me out to Gate of India for a birthday dinner. What’s left for Tuesday? Other than the fact that I think the mail carrier may be stealing our mail… everything birthday related is coming up roses. Check out the pictures. I’ll post more later.

Standing in my Kitchen

I burnt soup this morning. Danielle started making it before she left for work and I was left in charge of it while it ’simmered’. Little did we know that simmer is code word for burn terribly. Our whole house, myself included, has this lingering smell of burnt grossness. Hopefully the soup is salvageable. In an attempt to get rid of the horrible odour I am burning two candles and making chocolate chip cookies. I have also been eating a lot of cookie dough!

I spent some time last night with a good friend. He has been a big part of my life since before I even moved to Hamilton but his friendship has become even more meaningful now that we’re both in the same city. When I moved here at first he was my only friend in the city. God’s been good to both of us. We started talking about life and I began my latest lament about life being hard. We talked about my future, including job prospects, going back to school, getting married and moving (that’s quite the gamut). I told him that I was just so tired of things being such a fight all the time. At some point a couple things started to come together. As I slept on them they started to take more shape and by 9:00 a.m. this morning I had shared with the women I live with what I consider to be some significant thinking in my life.

See, I realized that I was tired of having to defend my life to the world. I’ve been really struggling lately to feel like my lifestyle is valid and legitimate. In my attempts to make things easier I have started to make plans about the future that line up pretty closely to the things people expect me to do. I’ve taken God out of the picture, started thinking about how to get a ‘real’ job that would allow me to make a living wage and get the things out of life that the world tells me are important. I realized last night that I had stopped believing that God had big plans for me. At some point it got easier to define my life choices as a ‘phase’ that I was attempting to grow out of, instead of standing up to the world and telling them that I actually believe that this is how God is calling me to live.

As I’ve begun thinking about the future (something that is not inherently bad to do… in fact, it’s likely even good) I’ve forgotten that God is creative. That He’s powerful enough to make new things out of nothing. Where I can’t see pathways from one thing to another, I’ve started to think about how I can build my own paths instead of allowing God to act in power and faithfulness. So I spent some time this morning turning away from the world and reminding myself who God really is. I spent some time reminding myself that He is committed to me, that He has big plans for me, that He’s not finished with me. For the first time in months I feel hope, peace and joy when I think about the future. I don’t know what’s going to happen… but I realized that it’s not up to me to create the future. It’s my job to be who God made me to be… to not hold back.

A Long Time Away

This post marks the end of a two month long saga in the journey that has been getting wireless internet to our new home. We’ve spent countless hours on hold with various customer service agents, purchased a new router and called on more favours from our tech-savvy friends than we will likely ever be able to repay. But, as of about an hour ago, we have internet throughout our entire home… and that is a good thing.

There were more reasons than just no access for the lack of posts over the last month. December was an intense, stressful and very busy month. By the time Christmas came I was quite ready for the welcome break from the hustle and bustle. I think part of the problem was that I got sick the first weekend in December and I just never felt like I caught up again. I took a couple days off work which got me behind and sleeping for three days straight just really messed up my internal order. Things seem to be starting off better in 2009.

I’ll try to give a brief re-cap of the last month. Eric and I went to the Canadian Youth Workers’ Conference in TO. It was four days of speakers, sessions and lack of sleep. I learned a lot from the various sessions and God brought out some interesting things during the worship and the teaching. It’s been a struggle to adapt to sharing a ministry this fall and I think it was good for Eric and I to spend the weekend together away from all the pressures and stresses of everyday life. We also got to stay with our good friend, Jenn, at her sweet apartment… that was very neat.

My beloved friend Timmy (he’ll love that I’m referring to him that way in a semi-public space) moved back to Michigan. I took him half-way and met his mother, whom I love. Since then, all of us have been adjusting to life without him… he spent so much time at our house before he left that I had jokingly started referring to him as ‘the man of the house’. His departure has left me without a walking partner so we’re talking about replacing him with a dog… but we’ll see if that actually happens.

I spent four or five days at my parents’ house over the holidays. It was nice to get away… to spend time with people who hold my history… but I was ready to come back to Hamilton and who I am now. It’s been a good week back. Our house hasn’t been all together much this week but we did spend most of New Year’s Day doing stuff around the house before having dinner together that night. I love my house and the girls that live in it… it’s been good to remember that.

Other random things that happened over the holidays include; bridesmaid dress shopping for Christine’s wedding, witnessing a high-speed police chase, new year-ing with a small group of friends, bowling in this incredibly amazing, retro-fab bowling alley and a great visit with Darda and Brad. That pretty much brings people back up to speed. I’ll try and be better with posts now that we have internet but sometimes I just don’t feel like I have anything that interesting to share. Maybe I’ll just need to get a more interesting life.