Donna the House Wifey

so heres the latest update.












i'm still looking for a job, but i have a few things lined up so i'm not worried about it.
1st over flow service went very very well.
aaron and i finally sat down and started to plan wedding stuff
lauren and i are getting ready to start a bible study in 2 weeks
jo went to the homeless out reach on tuesday and wants to come to college group this sunday
hannah moved out therefore aaron has a room temporarily as well as a bed
i miss not being at school
i am turning into a house wife more and more each day that i am not working.
example of this would be i cleaned the fridge out and the living and dinning room yesterday
i am trying the special K challenge to eat their cardboard cereal for two weeks in order to lose a dress size for amee's wedding
i am still working on a better devo life be cause i enjoy spending time with God, and i have no reason not to now
aaron and i are watching these DVDs called the truth project, and they are pretty sweet.
jo usually comes in for the 2nd half of them and actually stays to watch the rest

oh yeah and
i have become one of those people who carry around a note book/planner type deal all the time and i am constantly whipping my book out to jot down notes, or dates, or lists...

rooms for our honeymoon!!

these are rooms at one of the hotels we plan on staying at in our road trip honey moon. they are pretty strange, but that's what really appeals to us any ways!! it's going to be sweet :D



option number 1 the cave man room !! the whole room is made of stone, and the showers and sinks are too!!


a view of the bathroom





option number two the old world room same stone type set up, but a classier version lol

forgiveness

God has been doing a work in my heart lately, even though i have felt distant from Him. my own doing of course.
little bits and pieces have been coming together to bring me to a foundational truth that i have let slip from my thoughts.

Forgiveness.
i have been angry and have had malice in my voice all too often towards people. i have been holding grudges and letting resentment and bitterness take over my thoughts. all of this is a result of forgetting the power of forgiveness. and i gave in all to easily because it is always easy to slip back in to old habits. they felt comfortable at first so they go unnoticed, but i quickly noticed the symptoms, the restrictions that come with the old ways. it's like when you are wearing sneakers all day long and you finally realize at some point during the day that you feet are hot and uncomfortable. all you want to do is stop right where you are and take them off, let your feet breath but you cant. in fact, you still choose to wear the shoes for another 3 hrs, and they are seemingly the longest 3 hours of your life. you dream about taking them off and how relived you will feel but you are punishing your self unnecessarily. when you get home instead of fixing the problem entirely you just take the shoes off, or only take care of the outer issues that are obvious to others, rather than going all the way and taking off the socks too; exposing your feet which would be not settling for the temporary smoothing of the surface dysfunction but going for the root.
7 months after england and i have already began to forget what God has shown me about His love for me and the world and His ultimate sacrifice. i started picking up on it a few weeks ago, and today in church pastor phil really laid it all out there for me. what was the baggage that i was carrying around that was causing me to not be able to forgive others? what did i still need to deal with?
because of this digression i have lost my vision of love for people and His vision of love for people. i want those eyes back the ones who see everyone through an umbrella of Christ's blood. to see people as His children and beloveds... just as i am.


God..Lord...Father
please help me to see as you do with love and compassion and grace;
help me to remember to forgive as i have been forgiven;
give me the knowledge to act as you would desire me to
i pray Lord that i would recommit my life to this mission of showing your love and grace to those who don't deserve it just as i am shown your love grace.
i love you Lord and i thank you for your grace and forgiveness.
in your awesome and holy name
Amen

so i'm taking off

no, i'm not going any where even though i thought bible college was in my future. not any more... nuff said, moving on.
i'm excited about how God will be using me here and i am open to the possibilities. College group is getting bigger and Over flow is going to be starting up very soon with tons to do there i will be busy.
although i'm not leaving Santee, i am leaving behind being so dependent on my parents and running straight into this crazy thing called being an adult. it's fun, scary freeing, intimidating, and long over due in my mind. i'm quitting my job at Color Me Mine and i'm looking for a full time grown up job.and i'm done with school for now; it will be nice to live a life that doesn't revolve around the semester system.
i'm growing up, and closer to God and in the process hopefully encouraging and influencing those around me.

YAY LIFE

so i was reading over all the blogs i posted, all the way back to the stuff from when i started the blog, and i just see how god has changed me and where i am in my life now. i'm in the same situation as i was last year filling out yet another application to bible college and yet my reaction to this is very different. i am still nervous and yet it is not consuming me. i still and anxious about my new room mates ( supposing i get in) yet i know that we will be the people god has appointed to care for each other for the next 4 months. the issuse of health insurance has come up too but i know htis will all work out.


the main difference is that i know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God is in control.
God is soo good, life is soo good.
yay!

ps i'm not on drugs i swear :D

Please Don't Leave Before I Do

Aaron and I were driving in the car and he says" Donna, I don't want you to die before me"
I thought about that and I don't want to die after him, I can't imagine how hard life will be after we have lived together so long. I think about Heather's grandma who is living on her own getting by day by day, or Tiffany's G-ma who needs the support of Tif to get through one moment.
The heart break will be something I doubt I could ever fully express in words, and even now thinking about it makes the breath get caught in my chest.
I know it is very selfish of me to think this way. If me leaving second spared Aaron that pain then i would rather him go to see Jesus and wait till we can both be before the Lord. I pray that it will be a very long time before any of us have to think about this.

Thoughts For Today

I was looking at pictures of us from England and the longer we were there the whiter we got... England sucks the color or colour right out of you.
That being said, I miss being there and the weather and the people and all sorts of different challenges. But I love that God is using me here and I am trying to keep my self open to that.

Pear said to me the other day that in the end God will do great things in your life, but His end goal is to have a great relationship with you.

So instead of trying to learn all there is to being a pastors wife way before my time (not really possible till i am one) or trying to prepare myself for my life in ways that I am not even sure if God will take me. I need to stop grasping at straws and simply learn to love God more and learn how much He loves me.
This time not a learning of the mind, but rather of the heart. Recognizing all the simple things that delight me are from Him like the way the sky looks as the sun goes down, or catching that moment when a leaf falls. Or seeing a cup on top of some one's car stay there the whole journey.

i had a dream last night and some random person came up to me and said " the verse you are looking for, the one that you need, is Hebrews 3:13" i've never read this verse in my life and i just remembered the dream a moment ago, so i looked it up it says



"But encourage one another day after day, so long as it is still called "Today", so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin"

The sin that is being reference here is the sin of unbelief in God. The passage also hits on the need for fellowship because in order to exhort one another or to be exhorted, you must be in relationships with other people. So if you are not in fellowship with other people, how easy then is it to stop believing? Not stop believing that God exists, but stop believing that His will for your life has any influence and weight in your ways.


Not sure yet why this was given/shown to me by God, but if you have any ideas throw them out there.