27 June 2005

Stuff

An old comedy routine talks about stuff. You gotta have some place to keep your stuff, and you gotta make room to bring home more stuff, stuff and more stuff...etc.

Today I watched all my stuff be pulled out of my drive way and down the road. I was cleaning the kitchen and had an idea that I needed to use the phone. When I walked into the living room, I saw a truck hooked up to our container pulling out of the drive way. I thought they'd ring the door bell and give me a seal number or something. No they just hooked up all our belongings and drove off. The next time we see it all will be in a foreign country.

Thanks to you that helped us put all that stuff in the container! Big time! May all that stuff arrive in Madrid safely.

21 June 2005

Suppose...what if?

Recently we were at a meeting in Texas and there was a lot of discussion of projects we're going to work on and testimonies of people whose lives have been impacted by video or radio presentations of the gospel. It was a moment where God said to me, what if?

In fiction writing, one technique is to say, suppose this happened...or what if (fill in the blank). Then you have the start of a story. You keep doing that taking it one more step and one more step. What if this happened...then this happened.

I had been feeling rather overwhelmed by information and research I've done on Muslim perspectives lately. I'd been feeling like there's no way I could communicate truth to this very different world view. I'm not sure how they can be reached.

A story of a Muslim woman who decided to change her life from watching a Christian television show, struck me. God said to me, "What if I CAN reach these people? What if? What if some lives are changed?" It filled me with hope. While I may not have the ability to get through, God does.

I've been trying to apply the What if principle to all the changes we are about to embark on in life. I tend to get caught up in the worrisome aspects of what might happen, but God is saying, "What if I do something remarkable?"

I'm hanging on to see what if...

11 June 2005

Reality shows for everyone

I'm not a big reality TV fan. I watch a little precariously through Dar, and through you my friends I sort of know what is going on in a given show. I feel connected enough.

I discovered last week that my parents are hooked on a reality show. I would never have expected this in a million years. They haven't watched any of the main network shows and in fact think those shows are dumb, so I was shocked.

They are watching Hell's Kitchen on Fox. It's about a mean British (I think) chef who has two teams of wanna-be chefs who are competing for a permanent job in a swanky restaurant (again I'm not totally positive). I watched a little with them. It had all the same tension of the other shows and personality back biting. Gross stuff like how many squid can you skin and de-gut in 10 minutes. And someone gets the boot off one of the teams at the end. My dad likes it because the mean chef reminds him of a kitchen manager at his first job. My mom is a gourmand and I guess she likes it for that aspect.

It just goes to show you there's a reality show for everyone. I just haven't found mine yet.

06 June 2005

Tea Time

Last Saturday my friends threw a going away tea party for me. It was right up my alley. Many of you were there. It was really wonderful. I enjoyed it completely - I am a tea party kind of girl! Major thanks to all who made it so terrific.

In contemplating the party afterwards, I'm amazed that a dozen or more friends from my life could all deceive me so thoroughly. It's very funny that I had no clue and that I fell for every line that was fed to me the last couple weeks! Kudos to everyone for being good at keeping a secret...or should I be questioning my gullibility?! Either way I loved it!

02 June 2005

It's good to use my brain

Today I have climbed a mountain. Not the ones in Washington State that Doc climbed last weekend, but I do feel like celebrating. I managed to post a website for our missions endeavor. No big deal for all of you techno-crats, but for me it was a huge accomplishment.

I had no idea what I was doing and had to teach myself the program I was using, a little of html, and how to post. It's something I've been working on for more than six months. Not six months straight, but on and off during that time.

It comes with great satisfaction. It's the kind of feeling you get when you solve a really complex problem, or something is beyond your understanding, bing the light goes on and you get it. Since I'm not a computer geek (I say this affectionately as my dad and brother are), I feel an intense, almost high, when I'm able to restore order to the computer universe. Today, I have that same feeling. A little shocked that I managed to pull this off, but satisfied that however disorganized and filled with bad code it is, I did it.

Feel free to go look and gently tell me what's wrong. It's got to have major problems, but today I can bask in completion. Tomorrow I can learn how to fix the problems, maybe talking to some of you. You'll recognize the web journal posts as I stole them from our posts here.

http://www.godwinsinmedia.com/