Showing posts with label Happiness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Happiness. Show all posts

Monday, May 31, 2010

Trust – Part 2

Your love is amazing, steady and unchanging. Your love is a mountain, firm beneath my feat. Your love is a mystery, how you gently lift me. When I am surrounded, your love carries me! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Your love makes me sing!

My bad if those lyrics are slightly messed up, because that was just from memory. But those lyrics mean so much to me. God’s love is huge. It is so much more than we will ever be able to comprehend. And we have a direct link to our loving God, through prayer. I think prayer is greatly underestimated. Prayer can literally change lives. In Daniel, as soon as he realized that Israel’s exile in Babylon was soon meant to be over he prayed. The Bible says that the minute Daniel began to pray, God made the decree to start to bring Israel back to their homeland.

I have been praying for a very long time now, daily, that God would give me more time in Turkey. I had been having many issues with trusting God because of the uncertainty. I prayed daily for as long as I can remember having trouble over this issue, my prayer group at my Youth Group had been praying about it for a while now, and countless close friends have told me they had been praying for me. This past Thursday (May 28th) I arrived home from Youth Group like any other fun Thursday after Youth Group. Later that evening my dad came home and came up to my room to talk to me. He told me that he had found out when we would be leaving Turkey, and he asked me if I wanted to know. This scared me, because I wanted to know, but I did not want the news to be bad. Because of this, I was pretty much speechless. Finally, I managed to say ok. He made it very suspenseful, which made me even more nervous, but finally he told me that we would be staying in Turkey until at least the summer of 2011. As soon as he said this, I started to cry. This is one of the few times in my life that I had been happy enough to cry. This is my testimony to prayer: God listens to you, so pray! God knows the desires of you heart, so ask him for them! And best of all, God knows what is best for you, so it is guaranteed that it all all turn out well no matter how bad it may seem at first.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.”    ~Proverbs 3:5-6

Think about it. Trust in the Lord with all of your heart, do not lean on your own understanding, but lean on God’s understanding. Do all of this, simply acknowledge God’s sovereignty and he will make your paths straight. God promised to never leave you nor forsake you, so why do we not lean on God? Because he also promised that if we do that he would make our paths straight? And that is something most of us would not mind having. It takes faith, but there is so much around us that can strengthen our faith, and God blesses us so much that I, for one, feel the need to praise him for it! God has made me extremely happy through so many people and so many things.

I want to end by re-stating something that I want to emphasize in this post. Prayer works, so do not doubt it for one second. God always has an open ear, and God listens to persistent, longing people. God knows if you care enough about it, and he knows what is good for you. Pray often. God listens to those who serve him whole-heartedly. God always listens.

Even though this all stands true unconditionally, I want to emphasize putting God above all else. What are we living our lives for? The answer should be God, but chances are that is not 100% true. An easy way to answer this question would to be by asking another question: How do we spend our time? This is so huge, I know that I have major issues with this, so I am definitely not pointing a finger, trying to judge anyone here, but I do want to emphasize this. Also, I want to credit these thoughts and questions to my Bible teacher, Mr. Meyer. He has taught me a lot that I hope never to forget, and God has truly blessed our school with such a great Bible teacher.

Saturday, April 3, 2010

March Madness

Ok, so March Madness totally does not account for just basketball for me. In fact it accounts for just about everything but basketball since I really am not a fan of watching any sports :P But anyway, I'm gonna write about what an awesome month I had.
To start off the month nothing much happened, but I have to say right around my birthday it all became very very eventful. First of all, on March 25th we had our first OIS girls soccer game of the season. This was kind of a shocker game for me because I actually scored a goal. You see all of last season I played defense, and I never even got near the other teams goal. I never have been much of a shooter either, so you can see why this kind of was totally unexpected to me. I'm just so happy to be able to help my awesome team out by scoring, because I totally couldn't have done it without Nani, Helin, Grace, Katerina, Hanne, Aicha, and all the other girls that were on the field with me then. In fact I couldn't have done it without any of my awesome team members that I'll never be able to thank enough!! :) So many people (like my mother, Luke, and David) missed my goal, and they were all like "I can't believe I missed it!" I didn't think it was that big of a deal, but I guess since it was the only goal scored for our team that game it kinda was a little bit of a big deal. I dunno.
That night somethig else happened that certainly brightened up my day (and my whole life presently). But for now I won't go into any details. I'll save all the info on that subject for a much later date :)
The next day was my birthday (March 26th). I turned 14!! o.O Grace was kinda disspointed because that meant she was no longer my elder, even though in reality she still is ;) But it was a fun birthday, from the most hilarious play practice (with lots of fun bday presents x] *cough* Sofie & Luke *cough*), to mi hermanito winning first place in the science fair for his class, to hanging out with some of my most special friends later that night. My friends that came over included Grace (of course :D), Hannah, Dianne, and Sofie. Nashiha, sadly, could not make it, and we missed her dearly!! :( But niether here nor there, it was a lot of fun! From karaeoke (we beat you Konnar and Noah!!), to talking at dinner, to playing Truth or Dare (lol xD Sofie smelled and rated out feet!!), to watching the Game Plan, in which I tragecly fell to sleep. I was going to attempt to pull an all-nighter with Grace, Dianne, and Hannah, since they had never done it before, but when I watch movies at nightime I tend to..... fall asleep ;) So basically I was the first one asleep :D Then the following day Miss LaMertha came into my bedroom to wake Sofie up to go to Chapel. All Sofie did was roll over and say "That's weird." It was hilrious!! Then by 11am Dianne and I thought we had to be at play practice, so we all left the house then. We were sadly mistaken because practice actually started at 12pm, so we wished we would've gotten more sleep. I also wanted to mention that I loved my birthday presents!! From Dianne I got a bar of chocolate with 10TL inside, carrying on the tradition of my dear, Military School-Going Zombie Boy, friend, Hannah Birmingham (whom I miss very much, along with my other dear friend Harim Kim!!). Hannah and Grace got me the coolest matching bday presents ever. And they got me awesome gel pens: Hannah's was sky blue, and Grace's was sparkly green. I love them both so much!! I have used Hannah's gel pen on every test I've had since then. And I used Grace's gel pen on my "cheat sheet" for my sicence midterm exam. Please note that this so called "cheat sheet" was allowed by Mrs.Schultz, my science teacher ;)
After my birthday, I discovered by my dad that he got me a new computer for my birthday. This is the best thing ever because the computer I have now (yes, its the one I am currently using), is.... well to put it nicely, its crap :P I mean it is sooooo unbelievably slow. This becomes a problem when I try to do things like open up the internet or start my computer. And especially when I try to chat with my dear friends on facebook. So I have officially decided I have the best parents ever!! (Not that I didn't think that b4 or anythin ;) ). I love them very much :)
Even though not in March (but I'm just gonna say that April 1st counts ;)) I disovered something very important. At Youth Group, this past thursday (April 1st), Missa gave her testimony to our prayer group. This also happened to include Ms.LaMertha and Ms.Schneider at the time since we are a little short on people. Missa shared how she was at a school with around 2000 Muslims and her, the only Christian. She told us how God had put in her heart that she was placed with all of those people for a reason. We later got into witnessing to other. This leas to the fact that I am one of the only Christians in my class (also there are Michael and Sam), and I am the only Christian girl in my class. I have wondered all year now why God has not given me any Christian friends in my class this year, because I really thought that I needed at least one. I have many really really good friends that are Christians (like Grace for example :)), but it sometimes gets hard since she's not in my class and we don't always have the opportunity to spend as much time with her as I'd like to. But God has shown me, through Miss LaMertha, Grace, Missa, and Miss Schneier, that he has placed me in my class with so many non-Christians and no Christian girls to be a witness to them. Miss LaMertha told me that she and all the other teachers are always praying for my class and especially me because she said she knows it is an extremely difficult class to be in. I soooo greatly appriciate that she and other teachers have been praying for me. And I sooooo greatly appriciate my dear friend Grace who is always there for me. Hugs sometimes just feel good when you are struggling or upset you know?? I dunno who really I'm talking to when I ask the reader questions like that. I guess I'm just talking to whoever is reading....
Well I know am happy to know that God had brought me to Turkey not only to learn more about him and build a stronger relationship with him. But I now know that God had brought me to Turkey to be a witness to my class. Sadly, I feel like I have really not gotten much accomplished in that area; therefore, I really do feel like I am supposed to be in Turkey longer, now for reasons other than my own will. I think it's God's will for me to stay in Turkey longer, but I don't know for sure, and sadly I do not know who long "longer" is either. But I am trying my hardest to place my trust in God with my unknown future.
In all this have been a very good past couple of weeks for me. And although I am missing some people over our current Spring Break, I am quite enjoying the relaxation that comes from not doing much of anything especially this coming Monday through Friday. I think I'm going to Nashiha's house on friday though. If I do I totally gotta bring my camera :)
But anyway, to finish off this post..... I'll just quote something. "You are my strength when I am weak." This quote from a song (All in All) really hit me today for some reason. It is so awesomely incredible that God is our strength through everything, even when we are most vulnerable and weak. And to go along with that another quote: "What God brings us to, he will get us through." So true, because not only is he our strength, but he gets us through our weakness. As I head into Easter tomorrow I really can't wait to worship Jesus for what he did for me at the cross 2000 some years ago. So many songs have touched me these past couple days "Surrounded by your glory, to my knees will I fall? Will I sing hallelujah; Will I be able to speak at all? I can only imagine.... yeah, I can only imagine." It is so true, I really can only imagine. Makes me wonder, what will it be like in his presence?? Also, "I love you Lord. And I lift my voice to worship you. Oh, my soul rejoice. Take joy my king, in what I bring. May it be a sweet, sweet sound in your ear." Just the fact that I am called to love, rejoice, and take joy in God. And the fact that through my every action and word, it should be a sweet sound in God's ear. Which brings me to one last song "Over every through, over every word. May my life reflect the beauty of my Lord. You mean more to me than any Earthly thing. So won't you reign in me again!" My every thought and word should be a reflection of God. This is how I must witness to others. I certainly do not get every opportunity to share by verbally witnessing. The only other way it to be a reflection of God. I need so much help with this, and I would be heading in the complete opposite direction of this without God's help. I'm praying that my class mates will see a difference in me. I'm praying desperately that I will be able to reflect my Savior who means so much to me that I cannot bare any of the people in my class not to know about Him. "You mean more to me than any Earthly thing, so won't you reign in me again." I need God to reign in me so that I may be a witness to those around me that are not so lucky as I to know the Lord Jesus. This has gotten pretty far off topic, but that's ok because this stuff is just as important if not way more important. I hope this wa interesting.... for you.... whoever you are that's reading my blog. Chances are its Grace, but its very possible that some random person could stumble upon my blog and be reading the whole extremely long this for no apparent reason. But honestly I don't believe in coincidences. God is at work in everyone and everything :)