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Monday, November 10, 2008

  • Journal Entry 11/9/08

    I was contemplating today how I had heard someone in the ministry say that God called him into it because heneeded to be kept on a short leash.  I realized, maybe a few years ago, that this also applies to me.  While some would like to glorify what I am doing over here, itis not the truth.  I am no holier than anyone else and these last two days prove it.  We have not had access to the internet these two days and, while I thought it was only my computer, it's the whole Center.  Also, my mp3 players broke on Thursday.  Without these two things, my world continues to turn, but I'm having a hard time keeping up.

    I began to wonder why and came to the conclusion that I have been neglecting God and so He's drawing me back in.  Also, my sin has affected the whole of this building.  What is funny is that while I was coming to this conclusion, in the next room over, the other teacher cam to it as well, but for herself.  Even so, I have still refused to converse with God and I can sense Him outside my door waiting and wondering when I'll just give up and let Him in.

    I have become preoccupied lately.  Preoccupied with "good" things: my updates back home, building relationships with the lost, listening to sermons, and possibly falling in love with a man, a good, godly missions-minded man.  But none of these are God!  I had promised at the beginning that my mp3 player would not be used in transit, so that I would use that time to read the Bible or a Christian Living book.  I failed that.  I had decided that I would do a sketch on God's characteristics, but have failed that as well.  I also decided I would go through all of Paul's letters...I'm still in the 1st chapter of Romans. 

    I fail and fail and fail.  I wonder how my predecessors had done it before me.  Someone like Amy Carmichael...was she such a fickle and uncommitted person as I am?  All the beautiful and devited things she wrote, were those on her good days that came once a week?  once a month?

    Proverbs 2:1-15...specifically verses 4-5: if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.

    All will fall in place when I give God His due place in my life ---> #1!

Tuesday, November 04, 2008

  • Submit, even in the...Voting Booth??

    I just had a thought and then I thought, this might make a good blog entry...esp. since it's been a while since I've updated this one.  I, myself, am a single lady, and therefore, when I do a lot of things in my life, and make certain decisions, I don't really have to ask anyone else.  It's between me and God.  But, I am also a Christian, and I firmly believe in the commands in the Bible, "Women, submit to your husbands. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church." 

    So, when I get married, I know that my independence will change, and in areas where I think I know better, I will have to learn and readly submit to my husband in his decision-making.  Not to say that I will follow blindly, but hopefully the marriage will be a forum, where my views and ideas are easily given and received, and then a more appropriate decision can be made for the family as a whole. 

    But this is all fine and dandy.  What I was really curious about is everyone's thought on how much authority the man has in a marriage...does it extend to every day minor things (goodness, I hope I wouldn't be expected to call my hubby when trying to decide between a chicken wrap or a ham sandwich for lunch), and for even the globally big things?  Like in America, we have the sovereign right to vote individually.  We have an opportunity to declare our own beliefs, views, and thoughts on how our government should be run.  When I go in the voting booth, would I be expected to follow my husband? 

    Some might think this is a weird question, but I really want to know your thoughts on it.  Where do the lines of submission begin and end?  There are some things you just don't agree with your spouse on...could you put those aside to submit even in the voting booth?  It's a pretty big decision.  Even if you aren't Christian, how much loyalty do you give to your SO?  I can't say that I have my own established idea on this.  I'm still hammering it out in my own mind, and probably won't be able to decide what I would do until I'm faced with the circumstance.  What about you?!  Please tell!

Friday, October 24, 2008

  • Mailing List

    Hey everyone!  Some of you who read my blog are already on my mailing list, but some of you I only know through Xanga or Revelife.  So, if you would like to receive news each week about the work that's going on here in Shimonoseki, Japan, please use this block below to sign up.  I would be so happy to have you on board and praying for things out here.  I have 6 more months left and then I'll be home, but if they are anything like the 1st 6 months, you will want to hear about it.  Since I send it out weekly, sometimes I'm a little dry for writing on here, so this is a good way to keep up to date about what's going on with me.  Thanks!

    Join My Email List - Japan
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Friday, October 17, 2008

  • DJ AM...A Believer?

    There are some parts of Hollywood that I just don't pay attention to, but when I see the title of an article including a celebrity's name and God/Jesus, or it might possibly shed some light on their spiritual beliefs, my eyebrows raise.  If you haven't read, there was a plane that crashed during take off back in September in South Carolina.  DJ AM (Adam Goldstein) and his buddy Travis Barker were on board.  The pilots and two passengers died, and DJ AM and Barker received critical burns.  After recovery they jumped back on the horse, so to speak, and have done at least one performance since. 

    I just saw this article from People saying that if DJ AM had not been hospitalized for the burns from this plane crash, he might not have found out about a blood clot in his leg from all the regular flying he does.  He has over 2 million frequent flyer miles!  Amazing.  But, it could have found its way to his heart and that would have been it, cardiac arrest and he'd be done.

    Before I clicked on the link, I wondered if Goldstein would acknowledge God or not.  I don't know much of anything about him.  According to Wikipedia, he has been engaged to Nicole Richie...which doesn't gauge too high on my charts, but who knows.  At the end of the article, though, he makes this statement, "I have great faith that everything happens for a reason." (and the part that TMZ conveniently leaves out of its article of the same story) "I put my life in God's hands."

    Now, I don't know what that means to him, but it sounds pretty good.  Goldstein is an obviously Jewish name, but there's no way to tell if he adheres to Jewish beliefs or Christian, or any particular theistic belief system. 

    What I'm curious about is if anyone knows anything more about this guy.  Like I said, I don't know much about him, but this is interesting to me.  How do you feel when a celebrity begins to talk about God?  How do you feel when one begins to talk the talk but remains in the immoral atmosphere of so many parts of Hollywood? 

    Links:

    http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20233680,00.html?xid=rss-topheadlines

    http://www.tmz.com/2008/10/17/dj-am-plane-crash-saved-me-for-real/

Wednesday, October 08, 2008

  • Currently Listening
    The Best of Passion (So Far)
    By Passion
    Glorious by Chris Tomlin & Christy Nockels
    see related

    "Knowing God" J.I.Packer

    "This is momentous knowledge.  There is unspeakable comfort - the sort of comfort that energises, be it said, not enervates* - in knowing that God is constantly taking knowledge of me in love, and watching over me for my good.  There is tremendous relief in knowing that His love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion Him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself, and quench His determination to bless me.  There is, certainly, great cause for humility in the thought that He sees all the twisted things about me that my fellow-men do not see (and I am glad!), and that He sees more corruption in me than that which I see in myself (which, in all conscience, is enough).  There is, however, equally great incentive to worship and love God in the thought that, for some unfathomable reason, He wants me as His friend, and desires to be my friend, and has given His Son to die for me in order to realise this purpose.  We cannot work these thoughts out here, but merely to mention them is enough to show how much it means to know, not merely that we know God, but the He knows us."

    J.I.Packer
    "Knowing God"

    *enervates: to weaken or destroy the strength or vitality

xapatotheworld

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    • Member Since: 8/2/2008

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  • JandJinJapan@xanga
    Thank you for considering me as a friend. I added you! Where in Japan are you? My wife and I live just East of Tokyo, in Chiba Prefecture. May the Eternal God and Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, bless you and walk with you this day! --Jason (JandJinJapan)
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