"homework" projects

i just watched a video of dwight's testimony. i forgot how similar our stories are... at least the part about how God worked through prayer to draw us into a relationship with Him. it was again a reminder of how powerful prayer is and how we can/should lift others up in prayer too. both dwight and i were "homework" projects for our friends who were going through an outreach study. so little did we know at the time, but we each had groups of people praying for us throughout the study while our friends took steps in faith and with courage to ask us questions about God, church and life. God used these steps of faith to make us curious, and He softened our hearts to say "yes" to the invitations, and eventually we fell in love with our God who pursues us with unconditional love. after i became a believer, i too found out that i was a "homework" project and i was blown away that people i barely knew cared enough to pray for me during that time... and i was happy they did too. it's a good reminder that i need to not give up hope and to keep praying too!

A Full and Abundant Life

Jesus said, "I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full." (John 10:10b)

this is the verse that i think of when i think about dwight's life. over the past week since his accident, i've gone through many emotions and thoughts about the events that took place. there was the amazing way no one was hurt after dwight passed out at the wheel, to the timely cpr and care of the nearby construction workers, to the encouraging note that one of these workers and his whole family had just become new believers, to the way God's family came together to provide prayer and support, to the amazing miracles of his mom and uncle accepting Christ and then there were the hard times when they said his brain activity showed signs of damage and the MRI tests that showed evidence of lack of oxygen to his brain.

as i reflected and prayed over the past week, i became more and more amazed at what a faithful and FULL life dwight has had even though he's not that much older than me! i first got to really know dwight when we went on a 6 week missions trip to brazil. we were on the same team and i got to see his heart for serving others and his heart for following and glorifying God in all he did. on the trip, he hurt his foot (above pic) but didn't allow that to stop him from serving others. i saw his gentle spirit and his big heart....and his funny side too! i also got to serve with him on the mission board and saw his passion for expanding God's kingdom. then i saw him faithfully follow God to kazakhstan and loved hearing how he even used some of the english lessons we did in brazil over there too. he also followed God's guidance in organizing perspectives classes here in seattle so that fellow believers like myself could learn about what God is doing all over the world and get excited about joining God in kingdom work. dwight had such a servant heart that when my front door lock broke one morning on my way to work, i didn't know who to call and i ended up contacting dwight who came over that very day and spent several hours fixing it for me. it was always a blessing to chat and catch up with dwight b/c he had such a caring heart and just being around him encouraged me to live more for God. dwight has touched and blessed the lives of so many people here in seattle and all over the world, and though i am sad he is gone i'm amazed at how FULL a life he has had and now i know he is enjoying eternity with Jesus. how awesome is that!

for me, reflecting on dwight's life has encouraged me to renew my pursuit of a life of knowing and following hard after God (a line from a popular praise song the year we went to brazil... we sang it a lot that year). my favorite verse, the words of the apostle paul, truly applies to dwight's life and i hope they may apply one day to my life as well, "(you) have fought the good fight, (you) have finished the race, (you) have kept the faith." (2 tim 4:7)

i'll miss you dwight, and i can't wait until we meet again so i can thank you for encouraging me to live a FULL life no matter how long or short it may be.

food poisoning & meeting jesus

yes, you read that title right...."food poisoning" AND "meeting jesus". what do those 2 things have in common? well let me tell you!

this week, i had my very first and hopefully last experience with food poisoning. i went to a nice dine around seattle meal on monday night, had some crab cakes and ate way too much and went to bed early. then at 2am i woke up, not really knowing why, and i couldn't go back to sleep. by 4am i was feeling even worse, still couldn't go to sleep and finally threw up. after that i think i threw up almost once every hour for the next 6 hrs. it was horrible!

see i'm not the type of person that gets sick like that... in fact i've often thought i must have a super iron stomach b/c i never throw up. but that tuesday, it was like having the flu plus the added "bleh" factor of puking. i had literally no energy, i could barely walk upstairs to try to get more water or something to settle my stomach. a friend was nice enough to come over to deliver me some "safe" foods to eat and i could barely talk/hang out with her before wanting to just lie down and go to sleep. never again do i want to experience that!

now where is the "meeting jesus" part of this story? well, it's kinda funny because throwing up like i did this week will always remind of me of when i first met Jesus. see when i first started my journey into figuring out what i believed about God, Jesus and everything it was around my birthday, and that year i drank a bit too much and ended up throwing up a lot the next day. which is why it reminded me of when i first met jesus... or at least when i began that journey.

it's also quite ironic that today is also Good Friday and as i sat in service and reflected on my life with Christ i was again reminded of that birthday many years ago where i threw up a bunch and was introduced to Him... the 2 things will always go hand in hand in my memory. it's truly amazing how much my life has changed since that day and i'm SO grateful for the life i have with Him. how AWESOME is our God and how AMAZING it is that He loves us so much that He laid down His life for us!

"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." 

Romans 5:8

Turkey...not just a normal vacation

this is my first flashback post, so i'm going to go back and write about my trip to Turkey which started off 2010 for me. sadly i can't seem to remember what happened in 2009...again a reminder why i need to blog more!

i traveled to turkey on 12/29/2009 and kicked off the new year there! i spent 5 days in izmir and about 5 days in istanbul. i decided to go to turkey b/c a really close friend of mine had moved there a year before to pursue God's calling as an m worker. i was really intrigued by turkey b/c i knew so little about the country and the people/culture there, but had slowly learned more as my friend would share about her time there. i was also curious about the life of an m worker and wanted to see/meet/experience a little bit of what it's like living over there. so while this was a vacation trip for me, i would have to say that it unexpectedly became a lot more than that for me.