breathe.in.life

Get Lost

2010-09-18T16:57:00.000-07:00

I believe it is thought of most the time that a person who does not have a plan for their life is considered lost, is without guidance and direction. And I feel that so many people are quick to judge or shake their heads or look down upon seeing this state of being in others. Yet, if I wouldn’t have allowed myself to get lost, I might not have ever found out where I am going. In order to be found, does it mean that we must first be lost?

So Get Lost...or don't, it's usually easier not too. Praise God for navigation systems.

Powerful Quotes

2010-04-17T11:49:00.001-07:00

“Hell lies not in torture, hell lies in an empty heart.”

“A single just man causes a demon more trouble than a thousand blind believers.”

“A word of compassion to a criminal or prostitute is more noble than a repeated prayer in the temple.”

They really put into perspective for me Jesus' heart for how we should live. It's not about the life I want to live, it's about the life God desires and wills me to live. What does it look like to live in a way that expresses a full heart instead of an empty one? What are so many of us blind of that keeps us from seeing the truth? What is it that is blinding us? How much easier is it to say a prayer in the church rather than talk to the homeless in downtown Portland who might get on your nerves or make you nervous? How many times in scripture does it say to serve and give to the poor and yet we lack motivation, encouragement, passion?

I'll do my best and blog my reflection on these questions next week.

Live wholeheartedly everyone

Learning About Myself Part I

2010-02-16T10:20:00.001-08:00

In reminiscing and listening to this class share lessons learned through reading “My First white Friend” by Raybon, I find myself diving into my last year and a half and the understanding still not fully obtained concerning knowing myself and truly loving, forgiving, and being at peace with myself.

I’m learning that there is a transition in this life where one must turn from needing external love (i.e. from parents early on to friends or lovers later on) to internally loving myself through Jesus. I guess in my circumstance, I have never needed to truly love myself because I have always had the love pouring into me from my family and friends. I’ve never had to completely find who I am and know who I am because I’ve always known who I am in the eyes of my family and my friends. And because I am a great people pleaser, this was and has been all I needed. However, this delayed the transition for me because I never began to know who I truly am and in not doing so, I never learned to love myself as Jesus loves me.

I am now in this process of learning about who I am, and learning who I am in the eyes of my Father in heaven, learning who I am created to be. Through this, I am learning to love myself. It is so hard to do this when you have spent your whole life doing what others expect or doing what others say in order to feel that love. Since starting, it has been extremely hard learning to love myself in making my own decisions because I’ve never necessarily done that before. It sounds ridiculous actually that I’m just now starting to make decisions, as of summer 2008. But it has to start sometime, right?

Become What You Believe

2010-01-19T11:10:00.000-08:00

"We are not here to be successful, we are here to be faithful."
- Mother Teresa

As I walk, and sometimes run, down the path laid out in front of me, it is my hope that this quote rings true in my life. I'm really interested in what this quote means to you and your life and where you are right now?

God is Good

2009-02-23T00:10:00.000-08:00

I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would have the opportunity to serve God through running a snowboard park in the middle of nowhere in Japan. Before three months ago, I didn't even know that snowboarding existed in Japan. It's not a lie that God will use you in ways you can't even dream of when you give Him your life and constantly seek His will. That is one thing I've realized since being in Japan, that God will use you right where you are at if you welcome Him in and allow Him to work through you. I work everyday in the snowboard park doing relatively the same things every day and it has become very routine. I mean, we have done a lot of work and our park has grown by leaps and bounds, but I feel like I am working for a construction company. I guess it's just not what I had exactly expected to be doing on outreach. I had expected outreach to be a time of intense evangelism with youth and sharing testimonies daily with people. I've found myself going through the motions here because of how routine it is. This doesn't mean I didn't work as hard or put forth as much effort, but it takes the joy of serving away. I've asked myself multiple times, "what am I doing here God?"
He's answered me in a few different ways, by talking to me and by showing me. In the beginning I heard Him telling me to simply wait and see. So I waited. And waited. After a couple weeks I asked a few more times. He then said, "now see." For the week following this, multiple amazing events happened. God uncovered that my work ethic and my ability to serve without complaining and with a positive attitude has been an encouragement and motivator for many people. He has revealed so many of my strengths to me and they all revolve around being a leader and leading people. He has given me a heart for discipleship, for developing people into passionate followers of Jesus. You see, I was at one time 'lost' here in Japan. Now lost does not mean that I'm not tangibly doing anything, it is just lacking purpose, motivation, passion. "I was once lost, and now I am found" - famous words in the song Amazing Grace. While I was lost, God was using me right where I was and I didn't even realize it. He was and is continuing to mold me into a man who can sense His presence always, because it is when I don't feel His presence that I feel 'lost.'
Please pray for me as I begin to organize what my life will look like back home. Pray that God will open doors where He wills and that I will notice them. I miss you all so much and think about you all the time. Thank you for your continued support and prayers, you all are amazing. Peace and Love.

Japan Newslettern 2/12/09

2009-02-19T18:25:00.000-08:00

Greetings everyone! We are currently in the fourth week of nine and are halfway through out time here at N* (Northstar). Like always, some random facts we've found out about Japan. Not only do men and women have Ofuros (Japanese baths), but also do monkeys'. And yes, we drove two and a half hours to see them run around and bath in a natural hot bath. It was awesome. Another random fact that is highly depressing is that most Japanese deserts include sweet beans inside their cakes, donuts, and mochi. The really sad part is that the sweet beans look like chocolate and you know they would be so delicious if they were chocolate, but they are sweet beans and they are fairly disgusting. Coming from Switzerland, we are chocolate deprived! OK, now on to the important things.

Since our last newsletter some amazing things have happened. Our park is growing not only physically, but also socially! We have added three new features (flat-down rail, C-Box, and 10meter box) and are in the process of building a 10meter kicker as we speak. The popularity is increasing daily which is a huge answer to prayers. We have riders coming to our park over other really well known parks because our park is more fun. It is so encouraging and such a sign of things to come for N* and this snowboard park. Off the mountain, we have had a few awesome times of evangelism through english class and being invited to a youth church in Matsumoto. We have the opportunity each Tuesday night to participate in english class and help them learn the language. Some people drive over an hour just to come to our english class because they enjoy our community at N*, it's a great way to build a friendship with the people off the mountain. Also, JP and Matt were given the opportunity to share their lives and serve at a youth church in Matsumoto. There were eleven kids ranging from 13-17 and they are loved watching JP and Matt play Jya Ken Pon (Japanese style rock, paper, scissors). Don't worry, we'll teach you all when we come home! Our times off the mountain have served to be great blessings to all of us being able to build our relationships with the people here on a more serious level. Our days off thus far have consisted of trips to Matsumoto and Nagano and amazing Japanese food. We have really liked our trips to the different cities and have about a combined 1,000 pictures to prove it! Those of you who have access to Facebook will continually see updated photo albums from most of us, so keep your eyes peeled.

Now onto more prayer requests. Our team is back to full strength, everyone is healthy, strong and hard at work six days a week. We would compare this job to that of a construction worker; tough and long hours, but God gives us the strength and motivation to keep on working hard. We ask that you pray for continued health and motivation for our team, as well as unity and passion for us. It is so important for us to work together with the same goal and purpose in mind. Last, but definitely not least, for boldness. Can you please pray for boldness amongst the team to share our faith with the locals and the riders we see each day. Thank you all so much for your encouraging words and for keeping us in your prayers. It means more than you know!

We hope that you are doing well and that God is blessing you abundantly for blessing us.

Japan Newsletter 1/29/09

2009-02-19T18:22:00.001-08:00

Hello Everyone! We arrived safely into Japan a little over a week ago after one extremely long day of traveling. It is beautiful here in Norikura, snow is everywhere and it is freezing cold. A quick few random facts to get started, the Japanese in this region don't believe in insulation! Did I mention it is freezing cold here? Also, everything is plugged in! The toilet seats are all heated and the toilets themselves have a variety of options to choose from: get squirted with water here, get squirted with water there, etc. Monkeys have been known to play around the streets here so we have seen our fair share of wild monkeys messing around. There are vending machines everywhere here and they serve hot and cold drinks in a can! You can get your daily morning latte right out of the vending machine each day! It's crazy. God is so good. Now onto the important stuff.
We have had an amazing first week here getting to know the other Northstar staff and building up the snowboard park here. Like our YWAM team, the other Northstar staff come from all over the world and are really sweet people. Our primary job for the duration of our time here at Northstar is to make their snowboard park bigger and better than ever before. When we arrived here, the park consisted of three features (two rails and a rollover). In the last week that we have been here, we've added six new features to their park! It looks much more professional now and it is only going to get better. We received an awesome encouragement the other day from a guest pastor who came to speak to all of us. While he was driving, he listened to someone on the radio mention Northstar and share how awesome their snowboard park is becoming! This was a huge encouragement to us working the park and trying to make it look great. For most of us, rather, all of us, this is our first time truly building, creating, and grooming a snowboard park. So hearing this came as huge inspiration to all of us.
The people we have met in the park while snowboarding have been a blessing to all of us. We meet new Japanese snowboarders each day and it is really cool to watch these relationships grow each day. It has given us a deeper purpose hear than simply building a park. Our hearts have opened up for other snowboarders on the hill and this includes the guys working the chair lifts. We have developed friendships with most of the lifties and have learned different phrases in Japanese to say back and forth with them. Due to the fact that we won't have any contact with the actual camps that come through Northstar, it is another huge blessing that these relationships are developing. We desire to continually show the love of Christ to these people and hopefully we'll have the opportunity to share that love with them.
Now for a few prayer requests. A few of our teammates have been really sick lately and are now finally starting to feel better. If you could pray for their perfect healing that would be awesome. We all would really appreciate it if you could pray for strength and continual motivation for us each day, given that shoveling snow everyday could get old fairly quickly. Also, if you could pray for the relationships that are being built to continue to grow and develop. Thank you so much!

I Got Married!!

2009-01-06T01:47:00.000-08:00

I wonder how many of you came rushing to the blog freaking out to see if I really got married! As you can probably guess, I didn't get married; well, not in the normal physical sense we all know of. This past Saturday night I was married with Christ and the Holy Spirit. I was baptized for the first time in my life! Now let me tell you about this last week and how it came about, this story is awesome. I call this first section "The Turning Point."

So for the last few months the idea of being baptized has been on my heart. My whole life I have justified not getting baptized for various reasons: waiting for the right time, being stubborn and wanting it to be perfect, desiring for everyone I know to be there, etc. I have justified it one way or another time and time again since I was 15. With that said, God really stirred things up in me two weekends ago and beat out the stubborn mentality from inside me. However, that wasn't enough. The following Tuesday, our speaker gave us some prophetic words that he received for us and what he told me was so incredibly from God. He envisioned
me coming to Jesus and being handed a huge goblet full of His living water, and instead of drinking it in I poured it over my head and let it soak my whole body. If this wasn't confirmation for me to get baptized then I don't know what is! Later that evening, since that huge prophecy obviously couldn't be enough for me, during lecture our speaker spoke about John the Baptist and Jesus' baptism out of Matthew 3. At this point I was freaking out and I hadn't told anyone yet; so after the lecture I stayed around to talk to the speaker about it and just "by chance" my two leaders Vince and Arnauld wanted to stick around also to speak with him. So I filled them all in on how it came about that I feel like the time is now to get baptized and Arnauld goes on to say that God has placed a huge feeling inside of him this last week that somebody is going to need to get baptized, he just didn't speak up about it because he didn't want to put any pressure on anyone. Little did Arnauld know that I wasn't the only one feeling they needed to get baptized. After I shared with the group that I'm getting baptized this weekend, JP, Travis and Michael all jumped out of their seats and wanted to be baptized as well. It was like God was using my stepping out to open the doors for others to receive this marriage. Interesting how the hearts of those who were burning for baptism are all also going to Japan together, that is so awesome. "The Turning Point" is now accomplished, and now God is moving me into the next section called: "Let's Get Physical."

This section is everything that happened between Wednesday morning and the 5pm Saturday evening. As many of you know, my girlfriend Kirsten came to visit on Wednesday morning and I can honestly tell you that I don't think either of us could have pictured a better five days spent not only together, but also with Jesus. Wednesday was also the start of a massive event we put on called Worship & Ride where we had around 110 people here from across Europe for two days worshiping God and shredding the mountain together. It was unreal to say the least. Our times of worship turned into times of healing where some of us were blessed with the gift of healing and God put us to work. We had shoulders healed, necks healed, a certain man had a flat foot and hadn't been able to snowboard for six years and then after we prayed over him his foot had an arch and he went snowboarding the next day for the first time! I'm telling you, it was crazy! I haven't felt the Holy Spirit that intense in my whole life, it was insane. Now moving onto Friday, I was in a rather sad mood all morning because I was allowing the enemy to fill my mind with lies and deceptions about myself. Lies that made me believe that I'm not good enough and that I don't deserve love; they crippled me and broke me down to the point that I had to leave in the middle of a lecture because I felt my tear ducts about to overflow. I left with my journal thinking I was going write all my feelings out and as soon as I found a random little room where I could be by myself I put my journal on the ground and immediately broke down and wept. Please do not feel any pity of sadness about this because this might of been one of the most influential and significant revelations of my life. For the first time in my life I felt the Hand of God touch me and He went directly to my heart. He stripped away all the lies that I came to believe and and filled me with His love and truth. I audibly heard Him tell me "I love you" and I felt His arms wrap around me. My tears immediately turned into tears of joy and love. This was the first time I have ever felt His touch and heard His audible voice. I mean, I have been a witness to God working in my life, but I hadn't ever truly felt Him and heard Him like this. I couldn't sit still and stop shaking for a few hours after this took place and God filled me with His spirit and gave me a ton of prophetic encouraging words for some of the people here. God took my brokenness, took my imperfections, and has shown me unconditional love and let me tell you, it is intoxicating. Since that moment on Friday I have literally been on cloud nine learning what it means to truly live in Christ's love and not just knowing He loves me. It is hard to even express what this new heart feels like, it is unbelievable. Now onto the section you've all been waiting for: "The Marriage."

The staff here pulled a lot of strings so that we could use the indoor pool in our complex (I don't think anyone knew we even had a pool). So I was the last of us four boys to be baptized and we each had a little different way of doing it. When I first got into the pool, I spoke for a minute or two about why I am doing this and confessing my faith in Him. Basically saying my vows as in a marriage. Then I had my good friend Chantal read Psalm 139:1, 14, 23-24 and then Kirsten read Romans 8:37-39 over me. I had chosen these passages through out the last week because of their importance in my relationship with God. Then I had Vince and Arnaud baptize me in the name of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit and as soon as I came up out of the water I felt so incredibly energized! Through this whole time I had a song playing by Lifehouse called "Everything" and as soon as I exited the water, if you know the song, it hit the really awesome and intense part. Then they all laid their hands on me and prayed and spoke words of encouragement over me. If that wasn't special enough, they asked Kirsten to come in and they did the same over both of us. It was such a special time, God definitely demonstrated His love to me that night. I realized that the time isn't in the future, but the time is now to take that next step with Him. I realized how monumental of a step it is to be baptized, I feel as if God has opened my eyes and my heart more to Him so that I can draw even closer to Him. So, now you know who I am married too!

Wow, this is probably the longest blog I will ever write! I miss you all a ton and truly wish you could have been here this last weekend, but know you were all here in my heart! I hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas and a fabulous new year! Ciao!

If You Don't Feel Like Praying, Talk To God About It

2008-12-07T02:02:00.000-08:00

Many apologies for how late this blog is! Life has been truly crazy this last few weeks; but no excuses, my bad!

To say that God has been moving through this place is a complete understatement. The amount of retained learning and growth that has taken place the last weeks has been HUGE. Thus far, we've had these topics during our lecture phase: evangelism, culture of honor, spiritual warfare, character and nature of God, and the Cross. The two teachings that have had the largest impact on my life so far have been the cross and spiritual warfare. I could speak for hours about all that I have learned and all that I have been going through here, so if you have any questions or would like to hear about anything in more detail, please do not hesitate to drop me an email! I would love to talk more about any of these topics of our spiritual journey. I'd like to share with you a few events/life lessons that have been strongly put on my heart the last few weeks.

We had the opportunity this last Tuesday to put on a Christmas gathering at a men's prison facility about an hour away from our base. The morning before we left, we had a time of intercession where we prayed for the people we would come into contact with there and for the Holy Spirit to move through the prison. During the time of intercession, many of us were given visions, words, phrases, and bible verses. I was given a vision of Isaiah 42 and a very large black man. I had never read this chapter out of the bible before except for verse 16, so I had really no idea what the entire chapter was about. We shared with the group what we received from the spirit, if anything, about the prison visit. I was hesitant at first to share my visions because I thought they were so random, but I felt so strongly that i should speak up about them. So I did. I came to find out that Isaiah 42 is about the servant of the Lord, it speaks on freeing the captives from prison and leading the blind out of darkness. It not only brought new meaning to my vision, but quickly became a favorite chapter in the bible. Now I know that the vision of Isaiah 42 spoke truth about the prison, what about the man I saw in my vision? Wouldn't you know that about an hour into being at the prison out of no where came a huge black man that walked straight up to me and talked to me for the entire time we spent at the prison. His name was Kevin and he was from Nigeria. We talked, laughed, prayed, hugged, and he shared with me a lot about his past. It hit me half way through that Kevin is God's Isaiah 42. Kevin had faith in Jesus as His savior, but didn't quite know what exactly to do about it. My leader and I had the privilege to pray over Him and hopefully speak some truth to Him. With about 30 minutes left in our visit, I went outside because I felt led to simply pray for Kevin and our time there by myself. I prayed that if it be God's will, would He keep Kevin and I in contact when I leave so that I may have a hand in continually praying for him. When I walked back into the room where everyone was, Kevin handed me a slip of paper with his phone number and email address! I'm not kidding, I felt as if God himself was handing me this slip of paper. In all honesty, I've heard stories from other people about God giving them visions and prophecies and seeing them come true and what not, but it was always hard for me to realize or comprehend it because I have yet to witness it myself. This was God's first stamp in my gifts of the spirit passport: prophecy. To completely put this into perspective for you, would it help if I told you I've been praying for gifts of the spirit for two weeks now? God truly answers when we knock on His door, when we seek His truth and when we ask in Jesus' name. Continue to be faithful in the little things and God will truly begin to be faithful in bigger things. I could go on and on about this topic and what has happened to me over the last couple weeks because this is only the tip of the iceberg; so again, please don't hesitate to email me and ask me about it.

One more massive lesson I've learned since being here. I am supposed to be here right now. How simple does that sound? I am supposed to be right here, in Davos, right now. God knew I wasn't ready for what He had in store for me prior to me coming here. I know He is molding and pruning me to become the man I am supposed to be so that I can fully live in Him and accomplish His will. With that said, I've been seeking confirmation the last week or two on certain specific details of my life (one being the gifts of the spirit and that one is surely being answered as I write this). I'd like to ask you to pray for me regarding confirmation on the other details. Without telling you any of them, if you are given any thoughts, feelings, or visions while praying please email them to me! I would not only be thoroughly encouraged to hear your thoughts, but they could very well be the words God desires for me to hear.

Thank you for the continual encouragement and support that I have received, it means more to me than you know! I pray that all is well with you and that God is at work in each of you. I miss you all!

SNOW

2008-11-13T06:55:00.000-08:00

We woke up to a winter wonderland Wednesday morning! Snow was falling all day long and covered our lodge and surrounding area. We had some free time today so we went out on the hill behind our lodge and built a kicker (jump) and all of us boarded off of it! So fun and exciting to finally get back on my board. All of our prayers for snow finally came true; one of my friends here did an all-day fast on Tuesday for snow! And it worked!

I led everyone in devotional time this morning. Each student has to do it three times through out lecture phase and I was the first student to go. I gave a little teaching, or sermonette as the leaders here call it, on one of the nine fruits of the spirit: self-control. I gave them examples from my own life, biblical examples, and where I have already seen self-control at work in some of the students. It was interesting teaching on the subject because self-control has translate into discipline and this bunch of 18-20 year old snowboarders don't want to hear it! I noticed how uncomfortable it made them in their seats, so I switched up my game plan a bit and praised these young guys for acts of self-control I've seen in them here. They responded well and a few came up to me after devotional time and asked further questions or if I would pray for them. God is so awesome. We had our weekly worship session on Monday night and the Holy Spirit made another magnificent appearance. We not only had a non-believer come and experience Christ's love, but Jesus spoke to me through my friend Sean. During worship, a song was playing that spoke about laying down your worries and burdens at the feet of Jesus. I felt the need to go to the back of the room and start to simply pray. My pride was on my heart as I asked Jesus if He was proud of me; I've never really thought about it or thought that He truly was. I know that He loves me unconditionally, but never knew if He was proud of me because we fall short so often being human. A few moments later, my buddy Sean walked over to me and simply put his arm over me and started praying for me. When we were done, he hesitated a bit and looked uneasy. I asked him what was up and he told me that God has been telling him all evening to tell me something. He told me that God wanted to tell me that He is proud of me. How crazy is that!? Sean said that God had told him too a few different times and he just thought it was nonsense. When I told him that it wasn't nonsense at all and that it was exactly what I needed to hear his face lit up and gave me a huge hug. God is so awesome again!

We have free time tonight so my small group is going indoor rock climbing together! And Saturday we are going cross country skiing for a few hours! I've never been cross country skiing in my life! Nor have I had a pair of skis on my feet since I was in middle school! I'm really stoked to go.

I have been receiving so many encouraging comments from people, thank you all so much for them. I hope all is well with you and I remember you in my prayers (which is often because we literally live out the verse, "pray without ceasing"). I miss you all!

Psalm 139:14

2008-11-06T05:00:00.000-08:00

Gruezzi! Welcome to German 101, that means hello, it is the formal way to greet adults here in Switzerland. To say the last few days have been unbelievable would be an understatement. I know it has been awhile since we last spoke and I would love to unload everything right now on here, but you'd probably go crazy reading such a long post and I just don't have that much time! So here we go!

This is pretty cool, so one of the reasons I came to YWAM is for guidance and direction from God and to learn how to truly hear, feel, and see the holy spirit move in me. The very FIRST teaching we had on Monday was on 'Hearing God's Voice.' If that wasn't a sign then I don't know what is! Another awesome story like that, before all of us students arrived here and before our leaders knew anything about us, they spent a day praying for each of us hoping to learn something about us from God. In turn, we had a prayer session the other night where our leaders shared with us what they had revealed to them. Arnold, my mentor here, shared with me a couple visions that came to Him concerning me. He told me that he pictured me with an orange ball playing with youth from all across the world. Lets see, what could that mean? Maybe a basketball in my hands doing sports ministry around the world? What are my dreams again? Oh yeah, sports ministry. He also had James 1:3-4 on his heart while praying for me, which says: "Because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." This had been something that has been an issue of mine for months now! Those are simply two of the many amazing stories thus far.

There hasn't been any snow fall here around our base since we arrived last week, but the mountain tops surrounding us have snow. Hopefully, all the snowboarding areas will be open in two weeks because everyone here is incredibly anxious for some snow. We are having a board waxing party Saturday afternoon, I'm pretty stoked. Our days during the week are so packed that we haven't had any time to simply hang out with each other; so this weekend will be a great chance for us seven guys to hang out. Out of the seven guys, three of us are from Oregon! How crazy is that, then one is from British Columbia, another from Huntington Beach, another from Detroit, and last, but not least Norway. The guys from Norway is David, and he might be one of the funniest guys i've ever met. So far, all of us have been getting along very well and we've all bonded very quickly. Four of my leaders are from Switzerland, another one is from somewhere in Canada and my mentor here, Arnold, is from Holland. To say that they are all awesome wouldn't give them enough credit. They have done an amazing job leading and teaching us thus far and I honestly feel blessed to have the opportunity to learn from them.

I'm going to take some pictures of our base and the surrounding area this weekend so I can put them up for you all to see. And we are going on a long hike on Sunday so I will hopefully be taking some gorgeous pictures then as well. I will try and post more often, but like I said, my weekdays are packed! I want you all to know that I miss you and think of you often. If there is anything specific you'd like to know, just drop me a line and I'd love to answer it.

Day One- Sorry it is so long!

2008-11-01T11:08:00.000-07:00

Wow, I am finally here and it is freezing! What a day God gave me today. It started with a wonderful send off in Portland with my family and Kirsten; incredibly blessed to have them in my life. I had a direct flight from Portland to Frankfurt, Germany and sat next to a sweet elderly lady that literally talked to me every moment I was either awake or had my headphones off. She and her husband are on the tail end of their 20 year traveling time or experience or however you'd like to word it. And yes, I said 20 years, they have basically spent my entire life traveling! She proceeded to tell me stories from Africa, Australia, China...Fiji, Argentina, Peru...you get the picture. I was able to sleep for the first two hours of the flight, then I watched the new Indiana Jones movie (not all that good) and Leatherheads (also not very good); so I talked with my new friend most of each movie.
Once I hit Frankfurt, I realized two things that I immediately regretted not bringing. A watch would have come in quite handy walking through an airport where there are virtually no clocks. Plus, my phone couldn't find service so I couldn't use it as a source of time. So I sat down on my computer thinking I could check my email and Skype some people and 10 minutes into using my computer it dies. Where's my power cord? In my checked luggage...fantastic. I was able to reach my lovely mother, however. I decided just to walk to my gate and hang out there and read until my flight boarded, but to my surprise I had the Amazing Race in my waiting room and on my flight. There were 7 teams of two hanging around being interviewed by the crew with their huge cameras and all. Lucky me I was the only one in the whole crowd they decided to interview! So I had two teams come up to me with their camera crew and talk to me about who I am, where I'm from, and a ton of other random questions. I had to fill out a release form so they could put me on TV and everything! Pretty crazy, right?
I landed in Zürich to find both my bags waiting for me which was such an answer to prayer! I walked through customs and had this grizzly looking man run up to me and give me a hug and then said, "You're Matthew, right?" Arnold is his name and he led me to the rest of the YWAM people so I could meet all of them and then he treated me to McDonald's: the home of the $12 McChicken value meal. How horrendous is that? I felt ashamed having him pay that much for me knowing I could get 12 McChicken sandwiches back home for this price! There are seven guys and two girls in our class, along with six staff members: two married couples and Arnold and another lady. So far, everyone is really cool and down to Earth.
Today has been a roller coaster ride of emotions, but I am happy to finally be here and I know I'm supposed to be here. Thank you all again for your prayers that got me here safely! I'll post pictures and a random video I took in Frankfurt tomorrow! Miss you all!

Blessed Beyond Measure

2008-10-21T15:48:00.000-07:00

In all of my days, all 23 years of them, I have never felt this encouraged, motivated, or loved by so many people. It simply began as a thought, and now YWAM is a reality. This is due in large part to all of you whom I so graciously dedicate my first ever blog! It is because of your support, your willingness to step out and put faith in not what I am doing, but in what God is and will be doing that I am here writing this today. To say the least, I have been overwhelmed and overjoyed by the amount of prayers and support that has been shown. It has been incredibly reassuring and encouraging to read your notes and letters. It has proven to me that God is in complete control and that His ways are higher than my ways (Isaiah 55:9).

The love that has been shown has been, as my sister would put it, exceedingly abundant. It has made me feel truly loved. As we do things that require us to step out in faith and be vulnerable, I believe it is our human nature to wonder what other people think and might do in response. All of you have helped wipe those worries away and taught me to look up and focus on God's love and acceptance rather than that of the flesh. From personal experience, I believe we sometimes forget the support and love we have around us. God places people in our lives for a reason and I encourage you to think of someone today who has supported and loved you in times when you needed a helping hand or a shoulder to lean on.

Thank you. Thank you for believing in me, trusting me, and illustrating God's love to me. This is dedicated to you, for all that you have blessed me with.

I close with a quote from a book I finally finished that is very relevant:

"Love the Lord your God, and love one another. Love one another as He loves. Love with strength and purpose and passion and no matter what comes against you. Don't weaken. Stand against the darkness, and love. That's the way back into Eden. That's the way back to life."
- Francine Rivers