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Tuesday, 24 November 2009

Quick thought

....from Sunday's sermon:
"Sometimes our punishment comes
in the form of God giving us exactly what we wanted
when we didn't want Him."

Tuesday, 17 November 2009

So there are some major adjustments coming up....and it would happen all at once too. I remember a while back someone at church saying the the word "flood" was making an impression in their thoughts. And it has been a bit of a flood of good things happening. It couldn't happen in a slower more "normal" pace could it? But, that is what makes life more adventurous and exciting -- the Abundant Life.
One of these big items would be the purchase of a new condo! Something I have been searching for since February. I'm in a state of mind-boggleness and giddyness....still pretty surreal since up to this point, I've just been exchanging pieces of paper back and forth. Even the $15,000 deposit was just a slip of paper passing through my fingers. I have a feeling that it won't sink in and become real to me until I'm holding the keys and standing in an empty condo. And that would be in a month.
Despite it being such a significant and exciting purchase (my first home!!), it is with a bit of a heavy heart that I acknowledge this. Yes, in order for me to afford a 2bd 2bth condo, I had help...huge help....help at a great cost and a cost that I would've never imagined nor wanted. And because of this, I will not obsess over this condo nor be possessive over it. It will be used to host others, to serve as a place of fellowship, prayer, rest and feasting....it will be to others what it will never be for the one whom I won't get a chance to share this with. Not on this side of heaven anyways. Thank you Father for this bittersweet gift. May it be a place of blessing and healing for myself and for others.

Thursday, 05 November 2009

One Year and Counting...

How quickly that came and went! I clocked one year in Vancouver a couple weeks ago...Oct 18. While it's true, that time flew, it also feels like I've been here a very long time. So how to update:
Work -- Telecommuting has been going well...so well that I hardly go into the Vancouver office anymore....and especially with the cold rainy season upon us again. I've come to realize that this job allows me to do the things that are meaningful to me. I can work just about anywhere on this continent so long as I have high speed internet...and I don't have to take time off work. I have a great team, supportive manager and an engagine director. I'm still learning a lot at work though I sometimes lament that my brain is just not cut out for queries, SQL, VBA, and etc. And so....work is a means to an end. It would have to be a pretty fantastic opportunity presented to me to leave the benefits of this position behind. Golden handcuffs? Maybe....but it's worth it. For now anyways.
Church -- Really really enjoy getting to know my community at F3C more and more. I wish there was more time in a week to meet up with people. The teaching has been solid, challenging and a source of good post service conversation topics.
Life -- I have to say....where I'm at right now is not the picture I imagined for myself at this age. But, as mentioned previously....I feel like if I had the life I imagined, I'd probably want the one I have now. =) Things are moving around, things are changing. It's a little stressful but exciting too. For starters, I'm currently living like a student in less than 200sf of space. Everything is crammed into one room....a cozy room....very adequate, very comfortable. Meanwhile...I'm looking for a condo to buy....will see how God provides. A condo possibility looms before me as I type. I feel God has been telling me to slow down the hectic pace of meeting up with people...and to take time to be still. But there's so many people to reach out to, to meet, to break bread with!! However it's to be carried out in His timing....I really need to be committing more to prayer and to be spending more time in the word.
Relationships -- God's blessed me abundantly with the friendships that have started and grown around me. It has been the smoothest transition into new social circles that I have had. There are great people here who have reached out to me and started walking with me...and I with them. I'm looking forward to knowing them more and being known by them. And with regards to boys....yes lots to say about that....will leave for another post perhaps. =)
Ok my flight is getting ready to board...signing off from YVR!

Saturday, 31 October 2009

Currently
Mere Christianity LP
By C. S. Lewis
see related

I'm reading C.S. Lewis' "Mere Christianity" for the first time.... L O V E I T . So much I could write on and share about....so I would just encourage you to get a copy and read it yourself. Here though, is a paragraph that particularly stuck out for me....great to chew/reflect over:
"We may, indeed, be sure that perfect <insert Christian virtue> will not be attained by any merely human efforts. You must ask for God's help. Even when you have done so, it may seem to you for a long time that no help, or less help than you need, is being given. Never mind. After each failure, ask forgiveness, pick yourself up and try again. Very often what God first helps us towards is not the virtue itself but just this power of always trying again. For however important <insert Christian virtue> may be, this process trains up in habits of the soul which are more important still. It cures our illusions about ourselves and teaches us to depend on God. We learn, on the one hand, that we cannot trust ourselves even in our best moments, and, on the other, that we need not despair even in our worst, for our failures are forgiven. The only fatal thing is to sit down content with anything less than perfection."