Learning God's Language

Wow what a last couple of days it has been for me. I only need say one word and you know what I've been up to... IKEA. Although here it is pronounced (EE-Kay-Ah). On Friday, we made the official trip with what we thought was only a few items to buy. We packed up Adam's car, and the four of us (Adam, Josue, Laura and I) made the 40 min trip to IKEA. Upon arrival we pulled out our lists and got ready to go through the maze. We were originally planning on taking only 1 1/2 hrs to do our shopping, but decided we might need longer so planned for most of the day. Our time started out normal enough, Josue and Laura looking at couches while I looked at different chairs. Then we continued onto desks, beds, mattresses, office chairs, bedside tables, shelving units, bar stools, and the rest of upstairs. At this point it was 1pm and we decided to stop for coffee and an early lunch (yes early in Spain!). Then we attacked the second floor. This took quite a while as well as we needed, kitc...

Well, its been 7 days officially. In some ways it feels like I have been here for so long and in other ways it feels like I just got here. Today was a crazy busy day as we went shopping to buy things I need to live. It has been quite interesting setting up house here in Spain as everything is different (as is to be expected). Today we (Adam, Angela, Josue, Laura and I) went to a couple of stores to buy some things for the house, but it started out slow. We arrived at Alcampo, a type of Walmart all in one store, but still quite different. The first things we looked at were coffee makers and toasters. We tried to find 2 different coffee makers and a toaster and were unsuccessful in locating them ourselves so we asked for help. We waited quite a few minutes for the first person to come help us, but when she didn't arrive we ask another person to come help us. He arrived and told us that those things were out of stock and he couldn't guarantee when they would be back. This starte...

Well I have officially been in Spain now for 3 days! I can't believe how quick time is flying by and yet it feels as if I have been here for far longer than 3 days. Today I have been reflecting on the new experiences and embarrassing moments I have already had in such a short amount of time. I thought I might share some of them with you. :) To begin with though, I'm going to give you a bit of a recap to my last few days. On Tuesday September 6th, I finished packing, said goodbye to the farm and headed to Calgary to get ready for my flight the next morning. It was a sad and surreal experience, but I am thankful for the extra time that God had given me there. Wednesday morning came early, partially because I didn't sleep much that night and partially because I am just not a morning person (just ask my Mom!). We had planned on being at the airport by 7:30 but were a bit late because of me and Popcha. I worked on getting checked in, my flight connected, and my bags weig...

It has been ages since I have written about where I am in life and what God is doing in me. I have thought about writing this so many times, yet I struggled with how to put into words what I want to say. Recently, I came across a song called Called Me Higher by All Sons and Daughters. It describes perfectly the journey that God is leading on. Here are the lyrics: "Called Me Higher" I could just sit I could just sit and wait for all Your goodness Hope to feel Your presence And I could just stay I could just stay right where I am and hope to feel You Hope to feel something again And I could hold on I could hold on to who I am and never let You Change me from the inside And I could be safe I could be safe here in Your arms and never leave home Never let these walls down But You have called me higher You have called me deeper And I'll go where You will lead me Lord You have called me higher You have called me deeper And I'll go where You lead me Lord Where You lead ...

Pain. What does it mean? Why do we have it? I feel like sometimes all I want is for it to go away while other times I'm frantically grasping at it, begging it not to leave me. When I was fourteen, one of my friends died in a car accident and it hurt so much I would beg God to take the pain away. Yet over time, as the pain slowly began to decrease I found myself trying to bring the hurt back. Try to feel the deep agony. Trying to bring her memory back. Trying not to lose her. Today I find myself in a similar situation. Many times, Im hurting so deeply and so completely that I beg God to take it all away and remind me of His goodness and bless me with His peace. Yet at other times when He has blessed me with such a gift, I find myself placing myself in situations where I can feel the hurt, where I can grasp at what used to be. Where I can pretend like nothing has changed. Where I pretend I haven't lost anything. Yet I know this cannot be. I need to allow heali...

What if God asked you to give up one of the people you loved most? What would you say? What would you do? Would you still trust God and believe that He is good? Would you do what He asked of you? Well a couple of weeks ago, God asked me to do just that. He asked me to give up a man that I loved. That I had dreamed about having a future with and cared about deeply. At first I was confused (we were confused). We tried to rationalize why we shouldn't break up and strategized on how we could make it work. But in the end we submited. God knew what was best and trying to go against his will was futile. This does not make it easy. Oh no. It was one of (if not the) hardest things I have ever had to do. To say goodbye to someone I loved and was in love with. But God gave us peace. He gave us strength and He allowed us to end our relationship with no loss of respect for one another. I am so thankful that God gave me a man in the first place who was ok with this. Now why am I writing all t...

Ever feel like you're overwhelmed and have too much going on? How many times is your answer to "How are you?" Busy. This was me. Run down, exhausted, with no energy. I didn't have anything that was spurring me on. I didn't have a passion. A desire. A driving force. This past week God asked me to give up everything. EVERYTHING. He stripped me down to bare bones and made me search for him. I had been asking for Him. Searching for Him, but without giving up things in my life and it just wasn't working. I constantly cried out to Him asking why I was always tired and had no zeal for life. I was trying to figure out why. Then God broke me. Completely broke me. I had nothing to do but search for him. I took away things that distracted me (food, TV, facebook, pinterest). And with all the spare time that I had usually used to distracted my brain from dealing with what was going on, I spent time with Him. I sat in His presence. I read His word. I sang music to Him and ...