EJ 05

Experience Jesus 2005. Thats the name of this year's San Diego Christmas Conference. Which is where I am at the moment. Im having a blast hanging out with college students and talking to them about opportunities to come work at Headquarters in Orlando.

The job is a lot harder than I thought but its still a lot of fun. Pray that God calls students from all the different Christmas conferences around the country to work with us in Orlando.

Tucson

So I made the journey to Tucson today. God is quite awesome I must say.

Today I arrived at the airport and got my tickets and went to my plane and right before they start boarding the plane I realize "wait a second this seat is in FIRST CLASS". I definately did NOT buy first class tickets but somehow I got bumped up. Yep that was my first time riding in first class. REAL food on a domestic flight is a first. Haha it was like a little Christmas present from God. I finally had time to work on my Christmas cards on the flight too. bonus!

Then I got to Tucson and saw my parents new house. one word: AWESOME!!!! The pictures that ive been seeing totally do not do it justice. Its actually quite big and bright and airy on the inside. I think it has a very asian feel but everyone else here seems to disagree. oh well.

Tomorrow I start my Christmas shopping. aaaaaaaaahhh.

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!! (I might post again before Christmas but I make no promises)

*ill*

Being sick is No fun! (you can pray I get better.)

On a more happy note: I only have 2 more work days (Friday and Monday) before I fly to Arizona for Christmas! Yay!

Narnia

Christmas Parties Galore. That sums up my weekend. But I also saw the Narnia movie.

I really like the Narnia movie. What I have always found interesting about that story is that C S Lewis was writing it as an allegory of the gospel. So its appropriate to look for parallels in it to the bible and christianity. And CSLewis was such a deep thinker that all kinds of neat things come out when you think about how the story plays out.

For instance when Lucy first enters Narnia it is this huge mysterious exciting place. She is filled with wonder. It strikes me that it is the same as someone discovering for the first time that there really is a supernatural - God exists in this universe of ours. The world theyve been living in becomes - different. Some how more Grand just by that knowledge.

Others like Edmund discover this same wider universe but they happen upon its sinister side instead of the good.

Either way you must soon discover that a war is going on.

Almost every scene in the movie portray's some piece of the gospel. If you've seen the movie what was your favorite scene was and what do you think its deeper meaning was???

The grass may be greener here...

But I've been looking at the pictures of snow on my friends blog and I have to say I'm pretty jealous. It certainly looks pretty and fun!! Some day I'd like to live somewhere that it snows.

Lake Hart Christmas Decorations!

I love this season! And now LakeHart is all decorated nicely! Here are a few pictures for your viewing pleasure:

more preview weekend pictures!

Here is a picture of the whole group that came in November as well as another picture of my particular group.

Congrats Steve and Cheryl

My roommate Steve got married yesterday. It was a really nice wedding and reception.

in slightly older news Thanksgiving was fun. I went to Georgia. It was wonderfully cold and we got to ride 4 wheel ATV's.

sorry I'm being so brief but I just wanted to get something posted in my spare moment before I dive back in to work.

God Bless!

Best preview weekend ever!

This weekend was awesome! Here is a picture of some of the people in my group when we went to DownTown disney. I had a lot of fun getting to know these students and I really hope they all join staff. By the end of the weekend alot of them said they are planning to join staff or do an internship. They were 100% more excited about working for Campus Crusade than the group last year! God is really doing some cool things in their lives.

Preview weekend '05 - take 2

(I was just going to say preview weekend 05 but then i remembered that the last one happend at the begining of this year so this is really the second preview weekend of the year.)

All that to say that it is once again Lake Hart Preview Weekend time. Once again I get to host students coming to check out Lake Hart. Im pretty excited about it. I love interacting with college students and I also know how desparately we need more programmers here.

Please please please pray that God would lead some of these students to come work in our office when they graduate. We need more laborers pretty bad in order to expand our capacity to support a growing world wide organization.

Hopefully I will get some pictures from preview weekend to post on here next week.

Have a great weekend!!

suggestions box.

I've been trying to think of something to Blog about today but nothing is coming to me. So I have decided to ask you, my wonderful readership what you would like me to write about in the future.

Suggestions anyone??

Persecution

I just thought I would post about something thats on my heart right now. In the last 2 days I've heard about the persecuted church from various places and it burdens my heart to pray. Please pray for our family throughout the world who are being beat, imprisioned, tortured and killed just because they love DAD.

This coming Sunday is the International day of prayer for the persecuted church. I dont know who gets to appoint that day but I still want to honor it and I challenge you to do the same. Who knows how long our religious freedom here in America will last, we should join with our persecuted family to encourage them and pray for them while we still are free.

Fall Festival

Last night was CrossPointe Church's Fall Festival. There was great food and it was a fun time. But the neatest part of it was that they did a baptism and 20 people got baptised!! It was really cool. This church is growing so fast.

God is truely adding to our numbers [weekly] those who are being saved. Praise God that he still makes his love and grace available to people today! It is good to see His mercies new (Fresh!) every day!

Its a delight to serve God!

Newsletters

Today is Newsletter day. Thats the day when I realize the end of the month is almost here and the newsletter I wrote last week STILL needs to be put in envelopes and mailed out.

Lord willing I will have it done by the end of the day.

Wilma

Well I lived through my fourth Hurricane yesterday. Wilma went through southern Florida but we still got pounded with Tropical Storm winds. That means we had sustained tropical storm winds with gusts up to hurricane strength (74+ mph).

By the time I got up (work was closed so i slept in til 9) the storm was most of the way gone. It was still windy and rainy til around noonish. But then the strangest thing Ive ever seen from a hurricane happened. The storm ended abruptly.

There was a cold front following the storm. So the air got really dry, the sky was a beautiful blue with no clouds in sight, and the temperature dropped to about 65-70.

as my coworker Nathan said today "It was the most beautiful day to have off from work due to bad weather."

The Passing of Lee Ann Mayr

I learned yesterday morning that Lee Ann died the day before. While you may not know who she was if you know me then you have atleast seen a little of her because she influenced my life quite a bit.

Lee Ann was our next door neighbor for the first 15 years of my life. Then she and her husband moved away and I only saw them two or 3 times in the following 10 years.

I have a myriad of fond memories of Lee Ann. I think the biggest thing she taught me was how rich life is. I'd walk into her house as a kid and there would always be such wonderful smells of food cooking. She'd paint for the sheer joy of painting. All my memories of her are permeated with this sense of... hmm... artistic rich realness.

She is missed. But missed with that sense of 'I cant wait to see her again'. Heaven will be such a wonderful place of reunions.

Georgia in Fall

Well I cant seem to stay put these days. Last week I worked extra hours so I could take off early on friday and head to Georgia for the weekend.

And it was a great time. I got to go to the Gold Rush Festival in Dahlonaga Georgia Saturday. That was fun. Felt like i went back in time 100 years. But with 200,000 people there (the estimate in the paper) it didnt feel very quaint like i was expecting.

Then we headed down to Atlanta and visited my sister for the rest of the weekend. She took us to this super neat Coffee shop that had live music. This couple was playing music... blue grass/folksy stuff. The lady had a upright Bass and the guy played either the banjo or the guitar depending on the song.

Well my biggest hope in going was to see some brightly colored fall leaves. but i was vastly disappointed. The leaves were falling but they were just brown. Some locals told me it was the weirdest thing this year. The trees were still green but leaves were turning brown and falling off. No bright colors. :-( maybe next year.

Back in the swing of things

After being gone for so long I thought it might take a while to get back up to speed on work. Praise God it hasn't taken long at all. Im back to working on multiple projects simultaneously. :)

Im also trying to get a prayer letter written. Pray that I get that done quickly.

Ah life. It seems to be always routine but never normal, and certainly never 'settled down'.

Cruise

After my trip to California I was treated to a little vacation. Thats right I got to go on my first cruise!! It was alot of fun. But mostly it was relaxing. I'll just put some pictures up to show a little of it. Thanks Josh for taking me along!!!!!



This is our tiny cabin on the cruise. Needless to say we weren't in here very much.


One of our stops was Key West which is shown here. I dont have any pictures yet of our other stop.


Enjoy!

Goodbye California

My trip to California to meet with supporters has come to an end. (actually it ended a week ago but im just now blogging about it).

It was such a good trip. I think I met with nearly 90% of my California supporters. What a fun trip to reconnect with people.

The biggest lesson I learned on the trip was this: Support raising CAN be a fun and encouraging time! I never would have guessed. Of course it helps that I had a bunch of people praying that I would stay encouraged, and all my supporters are great people that I enjoy meeting with.

If your one of my supporters and I didnt get a chance to meet with you I am really sorry - hopefully I'll meet with you on my next trip.

In Between Times

While I have been in California the past 2 weeks I have had tons of appointments with supporters and Ive gotten to catch up with a lot of old friends. But the "In between times" have been extra special. Between meetings and appointments and other varied activities I have gotten some delightful time with Jesus.

There is so much time spent driving places or sitting and waiting for the next event that I have started to fill it all with talking to Jesus or reading his word. I feel sooo refreshed its wonderful.

I'll leave you with one tidbit I've been contemplating today. Jesus is called master. And often the way we understand that is "owner" or "boss". He is that. BUT there is more to the word master than those definitions. He's also the "best" or most experienced. Think Maestro instead of master. What is he the best at? Life!! He was the one who lived life, gave life, was life better than any one who ever was is or will be. He mastered life.

It makes it so much easier to ask him for help when you think "he's the best one to ever live why would I seek advice from anyone else??"

well there is a whole lot more to say about that thought but i dont want to steal any more of the Joy of that discovery from you.

Blessings.

California

I love my home state. Im finally here and everything is great. But its sooo stinking cold. I LOVE it. I forgot how much i enjoy cold weather. And its not even that cold out, only compared to humid Florida.

The other thing I love about California is the people. Im glad I get to come back and see all my friends you guys are the greatest!!

If you havent heard from me about meeting up while Im in town LET ME KNOW!!! Post on here if you have to to let me know(some people already have) but its best to email or call me. Some of you i havent talked to because i dont have a phone number for you any more.

Katrina

No I dont have a new girl friend. Katrina, if you haven't been watching the news, is being called the most devestating hurricane in US history. Having been hit by several hurricanes last year I thought I had a good knowledge of their destructive power. And when Katrina was projected not to come anywhere near Orlando I felt pretty safe.

But WOW. I dont think anyone was expecting what she did. Cities destroyed. New Orleans practically became a modern day Atlantis - sunk beneath the sea. Or in this case beneath the storm surge. Seeing the pictures of the devestation really had me concerned but I wasnt sure how to respond and it all seemed very distant.

Well last night there was a 'gas panic' here in Orlando. And actually all over the southeast. People lined up 50 cars deep to fill up their cars. I admit I was one of them but mostly because my car was on the redline so I had to get gas.

Sadly that was when I really understood how different this hurricane was than what I had been through a year ago. Katrina physically destroyed several cities but her effects are felt across the region - probably across the nation. And in the world we live in today this will likely effect the whole globe for years to come.

Though we are all feeling the effects in different ways the people who need help the most are those directly effected by the storm. Crusade I found out has a ministry (probably more than one) that is directly helping the storm victims. If you want to know more or donate to the relief efforts check out GAIN at http://www.gainusa.org/

And Pray. Always and often.

Stress

Some days are just pure stress. Take today for instance. Granted its a Monday but my typical Monday isnt that bad. Today however hasnt been typical.

My phone has been ringing off the hook since before I got to work today (and I even got here early). Things have been going wrong that only I can fix (yay I'm important) but unfortunately they seem to all be going wrong in one morning. I dont know what they are going to do next week when I'm gone to California!!

I never thought I'd say this but today I'm really looking forward to making support calls! I think that might be less stressful than this morning. Actually this week I get to set up appointments with current supporters for my time in California. Im pretty excited to go see them, so I really am looking forward to making calls.

Prayer request: Car need

When I'm in California in September I will need a car so I can get around and visit with people.

If any of you have a car that you can loan me for a few days, or even for my whole trip let me know!!!

If you dont would you still please pray for God's provision of this need. This would be a huge blessing as it would save me several hundred dollars in car rental costs.

Thanks!!

Time for a trip "home".

Yep thats right in about two weeks I will head back to California for my first 'support maintenance' trip.

Im super excited to meet with all the people who have been supporting me. I think it will be fun to share stories of what God has been doing this past year while I've been in Orlando. It will be good to see friends and just be "home", though its not really home so much any more with my family all moved away.

I also need to raise a bunch of new monthly support. You can pray that God provides for that need on this trip.

More Goodbyes

Im begining to discover that its sometimes hard to hold onto friends working at the headquarters of a major missionary organization... everyone's always going out to save the world.

This summer a number of good friends have moved away. Tonight there is a little shindig scheduled as a send off to two more friends who are leaving Orlando to chase the vision God has given them.

There is a little bit of sadness to see more friends leave but they leave for the same reason that I came here. I recall the eager anticipation I had when I moved out here. Not an eagerness to leave home, but a great excitement to see what God might do with my life if I would only trust him with it. How can I begrudge others that same experience??

Birthday

Well its official I'm now a year older.

I had a great birthday - me and 16 of my Orlando friends went to dinner at P F Chang's. That's pretty much it. It was a really great relaxing birthday. And unlike last year there wasn't a hurricane destroying the city which is definately a plus.

Feel free to leave me congratulations or condolances. ;)

Heres a nice picture of all the OSP 05 staff. Dont we look great!! Haha. Fun times. But seriously what a great team to work with to influence students for eternity! 

OSP 05 is over.

Today is the last day of Orlando Summer Project 2005. Tonight there is one final dinner for them and then they go home tomorrow. Its pretty sad since I had a lot of fun with them and made some good friends.

Ill post a picture here in honor of them...

A beginning

Well this isnt the beginning of anything earth shattering but this IS the first post on my new blog.

My intention is to blog daily or weekly about little things going on in my life particularly for my ministry partners. My hope is that this would allow my partners to feel more connected to my life.