Just some thoughts. :)

Hi everyone! I realize I'm exceedingly bad at being a regular post-er, but I love you all very much and I appreciate you taking the time to glance through this anyway. I try to post regularly, unfortunately I can't seem to get the post worthy, exciting things in my life to happen on a set schedule. It's really quite frustrating. So as I haven't had anything thrilling come up recently, you'll all get to listen to me ramble. Yay! 

While everyone at home has been complaining if the ridiculous cold, I've been enjoying a rather mild winter. This last week it's hovered around 70 degrees outside. It's delightful, although a tad humid...and rainy. So every time you walk outside it's kind of like walking into a warm shower. I would necessarily say it's an enjoyable feeling. Just an interesting one. I don't think I can ever remember a December where I seriously contemplated the merits of layering. I don't really know what to do with it all. But I won't complain, it's -2 in Pullman, so things could certainly be worse! And this weather has been rather beneficial. As many of you know I'm not coming home until March, which means this is the first year in my life that I won't be home for Christmas. While it's not completely effective, the warm weather here has been rather helpful in managing my homesickness. I think the perfect compromise would be to have all of you fly down here and see me. That way we get the benefit of the nice weather as fellowship! It's a win-win solution. So start looking online for plane tickets! I'll expect to see you all here on the 20th. ;) 

<3 Ali

PS-

I will post some things from class soon, Ive been mulling over some rather large topics and could use some input! 

What do you guys think about VALUES? 

What are your values? Does your life demonstrate those? What are some values you think Christians should have?  Why? 

What about the KINGDOM OF GOD?

What does that mean? Is it applicable to life? How so?

What are people's thoughts on the CHURCH?

 What are the things you like best? What do you think needs work? Does the church need work? What are some questions you have that the church never really answers? 

You can go ahead and comment here or message me on facebook, but Id love to hear your thoughts!

Thanksgiving

This is my first Thanksgiving not with my family ever.  It was weird.  I missed everyone.  BUT! I did have a great day all the same.  But it made me think a little bit.  enough to pull me out of the realms of procrastination and write a blog about it anyway, so here it is!  I love Thanksgiving. I love turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, my grandma Norman's cranberry sauce, I like the sheer amount of food that is piled up, and how there are leftovers for days and days. I love seeing my family and spending time with them (this was much higher on the list after I went to college and didn't actually see them every day).  But what I love most about Thanksgiving is what it signifies: the beginning of the Holiday season. It is step one in the journey to Christmas and the New Year. And how very appropriate that the fist step in the journey that takes us to the celebration of the birth of our savior and the close of the year is one of thankfulness. Even though the year is drawing to a close, for most of us, our lives aren't.  2013 will turn to 2014 without a thought for our feelings or objections, as surely as the sun rises in the East. Somebody had wonderful planning skills I think, that they made the first step in all this a day to pause and remember to show gratitude for the blessings we've been given. Before the hustle and bustle of Christmas shopping begins, where we stress and worry about what to get our friends and family, there is a day that is designated for everyone to sit down together with some good food and thank God for what he's given us.  A day to remind the people around us how grateful we are for the part they have played in our lives over the course of the year. And that's important. I am not quite sure how to emphasize that enough. Showing gratitude is important. We need that, each and every one of us. Sometimes we need it just to take our ego down a few steps and remind us of all the people who got us to where we are, but more often I think we just need to be reminded that we matter. People need to hear that you're thankful for them. I believe that humans crave the affirmation that their presence on this earth makes a difference. There is a quote that is famously misattributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson (no one knows who really said it) that goes something like this: 

"To laugh often and love much; to win the respect of intelligent persons and the affection of children; to earn the approbation of honest citizens and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to give of one’s self; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to have played and laughed with enthusiasm and sung with exultation; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived--this is to have succeeded."

To know that even one life has breathed easier because you have lived--That's heady stuff. Everyone wants to feel like they made a difference in the world, even if that difference was only in just one person's life. And while it only takes about 30 seconds to express gratitude to someone, we have a whole day dedicated to making sure that people really understand just how grateful you are for their presence (however brief) in your life. I know I’m a bit late, but I encourage you to remind someone exactly what they mean to you. Don’t let your gratitude begin and end with Thanksgiving though, I challenge you to carry that attitude with you into the rest of the holiday season, I think you might be surprised what will happen if you do.

So! On that note, I'd like to take a moment and list some of the reasons I've had to be thankful this year. This is by no means a comprehensive list, I can almost guarantee that I have forgotten people, so if you are reading this and you aren’t here, there is a very good chance I’m thankful for you too. <3

THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR IN 2013:

• I am thankful for my mom and dad. That they love each other, that they love me. I’m thankful that I have a mom who lets me whine to her about life, who pushes me to grow and be a better person, and who deals with all of my food issues like a champ- even helping me work through them when I am ready to give up and just resign myself to starvation. I’m thankful for a dad who lets me call early in the morning to talk, who supports my craziest adventures and ideas, and who still lets me sit on his lap even though I’m probably too old for it.
• I’m thankful for my siblings, my wild and crazy siblings. I’m thankful for a baby sister who lights up my day with her giggles and hugs, and who steals my shoes. 
• I’m thankful for a sister who watches Barbie movies with me without hesitation or judgment. 
• I’m thankful for a brother who always seems to have the right words to make me laugh. I am so incredibly thankful for the talks, the laughs, and the smiles I’ve shared with my three siblings, and I know I could not have possibly gotten luckier if Id picked out them out myself. 
• I’m thankful for the family I’ve adopted over the years- Hannah, watching you grow up, become an adult, and go off to college has been one of my greatest privileges. 
• Jess, I loved watching you marry the love of your life. I’m thankful I met you this year, I’m thankful for the relationship we developed, and I’m thankful for how you have continued to grow since we've met.
• Sarah, You actually live with my family, you are small and wonderful, and I love you oh so much. 
• I’m thankful for my friends. Where would I be without you guys? Aly, for understanding how I am dietarily challenged and commiserating with me. 
• McKinley and Isaac, for being absolute rocks in my life. I don't think I ever expected my friendships from high school to last so long or be as deep as they were, but I would not trade you guys for the world. 
• Krista, I love you girl. No matter where life has taken us, we've stayed friends. They say if a friendship lasts longer than 7 years, psychologists say it will last a lifetime. I figure we've really been friends since about the 6th grade, that puts us at about 9 years. So Cheers! You’re stuck with me for life. ;) 
• Lucy, I can’t even begin to tell you all the ways I am thankful for you. Talking with you always helps me find my center again. Your life is truly the greatest ministry I’ve ever seen, because in everything you do, everything you say, in every piece of advice you give, you point me back to Jesus. And Lord knows I've needed to be pointed back to him a lot this last year. 
• Ryan, I doubt you know this, but a huge part of why I came to YWAM to do a DTS was because of you. Because I watched you talk about Jesus, and I couldn't remember the last time I had legitimately been excited about him. I couldn't remember the last time I really felt like Jesus was my friend, or God was my father. I struggled to reconcile the faith of my childhood with my life at school, and you did it so seamlessly. Jesus seemed to permeate every sphere of your life, and I was so incredibly jealous. Every time I walked away from a conversation with you, I couldn't help but think, "I want to know his Jesus." And in the end, it was realizing how messed up my own relationship with Jesus was that made me want to do a DTS. So I’m thankful I met you, and I’m thankful for your life, it helped give me the kick in the pants I needed to come to what has probably been the best and most influential experience of my life.
• Laurel, I could not have gone through the year without you. Thank you for being there when I just needed someone to be there for me. 
• Kyle, for skyping me football games, always finding a way to put things in perspective, for letting me freak out about spiders, boys, and just about everything in between, and just generally being fantastic. 
• Kaitlyn and Jenna, Thank you for always making me feel beautiful and helping me let loose and have fun. Jenna I can't believe I’ve only known you for a year. It seems like so much longer! You ladies are an absolute delight to know, and I feel privileged to call you my friends. 
• Malia. You are a snotty little brat and I love you more than I'd love a $100,000 shopping spree to Nordstrom. You are the love of my life, and absolutely irreplaceable.  You call me out, you make me laugh, you laugh with me, cry with me, and if I jumped off a bridge you'd come fish me out again to tell me what an idiot I was. You keep me humble, but you never let me sell myself short either, and I think it’s probably what I am most thankful for when I am with you. I love you to the moon and back. 
• Lastly, (but certainly not least!) I am thankful for that weird girl who at one point let me boss her into cuddling me and who's been somewhere between my sister and my best friend ever since, how many reasons this year alone do I have to be thankful for Mackenzie? Too many. 
• I’m thankful for all of the people I met at WSU, especially in ROTC. You helped me grow up.
• I’m thankful for simple things like a house and food, pretty blankets, and the ability to come to Jesus school.
• There is so much more I have to be thankful for, but this list is quickly growing too long. I am truly thankful to each and every person who has touched my life and supported me on my way to Atlanta, I’m thankful for the friends I’ve made since being here, and for all of the amazing people I’ve encountered. I am blessed beyond belief.

I love you all so much, Happy Thanksgiving!

And It Blushed.

Greetings from the YWAM SE Conference in Talladega, Alabama!

Things here are fantastic, if not a little bit chilly.  It was 32 degrees when I woke up this morning.  I thought I'd moved back to Pullman or something! But anyway, I will be putting up a more detailed rambling post later, but I just wanted to share something really fast that our speaker said today that really stuck with me.  You've all heard the story about Jesus turning the water into wine.  It was his first miracle.  Many of you Im sure know the cultural significance of what it would have meant for the host to run out of wine at the wedding. It would have been humiliating. And whenever I hear sermons on this story, that is usually the angle they come from, but Jim said something I don't think I will ever forget. He simply said that what happened in that moment is that "The Creator spoke to the water, and the water blushed." 

"I believe in a God who HEALS"

Hi guys! Doubling up this week! After I wrote my last post, we went to IHOP and that was pretty crazy.  Lets just talk about how cool God is.  Because in one day he gave me an entire sermon to preach, and then the next day BOOM. EVEN COOLER. 

But back to IHOP.  We go, and I'm excited- we hadn’t gone in a few weeks and it is always an adventure.  But I start feeling this massive headache come on.  I have no idea why or what caused it, but it was bad.  The worst part was when I went to reach for my trusty bottle of aspirin in my purse and realized I changed purses before we left.  The bottle of Excedrin Migraine didn’t make the switch.  After kicking myself over this realization, I went to go hang out in the back of the sanctuary during worship because it was so bad.  My own voice hurt my head, much less the loud worship music, flashing lights, and other craziness going on.  I was seriously considering going to hide out in the bathroom when I decided to just give it to God instead.  So I threw up a pretty casual prayer saying, “God, you’re going to have to do something about this, because this is stupid and I don’t want to have to leave and not be able to participate in worshipping you.”  Not even a minute later, the pastor asks a girl to share her testimony of how she had been healed there a few years ago.  And then he said, “If you need healing for any reason, even if it’s just a migraine, I want you to raise your hand.  The rest of you, if you see someone around you raising their hand, I want you to pray healing over them.”  Now I don’t usually ask for healing because of a migraine, they’re just part of my life, but I'm not an idiot.  Even if he did all but slap me in the face.  So I raised my hand.  People came and put their hands on me and prayed.  And suddenly my headache started to fade away.  They prayed some more, and it was totally gone.  That’s a new one.  And a whole bunch of other people got healed that night.  My roommate hasn’t been able to bend over and touch her toes without pain in her back and hips for years.  Now she can.  Cool stuff huh?

God is so Good. And really cool too.

Love

Ali

Selfless Faith

Hi everyone, I am sorry that I have so far behind! Last week was a little bit of a struggle honestly.  We were learning about Spiritual Warfare, but we were watching a video series, and I was having a really hard time.  I learned a lot, but watching teachers on a screen is not quite the same as having someone teach you in real life.  I really want to share with you all something God has been putting on my heart though.  There is this idea of "selfless faith" that keeps popping and working it's way into my life.  Over the last few weeks, I’ve been really trying to figure out exactly what that means though.  I originally heard the phrase in the song Hosanna.  Ive probably sang that line a hundred times and never thought about what exactly that means, but a few weeks ago we were singing it in worship and I kid you not I felt like I ran into a brick wall.  My voice caught in my throat and I just stood there with those words on my tongue.  Selfless faith.  And I could not for the life of me decide what exactly all of that entailed.  Is it blind trust and obedience? Going into a Nirvana-like state of worship where all sense of self is eliminated? (I figured that probably wasn't it.)  But I really wrestled with that concept during worship that night, and for the next few days I could not for the life of me get those words out of my head.  It was like a soundtrack that constantly played in the back of my mind.  "Selfless faith, selfless faith, selfless faith.  What exactly does that mean? What does it entail? How can I have it? Selfless faith, selfless faith, selfless faith...." and so on.  I asked God a few times what exactly he was trying to tell me, but with no obvious answer forthcoming, I figured that I would figure it out when it was time and left it at that.  Then it came up during one of our intercession times.  We were supposed to be praying for our generation, and during our prayers the overarching theme of what everyone felt like God was speaking to them happened to be parts of the Song Hosanna, specifically the idea of selfless faith.  Now, as you can well imagine, I am sitting in my seat listening to everyone talking about what they felt like the Lord was telling them, growing progressively more uncomfortable and squirmy as their revelations were eerily similar to what I had already been kind of talking to God about.  Well talk about a kick in the pants, I *somehow* managed to discern (please note my obvious sarcasm here) that this whole selfless faith idea was kind of a thing I needed to not be blowing off.  So I started really seeking the Lord.  But once again, I didn’t really hear much from him.  So I kind of let it drift to the back of my head.  Then this week, I had to give a sermonette (which is really just a short 10 minute sermon).  I kept asking God what he wanted me to talk about, and I just kept thinking, I really wish I knew what I'm supposed to know about Selfless faith…  So the week moved on and Thursday kept drawing closer and I still had no idea what I was going to talk about.

Tuesday Night, Ramona talked in our community night about the fear of the Lord and the whole time it was just hitting me.  I knew this message was meant for me.  I wasn’t necessarily convicted by it, but the concept intrigued me.  I’d always had a hard time understanding what fearing the Lord meant, I think I had somehow made it synonymous with respect in my brain.  Ramona however, defined it as understanding and believing that the Lord is going to do exactly what he says he will AND caring more about God’s opinion than mans.  That really stuck.  The other thing she said that I think I probably wrote down about 4 different times in my notes is that “anything of great value comes at a great price.”  This new definition was so different than my previous understanding that it really stuck with me and made me think a lot.  The next morning, Greg talked to us in class about servanthood.  This also really stuck with me.  Ive been kind fascinated by the idea of “servant leadership” and having a servant’s heart since I first heard the terms in middle school from Brandon Berg, my very first youth leader.  But as a result sermons on being a servant and having a servant’s heart always catch my attention.  Somewhere in the midst of listening to these two amazing and highly anointed speakers, I remember thinking “What the heck am I going to talk about on Thursday morning??”

            So Wednesday night, I went and sat on my floor and I started to pray.  I said “God, I need you to tell me what to talk about to.  I need a topic and three points.”  With the radio silence I got for an answer, I decided a shower was the next best course of action.  In the middle of washing my hair, I suddenly understood.  I knew what selfless faith meant.  So even though I suddenly understood it in my head, I needed 3 main points to teach about if I was going to use it for my sermonette in the morning, so in the midst of washing soap out of my eyes (epiphanies are rather startling things), I told the Lord exactly that.  And so by the time I got out of the shower I had my outline complete and I just needed to fill in the holes.  It was pretty cool.  So I put on my comfy clothes and headed upstairs to hide away and work.  That isn’t the end of it though, after working on my points I realized that my original points had morphed into Selfless faith is (A) not about you. (B) Its about being a servant and (C) fearing the Lord.  The very things Greg and Ramona talked about.  I wouldn’t have been able to understand what the Lord was trying to teach me even close as well without having heard those two sermons.  And its weird, because Alex got sick for a week and he was the first person to give his talk, as a result of him being ill we all had our sermonettes pushed back a week.  God works in mysterious ways huh?

All My Love,

Ali

FATHER HEART OF GOD

So the title of this post should be pretty self-explanatory.  Its about God as our father…our daddy.  This was a pretty intense week for most of us here.  Ive been so blessed with my dad.  I will bet you money that my dad is better than yours.  I mean, he is by no means perfect…he is only human after all! But as far as Dads go, he is pretty darn close.  As a result, seeing God as a loving father wasn’t exactly difficult for me.  However, there was one part of the unit that really did strike a chord with me, forgiveness.  Now, I don’t know about you, but I’ve heard plenty of sermons on forgiveness, so I was pretty ready to sit back and hear the same things I’d always heard.   

Because the whole series was on God as our father, Doug (our speaker), started off this whole forgiveness spiel talking about how we need to each forgive our earthly fathers for where they have failed us.  Either by things they did, or things they failed to do.  We sat in the classroom, each of us in our own little space we had claimed, and joined together in prayer.  Doug prayed over us, and we all forgave our dads.  For some, it wasn’t easy.  There were a lot of tears shed and we were only about 20 minutes into class.  Then we had to forgive our moms, this of course brought on a whole fresh round of crying.  Then Doug did something unexpected.  He made all the girls get up and stand in a circle, standing in the center he began to walk around making eye contact with each of us.  He apologized to us on behalf of men, for making us believe that our value was only in our image, for believing that we would never measure up, etc.  This was touching, and everyone was sniffling, but he took it one step further.  He asked us to think of the guys who had communicated those things to us, they may have said it out loud, they may have communicated it through actions, and everyone paused for a second, “You all have them in your head.  The ones who made you feel less than the treasure that you are. I want you to forgive them.  At that point, there was not a single dry eye in the circle.  We were all crying and thinking about the person(s) who hurt us.  And each of us forgave them.  Then Doug did something amazing.  He told each of us to hold out our hands, because God had a gift for us.  He told us that God was restoring our purity to us, whether we needed it or not, we had it.  If the water works weren’t going before they were on full blast now.  As I write that, I realize it sounds a little hokey, but in the moment, it was exactly what we needed.  After that, Mr. Doug prayed for each of us individually and it was pretty cool.  We then sat back down and he prayed with everyone to “forgive” God.  We cant really forgive God, because that implies he did something wrong, but what we did is we took every question, every “why didn’t you?” “where were you when” “Why?” “How?” and “When?” and we laid it at the foot of the cross saying, “Lord, I don’t understand these things, and I don’t like them.  But I trust your plan, and that you know what is best.”

Walking through forgiveness with Mr. Easterday was an amazing experience.  And I learned some things that were new.  I learned first and foremost that forgiveness isn’t just a one time choice boom it’s over and done with.   Forgiveness is an attitude.  I also learned some things about myself.  I have people to forgive.  I didn’t know that.  But sitting there listening to Doug pray, and asking the Lord to reveal anyone in my life that I needed to forgive, I suddenly found there was a whole list of people that I had been hurt by.  By training myself to be the “water off a duck’s back” type of person, I didn’t allow myself to stay mad or hurt long enough to deal with it.  I didn’t realize how many hurts I had held back and allowed to kind of fester in the background.  I had to deal with a lot of those that day, and they weren’t always easy, and even now I'm still asking the Lord for help! But, I cannot even begin to describe how much better I felt after we were done that day.  I went into that class not feeling like anything was wrong, and leaving feeling lighter and more full than I have in a long time.

Ali

Thoughts on The Holy Spirit

Sorry it has been a while since I’ve caught you up on life here in Georgia, I was having some technical difficulties with my computer. :P Anyway, here's the run down since last time I wrote:

Two weeks ago, our teacher was Mr. Mike Esposito and the topic was the Holy Spirit.  Mike and his wife Terrill are actually on staff here at YWAM Atlanta.  Terrill helps out in the kitchen (She's the one that makes sure I have allergy friendly food!) And Mike does...other things? He's a busy guy, he teaches at other DTSs and he and Terrill have a pretty big ministry in Mexico as well.  All that to say, Mike taught us about the Holy Spirit.  Now when last week rolled around, I was excited, because Mike is a pretty dynamic speaker, and its always interesting to see what people have to say about the ol' Spirit o' God.  I mean, being raised in the church and my mom being, well my mom, I am thinking that I have just about heard everything you can hear about this Holy Spirit Guy.  I figured I would of course pick up a few new good tid bits, but for the most part, I felt like I had a pretty good understanding on the baptism of the Holy Spirit and all that jazz.  WHOO BOY. I was in for a treat!  Because the thing is, I was kind of right, I did know a lot of the information he gave us, Id heard it all before (with a few exceptions).  What Mike did however, was take all of that information that was scattered and unorganized in my brain, and presented it in such a way that I was able to clearly understand process it all as a whole.  To borrow from my classical education, it was like moving from Grammar to Logic.  I already knew all the pieces, from there it was just learning how they all fit together; then going one step further into Rhetoric, learning to put those concepts and principles into practice.  

BUT! I like sharing, so if you don’t really feel like a bible lesson you should just keep scrolling until I say stop. Ready Go! For those of you still with me, here are some of the main points and my favorite tidbits I got from Mike’s teachings: 

Secular versus Sacred- it doesn’t exist!  You belong to Christ, and that being said, any ground you walk on is sacred ground.  It is our job to bring Christ into EVERY SINGLE SPHERE OF SOCIETY.  We cannot just relegate him to the church on Sunday.  Government/law, Arts/entertainment, Education, Media, Business, Family—God fits in every single sphere. 

YOU DON’T LEAD PEOPLE TO JESUS.  You share what you know.  The Holy Spirit convicts and works in their life.  HE and he alone gets the credit for leading people to Jesus. 

OLD COVENANT VERSUS NEW CONVENANT—Ex. 30:30 is the first documented time of someone being anointed with oil.  This anointing was symbolic of the anointing of the Holy Spirit, it represented the person being set apart for God’s purpose and the Holy Spirit coming upon that person and equipping and changing them in order to accomplish that purpose.  According to the Old Covenant, only a select few received this anointing, and IT COULD BE REMOVED.  Take for example Saul (First King over Israel), in 1Samuel 11, he receives his anointing.  4 Chapters later in chapter 15, he disobeys God’s commands, and the Lord REMOVES his spirit, and rejects him as king.  However, in the New Covenant, we receive the Holy Spirit when we accept the gift of salvation.  Let me reiterate, everyone who accepts salvation through Jesus receives the Holy Spirit, not a select few, everyone.  And he’s there to stay; he doesn’t get taken away from us.  Additionally, we also receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and that’s where people’s doctrines get muddled.  But for the sake of time, I'm just going to assume that you all believe in said concept, and if you don’t, well we can argue that in the comments or something.  So that’s all really cool, but that’s not everything!  Do you all remember the story of Jesus getting baptized by his cousin John the Baptist?  Well if you don’t, the jist is this.  Jesus is like “Hey! I'm here to be baptized!” And John is like “Whoooaa bro.  I cant do that! You’re the messiah! YOU should be baptizing me!” Jesus kind of rolls his eyes and is like “Just do it.” So he gets baptized and the spirit of God comes upon him like a dove, and God speaks from heaven and announces to everyone “THIS IS MY SON IN WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED.”  Also very very cool.  And then Jesus goes and starts his ministry.  So, here’s the point I want to make.  Even Jesus had to receive the anointing of the Holy Spirit before beginning his ministry.  He told the disciples not to leave Jerusalem until they received it.  So if both Jesus and his disciples had to receive the anointing of the Holy Spirit, why shouldn’t we?  God doesn’t need our help, but we need his.  So he commissions us to go and make disciples of all nations, but he doesn’t send us out all on our lonesome! God chooses to partner with us and gives us his Spirit. 

STOP

Okay, now that we’re all back together, lets move on.  To those of you who read through my theological ramblings, I hope you enjoyed it.  If you skipped through them, I cannot say that I blame you; I probably would have skipped through it too.  My conclusion to last week is simply this, God’s pretty stinking cool.  He doesn’t need our help, and yet he chooses to partner with us, and more than that, he pursues relationship with us.  Take a moment to really think about that.  Think about how massive the earth is, now consider its place in our solar system.  Now think about the size of the solar system in relation to the Milky Way, then take it one step further, and think about the fact that the Milky Way is one galaxy in billions.  Can you comprehend the massiveness of the Universe?  Now think about how small you are in comparison.  The God, who painted the night sky, who created each and every planet, solar system, and galaxy individually and knows them all by name, wants to partner with you. You, a tiny little spec on the sneeze of a planet we call home.  He is pursuing YOU.  And that is why God is so cool! Which brings me quite well into last week’s topic, which was “The Father Heart of God.”  Stay tuned. J