the most excellent way

it has been a little while! i don't have long now...but wow, God is up to something. and so is Satan. but i am so glad to say that we win!
this morning i was reading Corinthians 13, the famed love chapter, and realized--like, truly realized--how important love is. it is the most excellent way. the very best way to live and learn...to love. the best way to unify the body, and all it's parts, like in chapter 12....to love. the best way to show others Who we belong to and to bring Him glory...to love. the best way to rejoice and to suffer with others in the body...to love. love brings life to all other gifts. and not just any love. agape love. love is patient. love is kind. it does not envy. it does not boast. it is not proud. it is not rude. it is not self-seeking. it does not delight in evil but rejoices in the truth. it keeps NO record of wrongs. it ALWAYS protects. it ALWAYS trusts. it ALWAYS hopes. it ALWAYS perseveres. Love never fails. and i want to love that way. i want to live like that, and to learn the very best way to live. the most excellent way.

um...

well hey. life in moscow is getting a little more normal. i'm a little scattered today...talking to some girls while typing. making peanut butter cookies...yum. ok. this might be hopeless. can't gather my thoughts. we have english club tonight...so that should be interesting. had a revelation last night...er...two nights ago. it was a good thing to realize. but i will talk about that later. ok...i'm off to eat cookie dough! paka...(that's good bye)

Moscow...

well i've only got a few minutes before my time runs out on here...Moscow is...i don't know, come see for yourself. it is BIG. the people are quiet. it is busy. it is dirty. it is beautiful. the language is REALLY hard to pick up. i mean, it's a different alphabet, for crying out loud. i am really tired STILL. wish i wasn't. but. i know both God and Satan are up to something here. there's some crazy warfare, some amazing opportunities. I guess if i could ask for prayer from any of you, i would ask for energy, for overflowing joy and peace to love these people. for boldness and courage to talk to them. for wisdom and understanding of the people and their culture and language. i don't want to shrivel up inside. i am staying in the Word, but i need to be constantly aware of the Lord's persistent and relentless pursuit of my heart, whether in the hostel, on the metro, at the university, or walking down the street. both with my team, with the stint team, and the Russians. i want to learn how to love. i want to learn how to sing here. with my life, with my heart, and with my mouth. i am tired. and i can't go to bed for a long time! it's 8 hours ahead of eastern standard time. anyway. only 4 minutes to go on my time. blessings to you.

my addled brain

well it's the night before the last night i will have my computer. and my bag is mostly packed...minus a few essentials for the four days before travel.
the beauty of blogs is that it's like i am talking to everyone, and yet no one, the same time. random. anyway.
i'm not sure i have interesting or profound things to say tonight. most of the things that come to mind would probably best go unspoken. here, that is.
i'm not sure how i did it in highschool. the last four days i have had to get up kind of early. like two of them were truly early, and the other two, i am a pansy. but then i every night i don't get to sleep before 2 or 3(my fault). and it is KILLING me. like, i am officially an old person. after shopping with my mom today for things i needed, i wandered around the parking lot looking for my car for like, 10 minutes. no joke. i was so baffled. so when my mom offers to drive me around the parking lot to look for it, not 5 seconds later, do we pass it on the left, in fairly plain view. i think i've lost my marbles. and i'm not sure if it's a good thing to be so tired BEFORE traveling and adjusting and culture shocking, or if it is not so bad because i'll be tired and confused in a few days anyway. either way, if you are the praying sort, i would not mind a few sent my way.
and the cycle perpetuates. i must get in the shower before going to sleep and waking up around 5 or 6 to go back to athens for my sister's graduation. yeah for her! ok off to get squeaky clean!...

Daddy's girl

i cannot remember the last time i crawled into my daddy's lap and he tickled my back until i was almost asleep. it was a wonderful thing.
the LORD Almighty is Jehovah Rapha...He is our Healer. my Healer. it is amazing how far He has brought me. us. and i am convinced He won't stop now. as i was picking at the annoying flakes on my shins tonight from when i fried myself a couple of weeks ago, i realized that it is right where i have a huge faded scar up my entire shin from a couple of years ago. at the time, it was rather dramatic...essentially, i had to put gauze around my entire calf from just above my ankle to just below my knee. (cable wires are nasty things...i don't suggest falling off of them)
i was kind of afraid i would have a horrific scar forever. everyone said it would be a bad one, that it would not disappear. and it hasn't, completely. but i have to look at it from a certain angle in the light to see it. but it did go away. even though it gives me the weeby jeebies to remember scraping the wire up my shin, the pain and most of the evidence is gone. even though there's a lot of stuff--ugly, defeating, hurtful stuff--from not so long ago, Jehovah Rapha--Abba Father-- has taken most of the pain away, and the scar is fading. it might take a while to sort out truth and untruth, my natural tendencies and formed reactions and habits, the difference between silence and suffocation. it may yet be a while before i trust boy's hearts, and trust them with mine, before i can let someone pick up the pieces of my soul when it comes apart, before i can let myself receive and not just stubbornly, selfishly give. but. a while is not forever. and as long as i am on this earth, Jesus will keep making those scars fade farther and farther away. new wounds will come and He'll just start healing those too. and someday, some glorious day, standing before Him i will be in Him complete.

dad's home!

i'm so glad you discovered you can comment:) it will be sure to make things more interesting.

so, my dad is home as of this morning. which is nice. and actually means i probably ought to go out there and spend time with him instead of sit in my room on my computer. perhaps i'll wow you with my intellect later but adios for now friends. (that is, if eagle husbands make your head dizzy...)

the blush

what is with the blogging in pairs? geez, who does that...
so the time is QUICKLY approaching when i shall board a plane and fly away from here. far away. and tomorrow i am meeting...let's see...at least 5 people to say hello and catch up and say goodbye. crazy stuff. moved out of the brums today for good. again, crazy stuff. life has been full of some crazy stuff lately. perhaps too much to explain. and certainly too long for right now. but maybe one of these days i can articulate my thoughts well enough to put them down.
had a very funny conversation about kissing tonight. with a friend. she makes me laugh. another thing...what exactly triggers blushing? i mean, it's so terrible and embarassing. or maybe you blush because you're embarassed, and then are embarassed because you blushed, and it's a vicious cycle, spiraling downward in social skills. whoever wrote in those fairy tales and love storie that ' the deeper her blush, the more beautiful she became...' yeah, well, they are full of crap. there is nothing attractive about a red face and social awkwardness. the day some guy declares that 'it all started when you stammered and stuttered with incomplete sentences and a flaming face...'well. that will be the day. and what is with those people who see it and intentionally draw attention to it, therefore making it one hundred times worse? (yes, exactly one hundred times worse) i can't say anything. i have been that person before. and i'm sure i will be again. just a small venting session because i hate when i blush. which makes me a small pansy. oh well. can't win em all. (what?) time for bed. Jesus keep fighting for my heart. for it to be wholly and completely Yours. tear away my cynicism and coverings, and become my defender and strength.

unfolding

recently someone remarked that i am very vulnerable and out there. i have a confession though. i really am not. for whatever reason, all my life, it has been so easy for me to express myself on paper. i can write what i am thinking and feeling and what most people would never say. and somehow that does NOT cross over into person to person interaction. even my best friends have to pry sometimes to get me to talk from my mind and soul. that is one of the things Jesus has been teaching and stretching me lately. on many different levels, it is something Jesus has been teaching me for over a year. unfolding. unfolding my hands to let Him have full reign. unfolding my dreams to let Him blow them out of the water. unfolding my wings so i can fly. unfolding my heart to love and be loved. unfolding my soul to receive as well as give. unfolding to Him and to others, be they family, strangers, friends, kindred spirits. still got a LONG way to go. but that's the beauty of it. He is so patient. so i'll keep trying and failing and trusting and trying again. if you get a chance, rip off a little of my shell. it will be good for me.
(i saw this pic my brother took and it sparked my comments...not a fan of up close pics.)

ty-fry, seth boy and miss meredith

just one more final to go...incredible to think that a year has flown by. in a little over a week i will be half the world away. exciting. it is kind of weird, because i sit here and ask myself if i am scared or nervous, and i'm not. but i know it will be a really challenging time. kind of like a deep breath, eyes wide open thing. and lots of fun too.
little ones are so refreshing. there are these two boys my sister keeps a lot, and i always go visit and play. no matter what has happened that day, that week, that hour, they just make you laugh. they are precious. it is insane and wonderful to think that their biggest worries are whether i can catch them or they have to eat one more bite or picking a good spot for hide and go seek. somehow children just make me see God a little more clearly and see how i ought to be a lot more of the time. i could play with them all day. oh! brilliant idea. i will post a picture.
and now because i am retarded, i have to start a new post.