Change

What do you do when... you just don't know? You don't know where you're going to live once your lease is up. You're not even sure that you will stay in the same zip code, let alone the same state! You might be looking to enroll in school, but you have no idea where to begin looking. You might be totally jobless, wondering what your next step is. Whatever the situation, it boils down to a lack of direction.

You just don't know.

Bummer!

Because really, who likes to be without direction? Certainly not moi! I need a Plan. With a capital "P" thank you very much! I need to know things in order to be comfortable with my future!


Putting the breaks on right here!


First of all, do we ever know what the future holds? All you people with the five and ten year plans out there (not that there's anything wrong with that): are you certain that you can attain those goals simply by your own doing? (I really hope your answer is no by the way!) If you said "yes" to that question, then one can only assume that you are anticipating that NOTHING will be getting in between you and your final destination. One could only assume that you don't expect to meet the man or woman of your dreams and marry (supposing that you're single of course), or that you don't plan on an *unexpected* pregnancy, or you don't expect to walk through an intersection two years from now, and God forbid, come face to face with a Mack truck. You don't know what's going to happen to you!!! I am going to also assume then, by the way, just because this is my blog and I can, that you are also not, and I repeat NOT letting God have control of your life. Reminds me of a song...

"JESUS take the wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeel!"

So as I was saying, I need a Plan with a capital "P". But as I think I pointed out, plans are only good so long as you allow plenty of wiggle room for unexpected change. But what if we don't plan on something that could happen to us, rather we plan on something that happens by God's hand?

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;"

Proverbs 3:5. Love that verse. But there's a bit more:

"in all your ways acknowledge him,
and he will make your paths straight."

Proverbs 3:6. Okay so let me get this straight. I have to:

a. Trust in the Lord
b. Lean not on my own understanding (that's a REALLY tough one by the way!)
c. ACKNOWLEDGE HIM in all my ways (yeesh! Can I really do that?!)

That sounds like a lot, but that's... very little if you look at the list. That's only three things that I need to work on in this area in order to have a straight path, a prosperous life, a right relationship with Him.

I want those things, don't you?

I'm certainly not saying that it's easy! But really, what's the point of worry anyway? Why worry about this future of ours that we have no control over in the first place? Should we make plans? Well of course! But all the while being prayerful and seeking God's will for each and every step of your life. That is important. To acknowledge Him, to seek Him in all your ways, in order to keep a straight path (to be in line with God's will for your life). You can't go wrong!

So anyway: worry. Pointless! Really, it is. I know, because I'm the Queen. ("All hail, Queen of Worry!) Worry is pointless, and it's a sin! If you're worrying, it means that you, in fact, are not leaving your problems in God's hands to handle, you're trying to figure it out on your own, and by that, you are basically telling God he is INCAPABLE of handling your puny problem. (Puny in the sense of how big and massive HE is, and how tiny YOU are.)

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 4:6-7).

So are you sensing a trend here? Because I am! This is not only plainly acknowledging the actual condition of anxiety, but it's also telling us that we have no business worrying about anything! We're in the business of prayer and petition, people! If we build our "business", we will see the fruits of our "labor": guarded hearts, guarded minds, the *ahem!* Peace of God...? I sure as heck want the Peace of God in my life, because then I will be trusting in Him, knowing that He will make my path straight (He will provide that glorious future that we all so hopefully refer back to in Jeremiah 29:11), and I will be resting in Him peacefully, not worrying, because I'll know that my future is solid through Christ Jesus who strengthens me.

Now I know one person in particular who is going to stomp her foot while reading this, and then later, tell me that she already knew all of this stuff, but still needed to hear it. To her, I say this:

ME TOO!!!

Which is why I wrote it! I don't think there is a single one of us Christians that doesn't in thier heart of hearts know this stuff. But that is why we are to be in the Word every day. That's why we are to be in prayer every day. It's because we always need to be reminded. And God likes to be reminded too: only because He, in turn, is reminding you through prayer: He does that a lot. He requires us to do things: expects us to do certain things that we may deem to be "unfair" or "pointless", but He's saying, "It's all for your benefit, my children. It's not for Me: it's for You."

Anyway, while my changes have been wonderful, exciting, new, fresh, and blessed: I have a couple of big life decisions to make in the upcoming months that I am *stressing* and *worrying* about. So believe me when I say, that this post was as much for me as it was for you who are reading it.

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 4:6-7).

So keep that with you today. Trust in our Lord. He will keep your path straight.

What Are You Praying For?

I just want to thank you all again for all your love, support and prayers during this time of great change in my life. God is doing an awesome work in me right now, and I know that your prayers are helping to see me through to each and every victory.

So tell me friends: what is it that I can pray for you about? I have just been so blessed by your prayers, and I'd like to return the blessing. This is your time: any and all prayer requests will be logged into my prayer journal and become a daily petition of mine on your behalf.

No request is too great - or too small. So please: tell me what your needs are. I'd love nothing more than to intercede for you!

I hope you all are having a great week!

Donations

A huge thank you to those of you who expressed an interest in donating to my missions trip to Jamaica. I believe that I've properly set up a paypal account (per one reader's request), in order to make the process easier.

I think all you need to do is click on the link above, and it will guide you in your donation process. If you have any troubles, please email me so that I know my system needs to be tweaked. When I get a little time later today, I'm going to move this over to the sidebar of my blog: but I just wanted it here for now so you could see that the option was there if you were interested.

A big thank you to everyone for the supportive and encouraging words and prayers: I appreciate it like you'll never know!

God bless you all and have a wonderful day friends!

***ATTENTION!!!***

For those of you who may have an *AHEM!* unspecified THING against Paypal, and yet are still interested in donating to my trip, please email me at anie4him28@yahoo.com. I'll make sure to send you my church's address so you can donate directly (and it's tax deductible!).

I'm Going to Serve In Jamaica!

God did it again! Is there no limit to what He can do?!

(Okay, don't answer that! lol)

I've been praying for over a year now about missions. I've wanted to get moving on some short term trips to get my feet wet in the field: to see if it's really for me. So when missions month came around last year at our church, I became extremely inspired and decided that by that time this year, I'd be ready to go. I particularly wanted to go to Jamaica: I thought it would be an easier trip, therefore a great way to get started in the mission field.

Well here I am, one year later, and missions month is in full effect all around me. Up until today, I had been getting extremely discouraged because I was sure I'd have to wait until next year to be able to go: seeing that when I did have a job, I didn't have any vacation time coming up, and now, I just recently lost a job and didn't feel that it would work out.

So I got to talking to a couple of the pastors this morning in front of the missions booth that was set up in the foyer, telling them that I was interested in going on a trip at some point down the road. Well! Wouldn't you know it?! There's one spot left on the trip to Jamaica in... a few weeks-ish! Well, the rational, logical side of me wanted to kick in to high gear, and so of course the wheels started spinning right away: "You just lost your job! You don't have the money! You can't afford the time off! You don't have any time to raise money!"

But as all of these things were racing through my head, I started to get the Holy Ghost shivers, and I just knew right then and there that I HAD to go. However, just to be safe, I stated loud and clear that I would pray about it and get back to them in the morning: they told me that they're so glad that I'm on board and they'll email me the paperwork to get me started.

I only said I'd pray about it!!

Apparently they didn't buy it.

So, by night service tonight, I made the commitment, and just finished printing out all my paperwork.

I even recieved my first love offering in the amount of 100 dollars already! There is another person from my church that has already pledged an offering as well: but I'm not sure how much at this point.

So, as it stands, I have 1,000 dollars to go yet.

Yeesh!

But I'm trusting that God will provide a way for me financially: because I know in my heart that this is where He wants me right now. So I'm just "going where He wants me to go, and doing what He wants me to do"! It's kind of scary, but surprisingly peaceful at the same time. But as my pastor who's also going said, "But it's a good scary! It keeps you on your toes and excited about what you're doing!" I love that God can do that!

So once again, God showed His face in a mighty way in my life: He's just so amazing, isn't He?

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I have one request to you, my wonderful blogger friends: please keep me in your prayers about this. Please pray that He'll provide for me, calm any fears that I may have, and use me in mighty ways once I'm there. And while in prayer, if you feel that God is leading you to make a love offering yourself to help fund my trip, I would be incredibly blessed by it! And if you in fact, feel lead to make an offering, you can email me and I'll make sure to get you all the necessary information.

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Have a blessed week everyone!

And You Were There... And You! You Were There Too!

I had a dream last night: I don't remember what, where, how, or... what, but what I do know, is that I had a dream, and a few of you were in it. Katie of Kpinion, Eddo of Posted Note, Steve of Following God's Will, and Ben of Married In Minnesoooooota were all there. There very well may have been more of you there, but I just don't remember. All I know, is that I woke up remembering that these four in particular were in my dream. Again, don't ask me what, why, or how: I don't have a plot for you. We weren't re-enacting scenes from "The Matrix", and we weren't discovering mystical lands like the kids in "The Chronicles of Narnia". I'm really not sure of the story line: all I know is, they were all there.

Is this a shameless plug for all of my wonderful blogger friends? Not really: although it works quite well for that purpose! No, this is me just trying to remember what the heck my dream was about!

So I have an idea. In an effort to spark my memory, how about you (yes YOU. Even the ones who lurk around here but never EVER comment!) come up with a story line which includes me, Eddo, Katie, Ben, and Steve, complete with a plot, conflict, etc..., and leave it in the comments section of this post. I'm hoping that if I get enough stories, something will spark a memory in my head of what the dream was really about; in which case, I'll share it with you. Otherwise, if I can't remember, then we'll vote on the best story, and it will be featured on Monday's post.

The people who were in my dream are definitely allow to play too: so be creative, and comment away, people! I look forward to reading all the fun stories that you come up with when I get home!

Part 2

If you need a recap, on what has happened so far, click here.

So anyway, as I was saying....

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Roughly one hour after I made that call to my friend J., I was driving home from the temp agency that I applied to directly after I, um... lost my job. I thought I should talk to God a bit to tell Him how I'm feeling about this situation. I began to share with Him that I trusted Him in this: that even though I was officially in a major financial bind, that I was trusting Him to provide for me. I told Him that I knew of His promises of a hope and a future for my life, and that I was going to stand on that promise and know that I was going to be okay.


As I prayed that prayer, I recieved a phone call back from J.


J.: "Hey Stephanie! Just thought you might like to know that due to personal circumstances, I need to give away my cleaning jobs. I'm guessing you'll take them?"

Me: "Umm... YEAH!!!"

The rest was details which I don't need to fill you in on. All you need to know is that God provided. Oh but we're just barely touching the tip of the iceberg here.

While I was on the phone with J., my mom beeped in to tell me that her friend and neighbor J. who owns her own cleaning business, was wondering if I'd like to work for her. I could start as early as the very next day.

Me: "Umm... YEAH!!!"

Mom: "Well, here's her number, give her a call tonight and the two of you can iron out the details. I thought you should know that I did a little haggling on your behalf, and she has agreed to pay you the same wage that you were making at your old job."


Me: "Are you kidding me?!? To clean houses?!"


Mom: "You're welcome."


Whatever!!


So now only an hour after I got... umm... let go, I have two new jobs.


Uh, God? You're cool. In case I haven't told you. You are VERY cool.


So I got in touch with Mom's friend J. that night, and we agreed that I would start the very next morning. I called my mom to let her know that I'd be in the neighborhood in the morning, and asked if she'd like it if I stopped by before work for coffee. She was delighted.

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The next day, I was at my mom's by 8:30 which gave us about a half an hour for coffee before I had to head to J's for work. She and my step-dad and I chatted a bit about how absolutely random this all had been, and how cool it was that everything was falling into place.

I made it very clear to the both of them that I had not a shadow of a doubt in my mind that this was totally and completely God, and even though I should probably be sad for myself, I couldn't and didn't want to be: I was too busy praising God!

My mom understood, but my step-dad... well... he humored me: and that was fine. As long as he understood where I was coming from. As long as I got God's point across: that's all I cared about.

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I got back around 3:30, and found my mom in her office playing computer games. I sat down to chat with her again for a bit before I headed home, which is when she dropped the bomb on me.


"Your step-dad and I want to help you out with school. So just... pick where you want to go, audition, do whatever it is that you need to do to get into your program, and then let us know how much it is. We'll do what we can."


*Silence*


Actually, I think crickets started chirping all around us at this point.


And this is what I looked like:
















Well, but a 15 year older version of course.


So anyway: I now have two new jobs (and I'm going to be starting my own little cleaning company very soon), which will allow me to have most of my days free to finish school, AND my parents are going to help me pay my tuition so I'm not in debt up to my eyeballs for the rest of my life!

Can you BELIEVE it?!

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You know, If there was even a smidget of doubt in my mind of what God was capable of doing in my life; or in ANYONE'S life, it was completely wiped out after what I've just recently experienced. God proved that He is capable, and He does work all things for the good of those who love Him:

"28And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers" (Romans 8:28-29). (Thanks Luke!)

"...who have been called according to his purpose". I now know, without a shadow of a doubt, that God has me right where He wants me. He has a purpose for my life: and while there may be a number of possibilities in my future in terms of schools, programs, careers, etc., He showed me that everything can change in the blink of an eye solely by His hand. So I know that I'm taken care of: I'm loved, and I'm watched over. But more importantly, so long as I let Him have the wheel...


I'm headed somewhere totally amazing.

It All Started When...

I recieved a mysterious phone call at work early Tuesday afternoon. The person on the other line did not have good news for me: and they weren't very nice about it either.

They told me that I was about to lose my job.


And then they hung up.


I sat for a moment in complete bewilderment, unsure as to how I should process this information. After all, it's not everyday you are forewarned of something like this. Was this person serious? Or was someone just playing a horribly mean practical joke? I was hoping for the latter, but didn't quite feel I would be so lucky.

I marched into my supervisor's office to share with her the disturbing news that I just recieved, and I could almost see the blood drain from her face.

"I... uhmmm... I'm going to call the owner. That's ummmm... really... uhhh.... really wierd."


Yeah. Real wierd.


I knew right then and there that something fishy was going on, especially when I found out that the boss man was coming in right away. He's never there during the day.

I should have started packing my stuff right then and there. But in a desperate attempt at salvaging my job (and my dignity), I kept on trucking. I worked until the very last second. Well, suffice it to say, that didn't help me very much, because at 3pm I was packing a plastic bag of what little of my personal items that I actually kept at my office.

Yes friends: I lost my job.

I wasn't expecting it - AT ALL. Just two weeks ago, the owner and I discussed my raise. He said there were a couple of things that needed some tweaking but that overall, I was exactly where I should be in terms of my progress: and that we could revisit the raise in a month - or in two weeks if things were going well. Even at that point, the "things" that needed tweaking were vague. I did my best from that point on to make sense of it and "correct" what I thought might be the problem.

But apparently the owner had other plans. From that point on, he had been looking for someone to replace me.

In the end, he gave me not one good reason as to why he was letting me go other than, "you weren't quite meshing with the manufacturing end of things".

Whatever that means.

He said that I ran a really tight ship in the administrative side of things, but that I wasn't quite "getting" manufacturing.

Hmmm.

Does this add up for any of you?

Yeah, me neither.

So, I took my plastic bag filled with all my things, and gracefully began "The Walk of Shame" out the door.

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I got into my car, quickly started the engine, and it took everything in me to keep from peeling out of the parking lot at four hundred miles per hour.

I grabbed my phone, and dialed the only person in the world I would have trusted to handle me in my delicate state of mind at that very moment.

My wonderful friend Katie.

"Hey girl, is everything okay?"

As you can imagine, I turned into a blubbering mess within 2.5 seconds. I told her what had just happened, and as I suspected, she did a marvelous job at calming my fears. She reminded me of God's plan for my life. She reminded me that no matter how awful I may feel the situation is, or how grim the potential outcome, GOD is the one in control here. HE has a plan for my life.

"Oh my goodness Katie you are totally right!"

And that's when it hit me: I had been praying for a new job situation that would be flexible around my school schedule come fall of this year. The program that I will be enrolling in is not a night/weekend type of program. I need my days: and a fourty hour-a-week day job just wouldn't cut it. So I had been hoping to possibly be cleaning houses and working at Starbucks by fall so as to have the majority of my daytime free to work on my bachelors degree.

Okay God, aren't You a little early here? It's only FEBRUARY!

"GOD is in control. HE has a plan for my life".

After I got off the phone with Katie, I called my friend J. who cleans houses part-time to supplement her income as a massage therapist. I got her voicemail:

"J.... it's Stephanie. I need a favor."

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...TO BE CONTINUED.

I'm off to visit a friend of mine this weekend from college who's now living in Minnesota. It's her birthday and we are going to have lots of birthday fun! Road trip baby!

In the meantime, you all have a WONDERFUL weekend, and if I don't get to blog with you before then... see you Monday!

Oh Stephanie, Where Art Thou?

I've been away for a few days, friends. Well, only for a couple of days actually, but it feels like I've been gone for awhile: I'm out of the loop! To be completely honest, this is going to be a very common occurence from this point on.

Reason being: life is changing. Actually, all within one hour of my life, a very BIG part of my life changed, and then within one DAY, it seems that everything changed. Don't worry: they were all great changes, just cloaked in one bad thing. But that bad thing was the catalyst for SO many God-ordained events to unfold before my eyes.

I want to get into detail, I really do; but not tonight because I have to study. I just really wanted to lay this all out before you in the meantime: call it a plea for comments, call it a sad attempt at suspense... call it what you'd like. But I promise you: once I'm settled in and comfortable with all that is going on around me, I'll clue you in. For now though, please stop in, say hi, tell me what's going on in your world. I will certainly miss chatting with you all throughout the workday, but please don't let that stop you from stopping in occasionally to see what's new and say "hello".

Yes, this is my desperate plea for comments and such so I have lots of fun things to read when I get home at night.

I hope you all are having a wonderful week, and I'll talk to you soon!