what i'm learning.

i'm going to start blogging what I'm thinking and feeling, and what God is teaching me through my quiet times. i haven't had many quiet times of late, and i hope that you all can keep me accountable to have them.
anyway today i was reading 1 Chron 21 and there were a few things that stood out to me, but first let me give an overview. this is the chapter in which David takes a census against the will of God, Israel reaps the judgment of his sin, and David turns back to God by buying a fields and offering sacrifices to God on it.
the first thing that caught my attention is in verse one which says,

"Satan rose up against Israel and caused David to take a census."

Satan loves to bring down things that are doing well and Giving glory to God. One classic example of this is The Fall of Adam and Eve. Satan "rose up" against them and led them into sin. what was their sin? well amongst a plethora of other sins, there was pride. this is the same sin he led David to. Satan knew that God's people were enjoying relationship with him, were enjoying protection from enemies and were enjoying prosperity, and this was bringing glory to God, to the point where their enemies didn't want to fight them because they knew that God was on their side. this is glorifying God-- when even your enemies don't want to get near you. any way, David grew in pride in HIS achievements. Satan roe up and whispered into his ear, "look what you've made, God was there for sure, but YOU made this kingdom what it is!" David sufficiently brown nosed, and having his pride activated, said TO HIMSELF "I'll take a census to see what I've done!" Satan's plan had worked. Now David had a choice in what he did, he didn't have to take the census. if he'd moved in humility, he'd have seen what God had done in the kingdom of Israel and realised his small part of availability but he was caught by Satan's sweet words and allowed himself to be led instead of being the leader that God had made him to be.

God Even Uses Me!

It’s amazing how God uses people. He even uses those who seem insignificant and those who don't stand out from the Crowd. People like me. And you.
Have you ever heard of a Guy named Salma? Probably not and neither had I until this morning. He’s mentioned in a long list of names in the start of 1 Chronicles. He was the Grandson of Caleb, who was the grandson of Judah, who was the Grandson of Abraham. I think (correct me if I'm wrong) that makes him the Great, Great, Great, Great Grandson of Abraham who was the Father of the Israelite nation.
He was also the founder of Bethlehem, the first person in history to ever set foot in the town in which one day Jesus our Saviour would be born. I don't know why this stood out to me except to say that it does not matter how ordinary I see myself, and it does not matter if I think what I’m doing is insignificant and small and will not make any major effect on history, the truth is that it can! God chose to use Salma to build Bethlehem because he already knew that's where he wanted his Son to be born.

God has us where he wants us. He's using us in the every-day things that we say and do. I'm sure Salma didn’t think "this city is going to be such a ministry to people!" he was probably thinking this looks like a good place for me and my family to settle, I think I'll call it Bethlehem because there's a really Great bakery here!" (Bethlehem means "house of Bread")
Sometimes I don't feel like God can use me. I feel like I’m just doing the stuff a Christian should do. But even in those moments, God is taking me and using me in his plan.

If I don't pick up, its because I'm ENGAGED

so here we go, if you've been following my blogspot at all then you'll know that i've been in a relationship with Grayce Elizabeth Hollingsworth. well it just got a whole heap more serious!
we have been working towards engagement since early in our relationship. and it has all now culminated in a picnic and a beautiful ring! we went to the beautiful gardens at Rajabaht University and ate and i asked, and she said yes! you can see the pictures below here.

Isn't she Beautiful!! :D

the last update!!!

so i guess i need to fill you in on all that's been happening since my
last update....


well ministry in Pattya was great, for those that got to minister! On
Sunday our outreach leaders left for Malaysia to see about getting
visas, so i was put in charge of leading the team for the last week of
outreach.. the girls hard a great time teaching English at the Tamar
Center and going to the bars and ministering to the Thai Girls, though i
think they all found it heart breaking to be in that situation. As for
us Lance and myself, we still did not get much to do. on monday, we went
to the prison ministry and to our surprise, our contact actually showed
up and with a bunch of friends that were visiting from overseas! so
lance and myself got to hand out the food and toiletries to the inmates
and pray for them at the same time. however because our contact had her
overseas friends with her she was unable to visit the main prison and we
were once again left high and dry. we went home and talked with paul,
the DTS Chiang Rai leader, who had come to visit the team and see how we
were going. it was good to have him around even if it was only for a
day. on tuesday we had a twelve hour work day! we started at 9am packing
Chinese bibles to be given out to the Chinese tourists in town to take
back to china. we did that till 3pm. then from 6 till late, we were at
the pier, giving the bibles out the the tourists as they disembarked the
dinner boats. it was an amazing time, and we wer able to hand out three
hundred bibles! wednesday the Girls went to the Tamar centre and the
guyswent to prisons again and again our lady didnt show up so we had
nothing to do! :-(
we went to the crossing and hung out with the guys and girls there and i
think it was a more valuable time this time. on thurs we had a vrey
light day just doing slums ministry but it was fun and despite some team
issues earlier in the dya, we were able to work well and i belive that
God really worked in the Kids' hearts. friday we went with a relatively
new ministry that works with the very large homosexual community in
pataya we went to dongtan beach whhich is the gay beach and we
worshipped ther and prayed and spoke with a few of the men that were
there it was a really good time and i think the tram really thought so too!.
and that was the end of outreach! we lfte pattaya on a 14 hour bus ride
for Chiang Rai at 6 pm on friday night and got in at around8am saturday.
and i'm still recovering....
that brings me to the end of my out reach news. it was a great time and
God really taught me a lot about what faith really looks like and
trusting in him for all the details. i also learned a great deal about
leaning on God's strength and not on my own....

looking forward to the end of DTS... 1 week left!! :D

The News....

Hello Everybody!!


Well this month of lectures went by fast as always and God has not failed in teaching new things every day. we started off this lecture block with Steve and Marie Goode taking us through some of the history of YWAM, it's heart and how it came to be so World Focused. During this week was the YWAM international day of Prayer and Fasting. It was an amazing time but the devil tried to attack many of us by making us feel like we had been fasting for three days by giving us headaches and tiredness even before 11 am when we'd only missed breakfast! But we prayed all together that morning in class and pushed through those feelings. after lunch I went to the corner store and bought two iced tea drinks, which I apparently drank too fast because they came right back up about and hour later... my problem was that I was in the class room on the second floor and the bathrooms were on the bottom floor! So, not having time to get to the bathroom, I threw up over the second floor balcony hoping that there was nobody underneath!! It quickly became something to laugh about.... after I felt a little better!
The next week we had Suzanne north from Melbourne and she talked about global missions which was really good too. She and her husband used to be missionaries to the Islamic community in Nepal until they got banned from the country for "Forcing people to change religions." Suzanne talked about some of the history of Global missions and showed some videos of people currently and in the past who have been a part of Global missions.
Week three was Dan Baumann. Dan was a missionary to the Islamic nations surrounding Iran. he had spent years in Afghanistan and Turkmenistan and had been on a week-long trip across the border into Iran and upon exiting they would not return his pass port and placed him in jail. He spent 9 weeks there and endured beating and interrogation and the only thing that got him out in the end was his Swiss passport. While he was there he was able to minister to his main "interrogator" and the day before Dan was released, he gave his life to Christ. Apart from telling his amazing story, Dan also spoke to us about intimacy with Jesus and having a relationship with him that just trusts. You take him at his word and when he says go, you go and see what happens. He also talked about finding God's will for our lives and stated that if our hearts are for Jesus and listening for his voice, then it's virtually impossible to miss his will for our lives. another freeing thing that he said in talking about God's will is that IF we do happen to miss God's will for our lives, then he doesn’t say oh well that's another life down the drain, but he will either gently guide us back to his original plan, or he'll make a brand new BEST plan for our lives. It was really freeing and allowed me to make those decisions about Staffing and future.
And last week (week ending the 1/6/07) we enjoyed John hall a church planter/pastor who's been here in Thailand for almost 20 years working in the eastern provinces he talked about modern church planting strategies, the status of the local church in Thailand, and what a local church "should" look like. By this I mean that he challenged the thinking on what we define as church and what aspects are just cultural aspects and what parts are necessary (such as a leader(s)).
the schools and universities were on break for the first two weeks of this lecture block so we had to change our usual Friday night evangelism (one location was at a smoothie shop by a university, and the other was a boarding school) to Friday afternoon evangelism in just our Mubaan (Village/Suburb). This was great and all of the Students loved it. We were able to serve our village and talk to them, build relationship and let them know more about what the big base on the top of the hill was all about. We however could only do this for two weeks as the schools and universities opened backup and we went back to our normal evangelism locations. My team's location was the Night Bazaar and we were able to talk to people there and share the good news about Christ and what he's done for them. On the second week we took a guitar and bongo drums and we played and sang Christian songs on the corner, and talked to people as they came by. For many this became their favourite experience on DTS and they went back the next night.

I leave for my five week outreach to Kanchanaburi and Pattaya this coming Monday which I’m excited and a little nervous about, but I really do think it's going to be fun. I am part of an awesome team that have great attitudes and are all good friends outside of outreaches, so I know that we'll be fine. We will be in Kanchanaburi for three weeks and there we'll be building a house, doing some painting, planting an acre of mandioca (I don't know what that is) and teaching English in a school. We then go by bus to Pattaya for the final two weeks where the Girls will be working in the Tamar centre, a project reaching out to rescue women from prostitution and give them hope for a better life. They’ll also be going with the Tamar Centre teams into Bars to evangelise the Prostitutes there and tell them about the English classes that the girls on our team are also running. As for us males, we'll be doing prison ministry and ministry at a centre for young men called the Crossing. It is sort of a drop in centre with a skate park (good thing we're all good skaters!! NOT! :D) but we'll be working there and then doing street evangelism as well.
Something that I have been working on over the course of being here in Chiang Rai is my relationship with Grayce Hollingsworth. She did her DTS last year at the Chiang Rai base and now works at Baan Nam Jai (home of the open heart), an orphanage for children with HIV. I met her when I came to visit Shane last June and though we never really spoke while I was here, we became close friends through the totally amazing God given internet chat programme Skype. We talked and talked and by September we realised that there was something more than just friendship coming along here but chose for several reasons not to pursue that. When I got here in January we sought God and the wisdom of our leaders together and we decided that we would start /Courting/ with a view towards engagement. So that is the short story up to where we are. We are courting. You can see here her Photo's or her blog here. I think that's it, other than to say that she's an amazing Woman and I’m extraordinarily blessed to have her in my life! Jing Jing! (That means "seriously" in Thai).

Here is the biggest news. I have decided to stay on here in Chiang Rai and join staff for the next three DTS's. I really feel that this is in line with my calling and gifts and I’m excited about the opportunity. Since my mid teens I have felt God's call on my life towards missions and this is just another step to being commissioned to that call. I have been corresponding with mum and Dad, John Lee, and my leaders here about this and they all are excited and so am I. So that's it. I will be home either in September or November to say hi and work my little proverbial off to save some money, then I’m back here in January for Tom Beckingham’s wedding and life in Thailand! As far as I can see I’ll be here for three years, and then I don’t know where in the world I’ll be.


As always I would ask for your prayers. I’ve seen first hand how powerful our prayers are and how God wants to work to bring them to pass, so here are some things you can pray for.
*Safety and effectiveness on outreach.* (Someone in our commissioning service today read a scripture that Nations would quake at the work of the LORD, and I read last night that Kanchanaburi has two fault lines running through it. -- oh while I’m at it, I’ll just let you know that about four or five weeks ago now, there was a powerful earthquake (6.1) about 100 km north of Chiang Rai. There were no reports of injury and only minor damage. We felt it here in Chiang Rai at probably a magnitude of between 4 and 5 for about 10-15 seconds! Everyone was ok and there was no damage.)
There are five outreach teams going to all different parts of Thailand with one team going to Laos (which is still a communist country) pray that everyone will be safe in their respective locations and that God will use them mightily for his Kingdom.
*The availability of housing for after DTS. *As of the end of DTS, I have to find a home to live in for the time that I’m here. One or two possibilities have arisen but I will need money to pay for rent and living for that time. Pray that God will work all of this out and his faithfulness will be shown once again.
*That I will be able to get a Thai Motorbike licence*. Getting around here is cheapest and easiest on a motorbike (though safer and more comfortable in a carJ). I will be able to get a licence after DTS but will need all the necessary paperwork to come through as quickly as possible. (Also pray that I will be able to get a bike (or a Car at some point.)
*That God will CONTINUE to provide. *God’s provision up until this point had been wonderful and I have no reason to doubt that he will continue to provide but it still helps to ask Him, he knows our needs, but still wants us to tell him so I ask that you join with me in telling him my needs. And join with me in watching him provide them!*

*

*Once again I thank you for your prayers and support. I look forward to telling you all that has happened on outreach and all that God has done in me and through me as I walk out this adventure with him. I also look forward very much to seeing you all in September or November (the meeting will be all the more sweet if it’s in November).*

* *

*Love and Blessings to all…..*

*Ryan Munyard.*

My Desire

My Desire is to be a man of integrity who fights the Fight with honour and valour; a man who can stand before God in full knowledge of my Humanity and my past Failings and my NEED for Him; that temptation no longer has any power over me because I'm not living under my own strength but leaning on God. i put down the sword of determination, Pride and strength and Pick up the SWORD that is Sharper than any other, the Word of GOD. I confess that I cannot fight these battles of temptation on my own. I proclaim that I am a warrior in God's army, in fact I’m His son, a Prince in His Kingdom, and as such I’ve been given power and authority over the enemy. I stand and say "Yes, I am weak, but my God, my Father My king is NOT. He will strengthen me as I lean on him. I am his valiant warrior. I am Ryan James Munyard.

Did you hear the LATEST?

i thought it was about time that i let you know some of the things going on here and things that you and the church can pray for.
i think the last update you got was just after the outreach and was mostly about what we did there. we have since had four weeks of lectures and another outreach so here is the catchup... the second phase of lectures was harder than the first. for most people the schedule got to them, and as we began to become familiar with life here, it became harder and harder to concentrate in lectures. but we didn't stop learning. and god didn't stop teaching.
a few of us were taught big lessons in submission and heart attitude through some of the schedule changes but as i came through that we found a greater sense of God's working in our lives.
the final week of teaching before outreach #2 was on evangelism from a Thai perspective, and it was super hard to concentrate, but super good to hear. Narong who now works with YWAM Perth talked about the Thai mentality to evangelism and the differences in thinking between Thai (eastern) thinking and western thinking. where westerners tend to be linear and logical in thinking, eastern thinking is more story-based, so telling them the gospel and why they need to receive Christ just doesn't work. but to tell them a story and relate to them, will have better results. all this was very important for us to hear as we went on outreach with a focus more on evangelism than service.

so taht brings me to this outreach. i will shortly have photos of it on Flickr . but for now just let me tell you about what happened. we had no plan for this outreach other that we were going to Nan and doing what God told us to. so we prayed and prayed leading up to it and we sought god for waht we wold do. as we prayed, he gave us pictres of places that we would go. to Yvonne he gave a picture of a river and she felt that we would be staying within sight of it (we did.) to two or tree others he gave a picture of two mountains but and we thought that they would be physical mountains , but we discovered on the 4th or5th day that PS 25 talks about those that trust in the Lord being like mountains. and though in the village we went to there were NO Christians, there were 2 missionaries that had been there for four years working hard in teh community. i think the most the obvious picture that happened was when Lance an american who can't speak Thai got the word "luang" and as we looked on a map, there is was, "Luang village." taht's where we went and ministered for 6 of our 11 day outreach. i mentioned before that we had no plans for what to do and no plans for accomodation so it was a real blessing arriving in Luang and meeting the Chief at the market where we stopped and having her point us to the only accommodtion in town, an abandoned wood house with a tin roof, 1 bathroom (there were 13 people on our team) and bucket shower. but it was next to the best restaurant and "supermarket" in town. the chief set us up to teach at an english cam taht she would organise for us and also invited us to a party at her house to bless her parents.
the english camp was great we ran it from 9-11 in the mornings over 5 days and had up to 45 kids in attendance. we had heaps of fun and everythign that we did we focussed on God. we taught them bible stories and told testimonies, we taught them "if i were a butterfly" and "My God is so BIG." and had a heap of fun.
on the Tuesday (day four of 5) we asked them if they wanted to accept Jesus as their friend and saviour and we had 37 kids accept, but we think only 5-8 knew what they were actually doing. it was still awesome to see God moving like that!
we also had the privilege of seeing God heal 2 elderly ladies that were lame and also heal their hearts that were dead, and a man in hospital who was in his final stages of aids come to life in his heart too!!
the outreach was an amazing time of seeing what god will do when we seek him and put ourselves in a position where we have to trust him!

as for prayer points, please continue to pray for finance for living here, and that God will keep on teaching me the things that he wants to... I've been finding the greatest lessons I've been learning have been outside the lecture room and then just reinforced inside.

thank you all for your prayers and support. i hpe to be able to put pictures up soon, but my compuer is a little nackered at teh momen so it might be linger than i'd hoped.

bored.

i'm sitting here in the salah (thai for Gazebo) waiting for the staff to finish their meeting in the office. i'm supposed to be doing my work duties in there and i can't because im' not allowed. i hope they dont make me do it during my free time. that would suck. i have a skype meeting at 4.00 with kimberley, my sister. so i really hope they just let us pass on work duties today...
here's a funny story that you might not know yet.
all the dts crew have just been on outreach for two weeks. they broke us up into five teams and sent us to five different lications in the chiang rai province. this morning all the teams told everyone what they had done on their out reach and told some funny stories. there was a theme coming through of the teams doing manual labour jobs. one team built a bamboo church, another built some fences and another spread a heap of dirt out on an area and then had to pile it up again! it struck me half way through the sharing time, that all the other teams built something up they added to teh community they were serving, and our team DESTROYED something!! check it out!!>>>>


see what i mean? now, you have to understand the events leading up to this because it really is an amazing story.
we arrived at the bamboo palace on sunday arvo and immediately made jokes about it's life span and how safe it was. but we didnt reall think it would come down! every day on outreach up till then we had eaten lunch at the noodle shop around the corner, but that day, we got lunch at the market and ate in the palace; on the day it fell, our outreach leader Peaw (say Bow) had felt lead to spend the entire morning praying for us only stopping at lunch time; The palace could have fallen at anytime during the day or night when we were asleep or not there, but we were able to get everything and eveyone out in time; Danielle could have taken pictures of the palace earlier in the week, but her remebering to take pics at that moment and noticing the state of the building was what saved us!
we really believe that God lead that day down to the very last detail. i think it's pretty obvious really.

outreaching....

hey all i know it's been ages since i posted and i know that although i said i wouldnt be like shane and blog only once a blue moon that's how i've turned out to be. so all that said, i'm sorry.

the update:

i'm currently sitting in an internet cafe in the centre of chiang rai. i'm in an internet cafe because i'm on outreach and i wasn't allowed to bring my computer becuae they think that it would be too unfair on the people who are out in actual villages. that's ok i'm cool with that it gives me time to spend with my team mates.
anyway, out reach for us is at baan nam jai. there is a video here our outreach is mainly focussed on manual work around the property. we have a serious truckload of dirt that we have to move. i think it's between 2 & 3 tonne!!!
the temperature is warming up here too!! the days have been around 30 degrees, but it's not as humid as it will be later in the year, so it's not so bad. but moving that much dirt is HARD work!!! i think the hardest bit is working with the hopless wheelbarrows that we have, they'd be great if the werent falling apart, and 63 years old!! after one trip up the hill, with one of these wheel barrows, your legs feel like jelly and your puffing and there is sweat dripping off your brow, it's hard yakka!!

it's great having outreach at baan num jai thought because we get tot play with the kids if they're out! they're so much fun and they are so amazingly cute!!
you can see their profiles and stories at the baan num jai website above.
I'm sorry this isn't very long, sitting in web cafe's isn't good for the writing side of my brain.

one last thing

i miss you all!! i'm sorry if you've written me emails and i havent replied, i've jjust been so busy with other stuff!! i have thre half written emails i think and many more that i'm yet to start. the half written ones are to laura and jeff, and also to liz, i dont konw who the third is too, it's been that long!!
i'm having a grewat time here in CR but i'm fully nackered , looking forward to the weekend,and a good long sleep in!!

ok we i have to go, my time's running out, but i love you mum and dad and S and K and B and A and Gi miss you and cant wait to see y'all again.! and i cant wait for my package too!! also can someone let Charis know that i havent forgotten her textas, they arent quite in the mail, but i've at least bought them now!!

ok bye and i love you!!

My Bond

ok so i said i'd keep y'all updated on what's happening here in thailand, and i know tha i've been a little slack on that, but the reason i've been slack on that is because i really havent had time to not be slack! our schedule is so full!!
a quick rundown of a typical day:

• 6am get up
• 6.15 aerobics
• 6.45 breakfast/showers
• 7.45 quiet times
• 8.15 worsip/meditation
• 8.45 lectures
• 12.30 lunch.
• 2.00 workduties
• 4.00 freetime
• 6.00 dinner/tea/supper
• 7.00 night meeting.
• 8.30 finish.

so as you can see the tiny bit of time that we have for freetime is usually spent trying not to do anything, but we also have journals to do, and 15 chapters of scirpture each week to read, and a book to read and.... i could go on.

so there is my excuse for not blogging. with that out of the way, let me blog...
what am i learning?
god speaks. in more ways than i had ever thought of, and more often than i thought! i dont think there has been a day when god hasnt spoken to me in some manner. it's funny because i KNOW that god speaks to us all the time and whether we hear or not, depends on if we're listening (looking). so you would think that god speaking to me daily wouldnt take me by surprise! it has. i knew god would speak on DTS. but this much?! i guess by coming here i put myself into a position to hear him and so he's taking advantage of that.
last week was prayer and intercession week with art and ellen sanborn and it was really great to see god move and speak to people who had never recognised his voice before! many of us when we were asked to share what god showed us, started our statement with, "i dont know if this was god, or what it means but...." or "this might sound a little stupid but..." so we have all heard gods voice here and most of us love it!

yesterday the boys moved to the base from our temporary accomodation down the road a little. so we all packed up our freshly UNpacked things and moved them by motorcycle a whole 800 meters to the base but thankfully it only took a few hours!

for those of you who havent heard, i have a girlfriend!! her name is Grayce Hollingsworth and she is from Florida! you can read about her at her blogspot here. NOW, for those of you who are thinking to yoursleves "gee he's a fast mover," let me set you straight. i have known Grayce since june 2006 when i visited thailand for Shane's (and Grayce's) DTS Graduation. wihle i was here we hardly noticed each other... but since then our friendship grew and grew as we chatted and talked. so as we weere talking the other day about our relationship, we came to the conclusion that now was the right time to make it official! so we did.

Grayce and I, originally uploaded by Stunyard.

on saturday we had our first date, and we went to the golden triangle, where Burma and Laos and Thailand and drug trafficers meet at a junction in the Mekong River. it was a great time! the view however was not so great because of a thick layer of smoke that is covering the region at the moment...

i think that is my news to date, i am loving it here and loving getting to know god more and more each day!

The Best Is Yet To Come...

Well another year has come and gone and I’m still here.... which I guess is a good thing. I am so privileged to be able to just put out my thoughts and let GOD use them to bless or challenge or encourage you guys as you read. It is an amazing blessing to me.
Talking about thoughts and blessing I think ill make my last post for the year a slight challenge for you.

!!rorrim a ni ti daer ot evah uoy os sdrawkcab ti etirw ll'i :D

No seriously, just thinking about blessing and being blessed reminds me of a thought that I was challenged with 2 or 3 years ago, and it has to do with being blessed to be a blessing. It’s a strange thought. To think that I will be blessed just by blessing you, is not something that comes easy to us but when you think about it, it makes a LOT of sense! You know that feeling that you get when you go out of your way to help someone?? You walk away felling uplifted and encouraged and BLESSED!! You don’t do it so that you'll be blessed, you don't do it because you think you'll get something out of it, but you do!! This is being blessed to be a blessing!!

Now, think about what would happen if the person you tried to help, to bless, didn’t accept your blessing! How would you feel? Would you get that feeling of upliftedness? Would you get the feeling that you had actually been useful and been used by GOD?
No.
You would most likely feel a little disappointed and confused. Why wouldn't they want me to bless them with this? What’s wrong with what I have to give? I was only trying to help!!

Can you see what the phrase blessed to be a blessing means? It means that sometimes, if you are the subject of the initial blessing, accepting that blessing is more important than you think! It could be that GOD will use the return blessing to speak to the person doing the initial blessing than he will to you!
Take this for an example.... say I wanted to bless my best mate, Shane. Now I’m not feeling the best about myself, but I’m thinking of him and how it will be such an encouragement to him for me to bless him in some way... so I do. I go out of my way to make him feel good, loved, encouraged at some cost to myself. And he accepts that blessing and thanks me for it. I walk away feeling good because I’ve just done 'a GOOD deed.' and then GOD begins to bless me. Where I once was feeling a little down and discouraged, GOD speaks. Where I was being attacked, GOD defends. Where I was sinking I am uplifted, simply because I was ready to be used by him to bless someone else!

This relates so well to what GOD did for is through Christ’s death on the cross.... THE ULTIMATE BLESSING!!GOD saw that we were sinking, that we were a little down (actually so far down that we couldn’t get back up by ourselves) and he thought, "These are my children, my FRIENDS, I want to bless them! I want to help them out of the pit, out of their trouble. I want them to feel the same way about themselves as I feel towards them! So at Great personal cost to himself, he sent the son to help us he put the son IN the pit so he could give us a boost up and out! (Now if you think about this, if Jesus is lifting everyone out of the pit, then who is going to lift him?! herein lies the cost.) Jesus chose the pit so that we could get out of it!
GOD is blessed when we accept his blessing on us! IMAGINE NOT accepting this blessing!!! imagine that you said to yourself, "no thanks Jesus, I’ll just keep jumping and hope that one day I’ll be able to jump high enough." you've forgotten that with every jump you get more and more tired, and your feet start to make impressions in the dirt, both of which make your goal harder to achieve! If you take Jesus' hand, then he will lift you out of that pit. Just like that. Just say to him, "hey, I, uh, I, I need you. I can’t do it. I’m trying, you can see that, I’m trying REALLY hard; I’m jumping as high as I can but... I just can’t. Will you help me? I need to apologise for not accepting your offer sooner, but something told me I could do it! Thanks for being here to help me out, I know that it means that you'll die here, but thanks. It means so much to Me." that's all you need to do! Have you done it? Why not? What are you waiting for? Are you looking for another way? There isn’t one. Are you thinking to yourself "he's wrong I’m just going to keep jumping and I’ll get out, I’ll work harder?" IT WON’T WORK! Just accept the blessing that GOD has offered you and let your life, the very fact that you ARE alive, bless him!!

For those of you who have taken up God’s offer of life, who will you bless? This coming year? Who will you allow to bless you by blessing them?

Take the challenge and see what happens (or maybe you wont see) when you accept the blessing that a friend (GOD included) bestows upon you!!

I’m glad that GOD ahs used me through this blogspot this year. There have been times when I have felt like what I have to offer is of no use and not important, but GOD is faithful to his promises. And I have been available to be used by him....

The best is yet to come!! A scary thought!
I pray GOD bless your new year!
Servant.

P.S. The bit you could'nt read near the top needs a mirror. Have fun! :D

Silence: More Than Words

by Scott Lyons 11/22/2006 I am sitting across from my spiritual mentor. Today we are meeting to talk about silence, to discuss the importance given to the discipline within the church throughout its history. "There is irony here," I say, "Mystics and monks who go on and on about silence. It reminds me of Polonius, whom Shakespeare could only quiet by having Hamlet run him through with his rapier, speaking the words, 'Brevity is the soul of wit.' " "There is no irony," [my mentor] quietly assures me, smiling. And so we begin. "Her sister, Mary, sat at the Lord's feet, listening to what he taught. . . . 'There is only one thing worth being concerned about. Mary has discovered it, and it will not be taken away from her'" (Luke 10:39, 42). I don't remember ever hearing a sermon about practicing quietness, about seeking out silence and shunning conversation. Our culture doesn't value it. And though I want to criticize my world for all its noise, its busyness, and its foolishness--I am Martha. And silence, my sister, is a stranger to me. There is value in saying nothing, in stepping away from disagreements, in excusing ourselves from conversations. And to do so not because we wish to avoid conflict or because we pessimistically believe it will change nothing, but because we recognize in ourselves the wickedness of needing to be right, of wanting to be thought right, to be heard. So we become silent because we know that we lose something when we speak. But I am a lover of words. If I stop speaking, I will be naked on this stage-bearing witness against myself before God. So I keep speaking, wildly hoping that what I want to be heard will be heard. How do we walk away from words? I know it's not easy. But to be silent is to be known. And in the quietness there is forgiveness (because there is confession), peace, and strength. I am not asking anyone to become a Trappist monk. What I am asking is for us to try silence-just for a short period of time. Turn off your radio and head to the park near where you work. Sit quietly and eat your lunch. Turn off the TV one evening each week. Pray. Read. Pray some more. Learn to be familiar with the silence. Then, in time, if you are snapped at as you walk through the door, or if a barrage of little ones immediately crowd about you and pull at you, you will discover greater rest in your heart. The discipline of silence does not give us a place of mental detachment, but a soft blanket that we gently, caringly spread under our families. I am tired of hiding behind the noise and the words, expecting to find rest where I have never found it before, tired of trying to avoid hearing a quiet voice say, "Where are you?" Noise is just another fig leaf. So I shut my mouth and let my pretense drop, shattering around me. I need to be here, at this moment, in silence. I need to be able to hear again. I am desperate for rest; I am desperate to be known. "I confess to almighty God, and to you, my brothers and sisters, that I have sinned through my own fault." So come and sit with me. Sit with our sister, Mary. And let us listen to this Jesus.

Blessed

I just finished reading an article in relevant magazine that really spoke to me and I know will speak to you too! It was about looking to the blessings in the now instead of ignoring them and looking for the blessings in the future.

Right now is an amazing time of blessing in my life. God has been speaking to me and directing me and leading me, but the blessing has come through following his directions. Imagine looking at a map book for directions, and not going where it says!! It makes no sense! Following his lead, though, hasn’t been easy. He has asked of me things that I have not wanted to do and I have asked things of him that he has declined to give. So there are times when I get discouraged. I get down, because I think to myself that I will never see the end of this, that I will always be in the dark waiting for the light, or more fittingly, that the light at the end of the tunnel seems to be moving at the same rate I am!
The article in relevant talked about a guy and his sons who every week played XBOX together from 2 till 4 on Saturdays and Sundays. They really enjoyed the time together, but he found that his sons were SO HANGING OUT for Saturday that the rest of the week was just an obstacle to get past so they could get to the weekend.

This is how I feel sometimes. There are things, amazing, and wonderful blessings, in my life that God has told me to wait for. So do I look at the time I have now, the waiting period, and use it to it's full? No I pine for the blessing. I WANT IT NOW; I don’t want to have to wait. The waiting period is hard! It's an obstacle that's hindering me from the blessing.

I DONT WANT TO PINE FOR THE BLESSING!! I want to be able to enjoy what I have now! I want to be able to look at what I DO have and not think to myself "One day this will be better" but I want to think to myself "how blessed I am be have what God has given! Surely it can’t get any better than this for this point in my life!"

I choose to look at what God has given me now, and grow it. I choose not to look at what I want and complain that I don’t have it but rather to look at what I have and thank God for it! Develop it and to nurture it.

Because God has given it and I am blessed.

Term 4 Calendar

term 4 calendar, originally uploaded by Stunyard.

My Prayer

Dear Father,
I honour you as Sovereign Lord. I acknowledge that you are always present with me. You are the only all powerful, and all wise God. You are kind and loving in ALL your ways. I LOVE you and I thank you that I am united with Christ and spiritually alive in him. I choose not to love the world, and I crucify my flesh and all its passions. I thank you for the life I now have in Christ, and I ask you to fill me with your holy spirit that I may live my life free from sin. I declare my dependance on you, and I take my STAND against Satan and all his lying ways knowing you standing beside me. I CHOOSE to believe the truth, and I REFUSE to be discouraged. You are the God of all hope, and I am confident that you will meet my needs as I seek to live according to your word. I express with confidence that I can live a responsible life through Christ who strengthens me. I now take my stand against Satan command him and all his evil spirits to depart from me. I put on the WHOLE armour of God. I submit my body as a living sacrifice and renew my mind by the living Word of God in order that I may prove that the will of God is good and acceptable and PERFECT. I ask these things in the precious name of my Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. SO BE IT.

Home of the Open Heart - YWAM Thailand

2 min 59 sec - Aug 17, 2006
Thailand's Department of Public Health reports that per capita, Thailand has the most HIV/AIDs cases in the world. This translates into more than 14,000 AIDs orphans per year. Many of these will be HIV positive. Chiang Rai, one of the provinces worst hit by the Aids crisis, had no home for HIV positive babies. Project L.I.F.E. stepped in to meet that need with Baan Num Jai (Home of the Open Heart). Opened in December 2000, its heart purpose is to give HIV positive babies a loving home until their HIV status is determined. They also provide small group homes for babies who cannot be cared for by relatives. Home of the Open Heart is also committed to caring for HIV+ babies until they die. If a baby converts to HIV negative and is able to be adopted, Home of the Open Heart will release the child to have a family of their own! Our mission is to assist families affected by HIV/AIDs, through education, orphan care within the home and within the community, community visits leading to income-generation projects, and mother/child respite care.

If you want to know more about Baan Num Jai, please visit their website

Psalm 145

A psalm of praise of David.

1 I will exalt you, my God and King,
and praise your name forever and ever.
2 I will praise you every day;
yes, I will praise you forever.
3 Great is the LORD! He is most worthy of praise!
No one can measure his greatness.

4 Let each generation tell its children of your mighty acts;
let them proclaim your power.
5 I will meditate* on your majestic, glorious splendor
and your wonderful miracles.
6 Your awe-inspiring deeds will be on every tongue;
I will proclaim your greatness.
7 Everyone will share the story of your wonderful goodness;
they will sing with joy about your righteousness.

8 The LORD is merciful and compassionate,
slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love.
9 The LORD is good to everyone.
He showers compassion on all his creation.
10 All of your works will thank you, LORD,
and your faithful followers will praise you.
11 They will speak of the glory of your kingdom;
they will give examples of your power.
12 They will tell about your mighty deeds
and about the majesty and glory of your reign.
13 For your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom.
You rule throughout all generations.

The LORD always keeps his promises;
he is gracious in all he does.*
14 The LORD helps the fallen
and lifts those bent beneath their loads.
15 The eyes of all look to you in hope;
you give them their food as they need it.
16 When you open your hand,
you satisfy the hunger and thirst of every living thing.
17 The LORD is righteous in everything he does;
he is filled with kindness.
18 The LORD is close to all who call on him,
yes, to all who call on him in truth.
19 He grants the desires of those who fear him;
he hears their cries for help and rescues them.
20 The LORD protects all those who love him,
but he destroys the wicked.

21 I will praise the LORD,
and may everyone on earth bless his holy name
forever and ever.

HARD.

Has God ever asked you to do something that you don’t want to do? Or required something of you that you weren’t sure how to give? This happened and has been happening to me recently.

There have been exciting things happening in my life recently, that have been an answer to years of prayer. I have been amazed at God's faithfulness through this time and have learned so much about him that I either didn’t know, or had forgotten, or had misunderstood. But I am coming to see that as the Matt Redman song says he gives and takes away! Now, I guess I’m blessed in that he isn’t actually taking away what he gave me but rather asking me to give it over to him and there is a difference!

I think about a kite. You know one of those ones with two strings so that you can make it do cool tricks and stuff. I got one of these for Christmas a number of years ago and it was one of the best presents I think I have ever got! But I didn’t automatically know straight away how to make it do all the things it could! I was no child KITING prodigy that's for sure! In fact I remember times when I struggled simply to keep the thing in the air let alone make it do tricks! What I needed was someone to show me how to work it. Someone like my dad. I remember that he would take me down to the park in Murray Bridge where we were holidaying with my Nanna and Grand-dad, and we would fly the kite and he would show me how to do stuff with it and then he would give it to me and I’d crash it! And so he'd show me again this time more slowly and with a little more clarity. Then he'd give it to me and I’d make it do what I wanted then crash it! So the next time, he'd take my hands in his and we'd do it together, his hands around mine, helping me to make the small movements needed to flip the kite over successfully and then flip it back! and eventually he'd let go, after I got the idea and he'd just stand and watch and advise me on the finer points of making kites do flips but he wouldn’t leave.

It’s in this analogy of teaching that I find a picture of God. there are things in life that he gives us for you enjoyment and simply to bless us but if at some point we fail to use what he's given us properly, he will take it away and teach us. Then he gives it back and lets us try again. Once again we blow it, we pull the string too hard or for too long and we become a tangled mess that's plummeting straight for the ground. So what does he do? He gives us another go showing us in a little more detail how to do it well. And he repeats the process until we are proficient enough for him to let go! Now fortunately for us after he has let go he doesn’t just walk away, and leave us, but he stays beside us forever giving us pointers and hints on to use the blessings he's given us "successfully."

But it's our decision whether we want to actually give it over to for him to teach us or to keep it and try to learn by ourselves! We may learn the basics in doing it by ourselves, but we will probably crash so many times in the process that by the time we have mastered one trick, we are bent and broken beyond recognition! If we give it over to him, while we REALLY want to enjoy it, and it will be hard to give it over, we will gain so much more enjoyment out of it in the long term because we know how to effectively use it! And this brings joy not only to US but also to him!!
God wants us to enjoy what he's given us!! he wants us to be able to use it and then bless others through it and though it WILL BE HARD the best way for this to happen is for us to give it back to him so he can teach us!

No where in the Bible does it say that life will be easier as a Christian! In fact to many things we are called to walk a HARDER road (matt 5:17-48)! But the comforting thing to know is that God is right here beside us, never leaving, always guiding, and always helping us up when we stumble.

Now unto Him...

This is a post about worship. Worship that doesn’t hold back, that doesn’t talk about worshipping God, but actually worships him. I have been noticing recently, that many of the songs that are sung in church, especially the newer ones (the not-hymns), talk a lot ABOUT worshipping God, but don’t actually make the next step to saying how great he really is!! It’s about time that those people to whom God has given the talent of song writing, start to tell God what they think of him, HONESTLY with an once of vulnerability!! Now, I’m not gifted in song writing, but God has given me words. And so I am going to worship him with my words.
Firstly let me say that God is eternally faithful. He has never left me, he never will. I look back on my life and am amazed to see that God has been doing huge things in my life, preparing me for the future, in the times when I thought I was furthest from him!! In my darkest days of relationship with him when I wondered where he was and what he was doing that was more important than me, i have come to realize, he wasn't anywhere else, doing something more important, because there is nothing more important to him than me (and you)!! It wasn’t God that had gone anywhere, it was ME!! I’m reminded of the TRUTH found in the poem "Footprints."

One night a man had a dream.
He dreamed he was walking along the beach with the LORD.
Across the sky flashed scenes from his life.
For each scene he noticed two sets of
footprints in the sand: one belonging
to him, and the other to the LORD.

When the last scene of his life flashed before him,
he looked back at the footprints in the sand.
He noticed that many times along the path of
his life there was only one set of footprints.
He also noticed that it happened at the very
lowest and saddest times in his life.
This really bothered him and he
questioned the LORD about it:

"LORD, you said that once I decided to follow
you, you'd walk with me all the way.
But I have noticed that during the most
troublesome times in my life,
there is only one set of footprints.
I don't understand why when
I needed you most you would leave me."

The LORD replied:"My son, my precious child,
I love you and I would never leave you.
During your times of trial and suffering,
when you see only one set of footprints,
it was then that I carried you."

I love this poem because even thought it's old and some might say a little too "Christian" I can relate to it so easily! I look back on the times when I have been struggling, and don’t know what's going on, and I see only one set of prints! And I think to myself, "GOD IS GOOD!!!"

Another thing that amazes me is God's grace!
Actually this doesn’t amaze me as much as it BLOWS MY MIND!! I still struggle to come to grips with the fact that God, the creator of the universe sent his Son to die in my place and I am the one who did the killing!! In fact I think it goes even further than that! God didn’t just say to the SON, "Off you go, do your thing," God created a body for his son! Just like he created us, he CREATED Jesus!! I was thinking about this a while ago and found it hard to get my head around! This was God’s Son, with whom he'd been in relationship for eternity, being sent to earth, to live by the laws of this earth, to die unfairly by the people of this earth, in order that the very people doing the killing would be able to spend eternity with him!! What’s more, Psalm 139 applies to Jesus too!! God poured all of his creativity and imagination into Jesus, creating for him a body like yours or mine, God designed Jesus TOO! Then Isaiah 53 describes what happened to Jesus body! God poured all his love into this particular creation, he watched with intent as he grew in the womb, he laughed and cried as Jesus experienced childhood he shared in Jesus' struggles and in his temptations, he was there to strengthen Jesus. God spent 33 years with Jesus, all so that he could take our sin to the cross! One of the hardest things for me to understand I guess is the depth of his grace! I’m sure you know what I’m talking about, I just cant understand (I KNOW, but don’t understand, cow jai mai?-you get it?) how God is able to allow me to come back to him after I’ve stumbled. How is it that God LOVES me THAT much that, despite my murdering his son at the first chance I got, he still wants me back? By his amazing grace. It’s one of those things that I’ll never fully understand I think. I mean, who could? But I don’t think that lack of understanding is a bad thing when it comes to God and his unendingness. If I fully understood God, then where would be the need for faith? Christianity’s focus would focus from that of faith in a God that can’t be seen, to how can we use this knowledge to create a God we CAN see!

Let me say "I LOVE God!!!!" I don’t know if you can say that or not, but he says that about you everyday! If you think that you're beyond God's love, YOURE NOT!! If you think that you don’t need God's love YOU DO!! I can’t say it enough!! GOD'S LOVE IS MIND BLOWING!! GOD'S FAITHFULNESS IS ETERNAL!! AND GOD'S GRACE IS AMAZING!!!

This post didn’t really turn out to be what I thought it would, but I know that if you are reading it and feeling that any of it relates to you, then God has used it for his kingdom. I wanted to worship God through this post and I think I have! It may not look like worship but anything that proclaims just how good HE is worship!!

How will you worship him today?

Ephesians 3

Paul's (and Servant's) Prayer for Spiritual Growth
14 When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father,*15 the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth.*16 I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit.17 Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God's love and keep you strong.18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is.19 May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
20 Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think.21 Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever! Amen.

Here i go Stealing Posts Again!

Paradox Jesus…

Jesus came into the world… that we may enter into heaven.

Jesus was born in the flesh… that we may be born of the Spirit.

Jesus was born of woman… that we may be born of God.

Jesus became the Son of Man… that we may become sons of God.

Jesus accepted poverty… that we may be made rich.

Jesus became a man of sorrows… that we may rejoice and be glad.

Jesus was made sin for us… that we might be made righteous.

Jesus was put to death… that we may have life.

Jesus was cursed… that we might be blessed.

i got this from my friend MATT's blog. please check him out he has good stuff to say