seasons

I think my favorite spice is probably wassabi

(in reference to seasonings)

To everything turn turn turn turn

There is a season turn turn....

I hope your familiar with this song- its strait out of.. i want to say ecclesiasts.. anyway out of the bible.

Seasons in life are often defined by physical placement- and the operation of time. ie school and or a city you live in for a while.

Holidays!!! everyone loves getting a break sometime

Other things that often define a "season of our life" are friendships, relationships, jobs...

So my observation on seasons today is that they are ever changing, moving, and sliding into each other, overlapping, shifting- like the wind or a dance. Beautifully sometimes, graceful- sometimes clumsy and rough or outright painful and sudden. You do know when you are graduating you do not know when close friends are going decide to move 3 states away. You can foresee it getting cold for the winter (unless you live in Florida) But you cannot always see when you might loose your job. This movement we call life happens in time- that’s how we mark it all in our heads to make since of the turbulence. Seasons. As they move and come and go- my hope is that we would grow and change and bend and stretch and move with them- if we resist we will be like the oak trees in the hurricanes- obstinate though they are- immovable- they are broken under the weight of their own branches when the wind presses with its ferocious torrents.

Now time is turning again- and I must find a way to bend with it. What the word season does not help me with is finding some decent sushi in a grocery store.

Gettin' Lived by Life

You know guys I have an amazing life! Im blessed beyond belief in every area of my life, and I dont deserve it. I have anything I could ever need- and so much more I dont even realize it. But this semester I just havnt lived like I knew that. I whined, slacked off, complained, became depressed, got stressed out, sloppy, generally fell apart, my grades suffered... and you know I cant put a finger on why really. I just got so busy so quickly. Things with friends, Things with family, it all just ran together a rough week turned into a rough two weeks, into a rough month, (and my definition of rough is so pansy im ashamed to even complain about it) on and on... And now its almost over. Tuesday I have one last final. I dont understand. My relationship with God grew. But I feel like as a person I floundered. A new year has never looked so good. A new chance. I will never have to live these last 4 months over again. Though it wasnt any one thing I just have to remember who I am and how amazing my life really is- and the things that have driven me all along enjoying life, loveing God and loveing people. Living for others while still taking care of myself. Hmmmmmm theres a trick.

If I would listen

If i would listen- what would God say to me? Well i have spent a lot of recent time listening and fully plan to devote more time to this listening thing- cause i have questions that need answers- fairly simple q's but they are so very important to me- that if God is the friend i know he is, The father i love him for being, and the intamite lover he wants to be- then he has got an answer that will bring peace to my heart...

I have a good frind- probably one of the best friends ever (cause shes totally amazing). She is having a rough time cause she is going to a christian school where the dominant philosophy is that "people are useless wastes that our sin is all we are, that we are wretched to a point of disgust to God, nothing good in you, you worthless piece of shit-" need i go on? See there is a couple things i see wrong with this- and its basic weslean theology- (she said this to me and it grabbed me like a clinging earwig and just hasnt left my mind) If we TRULY have free will and our God is good and has made himself a choice for us- then we choose him; there must be something good in us that we would choose a good God.

God loves us- and true we are only able to enter into his courts by his grace because we do sin and skrew up and remove ourselves from his presence, will, and holyness... but that dosnt mean that were worthliss and so desparaging that we couldnt see Gods beauty and that he didnt create us "Good". Read genesis- Adam and Eve didnt cease to be the beautiful people God made them- and it probably broke his heart in a way we will never understand when they chose to sin, but he then spent the rest of the HUGE bible and on until now ages upon ages persuing and desireing and maddly chasing us back to his heart.

Another friend of mine asked me some hard questions- well im always up to a theological challange- not that i know anything about anything really- but he asked questions to the effect of "do we desearve salvation?"

i dont think its about desearving so much- essentially well we were created for a forever that didnt need salvation- then we skrew it up- then God sent a savior because he loved us. no technically i dont think we "desearve" if God is holy and we are evil- i just dont think man is evil- we do evil things and are decieved by an evil being who we let rule us- but man is something God loves and out of his love he desires a relationship- and has done everything he can to give us that relationship. Am I desearving of Christ dying for me- NO! But i dont buy into the ideology that there wasnt something he saw in me that made him want to do it. (most of the time i dont know what... but then there is something isnt there... and thats encouraging...)

And these college age students at my friend's school- they are being ripped apart by a self defeating mindset that why in the world would they love and persue a God who "Only saved your wretched skin out of mercy, not that you are or could be any good ever."


one last thought- not saying being basically good stopps us from leaning toward a wickid person we can be, but we are not made of our uglyness- the native americans have an old idea that there are two wolfs inside a man's soul- one evil, and one good- constantly at war over who rules the man- eventually one winns- the one you choose to feed.

Those funny stories :)

Well it has been well over a month sence ive been back in my humidifier of a sunny state- and i told yall id repeat some funny stories from my time in montana- there is a lot- and unfortunately mostly things that were so situational itd take me two hours to explain why they were funny (and usually it was because we were so stinkin tired it was either funny or unnerving)

So the crownin funny and also a really off- kind of story i will tell. Let me preface though with a truth about me and the staff- we all are humane and sensitave people and as we chose to laugh at the SURROUNDING EVENTS of the situation i am about to describe- the event at hand (a death) was an act of mercy and the events following said death are as morbid as i find them grimmley halarious.

So if you have ever spent time on a reservation you will probably be farmiliar with what we fondly refer to as "rez dogs" These dogs are usually fairly harmless, mangey, and homless animals that scavenge for their food.

This summer i fell in love with an abandond puppy and we fed and nursed her back to health- as she was starving to death when we found her. I bathed her regularly and almost brought her home with me. We called her princess.

But tagging along with some of our kids club children came one day a prince- so to speak. But said prince was not so lucky as Princess. He was too far gone to try and save on the means that we had. His fur was halfe gone from mange and fights- he was just a small puppy but he was starving and altogether too fierce and mangey to be around our participants. We couldnt get rid of him though, he would come back from the town if we just simply dropped him off- and if we stranded him he would die a long and painfull death- well details skipped he shortly passed on. Which we were sad about but it did free us from the medical and legal hazard this dog really was.

The funny part is this- we didnt immediately find him (though we assumed unless a bigger dog drug him off he had to be somewhere on the school grounds) until one of our work crews that were painting a teacher's house complained of a reeking smell whenever the wind picked up. Austin and i followed the smell to find him- well... there. And we resolved not to make a big deal about it cause our groups might be a bit disturbed- and at the time we decided to wait untill the evening and then we would dispose of the body.

We forgot


for around 5 days


there is no humidity in montana... and lotts of sun


So arriving on a sunny and beautiful sunday come a whole new batch of participants- i had just given my Princess a bath and she was clean and redy to greet her new friends- by the second van load i was in the kitchen when the site director came screaming in to say "princess wanted copper (the unfortunate rez dog) to meet our participants... I took off to catch my dog. There before me were about 30 screaming girls as princess wagging her tail came bouncing aroun with a very well preserved copper paw in her cute little mouth. (your stomach turns- so does mine but you have to laugh in that situation) not immediately tho, I wresteled the paw from her and asked austin if he knew where the rest of the dog was. "gone as far as i know" So we think its over- Princess getts another bath and were done.

Ah if only

That night we had some freetime just enough to find 15 girls looking out the window and then squeeling at what they saw... the rest of copper, once again princess brought me a preasent... so we desposed of him yet again.

Selah

I dont know if you are farmiliar with the word "Selah". It is used in psalms a lot. It means to take a reflective moment- a calm deep pause.

Its 8:15PM here- i have been packing, hauling, ripping down, bleaching, and pushing down tears all day. I got a letter from daddy and nearly lost it. Got a letter from my buddy Joseph (one of our kids here) and broke down.

So i took a break from cleaning and took a long glorious hot shower.

Then i walked out on our clean gym floor and layed down in the middle of it. And just was- this overwelming sence of deep calm. A peace i have never felt before- that moment was perfect. I was clean, the summer was a success, we are going home soon, and i am in one of the places i love the best- a gym.

Everything in Montana is big- the sky, the bears, the mountians, the trucks... It wont be strainge to be home, it will be strainge not being here. With the smells and crisp air... the family- so much of the time it has been a love-hate relationship with the other staff. But now faced with leaving them i realize how much of an impact each one has had on my life.

we watched the kids pull out in the vans yesterday- going home from our last Kids Club. Jess lost it- Josh and I kept it all back and down so that we could help lead the groups for the rest of the evening. Got done with club last night- i might have made it 5 steps out of site of club room and the three of us just sat down and wept.

This morning we waved off our final group- we all just sat down and stared.

Now we are cleaning- which is what i am returning to shortly. And we have kids running around the school playing with us. (they live close by) And we wouldnt dream of sending them away-

My time here was more presious than i realized.

The Beginning of the End

I love the line "and here at the end of all things", always have. Its hard to understand right now that I only have one short week left here in heart butte. I am rested right now- i have slept enough- kindof at the expense of talking to any of my friends. But even that seems ok at this point.

There are so many things i didnt do this summer. So many people i didnt make time to call. If i look at it long enough it feels like a failure. And im not sure what this summer was for me. It did not feel much like a success most of the time.

And yet if i really look at it- it was. Because plain and simple- its not about how good my talks are, or about how bad i skrewed up at inventory, or how i didnt prepare club well enough to suit the rest of everyone, exct. its not about me at all.

And its not about the youth and how much fun they had here, or what they give us on the evaluations- as much as it feels like its all about the adult leaders sometimes- bless the Lord its not!

So what was this all about? Micah 6:8, broken hearts, open eyes, and love- over abounding love that people need!!! So many children in Heart Butte see only one on one attention here at kidsclub, elders get loved on and served by groups coming and painting and hanging out. It is short term, i just have to hope that it has a lasting effect if we are able to stay on the reservation for years to come.

And now i am so ready to go home. And at the same time it will be strainge to not be here. I dont want to abandon these kids- and it feels a lot like abandonment. Its not fair! you lay down roots, build relationships, grow to love people, and then leave! Oh i have done so much whining on this blog- now i wish i could go back and give more story- more getting it right this time. this summer has been amazing.

No really, Im ok!

So i have been missing it. All of it. Wow- i feel dumb. Well, no, in a way i was right- fears are valid- but not so if i dwell on them, like the "attack" thanks yall who commented and reminded me to come back to earth. :) maybe i should explain "missing it"

See i get very frusterated with God- insanley mad sometimes, then just hurt- because i cant touch him- and he dosnt hold me. Like as blasphemous as it is, my thought process is very often "OK why stinkin not God??? Why dont you- creator of the universe? Why do you choose to not be physically here-" probably for two reasons, one faith isnt faith if i dont have to believe in something-

and the second reason where i have my "duh" moment :)

We are described as being the hands and feet of christ- as christians, my family and my friends- i am blessed to be surrounded by people who love the lord and love on me!!! Those are God's tangable gifts- a friend who putts their arm around me! A note of encouragment or just an "i love you" from 2,100 miles away- They are his voice and his arms in my life. And it is enough.
Maybe not always as much as i desire- but enough to remind me that it is not only their love for me (which is overwelming and such a gift) but his.

So thank you! everyone who loves me. Yall mean so much to me :) Unity in Christ is such a presious thing. like a treasure, that i am so stinkin quick to forget about! and then i lose words and just want to give the gift you all give to me- and i pray that God does that through me. same.

And besides all that-

I learned monday that i am a bad dancer in two cultures. haha

Im missing my guitar case- its GONE. hmmmm

and in case you were wondering- no i have not cut my dreads off (i love you mom)

somebody eat some sushi for me- then let me know what you had :)

PEACE!!!