My Prayer

Today Marcel played the drums at church, which means I sit all by myself during worship.  I'm used to it now, plus it makes me more grateful for the times we get to enjoy worship together.  After the first song, Pastor Ryan called the church elders and leadership team up to the altar to be available for our prayer requests, just like he does every week.

Without missing a beat, the little girl (I guess she was around 10, which is influenced by Marcel thinking she was 12) sitting in front of me, stood up, squeezed her way in front of her mom sitting in her chair, and went to an open couple to ask for prayer.  She came back and again took her place to join the congregation in corporate worship.

Worship was wonderful.  The sermon was touching as we plan for many upcoming opportunities to serve our community, but witnessing the faith of a young child was simply the most moving part of church today.

I pray that when God allows Marcel and I to be the earthly parents to some of His precious children, we will raise them in such a way that they have a faith in God as strong as I witnessed today.

MAT @ GFU?!?!

A long time ago, Marcel and I decided we were being called to Idaho because I was going to go to nursing school and he'd be getting his MAT. Then I realized I was far from ready for more schooling and just a few months later Marcel decided he wouldn't be able to start in January as originally planned because of some confusion from the Admission's Office, but after a lot of prayer we realized it was still the right thing for us to go to Idaho.

Fast forward to last week and things are changing: Marcel received a letter from George Fox University's Boise campus informing him that he still had time to apply for their program to start January 7th. It seemed impossible because before school can start he has to: apply to school, write an admissions essay, get 3 letters of recommendation, create a teaching experience resume, update his FAFSA, take the PRAXIS test, participate in a group assessment/interview, and attend the mandatory orientation session on December 21st, just 2 days after we're leaving Oregon! But with help with the wonderful people in the Career Center, a final schedule to die for and a wonderful wife, he has been able to get everything done! Plus, by using the Career Center he is eligible for their Grad School Application Fund--each student who uses them can receive $150 in funds for the application and testing fees. It has left us with just $20 to cover out-of-pocket. What a blessing!

The admissions counselor @ GFU told him there is still plenty of financial aid available and it is still the FAFSA using 2008 tax information, so we should be getting plenty of aid. And she also told him that pending no red flags being seen during the interview and the letters of recommendation he'd be an admitted student as of Monday, just in time for the orientation and he'll be on his way to getting his Master's of Arts in Teaching!

The program is part-time for the first 2 semesters, January through September, with class just Thursday nights and a class or 2 online, so he'll still be able to work nearly full-time! That's the reason he first thought this program was where he needed to be. So if he makes it through the rest of the process without any red flags, he'll be a licensed teacher in May 2011 and we'll be preparing for another big move to wherever he can find a job teaching music!

It feels good to be rewarded for our faithfulness and continually trusting in His plan, instead of following the path we set out for ourselves. It may be very uncomfortable at times, but it is ALWAYS turns out best when we allow Him to lead our lives!

Mysterious Message

Yesterday morning I was on my way back from Banana, anxious for my nap, and listening to K-LOVE, my new found love in radio. I heard that Steven Curtis Chapman was going to be on but I didn’t hear when. I was hoping that I’d hear it because he is my all-time favorite Christian music artist. On my way to the gym, my radio turned on to K-LOVE and it was Steven Curtis Chapman! His new song, Heaven is the Face, is about his little girl dying. His whole interview was about her dying and how they are coping still after 18 months. All he could say over and over is that there are still hard days and very hard days but each day they are reminded that they will be reunited and that is enough to get them through the difficult times.

He also spoke of his tattoo of her drawing—a six petal flower, with only 1 petal colored in, with the word SEE. He explained it as the sign from God that everything would be okay, that his family would get through the tragedy. He has 6 children, 1 of which has gone to Heaven, that’s the petal that’s colored. We can never reach completion in this life and it isn’t until we return to our Father. SEE was a word she had just learned to write but it spoke volumes of saying see I’m in a better place.

I spent my 30 minute drive crying along to the radio, and the DJs who were also crying. Lately I’ve felt that life has been rough for me—my jobs keep me way too busy for way too little money, my house never looks how I want it to, I don’t see my husband enough, etc… but this whole conversation spoke to me. There are people who have it way harder than I do, and they may even be in my apartment complex. I have 2 jobs at a time when many people have none. I have a place to live when many people don’t. I have food in my cupboards and fridge when many people can’t afford groceries. I have a loving, supportive husband and family when many people are losing their loved ones.

This was a message I needed to hear. It is something I’ve been praying about and having Marcel pray for me about. God works in mysterious ways and allowed me to hear the message I have needed to hear to come from someone I admire. I feel relieved to realize again that I am blessed beyond measure by a God who will never forsake me.

Baby Step 1

Yesterday, Marcel called me and told me that he got a revised financial aid letter from school. His financial aid had already paid for the entire semester, but they "found" (I don't know the right word, but found works for me!) more grant money and he was awarded an additional $1,338! Because his account is already paid in full, the school will issue it to us as a check, usable however we see fit.


At first we were not quite agreeing on how to use the huge surprise. I wanted to pay off one of my smaller school loans; Marcel wanted to use it to buy the computer he has had his eye on: a Mac. It is something he will need but since school is no longer in the immediate future, I thought it was a want and not practical since our bonus wouldn't have even bought the whole thing. Where were we going to get that extra money?? I got to work at the gym and had an epiphany: if we are moving to Idaho to get ahead of our finances and are currently reading Dave Ramsey's The Total Money Makeover as our guide then we needed to follow the steps he sets out for us, so I realized we needed to start with Baby Step 1: Save $1,000 FAST!!


Marcel was able to pick me up from work after being at worship practice and said, "So...that money needs to be our emergency fund. We can't spend it!" Remember that I am super emotional, but I almost cried. I asked how he came to that realization. At worship practice they have a prayer time and his request was once again for finances. He explained that we are moving to Idaho for financial reasons and that set off a light bulb for him! So our plan is to tithe our 10% like we are called to do and then put away the money and forget about it until we encounter an emergency.


Just the other day I was telling Marcel how I was in the stage of knowing we have to tithe because we have seen the blessings but still always worrying how it was coming to be when I had to sit down and pay bills. I think this newest surprise was just what I needed. Previously we've seen it in a few extra dollars here and there but to receive such a huge amount at one time reassured me that everything goes according plan, not our plan, but His. We are loved by a very awesome God!


Now on to Baby Step 2: Debt Snowball!

A Life Changing Conversation

I always desire that this blog can serve as a place to write about my feelings and emotions, not just the fun stuff I experience, and that is what this post is all about.

Every week our church has the elders and the members of the worship team gather at the front of the sanctuary to be available for prayer. As we were leaving our seats Marcel tugged me to go receive prayer with him. Without knowing what he wanted prayer for, I was tugging him back--it's well out of my comfort zone to tell complete strangers my life story. Marcel just told the guy (a member of the worship team, and a fellow drummer) that we were asking for guidance in where our life was going next, with plans for a big move and that we desire to see God's hand in our decisions so that we are constantly on His path, not our own. This prayer led to tears for me, so we walked around the outside of church until we found a quiet place to sit, talk, and reflect.

Some big decisions were made that day, ones the assure me that we are indeed following God's will for our lives, together and individually, because they are big changes in what we had set out as our next steps. For instance, Marcel will not be continuing on with his education to obtain a Master's in Teaching. While he knows that is something he desires and is gifted to do, he feels that it is not the right time for it (how I can I say anything to that? I too wanted to take time off before I embarked on anymore school?) He will be looking for a job in the Boise area, as we both feel it is in our best interest to head out of the only area we've ever known together. It will give us a chance to experience something new together; even if I do know Idaho, I still feel that this time in Idaho will be far different than any other time I've been there. I think that Marcel has always known I am ready for a change in my employment it wasn't until that conversation where I could tell he understood why. I no longer want to stress all day Thursday waiting for an email with my work schedule praying that I will have enough hours to pay the bills. I no longer want to feel guilty about taking a weekend off because it may mean a paycheck that is way too small. I no longer want to leave the house at 8am and not return until 9pm for only 8 hours of work. While I realize I have a lot to be grateful for in that I do not only have 1 job in the economic situation our country is in, I have 2, I am excited to think about what opportunities are ahead of me. Through our nearly 4 months of marriage, I have seen more financial blessings than I ever thought someone could have over a much longer time period. Marcel has made me realize the importance of tithing. I have been in church my whole life and while I have sat through countless sermons on that very principle, I could never quite wrap my head around the fact that money would just appear out of nowhere if I gave the fair share to God first. It has been an eye-opening experience to always be blessed at just the right time in reward for our faithfulness. If I could only take away 1 thing from the short time we've been married, that would be it. I never felt that a short 30 minute conversation could hold so much meaning in the words we shared that day.

We pray every night that we'd hear and see from God daily and that He'd show us the path he has set out for us. After that time with my husband I know without a doubt that we in fact keeping God first in our relationship and that we are faithful to obey Him and the desires He has for us.

I've Been Thinking

Since last night's Grey's Anatomy my mind has been running. It was such a good episode in terms of television season finales, and it was also very emotional and relational. I feel pretty sappy that a TV show can affect me like this, but I can't deny it; plus those of you who really know me already know this about me!

Since the day Marcel proposed to me we've prayed to always realize what is really important in the wedding (to us, hardly anything, besides the vows) and that the bigger thing is the marriage. The show made me re-realize a few things:

• We will forever put the other person's hopes, dreams, desires, needs and wants before our own
  
• Life will get messy and we'll face things we never could have dreamed, but God prepares us for all our challenges
  
• God brought us together nearly three years ago (1 week shy!) and He'll keep us that way if we keep him in our relationship
• There are rewards to marriage that you can never imagine until you are experiencing them firsthand
• I'm blessed to have found Marcel when I did, so that we could experience everything in life together.
• Marcel loves me more than I ever thought someone could be loved--he told me today that he loves me 85 trillion times more than I love him!

I'm only 15 days away from becoming a wife and am continually praying, not only with Marcel, but in my own prayer time, that as the wedding gets closer and closer I lose focus on the little things and the wedding things, but instead take time to consider the bigger things: the vows we'll be taking when we commit ourselves to each other and finally become husband and wife.

Random Act of Kindness

Yesterday, after a long morning of working with the kids at the gym, I got to Marcel's dorm starving and ready for lunch. As soon as he got to the door to let me in (he was nice enough to have lunch ready and waiting!), a girl came up to me asking me how to get to Pacific University, which she was already at since we were at the dorm. She then told us that she had just taken the bus from Hillsboro to see her aunt who lived in an apartment near campus--she had no address or phone number! Marcel and I both thought of the same one, and directed her in the right way to go. She seemed confused so Marcel offered me to walk her to where she thought her aunt lived. When we got to the most known Forest Grove apartments, it turns out that she lived in a small house near an apartment complex, so we headed back to campus to drive her around town. In my 15 minutes of walking with A (neither of us can remember her name but know it started with an A) she revealed to me that she was actually trying to find her foster mother's house who she had stayed with just 1 night earlier in the week before getting placed into a more permanent home. She opened up to me about her dad being physically abusive to her and her 10 brothers and sisters, but that she was the only 1 who stood up to him. She was only in foster care because she had confided in a high school teacher who was willing to help A get out of the horrible situation.

Once we got back to campus, we called Marcel for my car keys and he offered to come with. We drove all over Forest Grove and it seemed like everytime we found something that could possibly be the house something in her description changed (just like we were looking for apartments, then suddenly a small house). Turns out the foster mom was supposed to pick her up at Safeway (there's a bus stop there) but she wasn't there when A got off so she decided to find the house herself because she had no phone number to call.

After driving 45 minutes through what always feels like an extremely small town, we did miracously find the correct house: a little red house, very close to where we started, just on a block we somehow skipped!

As Marcel and I headed back to his room, all I could think about was that we did a great thing. Marcel and I pray nightly that God will use us to be a light to other people and today allowed us to see for ourselves that we can in fact be a light. The more interesting thing to me is that I was starving and ready for lunch way before I left work and with the walk time, drive time, then reheat lunch it had been almost 2 hours and I hadn't felt hungry. God took care of my needs so that I could help one of his children in a much worse situation than I've ever been in. The few hours we spent with A opened our eyes to what we're capable of with God's help.