Friend of God

Today my sister-in-law had an ultrasound and she's having a boy. I'm going to have a nephew. Well I guess I already have a nephew but he's just not born yet. He's due in Feb.
With my niece Emma, I could only picture her as a girl, and I was right. With Allison I couldn't tell, but with this one I couldn't imagine this one as a girl, and I was right.
I'm going to have a nephew!!!!!

I had so much fun at JAM tonight. I thought I would be really grossed out about the cow tongue tag and the 'hot potatoe' with the frozen fish, but it was fun. We got 11 kids out this week and 6 last week. All the kids from last week came back this week.
It was so awesome. I got to tell some girls about how being good isn't how you get to heaven but how giving your life to Jesus is the way. I had so much fun.

I went to JAM tonight, the junior high youth group that my church runs, to see if I want to help out. I had so much fun. The kids are awesome. There is something about hanging out with kids and just playing games and talking to them about God. You're in a situation where it is expected that you're going to talk about God so there is no fear in talking to them. I guess talking about God should be like that in every situation. So anyways it was so much fun and I'm definitely going to be helping out.

This is a pretty funny video in honour of Talk Like a Pirate Day.

May the words of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

I got to hang out with the Overholt's this afternoon and this evening. I love that family. They're so much fun.
Karra got her appendix out on Tuesday and it was leaking by the time they took it out, so she has to be on a bunch of antibiotics. She should be coming home from the hospital tomorrow.
She was doing better by the time I left compared to when I got there. When I got there she was sleeping but after that she couldn't even really sit up without a lot of pain, but by the time I left she had been sitting up for over an hour, after having walked around the ward. Tonight she made it all the way around the ward and she had said that she had only made it half way around this morning.
I played skipbo with Helen and then later Karra. They play by different rules than I do. Helen and I played by my rules, the official rules, and then I played their way with Karra. I actually kind of like their rules.
It's sweet seeing Dave and Helen love Karra. Helen pushes Karra on and totally takes care of her at the same time. Dave just totally loves her, she's his little girl. They both love to tease her and she teases them right back. They're a really fun family.

I feel like God is teaching me to enjoy him. Or asking me to enjoy him? Or something like that. God wants me to enjoy being with him not feel like I have to do something, but he wants me to have fun with him.
God is cool!

I keep finding stuff about what I'm learning today.

I am slowly learning that when Jesus asks us to deny ourselves, to give up our life, He is asking us to give up our desire to know our future, to give up all titles but the one that matters, which is follower of Jesus, beloved sheep.

And so I remind myself to breathe peacefully, pray faithfully and walk trustingly. And I remind myself of the words of Jesus, who does not say to us, “Move! Work fast! Figure out your life! Time is running out!” But rather, “I am the good shepherd. Come, follow me.”

I believe authenticity can be one of the hardest things for a Christian. We struggle between two identities—the old and the new. In Galatians, it says, “I have been crucified with Christ, and no longer live.” As Christians, we are to die to our old selves and allow Christ to live within us. We are a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17). However, I think for a long time I believed that meant not only was the old me gone, but that it would never be seen again. I came to believe that if I found myself amidst “old-self” behavior, I must not have really surrendered to Christ. The reality was, I just needed to continue surrendering.

This just put into words something I've been feeling. Have I really surrendered my life? I wonder sometimes when I know I'm not where I want to be in my faith, with being who God wants me to be. So I'll just keep surrendering.

Camping was awesome, even though I was sick the whole time. I did gradually get better throughout the whole weekend though.
The first night I didn't really sleep, I slept maybe 2.5 hours straight, the rest of the time I was in and out. The second night I slept for 8 hours and only woke up a couple of times but went right back to sleep. The third night I went to bed at 2:30 and fell asleep at 3 but I slept straight through till after 7 and went back to sleep until after 8. Sat morning I had an awesome nap in the hammock in my sleeping bag.
I love my new sleeping back, it is so nice and cozy. My new thermarest was really good. I slid a bit, especially since our tent was on a hill, ok so maybe not a full out hill, but definitely an incline.
I didn't shower all weekend, so when I got home the first thing I did was shower. I washed my hair twice, just because I wanted it to be really clean.
I think the best thing about the weekend was just spending time with everyone. Talking, hanging around the camp fire, singing, playing cards, huddling in blankets in the middle of the night and talking. Really good. I beat Peter and Paul at Rummy. :)
It rained all day Saturday but Christy had brought tarps so we stayed pretty dry. Matt had so many ropes tied to trees to hang them up. He even put a tent fly over the hammock so it stayed dry too. Very good. It was pretty funny when we got wet a couple of times when the water came off the tarps. We kept having to stand on the picnic table and push the water off the tarps from underneath.
Most of the weekend I had on 5 tops and 2 pairs of pants. It was cold, but atleast I had enough cloths.
I got to know the outhouse pretty well, I had to be so often because I had to drink so much water for my cold. Our site had our own outhouse, and since most other people avoided it because of the smell (I could barely smell anything, so I didn't care), I never had to wait to use it. :)
It was fun watching Niki learn to use the coleman stove. She did the cooking this weekend and did a very good job. By the end of the weekend she had figured out how to light the stove without help and knew how to refill the gas. Two things I have never done.
Overall it was a very good weekend, I'm really glad I was able to go.