yes, i'm wearing my gay apparel because it's cold outside

it's like minus a bazillion outside.
my car doesn't work.
it's a twenty minute walk to work.

what's the deal with manitoba?

i know, i know...tis the season to be jolly...blah blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah.

foetoeshewt outtakes

some more fun from our yfc foetoeshewt (by popular demand):

thanks to josiah speers for all the hard work taking pictures and putting up with us:)

my rollercoaster of pain, horses, and photoshoots

my recent life has now been a rollercoaster. it used to be a train...a train of constant busyness and inconsistent help in my ministry. but i finished this season with a bang...a wonderful fundraising banquet with lots of moral support and encouragement. plus, after this my two other staff were finally around consistently. sweetums.

but...the tide began to turn, as more recently massive issues came knocking on my door; such as severe alcoholism, suicide attempts, and throat slashings.

no overstatement.

no joke.

i've felt a bit of apathy towards seeking God creeping in, but these kinds of things are really addressing the apathy. if you could pray for me in these situations, that'd be swell. oh, and in all of this my support network of volunteers has dropped like flies...mostly from exams and the flu. this is all in the last week.

and then again...on the other side of things, i just got back from four days of taking care of my friend's place out in the country. it was beautiful and solitary, only me and many animals. the dogs are skeptical of new blood...but they came around and we had a blast. and the horses...just amazing. especially on a crisp winter morning with horfrost all around.

and...today we had a yfc amatuer photo shoot, and though eric was sick we still had a hoot! what a strange rollercoaster.

yes...we do need prayer :)

my body's too bootylicious for ya babe

i was thinking recently about how our bodies ought to be temples of the holy spirit. an actual dwelling place of God's very spirit! this is an actual "kingdom come" moment, or more so element of our faith, you know...how we pray thy kingdom come here on earth as it is in heaven?

this ol' bible also says these kingdom come moments are like treasure. we ought to give all, and drop all, to pursue them. but the world tries to dilute the kingdom of heaven on earth, or even destroy it all together so these treasures will not be obtained. treasure is also bounty, or even booty. so i say to the world...MY BODY'S TOO BOOTYLICIOUS FOR YA, BABE!

there, i did it.

survivor (what)

you know that awesome girl power song, by destiny's child?
i'm a survivor (what) i'm not gonna give up (what) i'm not gonna stop (what) i'm gonna work harder!!!
yeah...that's my song right now. i just survived an insane season in the life of being a local missionary of sorts. we completed our second fundraiser in the span of less than five days, on top of my other staff dudes being away a lot this month, and tonnes of teenagers on our plate (does that sound weird to you, too?).

so...thanks to those of you who've prayed for me. seriously, thanks. not that i'm on the easy road now, but i've got a few things under my belt, and a lot of grace from my homedawg upstairz. feels like i can breathe, and keep on survivin' (what).

walking in the winter with no pants

i wouldn't say my mind is exceptionally bright.
i also wouldn't say it's exceptionally dim.
but man, is it ever susceptible to overload. these days are bitterly busy for me, and my whole life i've never relied on decent organizational skills, just pure, unadulterated personal memory storage. it's brought me this far in life, however far that is, but i have surpassed other contemporaries who rely on other organizational techniques. now, though, life has caught up with my memory and random things i should remember begin to ooze out of my mind. it's been little stuff, forgetting details, what time it is at present, taking out the laundry, eating supper, and the sort. i'm just waiting until i start walking outside without my pants.

i have to say i haven't been the most diligent in seeking God on the matter. you know, the one who restores the heart, soul, and mind? that would probably be a good source of memory-leakage prevention. i think in God's good wisdom, he'd help me remember to keep my pants on. in all seriousness, i do sense deception creeping in, for as the busyness sets in, it becomes completely logical to avoid extra work, such as prayer gatherings, bible reading, and the sort. probably the very memory-leakage prevention i need.

teaching my elementary school religion class the other day, i was talking about the need for prayer in the storms of life (we pretended we were pirates on a ship, talking about paul's crazy ship storm story in acts...super fun). but simple pirate lessons for kids soon become huge lessons for stubborn adults like me (maybe because i'm a pirate kid at heart). but i can't help but think that as the storm of insanity whirls around me, i must be the one to rely on prayer...rely on my Father in heaven who will meet me where i'm at. probably restore my mind as well (and keep my pants on). no need to worry.

in defiance of winter

winter sucks.

i'm sorry, but i do not share the sentiment of winter excitement that so many seem to have. it's all over facebook. the only complaint i've heard is that there is not enough snow yet. i tried to take a positive stance. i even thanked God for the beauty of the dusk, as the snow seems to glow in contrast to the darkening sky. but that lasts 15 mintues, and compared to the 15 hours of darkness, it doesn't stand a chance.

last night i couldn't bring myself to wear my huge winter parka, unwilling to admit winter has come. i was humbled shortly after freezing my ass off, and now i wear the freaking parka...with another 6 months to go of this. the other day i had a car full of teenagers, ready to take them back to school as their class was about to start. sure enough the north wind froze my old grandpa car; it wouldn't start, and so they chose to run to school rather than accepting my piggy back offer. they were inevitably late for class.

but don't get me wrong, i'm not dissing anyone who remains positive about winter. i say good on ya! i just can't muster up any positivity on the matter. i'm also not stuck in pessimism, i just love the heat. the summer of 2007 we had a crazy heat spell, and i just ate it up. i was just in fiji for crying out loud, and i recall more situations of being too cold than too hot. maybe i'm just not made for manitoba.

i guess the only light at the end of the tunnel is another one of those character building things. i know that the joy of the Lord will come upon me if i look to him rather than my situation...it's happened so many times before, and it's real and it's true. i was just telling my friend matt braun (for some reason me and my brothers have to call him matt braun...and never just matt) that my life in the last five years has been a constant seach for this joy in the midst of life not going my way. constant. he could appreciate that.

but there's joy.

real joy.

if i just receive it.

so...here comes another season (both literally and figuratively) of joy seeking and character building. hooray!?

oh summer, when whilst thou come again?

ode to erg

the last night of eric's singularity.

we spent the night romping the unsuspecting streets of osborne village...trying to warn the population of the impending doom of marriage. i mean, from our angle we're losing certain rights and priviledges to good times with a good friend...so we had to let people know of this monstrosity. eric had to hand out about 50 sheets of paper personally to strangers before he was allowed to eat (a smorgisborg of amazing mexican food...which we all regretted the next day standing up on stage in the ceremony with awkward bowel movements).

one lady was super pumped about the message we had eric share with everyone.

a laudromat of lonely souls proved to be a great location to pass a few papers of propaganda to. the best situation (no pic) was when we made eric go into a posh restaurant and found a table with about ten people in their twenties, and only one was a dude. eric interrupted their boisterous conversation to deliver his last piece of paper to the one dude: "please refrain from getting married." gold, pure gold.

premarital stogies: celebrating an amazing fifty-paper feat, wonderful mexican food, oh, and eric's ensuing marital union!


the dudesmen (minus luke)


em's famous banana slush to cap off the night.

eric; looking good and ready for marriage. not awkward or nervous or anything. not eric.

so...as much as a bunch of dudes getting together the night before a friend gets hitched can be humorous (many jokes about loss of freedom and such), we were all still super pumped for him in all honesty. besides, melodie takes care of him much better than we did. Lord knows i tried. so...we raised our banana slush glasses in honor of our awesome friend getting married to an amazing girl.


cheers.

the upper room and the chains of culture

there's this little room upstairs here in niverville, where i gather with a small handful of students each week, to pray for our little town and school. we meet before school, so it's pretty hardcore for these kids to be coming...and yet they come. warm beds beckon them, complacent crowds discourage them, religion does not demand this of them, but still a few do come.

we gathered today, and i'm recalling right now that i had shared that in our busyness - that's when we need God the most! so instead of shelving our relationship with him, we seek him when we "should" be doing other things...and see what happens when we trust him. so there's my sermon, and i have to laugh as this was said early this morning, and only now, midnight, i think about it again...and realize i've been going non-stop since then and pretty much lived out the antithesis of my sermon. eat my words.

but there's always redemption, for me, and for our little niverville. sometimes i think this ol' town is goin' down. it feels like there's a vast sea of grey, where people fence sit in spiritual apathy, but recently i've heard some people claim blatant non-christian stances. this is rare for niverville. call me morbid, but i'm actually kind of excited about this, for it seems like something is awakening. there's also a group of us young adults going through a dvd series called truth project, which is a strong anti-fence-sitting tool. i guess i'm not afraid of a challenge to the truth i believe in...for the truth will prevail. it's time we draw lines. it's time we see the chains of our culture and let the gospel set the captives free.

i think these kids in the upper room are helping to draw lines. booya.

LIFE [before and] AFTER FIJI: the swing of insanity

for those of you who don't know, i spent this last summer outside of routine; the basic routine involved with living in the same town with the same job for the last four years. oddly enough, i never quit my job, or moved away.

but it feels like i broke this routine, for this spring my good friend, and only other coworker for the last four years, moved away. sad times. but we hired two other good friends of mine. booya. then i took off to try and walk home from saskatoon with my brother. (whole other story). three weeks later i was home...helping the drop-in centre, where i've been working all this time, a whole new ball game with different staff.

a little later i left for fiji (another "whole other story"). three weeks later and i'm back. with both these excursions, saskatchewan and fiji, it's been so laid back, with a lot of time to think and listen and meditate. like a mental detox. now i'm back into the swing of insanity, so much good, hard and intense things. but these intensities drive me close towards God, which, i guess, only intensify the situation even more, because i'm learning (slowly) that God DOES actually answer prayer, especially when we're patient...and desperate, and when light goes into a dark place...there is an intense reaction!!!

i learned so much from the hearts of fijian believers, something so real that we're missing out on in our busyness...and in our wealth. i now look at our culture and see many many camels trying to fit through the eye of the needle...reading christian literature to navigate themselves. it's rather silly.

and....now my good man (mcmahon) eric is getting married. good good. and more busyness:) so, here's to a whole bunch of jumbled thought on my swing of insanity.

my walk through saskatchewan (check out "saskatales" in my posted notes on facebook for the full story)

my adventures in fiji (check out "the Fiji Experience" in my photo albums on facebook for the whole story).

stupid coffee

so, i'll give this old blog a try once again.

the only thought i had was on my stupidity. like for instance, this last saturday i had the thought of making some coffee (brought back from fiji) on sunday morning before church. i hadn't tried it yet, so i was intrigued. well i'm not sure what it was, but i just kept thinking about this stupid cup of coffee, and had a poor sleep over it. i had a hard time getting up, and being a little rushed i quickly went to make this stupid coffee.

so i ground up the beans, but managed to spill the grinds everywhere. then i realized i left my coffee maker at work, but i had already made the grind, so i boiled water and held the filter with the grinds over my mug. it was going well until right at the end the filter slipped out, and the grinds went splashing into the fresh coffee. i had come so far, so i filtered the coffee once again in order to at least try some grindy coffee.

as the cup was finally done, i reached for the most frustrating coffee ever, and my hand knocked over the whole mug, spilling it all over the kitchen. it even got into the cupboards. after 15 minutes of cleaning, i finally left for church, very very late. and no coffee. stupid coffee.