Where is Home?

So lately my family has been discussing the idea of getting an RV. It's only a dream right now, but it's been something my parents have been wanting to do for a while.
It'd get us completely debt-free, and would be a sense of freedom for them---no responsibilities, just travel the country.
As fine and dandy as that is, I really hate the idea.
-hides face in shame-
Now you may ask, "Why do you hate it?"
But even if you're not, I'm going to give you the answer:

I'm selfish.

Yep. That's pretty much it.

I really don't want to move again. Ever since I was tiny, the longest I have ever lived in a house has been about 4 years. We've thankfully lived in the same state for 12, so that's nice. The reason we move around so much is because the taxes are a lot less when my dad builds a new house after a certain amount of time. Don't ask me how it works, I don't know... I haven't filed my taxes yet and don't own a house.

But I'm in college, going away for school is a huge possibility for me. Not right away, but in 3-4 years. I just would like a place to come back to instead of wondering where in the country my family was every spring break.

The other thing is, I want to have one of those homes I can bring my kids to and say, "look at grandma and grandpa's house... this is where mommy used to live!"

Really stupid, I know. But each house has a memory for me, and I'd like my kids to be able to share in that....

Plus, I really love my house. We've only lived here for two years (coming this spring) and I absolutely love it. The house name is actually "The Lanelle" ... and it's yellow (which is my favorite color). So I REALLY love it.
You may think it's weird that a house has my name, but it's something my dad does when he makes a new house. Every single one of us kids has a "plan" with our name on it. The last house we lived in was named, "The Elizabeth", which is my sister's middle name... so it's not all that unusual for us... just something special my dad does that makes us smile. :)

But to be honest, the point of this post wasn't just to complain. ... but then again, you probably already knew that if you read my blog a whole lot.

This idea of an RV got me thinking... and well, there's a lot of talk about homes in the Bible.

There's also this passage that talks about giving up everything and selling it to the poor. The reality is, I really don't actually "own" much. I have a few possessions I saved up money for, but the rest of it's my Father's.
Which, is the same with my heavenly Father. I don't own anything down here, so I really don't have much say in what goes on in my life. Kinda scary, but comforting too. I trust both my heavenly and earthly daddy to do what's right, and instead of having to concern myself with my own future. Granted, my earthly daddy can't create my future, but I think you guys get the concept... right???

So I was thinking so more about this idea, and in pops this verse right?

"Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit"--yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will do this or that." As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him, it is sin." (James 4:13-17)

I don't know what tomorrow will bring, and I can't scheme and kill to get what I want. Instead, I need to trust God with my future. He's got it all under control anyways.

Besides, my home isn't really *here* it's in heaven. I need to remember that my goal isn't comfort in this life... but honoring Christ:



So. If God wants me to take the gospel all over the country... awesome. Let's go.

"This world is where I leave, let it never be called home."
-Jon Foreman

Techie Things

Well,I know I'm about break my really awesome unnocticable Ninja rule, and show my FULL face on my blog (Yeah, it's called a Ninja rule because you didn't know it existed. Now you're thinking.. "hey.. you know, I never noticed that!" and will probably attempt to find somewhere I've broken the rule.)

First, I want to show you a video that pretty much describes Techies:
Unfortunately, the person who posted the video has disabled embedding so just click here to see it

But this week I got to run some pretty cool techie things for a concert, and I got to do what I usually do on a Sunday morning.... but my trainies were pretty hyper... and some odd things happened that I thought I should show you:

Well First things first, we got a Christmas tree. You see, the Tech Booth somehow in this particular room ends up being the lost and found. So we got a Christmas Tree... We decided to have a little fun with it. We have begun to decorate this tree. As you can see, my friend was a having a bit of fun hiding. He loves to get on my nerves. He's a very good lighting techie though, and pretty swift on running Media Shout, a good trainee... Even if he does love to irritate me.

This is our tree topper. His name is Francias Garcon. I believe you say his name "Frans say Gar son" but I'm not really sure, so I call him Francis. The way he got his name is because my former trainee (Now one of my right-hand people, she blogs here) speaks French. We were discussing something, and I told her I didn't like the guy who made up French. She told me "French Guy" in French, which just happens to be "Francais Garcon" and he became our Lighting Mascot.

And now I break the Ninja Rule.... You see, my other lighting Trainee (WHO RAN FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER SUNDAY) Decided that I should have a crown. I'm not sure what made her decide this, but she found some random rope and made me put on this crown. I love my friends :)

Adfhkgfvbhn

Heehe I can post random pictures with this thing.... For la win

The LOVEE Chapter

Psalm 91:14-16 says:
"Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him; I will protect him, because he knows my name. When he calls to me, I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will rescue him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation."

This formed an interesting concept in my mind. The concept of loving God. (Yeah, it's an old concept... but hold on.)
So. In my every day Bible reading I'm in 1 Corinthians. This morning I started out reading the Psalm above. Then I flipped to my every day reading. Guess what chapter I was in?
You guessed it, 1 Corinthians 13; the love chapter.
So I read it. I've read it a bunch before, but usually in the concept of what friendship should be. (Or a marriage.. pretty much if you're a Christian you should treat everyone with love)
But THIS time.. I read in such a way that I should respond to God... try it:

"Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends." (4-8a)

Did you get it? We're supposed to be patient and kind with God...
BAM.
Immediately I felt unworthy of behaving that way towards the Lord. The God of the universe. But see.. keep going...
You're not to insist on your own way with God.
You shouldn't get irritable or resentful with God.
Just like God, you rejoice in the truth that he has, and cry when the world does wrongdoing.
...
We're not worthy of behaving like that way towards God. Not really. Plus, he does no wrong... so it really should be easy to love him. We have the privilege to love God!!!
How cool is that?!

Not only that.. but read the verse again. We're told that God *IS* love. Replace the word "love" with God:

"God is patient and kind; God doesn't envy or boast; he is not arrogant or rude. He does not insist on his own way; he's not irritable or resentful; he doesn't rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. He bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. God never ends."

Now obviously there are some things there that don't fit word-for-word... like "believes all things" (He is the author of all things, so why would he have to believe in them???) but you get the point.

God is love. We're supposed to love God. We aren't even worthy of loving him. But he loves us.
HOW EPIC IS THAT?!?!

11 Things I Learned in 2011

Just so that you guys know, I have a lot of unfinished posts waiting to be completed so that you can actually see where my thought process was going.
I haven't forgotten about you.

So here's some stuff I learned in 2011, just because it's January first... :D

1. Don't ever let someone tell you you're too sheltered. The stuff that I've been told in response to being "sheltered" is stuff I already knew, and wished it wouldn't be repeated. Honest, you're not missing much.

2. Education is not the most important thing in life. Really!! The government will tell you that education will solve all the worlds problems.. but it doesn't. In fact, sometimes it creates more problems. I'm not saying don't learn to read (Come onnn, I like my readers, why would I chase you away??) I'm just saying it's not THE most important thing in the world.

I had to learn this the hard way. Ever since I was a little kid I've been an overachiever. If I'm going to do something, I'm going to do it all the way, the right way... or not at all. Which can be a very, very, bad trait... but it can also be very good. I got to college early, which is an achievement in the "homeschool" world...but I've had to learn that really, that shouldn't be my focus. No matter how smart I get, or what job I have.. there are still people out there who don't know what peace and freedom feels like. They never experienced pure joy from knowing unconditional love. They need Jesus. No amount of PhD's or Doctorates will ever give them that. I have to be careful that I don't get distracted from my goal of Christ.

3. You need to stand up for what yourself and what you believe in. Showing someone unconditional love doesn't mean letting them run all over you. Being love sometimes exposes people's ugly side. It's necessary to love them despite their "ugliness", but it doesn't mean being abused. Don't get me wrong, when I say "stand up for yourself" I don't mean in the sense that you don't trust God. But that if someone says you're unworthy, you don't take that. You say "No! I am created by God for a purpose, what you say doesn't hold any value in the large scheme of things."  Sometimes this is something you have to just tell yourself, other times, you have to let the person know you won't stand for their belittling any more.

If you don't stand up for what you believe in, then it's not really your belief. You're just a hypocrite. If I profess to know the God of the universe, and won't defend him in the schools, or behave like I know him at home, then I'm a fake. I'm not worth anyone's time. There's no point to what I say.

4. Love comes from God alone. The only way humans know what love even is, is because God imbedded it into our brains. When we fell from grace, we lost what pure love looked like. We don't model it very well anymore. No guy or girl can ever give you pure love, no matter how hard they try. And if the guy or girl your dating isn't pushing you towards Christ, then he or she doesn't really love you.

5. I am dangerous with sharp objects. No really... it's not even funny.

6.  I love my family. I don't like their bad days... but really, wouldn't it be weird if I did?
No seriously, my family is amazing. They have such a cool dynamic. They love to tell stories and laugh. We could sit around a table for hours just talking about different things and laughing. Not only do they love to do that, but when the laughter subsides, we can talk to each other. If we're having a hard time in life, school, work... we can sit down and say "this is what I'm struggling with" ask for advice, and prayer. It's such a blessing.

7. Homework is the most retarded thing on the face of the planet. What's the point of sitting in a classroom for an hour and a half, and coming home to do three hours worth of work??
And they wonder why kids are obese these days... I mean really, they don't have time to play! They're to busy being "educated".

8. I have weird beliefs. (ha!) To me, overpopulation and climate changes don't really seem like an issue. But apparently they're huge in today's society.
If we came from evolution (since that's the most widely held belief in the public school system, in my area today) won't we just adapt to the issues of overpopulation?
Hey... won't we learn how to take the heat? Hmmmm.....

9. I am no longer a tomboy. I used to hate wearing dresses and makeup..used to have burping contests with my babysitter... (oh boy, I just admitted that...)
Now I loveee dressing up and having tea parties with my friends.

10. I have some of the best friends in the whole world. I got a bunch of friendship necklaces from a whole bunch of my girlfriends, and have been wearing all of them around my neck all at the same time. It looks really really retarded, but it reminds me of how loved I am.

If you had told me when I was in eighth grade, that I would have the friends I have now, and even the AMOUNT of friends I have now, I would have laughed in your face... and probably punched you too (told you I was a tomboy) But the Lord has really blessed me. He's changed me a whole lot, and blessed me a whole lot. 
I guess I need an 11th thing for 2011...

11. I really love shiny sparkly things. Fireworks, explosions, glowsticks, LED's, fresnels, Pars, Cyclicals.... you name it, if it glows, emits light of any kind... I love it.

Those are my eleven things. How bout you guys???