it's 90 degrees and humid. feels like a sauna out there!
it's a good thing i don't have to be outside much today. in fact, i'm packing up my life right now. time to move one more time... for my last semester of college! crazy..
so when i'm finished packing, it's time for a washington DC vacation, a week at home, and then coming back to the city to move my things back to moody.

as i look at my room, all packed up in boxes and bins again, i realize how much i just want to settle down. i want to have a home where i don't have to move every few months. i'm tired of packing up and moving around. i used to like it... but that time is long gone!

i've been applying for some "real" jobs, and it feels so strange. instead of just taking whatever part-time work i can find, i have to think about what is going to happen after i graduate. what kind of job can i keep on a full-time basis afterwards... what will give me experience in the future. it's a completely different kind of job search, and, to be honest, it's a little scary.

well, more packing needs to be done, and i don't have much time left. my family will be here in 2 hours to head east! i'm excited :) and not nearly ready...

the rest of the summer is only going to fly by, and i'm so excited for it!

i leave on july 30th for iron mountain for cassie's wedding.
then back to chicago for a week for day camp.
family vacation in DC for the week after that,
and THEN!
it's the last week of day camp!
that next weekend i move back to moody (jenkins... woohoo!)
and classes start that monday... my last semester :)

wow. and i still don't know where my life is headed. or what i'm going to do as of mid-december..
any suggestions? ha.

painfully colorful.

little did i know how real the lesson on perseverance would become this week. more real than last week, even.
funny how my instinct is to run back to my parents... then again, that's what i was taught throughout my childhood, to come running to tell my parents when anything at all was wrong. makes sense that i'm still doing the same thing.

i was ready to leave here this weekend and not turn back. and then realized that then i would always regret leaving. i would see pictures of those kids, their smiling faces, and feel as if i had abandoned them. i would allow myself to fail, and i couldn't live with myself after that. so here i stay..
four more weeks :)


in the meantime...
this afternoon i ran out the front door to make a stop at the store quick before dinner. it was raining and i was wearing flip flops, which made for a bad combination on old wooden steps. the second step and i had already wiped out and i slid down the rest of the stairs. ouch.

there were two older women across the street who saw the fall and watched to make sure i was okay, probably holding in their laughter the whole time. i'm sure it was a funny sight. even i laughed a little bit, as i lifted myself back up, only to wince in pain and take a breather for a minute on the bottom step.

this is the story behind my now painfully colorful backside. ha.

tomorrow is field trip day. we are going to a water park... where i will slide down things on my butt. a painful day, i'm sure it will be. ouch. :)

perseverance:
steady persistence in a course of action, a purpose, a state, etc., especially in spite of difficulties, obstacles, or discouragement.

i wonder if perseverance is a character trait or if it is a state of being. is there even a difference? if it's a "steady persistence" then it must become a part of who you are, a continual part of your person.

the last few years of my life have been ones of steady perseverance. so many times i've been ready to get in a plane, train, or car to just go home. i've been on the brink of quitting each thing when it gets hard. but then the wise words of my dad keep pushing me forward.

but then, i ask myself, where is home? where am i really supposed to be? and i learn, time and time again, that to go to green bay is not going home. yes, it's going to the place where i grew up, but my home is here. here in chicago where i live in a house and have a bedroom and sleep every night. a place where i have people over for dinner and for smoothies, for movies and game nights. the place where i live and i'm most comfortable. it's home.

these last four years have been ones of constant transitions. of change and moving every three to six months, new people around every corner, and incredible learning opportunities.

life changes so fast.
and it's only time for more and more changes.
more moving. more adjusting.
more... perseverance. because it's not going to get any easier.

six more weeks here and i'm moving again. man, the summer has flown by...

another summer. another incident.

it always seems that violence happens most during the summer. statistics say that it's true, and so does my experience.

last summer, a man was shot and killed a block away from where i lived in albany park. we heard the shots. we heard the sirens. we were walking down the street.

last summer, a man was shot twice in the butt right across the street from the park on the south side that i brought my CSM groups to volunteer during the day. we saw it happen. we saw the guys run.

so this summer, i'm living in logan square, just north of humboldt park. this neighborhood is supposedly far safer than the other two i was in last summer. but, well.. it's not.

a few nights ago, one of the guys downstairs, a friend of mine, was talking on the phone on the front steps at around midnight when a couple of guys walk out of the alley. one walks right up the steps toward matt and pulls a gun on him.

wow... i don't even know what i would do except panic. which is pretty much what matt did. he gave up his wallet and cell phone, while sara, another girl downstairs heard the commotion and came to the front window. the guy points the gun at her through the window and threatens her too.

they end up running off and getting caught several hours later on the other side of the city. but matt and sara? wow. frazzled, to say the least.

i can't even imagine what that would be like. or how i would ever be able to truly process it.

i already have flashbacks to my 2006 car accident, but to a gun being pointed at my face?? ack. i don't even know.

so i'm asking for prayers for matt and sara. they're having a tough time working through it, and still keeping their minds on their jobs with YouthWorks.

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on a much lighter note, we finally got our first paychecks. God provides, sometimes after he teaches us a valuable lesson about giving up control. hm...

summer.

my new home is in logan square. it's the second floor of a beautiful house. it has huge front windows, two bedrooms, beautiful hardwood floors, fully furnished, and it's just... perfect.

my summer job is at salem christian school. i'll be counseling for their summer day camp program. it's a 9-4 job, which is completely different from any other summer job i've had before. but i like it! we are one day away from finishing the staff training, and then camp starts on monday! it's exciting.

this morning we had about a half an hour just to spend in silent prayer, and it was beautiful.

as much as i know that Jesus is the rock and i'm standing on Him, i've been living as if i'm standing on quicksand. in the last 4-5 years, so much bitterness has come over me. i've been severely disappointed by people who were role models in my faith. and it's because i had raised up those people to a position they should never have been in, and i expected them to be super-human. so i began to associate those things, those people, that bitterness with God, when it was really only the sinful people who let me down, not God.

so i see God and think "hm.. i don't really know what i think. i know the bible says you're good and faithful and perfect and redeeming, but i don't see it. so i'm confused and i just don't know what to think anymore." and i live like i'm in quicksand.

man, i need to live in confidence. i'm standing on a rock. a huge, hard, immovable rock! why don't i live like that? i don't need to frantically scramble to keep my head above the sand, because i'm not even in sand to begin with.


so this is my encouragement...
live in the redemption that God has given you. stand on His promises, because they're true. don't let yourself doubt to the point that you doubt even the goodness of God. he is good all the time, whether we believe it or not.




that's all for now.
i'll keep you posted on the summer :)

healing.

a post from a couple of weeks ago that i left in edit mode without publishing...
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do you believe that God still heals people today?
do you actually pray for people to be healed?

i find myself praying that God would "guide the doctor's hands and give him wisdom." Or, "Lord, let the medicine work so that she can be well again."

and yet i never actually pray for God to heal them. i may say, "Lord, in know you are able, and if you are willing, would you make this person well again?"

but i don't entirely believe that God will heal them. i know that it's not dependent on my faith, but at the same time, i should know and understand that the power of God is bigger than any sickness.