food for fish

I have finally written a post February trip newsletter, as well as a pre October trip newsletter!

And don't forget, you can always donate via my Chip-in via PayPal on the right!

Marcus got me thinking...
I'm feeling the need to go wild....

Years ago I read John Eldredge's book "Wild at Heart" and it was, at the time, a great read. However I think I need to read it again. I remember a few of the ideas; being free to adventure and including our loved ones, allowing others to love me and allowing myself to love, while all at the same time taking hold of my inner sense of adventure and stepping out into an unknown world.

Gosh, if only I could hold onto those things each day, and remember that everyday is a step in the adventure God has put us. Every major decision we have made has been with our calling to Poland in mind. From the house we live in, to the job I have, to the ministry's we volunteer in. Everything is for the great adventure we know we are stepping into.

But on a day to day basis, work in, work out, the adventure is lost. I have small "revivals" in my heart, times where I search far and long across the Internet at houses and apartments to buy in Kraków, at store-fronts for rent near the city center in hopes of that bookstore or café Alexis and I have talked about, and at times even the adventures of going to Finland (and the other dozen or so nations) with Polish leaders establishing relationships and seeing God bring about similar visions in them as he has in us.

And then.... well it dissipates (to say the least) when the phone in my cubicle rings because someone, oh so important, can't open some attachment in their email.

I strongly believe the job I have is from God, in fact, I know so in my head and in my heart. I know he has me there not just for my own good, but for other's well being as well. This past week was an example of that, in fact March was simply an emergency month, kind of nuts, but good all at once.

I know that when my priorities are met, my relationship with God, with people, and my calling will encourage the adventure to grow in me.

Uh... or global cooling?

Snow in late March... how fun.

Okay I'm tired of letting myself down in certain diciplines, lately, for lack of having a study partner, I have been skipping my morning devotions. This isn't good, because at any point in the next two weeks my life is going to change (for the better) when Emma arrives on the scene, and I don't quite know how my schedule is going to work! I have got to stick to the priorities of life, find a way to be self motivated, albeit life is so much easier when you have someone to do it with (morning devotions, working out, being accountable, etc).

My buddy Marcus posted about coffee shop community, and I have to say, our society and culture really has lost what the deepest meaning of community is... it's all faux.

In some way we are all builders in God's kingdom and we all have some kind of impact on other people's lives therfore we need to pay attention to the relationships in our lives. What exactly are we buildibg in the lives of those around us?

In 1 Corinthians 3:13-15 Paul says:

But there is going to come a time of testing at the judgment day to see what kind of work each builder has done. Everyone's work will be put through the fire to see whether or not it keeps its value. If the work survives the fire, that builder will receive a reward. But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builders themselves will be saved, but like someone
escaping through a wall of flames.

The Jewish survivors of Kraków's ghetto are gathering for the 65th aniversary of the liquidation of the Jewish district of Kraków. This is the city where Alexis and I will serve and live in jew a few years.

So, the last week or so I've been thinking that I'm a bit tired of doing proposals, regular maintenance, etc at work... I realized I actually like doing the "fire fighting" stuff (the emergencies, down servers, etc)... well out of the blue one of our clients loses their server, and everything with, despite the fact that they had redundancy and all of the precautionary things to prevent it.

The funny thing, I'm okay with it, yes it is a little stressful having them breathe down my back (their pretty nice about it though, not talking to the air, yet). I like it, weird eh?

PS... Also take a look at one of my buddy's blog from my small group.

I think we all know people who "talk to the air" - the kind of people who make comments like "Boy it's hot in here, why isn't the window open?", while these kinds of comments can very well be benign and not mean a thing, many times it should be translated as "I'm hot, can you open the window for me?"

While the example above doesn't have any big consequences other situations do create bad communication and frustration between people. In the example above, I use to either do one of two things, I would either open the window for the person without asking others, or I would ignore the person (since he/she wasn't exactly talking to me anyway) because I didn't care for the window to be opened.

The problem this creates is that someone will not be heard, either the asking person (when ignored) or others... Now when I hear something like that I either ask "Are you hot, do you want the window open?" which allows the person to directly ask what he/she wants to me and others around, or I ask "So, what you are saying is that you are hot and want the window open?" These responses allow full communication.

While the examples are a bit lame, I think the point comes across, full communication is much more healthy and creates a safe enviornment for people to share and fellowship, rather than speaking in codes and adjusting to people's fears.

Earlier today Alexis and I created this video of Emma's soon-to-be room. Have fun :P

So God has put on my heart lately a lot about sending and receiving... messages that we hear and say to one another. I know that for most of my life I have filtered the things people say through the experiences of my past. I also know that when I say things to people I expect them to understand the message in the same way I would. Again when I send a message it's being done through my life filter.

Over this next week I'll be building a sermon on the importance of being aware of how others receive your messages and how to send messages in an effect way. I figured this is a good place to process since the written word can be much more thought out.

Get the message?

Pretty much I summed up my trip in my post called "well". But a few afterthoughts have made their way to my head. The first real bit one hit me last night at church, we had a special children's service called "The shared family experience", during the worship time I cried a few tears because I realized that the joy of God and all his goodness was truly understood in these children, and that Alexis and I will be raising our child away from such an amazing ministry. We trust that God himself will be with Emma and that such a ministry is absolutely possible in Poland, it's just that we have an amazing church here and leaving will be just that much harder now.

I uploaded new pictures to facebook (the albums are public), see part 1 and part 2.

That's all for now! (my birthday is tomorrow, here's my wish list).