Vacances

I had such a nice time at the beach with my wonderful fiance. I am so blessed to have him in my life. 

J'ai eu le plaisir de prendre des vacances pour visiter des amis récemment. Mon fiancé et moi précieux de notre temps pour se reposer. Lors de votre visite, nous avons pu aller à la plage. voici une photo de notre aventure.

Childhood

My Grandfather has so many ridiculous home videos of me. Everything from embarrassing plays to me walking with rocks in my shoes on purpose. I was a pretty crazy kid. What gets me is that most of these crazy things I did didn't even get caught on camera. The other day I watched the movie Ramona and Beezus. It is such a cute film. I read the books when i was younger but now I couldn't help but laugh SO hard at the similarities between Ramona and I. If anyone wants to know me better or have a better insight into my childhood I would highly recommend watching that movie. Key difference, I have a big brother instead of a big sister. My Beezus is a boy. I'm so excited for my fiance to come back to the states so I can watch that movie with him.

Saturday 16 June 2007- I AM ONLY A CHILD 4:52 pm Illinois time

I was just reading in Jeremiah where he is talking about how he's just a kid but God basically says

Hey that doesn't matter to me. I have big plans for you Jeremiah!

And it reminded me of what God is doing here in my life. Despite my age, despite my inexperience God says: Hey I will use you and it will be for my glory! 

May God be Praised!!!! What an adventure this has been! I feel like I've been gone at least a week, not just a day. The staff is great and I am loving it but apparently I have an accent. haha O well. Good times, even better God! Much love and O yeah, so we're taking a really long bus ride to Training Camp. God bless! He's the best! 

Food Report: Dominos Pizza for lunch and Duncan Donuts for Breakfast

Lessons from a Seventeen Year Old.

I am looking back at some of my old prayer journals and I have been feeling so convicted. I am impressed by how awesome God is and how odd it is that I let myself get in the ways of His great and AWESOME plans. I mean seriously who am I to get in the way of what God wants to do. Unfortunately I seem to find myself getting in the way a lot. I look at some of the things in my life and sometimes I wonder, what in th world am I thinking now. I am in the process of working towards a BA in English at a "secular" University but who am I to say or assume that God doesn't have something awesome planned for me in this part of the adventure of my life. I have to admit, I have not been spending the time in the Word [aka the Bible] that I need to. Unfortunately I have not only done that but I have been beating myself up for doing this and I haven't been spending more time with God because of it. WHAT AM I THINKING? I am such a fool sometimes. Spending time with God is so precious and I have not been loving God the way that I need to. I go to read my bible and get distracted with Plants VS Zombies. I mean really as far as things of eternal worth are concerned I would def say that time with God beats fighting Dr. Zombtness. Part of why I started this blog is because I really need some form of verbal processing and at the same time admitting when I have done wrong. That is so hard for me. Today I just wanted to say that I have been so so Wrong. But I would like to start being right again. Spending that time with God that I need so deeply within the core of my being.

The hands we hold

Lately I have been working on a project for my Painting class that focuses on hands. I am intrigued by the importance of hands to almost everything I do. Above is one of the pictures I have been working on for the project. on the Left is my hand and on the right is Hans' hand. This picture is meant to represent or symbolize memories of Hans and my relationship from when we first met and first started dating. I actually don't remember the first time Hans and I met. I remember the event but I do not remember him being there. One of my life long best friends and Hans lived on the same floor our Freshman year of college. My friend and I had gone for a run and when we came back I was all sweaty and gross but we decided to play cards. After playing cards for a bit Karl (my life long friend) and I went to the hall and I met a group of guys. Apparently Hans was in that group and I caught his eye. From what he has told me I talked about how much I love my brother and Hans thought it was really attractive that I love my family so much. Although I didn't notice Hans, his eyes and heart were set on me from that time on. What caused me to notice Hans was actually that someone very dear to me had a crush on him. I would not have realized who Hans was without this person and I am so grateful to them for having liked him. After becoming good friends, mostly through friends, I gained a lot of trust in Hans but never realized that he liked me. When I finally realized that Hans liked me I was so unsure of what to do, after a long while he and I went on some dates. We were so tentative to even hold hands... Now I sometimes look at his hands and just praise God, Thanking God that I get to hold Hans hands for the rest of our life. I also thank the Lord when we were just freshmen in college, his were the hands I held. 

Elmo The Fussa

Elmo is such a sweet cat. He is not my cat, he's my brother and sister in law's cat. Since I live with those two sometimes I feel like Elmo is mine too. He's so precious. Tonight he came and sat at my door as if to say good night. I was just needing a little extra encouragement this night and that was just super sweet. Elmo somehow wiggled his way into my heart but not I'm so glad he's there. Here are a few pictures I took of him the other day, such a sweet model.

Here the happy little guy was drooling for his treat :]

REACH!

Elmo & I 

My big brother got a job that I am VERY happy for him about, unfortunately that means that the Fussa Cat wont be living with me any more as of 12/17/2010... I will miss my little kitty Nephew but I hope I get to visit him a lot. :)

Young and will be Married Soon :S :]

This Spring I will be marrying my best friend Hans. We'll both be twenty-one and are looking forward to this very much! Hans is hilarious and so much fun. For as long as I can remember knowing him we have some of our best talks when we go on walks. When we first met our freshman year of college we both looked like little babies and sometimes acted the same. We were in a bible study together and sometimes we would get into arguments about what certain points in the bible meant. Some from our group thought we were flirting but we were legitimately duking it out. I find it pretty funny now. On our walks sometimes we talk about theology, evaluate our lives, share memories or just fall on the ground laughing. One of my favorite things about Hans is that He continually challenges me, in my faith, my understandings, my cultural expectations. In Christ there is always adventure and I am so glad that Hans seeks to go through that adventure with God and me too! Hans is such a blessing to my life and love that I get to spend the rest of my life with him!

Hans and I want a relationship that lasts till death parts us... I would hate for a spiritual death to part us... I need to be spending more time focusing on my adventures with God so that I can truly be alive.

Wooot Woot!

God is Bigger

Do you believe that God still speaks through dreams? I do.

I have been thinking lately that God is FAR bigger than I am willing to admit to myself. I am trying to let go of my inhibitions and wrongful preconceptions about who God is and now He works. Growing up I sometimes heard times that God didn’t really work the same ways that He did in the bible…. He was more at work in quiet, passive ways. More and more I feel like this really isn’t true. I also feel like YES God sometimes works quietly but I can’t seem to understand why God wouldn’t still use things like healing, tongues, speaking to people. I think God still speaks to people in big ways... Isaiah 30:21 says, ‘Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.’” Jesus teaches us to pray and shows us the meaning of true sacrifice and love. He encourages us to pray for our daily bread and also tells us that we cannot live on bread alone. I am pretty sure that our bread is supposed to be Him. I am considering some of the things I’ve prayed about lately… doing well in Geology, getting good reviews for my art critique, not having so much snow, help with wedding planning… when will I learn my lesson. I don’t need so much stuff. In Matthew 24:35 Jesus says, “Heaven and earth will pass away but  my words will not pass away.” You know what else passes away with Heaven and earth Chelsea?  Grades, snow, Hans, fill in the blank.. What isn’t going to pass away is so hard for me to wrap my mind around when I get caught us on now. I have such a short-term perspective it’s awful. I’m in geology right now and my professor is talking about the millions and billions of years, which I don’t really agree with but that is besides the point, and I am thinking that is a lot of zeros…. Eternity is so much longer than any of these numbers we’re conjuring up. I’ll be out of class in 8 minuets if I am out in time. This class can’t pass away quickly enough. I am so imperfect. My mind focuses too often on temporary things. I want to be more aware of that still small voice telling me which way to God and I want to be so caught up in God. One of my favorite verses is found in 2 Corinthians 5:13 and says:

If we are “out of our mind,” as some say, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you.

As a Christian I think my life could maybe use a little bit more crazy…. Now off to  painting. I am hoping to incorporate that sweet little girl’s prayer. 

Birth of a Blog

I am not really sure what inspired me to start this blog but for some reason I was feeling the need to start one for a while but now that I have started this what will I do with it. I hope this is a place where I can put my thoughts in writing, pictures and maybe even show some art work... I guess that is yet to be determined.  To start, Thanksgiving was such a blessing this year. I am so grateful to God for the time I had with family and my fiance.
I went to ctk with my Aunt, Uncle and Cousin. I was blessed to hear a sermon on thankfulness and was genuinely challenged by a prayer that the pastor shared. The prayer came from a little girl in Africa and has not left my mind this prayer was the following and I hope it challenges you as much as it has me.

"I appreciate you God for this food which is a gift. I asked you for my daily bread and YOU have come through for me again. This food you could have given it to anyone but you gave it to me. I will not waist it,  I will enjoy it, I will not complain about it, I will receive it. I am your child, You are my Father, Asante sana, Thank you very very much and I love you. Amen."

This completely touched my heart, I am overwhelmed my the materialistic-ness in my life, the lack of gratitude, the blindness I have had to my own apathetic heart. I want to pray to God like that... I want to pray in a way that shows God SO much gratitude. I have been thinking about what I need to change in my life and how I need to be more actively in pursuit of God... As I was thinking about all this I heard the song 'Call Unto Me' by Phil Joel. I was reminded that God is so awesome and as the little girl said, God comes through! He has come through for me AGAIN!!! My brain cannot even wrap itself around the fact that God has blessed me more than I can comprehend.  I have so much to thank Him for. Lord, Thank you for how you bless me so much. Please help me to love you better.