Who I am

"'For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed,
but my steadfast love shall not depart from you,
and my covenant of peace shall not be removed,'
says the Lord, who has compassion on you."
-Isaiah 54: 10 [ESV]


"I have loved you with an everlasting love,
with unfailing love I have drawn you to myself"
-Jeremiah 31:3 [NLT]




"Nevertheless, I am continually with you:
you hold my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel,
and afterward you will receive me to glory.
Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
For behold, those who are far from you shall perish;
you put an end to everyone who is unfaithful to you.
But for me it is good to be near God;
I have made the Lord God my refuge,
that I may tell of all your works."
-Psalm 73: 23-28 [ESV]


My Strength in Life is I am Yours

"God is great, God is good & we thank Him for this food"

For one of my classes I have to volunteer 30 hours at somewhere other than a school where I am working with youth. I am volunteering at a Christian Daycare called Metro Kids. It is a block away from the metrodome. I think I shared a little about this already, but seriously I love it!!! I just love being with these pre-schoolers. No it's not easy, but It's so fun to encourage them and to just have fun with them. To make crafts with them, learn about the planets and hear them pray. We eat breakfast together at the beginning of the morning and sing "God is great, God is good & we thank Him for this food, we gotta thank Him in the morning, noon and night, our God our God is outa sight amen 'chi chi chi chi chi chi' amen 'chi chi chi chi chi chi' amen" aahhh It is so fun! And then today we got to go outside with them at the play ground and I just got to push them in their swings and watch the other ones run around and be freeeeeee! It was great! I said to one of the girls "Are you having fun?!" and she was just laughing and looked back at me with a smile and said "yes!" Maybe this isn't as exciting for some of you, but most of the these kids don't come from the greatest families whether it is socio economically or because they live in a single parent home. To see them have fun, feel nurtured and get the attention that they need is just my joy. Children bring me joy! ahhh it's good.

So go be with children - they are wonderful!

-Jamie

Walking This Road

So I have a few thoughts I want to share:
This year, that is almost coming to an end [what?!], has felt like much more than a year. It has felt like a life time. Good Lord there's been just this constant shifting of my heart - and sometimes I feel like I'm not healing at all. But I look back at all of what has happened this year and where I am today and I know Jesus has really intervened and done lots of healing and is continuing this healing process.

Some things that I feel blessed by this year:
1.God
2.My boyfriend =)
3.The wonderful women God has placed in my life to mentor me [Becky,Hannah,Lisa,Amanda,Kathryn,Brittany]
4.Knuha RA staff
5.Green hall <3
6.The 2 placements at schools I have got to do [both being hmong...which was randomly chosen for me...]
7. The 30 hours of volunteering i get to do at a Christian Daycare that is right by the metrodome...I get to hang out with pre-schoolers who come from low-income homes and single parent homes!!! AND I get to hug them =) [they told me I could!!].
8.New friends [my commuter friends! and having lunch bunch on wednesdays in the library =)] and growing closer with current ones
9. being able to dance with the girls in my hall for Knuha Day and express my heart.
10. being able to be a part of another dance for chapel in April and getting to learn it from an awesome woman that was a part of the ballet academy for 2 years. <-- in all of that having Dancing redeemed for me, so that it it's not about performing but worshiping..WOW.
11. My amazing education teachers...I just love Mrs. Leclaire and Dr.Banks <--they have taught me SO much about teaching, about people and about passion.
12. Being broken and being given more of a hunger for God's word -- I asked for it and He is giving it to me!!! woohoo
13. Understanding God's word more, even when I'm not reading it.
14. The sunshine and the view from my window in my room
15. My roommate... and growing closer with her.
16. The closeness I have gained with Clark...WOW...and the healing that that relationship is bringing and has brought.

God is REALLY blessing me. He is good, I need to remember that. I need to remember that He IS taking care of my needs. Every single one of them.

Well, it is off to a group project for me.
I hope that as you read this you can be blessed!
-Jamie

We have a big world

This weekend I decided to go home for a few different reasons. The two weeks prior to coming home I was extremely busy. Everything that I could have on plate was put there -- I mean EVERYTHING. Going from class, to hall event, to group project, to a hall retreat, to duty for RAing, to another hall event to another class and to another group project and so on. To top all of that off we had Knuha Day last Thursday night and on the same night I decided that I am not going to be an RA next year. On that Friday I went home with a really good friend of mine. We took my boyfriends car and I drove home! For those of you that know me, you know that driving has been some what of a challenge for me. So this was a big accomplishment =). Throughout the weekend I got to spend a lot of time with my friend and It just encouraged me so much. Seeing how she has grown and how God is just molding her and changing her and giving her more hunger for Him inspires me. During this time at home I also gave blood for a part of my doctors appointment. Also once again this is a big thing for me because I am afraid of pain and especially pain in the form of a needle being stuck into my arm. Well it was fine AND i did it all by myself - no one went with me! I am proud! I guess there is just so much that I have going on in my life and so much I could write about.

The thing that inspired me to blog I think is a combination of my human relations class, diverse learners class, placements, future volunteer hours and hearing from other people's hearts. From all of these experiences I am seeing that this world is so much bigger than my little life. There are people hurting and I don't have the answers or ways to relate with them. As much as I want to say that I know what to say to those that have went through things I haven't - I just don't right now. I think I feel this realization that we have a big world. There is so much going on and as busy as I am I know that everything I am learning about is teaching me about the diversity of our big world. If you asked me 10 years ago that I'd be where I'm at I wouldn't think so. But I'm just really seeing that right now - that I am small, that I don't have the answers and that there are people that are hurting.

[this isn't to depress anyone, I think it's just to see the obviousness of our world and how there is greater purpose in our lives]

Today my Christian Theology professor quoted a verse in Isaiah 43:7 that talks about how we are created for God's glory and therefore we have purpose. What's running through my mind right now is what does that look like to live for God's glory? And it also gives me a lot of hope - that we have purpose, that we were not mistakes but purposefully created.

Yeah - those are my thoughts.

Healing Begins

So last night was Knuha day - for those of you who don't know what it is i don't feel like explaining it right now but basically in part of it each hall makes up a dance and performs it...this has been a crazy time in my hall because we have been so busy working on the dance and just with life!

BUT we won!! woohoo no but really i am so proud of my hall..i love those girls. I'm glad its over because i am tired. But i just love dancing..i can express my heart in a way that is inexpressible otherwise. okay that is all for now.

back to my busy life

A great Saturday!

So, I haven't really been blogging because honestly it's not the healthiest thing for me to look at everyone else's blogs with where I am at in my life; the benefits do not out way the torment that starts to spin...

BUT, since I no longer have a facebook I just really wanted to share my Saturday because it was great..haha.

Okay so Clark and I have officially been dating for 6 MONTHS. That is crazy! Let me tell you it has been an adventure. When I said yes to dating him I did not think that it would be so...life changing? Yeah I think that is what it has been. There is this verse in Psalm 33 [my new favorite bible verse] that says something like God frustrates the people's plans. And all I can say is that I think that is what Jesus has been doing in my life and it's not bad. but growing up out of my brokenness I had my idea of "more and better life." I think that it made God really sad because my picture of "more and better life" is actually destruction. This is true. But I think that I get to choose to see that God is SO faithful that He decided to frustrate my plans.

So Saturday was our 6 month and I told Clark that he got to pick what we got to do. Which was me letting go of control and expectations. Not very easy. We ended up going to this iceskating place at centennial park in Edina,MN. Which is SO pretty. The skating rink is just a frozen lake but it is a really long lake and has walking bridges over it. And when it gets darker there are Christmas lights on the trees. There is also an inside room with a fire place and hot chocolate. FUN! It was great. And then we went to Loring Pasta Bar. Woah baby it was fancy. I got this chicken ravioli and it was yummy and fancy..haha. And Clark got tortellini. Yum yum. They had a live band there and this yummy bread with this fancy butter. It was sweet. After that we were just going to go back to his car but we found this book store that is two levels. In there are all these old books; like really big German bibles and this book that Martin Luther wrote that has latches on it! Okay...I don't know why but I just think that is so cool. Just seeing bits of history makes it come alive. And I think that I could probably just look at the books forever. I'm kind of a book lover. Call me a nerd...it's okay.

Well, that was my Saturday. Life is still hard, looking back it's so much easier to see God's hand than in the moment but today has been good. Today's been good! okay just had to say that twice. I am once again doing my placements for education at a hmong school. I'm still doing the education program and I don't really think I will switch unless God makes another path really clear. I have some really amazing education teachers that have a HUGE heart for teaching, which makes it exciting. I think though I have too much going on, I'm REALLY busy. I applied to be an RA next year but we will see what happens. I've thought about working in the campus ministries office in our school so that i can help out more with chapel..It sounds like something I would like. Our school is building a new building and we are getting new meal plans. Haha that is kinda fun but i don't know if everyone likes it. Um also they might change the time for chapel - that'd be wierd. I have the hiccups...

Okay you are updated with my life in all that ways that I'd care to share.

adios

Maybe I should update this thing huh?

hmm well i'm not sure if anyone reads this BUT; Here I am - I'm a sophomore in college!!!! woah! that is crazy. Right now Life is very different then it was a year ago. I am an RA at Northwestern College in St. Paul, I'm taking a buttload of hard classes, observing a special education classroom at a hmong school, have a boy friend [by Gods lead i believe], and am trying to sink in and enjoy life. I really don't know what God is doing but i know he is blessing me. I know that he is pulling out icky things in my heart, bringing up wounds to be healed, constantly putting people into my life, books, and sermons to remind me of his love and grace. Things are not easy,and i'm realizing that i dont make them any easier. This year though I believe God is going to do a lot of healing. I also believe that he is going to do great things in my hall [green hall;knuha]. I think it's such a year of surrendering my plans, so that he can do his thing. And just embracing the rich reality he has placed in my lap.

...I think it's just good to write it down to realize the truth of what is really going on. I know I have a long way to go, but it's gonna be okay.