The Things That Changed My Life

I should start by saying, this could get real cliche, because I've seen a few other people post things similar to this, but I wanted to share a part of my own story. With that being said, I'll explain what I am talking about.

Three years ago yesterday, I was getting on a plane with a few people I met at the Milwaukee airport that day, heading to Estes Park, Colorado for training for a summer job. Three years later, I have completed 3 summers working with Group Mission Trips, numerous volunteer events, met a lot of incredible and inspiring people, and been a part of an amazing ministry and organization. My theme this year has been about appreciating and being thankful for every thing, little or small, and its the huge amount of little things that I have been introduced to because of Group Mission Trips that makes it a huge, life-changing thing. There are three major ways Group has change me:

First, the ministry. I had opportunities to watch youth and young people grow, learn what serving means, as I was called to do just that every day, even when it was hard, and I didn't want to do it. I learned so much more about what it means to be a part of a ministry, and how the little things such as being goofy holding up a huge yellow sign that says "welcome" can make an impact. 

Second, the people. The full-time staff, my crews, the youth leaders, service project contacts, and even inspiring youth are just a few of the people I've interacted with. There are great summer staff that Group hires each year who have been incredible to hear their stories, and connect with them. Some of them I still keep in contact with, and I look forward to the times I get to skype with them, catch up, or even hang out at a Group Conference or event. Behind these summer staffers is an incredible team of full-time staff who encourage and believe in the young people who run the camps. We couldn't do what we do without the vision and hard work from the full-time staff, who care endlessly to see youth encounter Jesus. 

My crews. My word, I can't say enough about the great people I have had the opportunity to work alongside for three summers. With Taylor in Cincy, Erika in Charleston, and Leah and Laura in Nashville, these women have really impacted me and have made me learn so much more about not only myself, but how to love God and love people better. 

People from the projects. I have met some incredible people who work and serve people every day, and are truly inspiring. People who work with youth, refugees, people without homes, those with Alzheimer's. Week after week, we would work alongside incredible people who have stories to tell of inspiration and the front-range work of caring and loving people. It is people like this who remind me of my humanness and how futile and selfish I can be.

Thirdly, the opportunities.  Where else would I have the opportunity to stand in front of 600 people, and speak to them how God repairs and renews? Where else would I find an amazing church to intern with and learn about worship ministry so I can finish my degree program? Where else have I had the opportunity to travel the country, and get paid to do it? Where else would I go out of my way to make it to Columbus after having money stolen, and not having a debit card, just so I can volunteer at a youth-ministry conference where God had plans of transforming me in an unexpected way? The stories are endless, and the impact is life-long. I celebrate and rejoice for the time I have had, and the time that is coming. God has used Group to meet people, find opportunities, and move in my heart in ways that will be lasting for the rest of my life. It's not over, and it simply is just begun. 

My charge to you? What little things or big things do you have in your life that you could consider to be life changing? How have these things been put there, and what impact have they left in your life? Sometimes it becomes easy to get caught up in the day to day, and forget God's promises that are life-long. It may take some digging, but they are there. Practicing thankfulness and opening ourselves up to all that God can do, opens us up to greater fulfillment and joy of life. 

If you want to read more about this, check out Ann Voskamp's One-Thousand Gifts, and find what are your moments of grace to be thankful for. One of mine is:

20. Meeting people and finding opportunities through Group

Looking forward to a more full and fulfilling life.

http://onethousandgifts.com/

http://groupmissiontrips.com/

The Refreshing Start of A New Year

Well hello to all my blog readers. I know its been a while. (I feel like I always say that).

I have been thinking about getting into blogging a bit more regularly and how I would like to do that. Its a new year, so time for new things right? I read on someone's blog that they wanted to blog about love. Not love in the sense of romance, but lately, there have been so many negative "here's my opinion on the problems with X..." type of blogs. So instead, I want to join in the movement of writing and promoting things I love, and for me, promoting joy. (Thanks to Michelle Weygandt for the great insight! >>Link to her blog about this... Promoting Love )

So here's to writing about things that inspire, things I learn, and promoting things I love. Forget all those negative posts that are still drafts in my blog post box.

Joy.
Its been a word that has been coming up in my life for a while. I've realized I've let myself sink into negativity and complaining about the things I don't have. So I decided to get the book (promoting favorite thing #1), One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp. I've read two chapters so far, and have been really convicted. So I want to start promoting joy and all the things I've been blessed with. In her book, Voskamp studied the Greek word eucharisteo which was the word used at the table of the Last Supper when it says "Jesus gave thanks." She discovered this word derives from charis which means grace, and chara which means joy. The fullest life can come from these three things, thanksgiving full of grace and joy. So I invite you all to enter in my journey to explore this kind of thankfulness with joy and grace.

Reading.

I got a bunch of book for Christmas that I am excited about reading.
1. Bonhoeffer, Pastor Martyr, Prophet, Spy: basically the biography of his life. I hope to find this read inspiring.

2. The Complete Signature Classics by C.S. Lewis. This is all of his "classic" works including 7 book such as Screwtape Letter (which is what I am currently reading), Miracles, and Mere Christianity. 

Coffee. [Tea]

My "Focus" tea Latte. Yum

I know it sounds kinda silly, but most people know this about me, I LOVE coffee [and tea]. I love trying new coffees, exploring coffee shops, and even experimenting with my own brewing methods, types, and making my own drinks (and also collecting mugs). For Christmas again, I received a Bodum coffee press, which I would highly recommend. Not only that, but I got this milk frother, which has been a blast, (and my roomates LOVE) as we have made many coffee and tea lattes and all sorts of drinks. My favorite was the Tazo Focus tea, with frothed, hot milk and half-and-half, with Agave nectar drizzled on the top, and also topped with cinnamon. I seriously cannot describe how tasty it was. 

So here's to trying more, and finding new creative drinks to make... and maybe to someday opening my own shop! 

Music.
I am doing some recording this semester with my friend Grace, and so hopefully can put some of it up when we get it done! I am also starting to try to do some more producing/ engineering on my own, which has been hard because I don't have the money to buy my own equipment. I hope to share at least one song this semester that I produced myself.
I'm thinking about also sharing more of the stuff I've written, and hopefully finding time to write even more. I've done quite a bit of writing lyrics, but have put like 2 songs to music.
Also, I love listening to Beyonce. It's currently what I'm listening to.

So tweet me, comment on this, I'd love to actually get responses to know people actually read this! 

Peace and grace.

These ladies bring me great joy! We were enjoying winter and went ice skating!

The Problems With "Christian" Music Industry - From Gungor

Gungor on the Christian Music Industry

This is a great article, and I agree almost completely with what he has to say. As a musician, this is what I want to do, create music that is from the soul, and not just in the style of some "secular" band.
I also really hate the terms "secular" and "Christian" music. Music is music. Some people sing from their faith, but they create music. There needs to be less of a divide between this. Who is to say Bach, who wrote tons of church music, was not glorifying God through his instrumental music, which do not speak of Jesus, because there are no words. But yet, he glorified God by creating - the gift that God gave him, and he used it, which is so glorifying to God!

Instead, lets create music that is from our soul. Not just nice words about Jesus, but word that mean something to us, melodies that make our heart sing and want to make us draw closer to our Savior.

My heart echos the words of the Psalmist,

"My heart O God, is steadfast, my heart is steadfast; I will sing and make music with all my soul."
-Psalm 57:7

*Update
Gungor tweeted later today that he actually deleted this blog because it could have been offensive, and someone else actually re-posted this. But I still think there are some valid questions and could be a beginning to a movement of change that is beginning to happen.

The way of the wolves.

Well hey. So I've done a great job on updating everyone on my summer. Sorry about that. I just finished week 5 and have not even finished blogging about Europe. Sorry. But I am here now, being super hipster, writing a blog post at a coffee shop in East Nashville. Doesn't really get more hipster than that....

But besides my apparent hipsterness (let's be real, it's actually just homlessness), I have been having quite the experience in Nashville. Let's start with my crew.

Chacos. Love.

So I am a flex, which means I am extra and mess everything up. So I don't have a particular role at camp (well for the start I didn't), which has been a struggle and a blessing. But essentially I help out with anything Leah and Laura need who are my partner's and the real deal summer staffers in Nashville.
But... it was an odd pairing, because they are extremely fully capable and outstanding at their jobs. I mean Laura is a returner, I am a returner, and we both have been trainers. This all made sense when we arrived. Nashville is kind of like a brand new camp this year. The local coordinator had only been working for two months before camp started, and most of that time she spent finding a lodging facility. So let's just say Nashville was a bit behind our other camps, and needed a lot more projects to fill up weeks later in the summer. Also, everyone wants to go to Nashville. We learned that Tennessee is known as the "volunteer state." And that is true. Besides week of hope there are probably at least 4 or 5 other organizations in Nashville doing what we do. So me, the third awkward girl got put in Nashville to help sort out all of the other stuff going on so they could run camp normally and not still be doing extra work.

Laura and I look like we're in a band. Perfect for Nashville!

Whew. Made it through that. So more fun stuff. Leah and Laura like I said are great. This was probably a great grouping because we are all really goofy, funny, love outdoorsy stuff, and are all kind of homeless. So on our roadtrip to Nashville, we were talking about how homeless we were, and somehow thought we were like 3 wolves and wanted to find shirts that fit this 3 wolfs. You know, those weird ones that no one should ever wear, with three wolves and a moon? Yeah, well our friend Bri ended up coming across those shirts and bought them for us. And then we found crop tanks of them at Forever 21, and we are truely the 3 wolf moon crew. Go ahead and search that hashtag (#wolfmooncrew) on twitter, and you will see too many tweets from the 3 of us about our adventures. So here we are in Nashville, 3 homeless wolves, and we own two shirts to represent our crew. Plus we all have Chacos which is just cool so I had to write about that. So the three of us have had some wonderful times, me getting flexed to Nashville twice, and just a lot of good memories.
Here is a link for the amazing crew shirt we own.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Wolf_Moon

But despite the chaos we all have seen God do some amazing things. At first we didn't know if our church who was hosting us liked having us there, or what they thought of us. But God has blessed us with some amazing people from the church who have helped us and encouraged us through everything we have done. When we think the work has been too hard for any of us to handle, God does something cool. And it has been a huge blessing, despite all the chaos we felt with this camp, we have had really good reviews and feedback. They have really enjoyed camp, and experienced God while we were there. Sites that were a little rough were ones that had some really cool God sightings. The first week we had a resident whose husband had cancer and she needed help on the farm. He couldn't even eat or barely speak because it was throat cancer, but they shared their lives so much with these kids and cooked them food and were a huge blessing to our kids. Also, we had a group who it was their first time, and they pre-registered for a camp next year! I know they had a great experience despite whatever we felt. God was definitely there giving us strength, and I cannot for a second think it was anything I, or Laura and Leah did.

Like I mentioned earlier, we had many supportive people from the church. A lot of the pastors we interact with, and they have been so supportive of us. Especially Pastor Steve. Every time he saw us, he had something encouraging to say to us and how he appreciated all that we were doing. He was also asking people and looking for projects for us.  There were several ladies who helped with the summer bible school that were helping with this as well. Such a blessing. Slowly but surely God has been showing us that they do believe in what we are doing, and supporting us. There was an elderly couple who adopted us as their Nashville granddaughters, and let us stay at their home. We literally hung out with them for the whole weekend! They took us to the Country Music Hall of Fame, took us to dinner, bought us tickets to the Grand Ole Opry, and let us sleep at their house. They are so sweet, and in their 90s I believe? They have been married for less than 10 years, and act just like a young in-love couple, except they are older! It is precious, and definitely been a support and encouragement to us.

Us on a hike. We were meant to be!

And then there is Betteye. She is our main contact at the church, the facility manager of the church. She is an amazing woman. Sometimes we didn't know how to read her, and thought she was angry with us, but over time, we got to know her more, and she opened up to us and said we were her favorite girls! She has had a lot of encouraging things to say, and told us to keep serving the Lord because this is where we were supposed to be. She may be going to Africa to start a ministry or something. God has great plans for her wherever he leads. Last weekend she let us stay at her house when she was out of town, which was so gracious! Every time we see her, it really lights up my day, because she has joy from the Lord.

Some other cool fun things that happened...
One was fourth of July. We had terrible weather all day, but it finally cleared up at night, so Laura and I went downtown to see fireworks and the Band Perry! That's how they do things in Nashville. Typical.
We also got to go to the Opry, see the Band Perry again, and Carrie Underwood. It was such a fun experience! We obviously spent plenty of time at the mall looking for dresses, and also went on a hike in the beautiful Tennessee hills! Let's just say, the three wolf moon crew knows how to have fun!

Carrie Underwood at the Grand Ole Opry

Another thing I have been very blessed by is the church Leah and I have been going to on Sunday. It's called the Anchor fellowship, and we have been so rejuvenated each week there, to help us better serve. Another thing that is cool about it is that they have a church plant from it in Grand Rapids which I have been a bit familiar with.

The Church Under the Bridge

Before this gets too long, I should touch on why I am still in Nashville. Week 4 began, and we had 3 htms, plus me, and a lot of holes in our matrix of projects for the remaining 3 weeks. I got a call from my boss telling me my role was going to change and my goal at camp was to finish the matrix and make sure we were set on projects for the rest of the summer. Kind of like a local coordinator role, but also a summer staffer. This is when things got intense for me. I went from being a Hospitality Team Member to intensely researching Nashville's service opportunities and making phone calls setting up projects and service opportunities. I spent a lot of time in an office and on the phone and not seeing much of camp. It was really tough at first, and I was frustrated that things were not coming together, and did not think I could finish it by the end of that week. The holes seemed so big, but eventually things began falling in place. In the meantime, I ended up meeting some really neat people and organizations. There is a ministry called the Bridge Ministry which ministers to homeless people. Every Tuesday night they hand out food, clothes, and supplies to homeless people, plus host a church service under the Jefferson street bridge. It is a really cool organization. So I contacted their volunteer coordinator and she was so excited to hear what we were doing and excited that we were partnering with her. In her emails she kept saying things like "I can't wait to see what God does through us working together this summer!" and lots of great encouraging things like that. I know that God is going to use ministries such as the bridge in these last two weeks, and I am absolutely stoked to see it all play out (as long as I don't get flexed again).

So in the midst of everything that may seem overwhelming or hard, I've found moments of grace, great people, youth groups, experiences, and seeing kids excited about serving and seeing God work in their lives. This is the part in the summer where I need to constantly choose joy because each day is a gift.
Thanks everyone who has been to Nashville this summer, y'all were awesome! And you coming the last few weeks, get ready for God to speak to you.

This has been a small piece of the journey of the 3 homeless wolves. Stay tuned for more.

Some German Adventures....

Starbucks in Germany where I did some blogging

So sorry everyone who was keeping up on my blog. I kind of fell off the face of the earth, and never shared any stories from the last half of my trip. Now I am traveling again, but in the States, for my summer job… we are somewhere around Kansas City. Sorry about that.

One of the church's we sang at in Germany

So now I have to figure out where I left off. Somewhere in Prague. After we left Prague, it was time to head to Germany. This is where we stayed at the  Haus der Musik und Begegnut, or something like that. Essentially, it is a big house where people can come stay. They often host choirs or other sort of touring groups. It was great, all the room names were musicians. Everyone was so kind and welcoming! They had food prepared for us late at night when we arrived.

It was quite nice.

The next morning, we did a church service at the church of Hans Gerhalt - the one who runs the haus we were staying at. We also had a concert there that evening, and in the afternoon was sleep and rest time. I definitely passed out.

Sightseeing in "Rothenburg"

Church in Rothenburg

The next day, we had a sightseeing tour in a nearby village, and a concert at another church. Our whole time in this area was so great because everyone was so hospitable, making sure all our needs were taken care of, feeding us wonderful food, and having some great conversations with us. It was great seeing these people interact with Dr. Walter's as they were all such great friends.

On our sightseeing tour we went to Roteburg, where we saw a lot of historic sights. There was a "castle gate" that used to be a drawbridge. It was probably one of my favorite things I saw. 

Prague and the Czech Republic

So this blog entry will be an update on what happened in the Czech republic.

So we are on our way to Germany! I am on the bus and there are beautiful hills and cute villages behind me. It is so green! (Sorry now that I am posting it, I am in Germany, but when I wrote it that was happening.)
But anyway, we arrived in Prague on Thursday and met our tour guide to do a short 1 hour tour of the city. We walked through the city and saw a lot in a short amount of time. It was great! We saw old town, new town, many town squares, and a monastery. We also got to see the opera house where Mozart's Don Giovanni premiered and Mozart conducted it. There is so much history in this city!

After sightseeing, we rolled into the Dolce Villa, and had to get ready for the concert, eat and head to the concert.  Dinner was really good again. We keep having all sorts of incredible authentic food on this trip. And everyone wants to keep feeding us.

Our concert was downtown at a church that had extremely live acoustics. At the end of "Praise To the Lord" sound was still going for about 4-5 seconds afterward. So I guess it is tradition in Prague to sing on the steps, inviting people to the concert, since we had a small audience. So we sang our fast songs on the street. It was fun singing in the little square outside the church, and many people stopped to listen or take pictures. The concert was a bit hard because we had to adjust to the acoustics, but it was still great to have the opportunity to sing in Prague. There were not a lot of people there, but everyone there seemed to really enjoy it!

One lady came up to me after the concert, wiping her eyes, saying how wonderful it was, and how glad she was that we came.

After the concert we went back to the hotel and pretty much went to bed.

St. Vitus Cathedral (Behind) and one of the main old town squares

The next day, we got up a bit early to do a sightseeing tour before we sang at the International school of Prague. We went to the Prague castle as well as the Cathedral St. Vitus. It was so beautiful and built in the gothic style. May have been my favorite that we have seen so far. We also sang a few songs in that space, which was quite wonderful. (And we didn't get kicked out for doing so!) Another thing we saw was this really cute street that had some shops in it. I got this little book about kava houses or cafes in Prague.

Then it was time to head to thee school. We sang for the younger kids as well as middle-high school students. It was fun talking to some of the kids as they were from all over the world, and had also traveled all over the world. They all seemed to really enjoy it! One little girl and her two friends came up to me and asked me a bunch of questions - they were all so cute! This one girl was like "I am an actress. I was in a tv show, and my movie comes out in December!"

In the Prague Castle

In the second time we sang, I talked to a girl afterwards and Heidi asked her how long she had been in Prague and she told us two months. We asked if she was adjusting well, and she said yes. She said she really enjoyed the music because it was all so new to her (she was from India), and she enjoyed hearing all the different types of music.

After leaving the school, we went into the city again and did a short tour, walked across a bridge and saw many of the other historic bridges, and all sorts of neat stuff! There was also a spot where they had filmed Fast and Furious. We walked, where Leonardo Dicaprio  had walked! (Just a random fun fact.)

Finding fun things while we were shopping

Then we had free time, so me Heidi and Brianna did some shopping. Got some cool gifts and saw so many cute things. There were a lot of cool markets and shops with neat authentic Czech stuff. But it didn't take long until we were too tired to shop, so we walked around, took pictures, and saw some interesting things. One guy in one of the shops thought it would be cool to hit on us, which we got discounts on all of the stuff we bought, but at the same time he was creepy. He asked Heidi if we wanted to join him for coffee… Yeahhh we definitely said no.

There was also a lot of strange cultic things in the city. There was a guy who was doing strange and weird magic tricks in the square. There were a lot of strange shops too. It was rather unsettling.  I think we were just made aware of how dark of a city it is. All of its beauty cannot mask the darkness and sin that lies in its midst. We were told before that it was a very atheistic nation, and gave us more reason to be there and bring the light of Christ to it.

Eventually we met up with the group and went to an authentic Czech restaurant which was delicious! I had this potato thing that was two layers of potato with cheese in the middle, then the whole thing fried. So yummy! After dinner we went back to the hotel and it was sleepy time. 

Vienna, Music Capitol of the World!

When we arrived in Vienna, we did some sightseeing from the bus with our tour guide. I was a bit out of it so I don't remember much, but we had some time to walk around the city and mostly see a few things and drink coffee. We did a bit of tour walking as well and saw some important music houses. Our tour guy told us all about the city and the buildings. We saw many Mozart houses including where he died, and a Beethoven house. We also saw the graves of Beethoven, Schubert, Shutz, and Brahms. In general there were so many music important buildings and sites, I cannot even list them all! It was just one thing after another.  Mozart performed here, this is the opera house, here is a museum, this is where Beethoven lived.  Another amazing thing we saw was the St. Stephen's cathedral which was breathtaking. Then we went back to the hotel, had dinner and relaxed a bit. It was a pretty chill day - like days off are supposed to be!

St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna, Austria

The second day in Vienna, in the morning we had more tours - of the palace of the Hapsburg dynasty royalty. We saw Empress Elizabeth's palace which was enjoyable, except for the fact that she was obsessed with herself. Like no joke. We saw the royal treasury and I don't know if I have ever seen bigger crowns in my life. Or maybe even any crowns. We did other walking around the palace area since it was such a huge history place, then went into the city for lunch. We had some good food and then did some shopping. We went to H&M where we ran into a pickpocket, which made us all a little freaked. Thankfully I still have all of my belongings, but definitely was a little overcautious for the rest of the day. We shopped until we were too tired to keep walking, and then headed back to the bus. We went back to the hotel for dinner. After a short walk around Modling, we went to bed early.

Brahms and Shubert's Grave I think

The next morning, I had a cool moment with God before we left Modling/ on the bus leaving the city. I had a nice quiet morning to myself. After breakfast, I took my cup of coffee outside on the patio and read my bible in the fresh Austrian air. It was beautiful.
It was also beautiful because I read Psalm 82, which verse 10 says "Open your mount wide, and I will fill it." and in verse 16 it says "But he would feed you with the finest of the wheat and with honey from the rock would satisfy you." It was great because I realized how God is here to feed us and really provide everything we need, but we have to be open to receive it. This is the importance of entering every concert with prayer and opening ourselves to God. And the great thing is that God is not only providing our needs, but he has been satisfying and giving us things we enjoy. God has gone above and beyond in simply providing. He not only provided what he has called us to, but also has given us amazing experiences in these great cities and in wonderful host homes, and in times of rest. Even just the wonderful food has been a piece of God's overwhelming blessing and provision. Yes we are given food because we need to eat, but it has been in great abundance and great cultural different food.

Then I got on the bus that morning and right after journaling on Psalm 82, Dr. Walters shared that he found the Lord satisfying his hunger for things that were his 'favorite things.' The Lord was also feeding his soul, and satisfying him. It is cool how God unites his people by putting similar things on their hearts! God has been so good!