Crazines...=/

Lately my life has pure chaos!
I'm not even sure where to start...
But lets start with what's going on at home. My mom had mouth surgery last Thursday. So my family has been tending to her a lot. Then me and my sisters are fighting so much! I don't know why, but all of the sudden we just can't get along very well. Since my mom has gone back to work me and my sisters are at home alone from 8:30-1:30 every weekday. That just gives them more time alone with me to get on my every last nerve. I have so much stuff to get done cause of my Kenya trip being in ONLY 2 weeks, It's very hard to study and prepare sermons and a Sunday school lesson with two girls always yelling at me. So the focus on getting stuff done in time for the Kenya trip hasn't been going very good at all. Then my parents were fighting, but luckily that has stopped now. It always bothers me so much when my parents fight. It scares me too, cause on my mom's side of the family- her and her youngest brother are the ONLY ones who have never been divorced. And it's not that i think my parents are going to get a divorce, it's just that's the only thing I've ever seen- when times get tough, run away from it. Luckily, i know that my parents will never split up. And the fighting between them has stopped! and i pray that it won't start again.
Now on to the spiritual stuff: Kenya in two weeks!! [as mentioned earlier :P] I've got 2 twenty minute sermons to get done, 1 little kids Sunday school [1hr. long, w/50+ kids.] to prepare, Evangelism stuff to get together [aka- testimony, and a couple five minute things.], THEN a devotion for the morning or night time meetings. Then there's always the packing and buying of luggage, and malaria Rx., and the shots [OUCH!], then so much more...
But that's just the Kenya stuff!! :P HaHaHaHa.
Here's the other stuff...
I'm on the prayer team, so every weekday we have a schedule of what to war for. It's a pretty long list to always keep up with. But by no means is it impossible!!. Then Lance- who is in charge of the whole pre service prayer and prayer team thing- is leaving! Yep, tomorrow is his last Wednesday ever! So the original plan was for Nate-James to take it over, But he's a nation leader at Y.F.N. so he will be gone for a big majority of the summer. Then the back up plan was Trish Key. But she works at the C.F.N.I. cafe, So whenever yfn is there she has to be there till 6pm. By this time we have now lost our team leader [lance] and both our adult leader, and intern [Nate 'n' Trish] The only people left on the team are students. Jordan W., Kelli G., And I. So we will be doing everything. I'm soooooo super stoked about it being completely student lead. But there comes a whole buttload of responsibility with that. We [Jordan Kelli and i] understand what it'll take, and we're ready for it. It's just going to be harder then normal. And personally that makes me excited!! I love a challenge!! Epically when it's a challenge at church. I always love being pushed beyond my limits.
So that's what's been going on lately. sorry it's been a lil while since I've posted.
I just haven't had anything to post about.
And this post is kind of boring anyways :P HaHaHa..
PS- please be praying for me, cause my wrist has been messing up so much lately. And i know without a shadow of a doubt that it is because of Kenya. It's amazing how much stuff has come against us. But i kind of like that it's hurting, cause that means the devil is trying to stop me from going, which means we are all going do some pretty amazing stuff over there!! :D
The~end(:

_Rebekah_Danae_

Hmmm.. {not sure what the title should be}

So, I don't really have anything specific that this post is about. Which means that it'll be random, and let's remember that random isn't a bad thing.. not a bad thing at all(:

I'll just fill you guys in on what's gone on since my last post.....

Saturday my family and I were shopping for some things for Kenya. I needed shoes since every pair of my shoes are either flats, or converse. And my dad needed some dress clothes since he's going to be preaching at the pastors conference multiple times. We started off at DSW for shoes [my dad needed shoes also]. I personally don't like tennis shoes, But for Kenya i have to have them. So one of my sisters [Krysta-the 11 yr old.] asked me if some white shoes would work. And i responded "No, cause white in Kenya doesn't mix." In my head the thought process was because everywhere you go there's dirt!, and so the white would get really dirty. But of course my other sister [Haley-she's 9.] took that completely different than how i meant it. So she starts busting out laughing!! She was laughing so hard that old people were looking at her weird!! Then she explains rather loudly to Krysta [across half of the store] that the reason white in Kenya doesn't mix is because everyone in Kenya is black!! It was the funniest thing I've experienced since i heard Hiroki's Yoshi laugh!!! The looks on every one's face that was around us were truly priceless!! Most definitely a Kodak moment :D But long story short for that adventure we did find some shoes!
Then later that evening my dad told me that I had to check all the fluids in his car- Since I've started driving he puts all of the stupid, simple, yet annoying jobs in my responsibility. Aka getting gas and checking the oil, power steering, brake, and transmission fluids.- So i went out to do it. The engine oil was a little less than a quart low, so i added some. Then all of the other fluids were fine. This seemed like a pretty normal check up for the lil car he just got. But i was mistaken, oh so mistaken. I went to start the car so it could get to operating temperature and then i would be able to check transmission fluid. Ten-ish minutes passed then i started to check it. It looked fine the first time, but you're supposed to check it 2-3 times. On my third time of checking it, it still looked good. So i was putting the long thing [can't remember the name] back in the pipe and i accidentally touched it to the edge of the battery connector. So it made this piercing, shocking, crackling, sparking sound. There were sparks everywhere!! And so the thing that started out to be about two full feet long all-of-the-sudden turned bright orange- cause it was so hot- and then just melted off and fell onto the engine [still bright orange!]. After everything had melted off the thing was maybe 5 inches!!!! It was the scariest- yet coolest- things EVER!!!

Then Sunday was a pretty legit Sunday. Except that I ate lunch with Alex Perezillll. Which just made me realize how much he has fallen. Kinda depressing, but made me more aware of what is happening to my generation. Cause most of the time I notice that people aren't at Paradigm, or that I haven't seen them on Sundays. But i never see them outside of those settings. I never see them to realize and see the change that they've made. It also made me appreciate the leadership team that we have, that are strong and here to stay, even more. Then Kenya meeting. Then small groups with Nate 'n' Trish.

Monday was crap.
Tuesday was borderline okay but leaning towards the crap category.
Wednesday was great.
And today [Thursday] My mom got her wisdom teeth cut out. Painful, yes. But the rest of today has been just sitting around at home getting her stuff that she needs- aka water and pain killers. Then here i sit, blogging it up.

I guess that's the end for now..

But please be praying for me, cause I'm not doing to great on the preparation-ing for Kenya stuff.

Thanks(:

..::From the Inside Out::..

For Kenya this year what Gavin Audagnotti is doing is he's letting each of the team members pick one song that is really close to their heart. Like, one of those songs to where when you turn it on you just feel deep in your heart that you need to worship, It speaks to you. He's doing this so that when we worship it won't be some random song that he picked, It'll bring us to that place with God. And my automatic choice was the song From the Inside Out by Hillsong United. When ever that song is on my iPod I just want to break myself down for God. I can't really explain it, But if any of y'all have ever been to Y.F.N. before you know what i mean. It's sort of like the feeling to where God consumes you so much that you don't know whether to sit, stand, jump around, be still, raise your arms, or just fall flat on your face!! You're so in love with god that you don't know really what to do. For me, that's how the song From the Inside Out is! I don't know what it is, but i love it!!
One thing that i find with music is that it can sound really amazing, But the lyrics are lacking. With that song though, it doesn't.

A thousand times i've failed, still your mercy remains. And should i stumble again, I'm caught in your grace. Your will above all else, still my purpose remains the art of loosing myself in bringing you praise. Everlasting your light will shine when all else fades. Never ending your glory goes beyond all fame. And the cry of my heart is to bring you praise. From the inside out Lord my soul cries out. My heart and my soul, i give you control. Consume me from the inside out Lord. Let justice and praise become my embrace, To love you from the inside out.

I think that every person needs something that speaks such truth into their life that they can't even find a loop-hole [for lack of a better word]. This world needs more Christians who are willing to desire such an intimacy with God. More christians who are willing to loose themself in praising God with a purity that surpasses all sin and doubt.
I had no idea what i was gonna blog about, and this is what came from typing out what was on my heart. So take that cookie and eat it!! :D

Wednesday night.

Encouragement...
Encouragement can be a very mind changing thing. In the perfect timing it can give someone new perspectives on anything. Wednesday night at youth i was so encouraged by some of the greatest people ever. In the prayer team meeting if we have some time in the end then Lance will pick a random member of the team and just have everyone else pour into them, encourage them, to tell them basically how awesome they truly are. And this week we had about 8 minutes left before we had to head out into prayer, so Lance chose me to be the encouraged one for that particular meeting. So for about 8 minutes i was just being encouraged by the whole prayer team [Lance, Trish, Nathan, Jordan, and Kelli]. It's kind of funny too, cause sometimes we don't really know how much we need encouragement until we get it. So i realized how much i didn't see myself as a leader, and how much i needed to be encouraged...
Lately i had my best friend all-of-the-sudden completely ignore me. She wouldn't answer any of my phone calles, she wouldn't email me back for anything, and at church she would see me then walk the other direction, then eventually she stopped coming... I kept on asking myself what i did wrong, and if i was even a good friend. But i didnt have any sort of answer. I also kept on questioning my leadership skills. Cause if i can't even get my best friend to come to church then how could i get anyone else to come?? I didn't know what happened. I just had to deal with it, and eventually get over it.. I still call her all of the time, and i still look for her at church. Cause the worst thing that could happen is that she'll ignore the call, or not be at church- which has been happening for the past few months, so the worst is over, and i had no excuse to not reach out to her still. So i kept on trying.. And even though i'm basically over the shock [for lack of a better word] of this happening with no explination, i still had those questions in the back of my mind. No matter how hard i tried to ignore them, or silence them, they were always there. But last night in the prayer meeting I was more encouraged than i have been in literally years. Everything that the team was telling me was everything that i needed to hear! They kept on telling me that I am genuine, amazingly committed, and strong. Jordan said this verse that he said made him think of me, and that it truly described me. The verse was Psalm 16:8 "I have set the Lord always before me. Since he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken." And i had absolutely no idea how much i really needed that!! They pointed out that in our youth group we always have students that leaders need to go after to get them involved or to get them to commit. But no one ever went after me to disciple me or pour itno me. I just already was a leader before i was an actual student leader.... Because of that my night was the greatest night ever!! It just made me excited to be there, and ready for the service. It lifted my spirit. I was ready to set an example in worship and everything else.
So from now on i am gonna try to encourage people as often as i can, to let them know that im grateful for them just being them, and nothing/no one else... Cause you never know what is going on that you can't see. And you never know how some simple encouragement can change their self-esteem level, and their heart.

The Day for Mothers

Today was a pretty great day!!(:
For mothers day we got my mom a card and Chocolate. [low on funds, so that was the extent of the presents] We didn't do a mothers day dinner yet cause we never do celebration stuff actually on the day of. We wait till the day after, or we'll do it the day before. Cause everywhere is usually too crowded and too busy to make it hard to enjoy. So we are most likely going to go to macaroni grill tomorrow night for a happy belated mothers day dinner :P haha..
So we went to taco casa for lunch. I'm not too big of a fan of that place, but.. I survived. Then another thing that she wanted most for mothers day was an un-interrupted nap. For however long she wanted, and at any moment that she wanted it. So everyone went home and let her take a nap. :P Then we rented a movie grabbed some dinner and came home.. We never got around to watching the movie though. Cause right when we got home we all gather around the phone and called all the grandmas and great-grandmas, The place we happened to gather was in the back yard cause my sisters were jumping on the trampoline. The phone calls were kind of awkward at some points cause everyone was talking over eachother since it was on speaker phone. But none the less still good to talk to all the old relatives. Right after that i saw a tennis ball in the yard. So i grabbed it and my dad wanted to see how far i could throw it. I was in the very back corner of our yard and i threw it as hard as i could, the ball went completely across the yard, over the fence, down the driveway, and hit my mom's car!! We were all impressed that i could throw it that far, but my mom was mad that it hit her car :P haha.. I ran to get the ball and it was stuck right in between where the hood meets the windsheild and windsheild wipers. Then when i had got it out and was back in the yard me and my dad were throwing it around, so my sister got inbetween us and tryed to get it. Also known as monkey in the middle.. But this was a complete knock down drag out game of monkey in the middle! We played for nearly an hour! And i left the game with a huge black bruise on my thigh, A welt on the top of my foot, and bruises all on my arms!! It was the greatest family bonding we've had in a while!! (:
And that's all for today, just bruises and naps and crappy taco casa :P

Thursday.. : )

Today was a pretty darn good day! For the longest time we've [me and the family] have been praying for my dad a car. The requirements were: A/C, Good m.p.g., Good cd player, and last but not least It couldn't be any color or shade of brown. {[Cause literally every car that we've owned has been the color of dirt.]} But my dad's car now is this little '93 Saturn. Tan [which is a no-no]. 30-33 mpg. No A/C. And it has 189-ish thousand miles on it. My dads work is off of highway 635 and midway- Basically over by the galleria. So therefore A/C and good gas mileage are a must!! Then today God answered our prayers!!! :D A guy that we know called us up and basically asked us if we were by anychance looking for a car to buy. So it turns out that this guy is selling a 2000 toyota corolla!! It's blue, Gets 30-33 mpg, And barely has 115 thousand miles on it. W/air conditioning!! which a 2000 isn't new, but he is only selling it for three thousand dollars!! and earlier this week we got our tax-return check. So there's exactly 3000$ in my dad's car fund. Whoa, God is awesome!! So we took it for a test drive and checked it out alot, and we're getting it tomorrow!!!!! And i'm pretty sure that this was most definately an answered prayer!! :D The~End

Luke 17:6

So earlier i was praying and reading my Bible, and God took me to Luke 17:6. And that is something that it seems like every regular church go-er has heard over and over again. But this time God showed it to me in a different yet interesting way.
Luke 17:6 "The Lord answered 'If you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, then you could say to this mulberry tree 'May you be uprooted and thrown into the sea,' and it will obey you!"

But instead of looking at it as it's always been told- Faith is the key! [which it still is] Just look at it this way... Why did God pick a tree in this example? Well it's because a tree has roots! You cant just push a tree over and it'll slide over out of your way. There are roots involved that are deeper than we can see, and stronger than the tree itself. Whenever we have a problem that we don't want to deal with it becomes the seed. When we try to ignore it we're just putting dirt and soil on top of that seed. And when we try to say that we don't have any problems then we are merely watering that seed that is now in the perfect growing habitat that we created for it. For me God showed me this for the Paradigm students that have fallen away or chosen the wrong paths, the roots became too much to deal with alone. And that's what we all are here for. We are here to help eachother with the small seed problems before they become roots.

Another thing that i was shown was how in the end it said "and it would obey you!" key word being obey. Why did God say obey you instead of "and it will move."? Well when something obeys you that means that it's submitting to your authority. When you obey your parents it's because they are your authority. It's the same thing with the tree, We have authority over it! But like it said in the beginning- "if you had faith." Faith is still the key, and without faith we don't have the strength or authority to uproot that tree.

amazing...

Watch this quick you tube video.. Greatest thing ever!! :P

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ar_k8JjVWQA

<- This picture was in Kenya last year. At the end right before we said goodbye to the kids at the grace HIV/aids children's home, we all circled up, held hands, and prayed together. It was easily one of my favorite parts of the trips. And yet the worst part, cause we were leaving.

That trip has changed my life. Even now as the return to Kenya is coming soon [June7Th] I still remember how much those little kids touched my life, and how much it hurt to leave. But I'm pretty sure that leaving will always be the hardest part. No matter where i go. Or how long i stay. Or who i am with. It will always bring me to tears to look back in the van and watch the orphanage get smaller and smaller as we drive away. Yet leaving in and of itself is a blessing in disguise. Cause if I had never left then i wouldn't be able to return. All of the excitement that i have right now wouldn't be here if i had never left. You can't return if you're never gone. So i had to accept those tear as a gift. Cause now I am over-joyed with the anticipation to say 'hi' to those kids again.

Just for Kirsten.

So in one of the comments that Kirsten left me she was telling me that i spelled something wrong.. So this is everything wrong that ya'll should know before going on in reading my blog.

1. I will prolly spell a buttload of words wrong.
2. I suck at grammar, in fact- I always got alot of sucky grades in school at grammar.
3. Sometimes i make up my own words as i go along. They just come to me, so i go with it.
4. & i can be bad at getting off topic.
So you should be expecting a lot of the above within this blog of mine( :

Oh sweet petition.

So, something that me and a few other sl's {student leaders} have been joking around about for a while is getting together a petition to give to Pastor Tim. The reasoning behind this petition is because we always come into the sl meeting with our stomachs growling cause the donuts don't last beyond second service, and there is always food in upgrade- just never in sl meetings. So today i decided that i was actually going to make it!! Yep, I made that petition!! In fact earlier I spent an hour on excel with my dad [He's an engineer/nerd, so he uses it all the time]. Cause apparently i'm just that bad at it! :P So for those of you lakeshore-ers come sign this petition of mine and support a very worthy cause, the cause of the neglected and starved Paradox student leadership team.

Anticipation..

I am so excited for my return to Kenya! To where everything i say is about Kenya or the journey there and/or back. I am going to miss last years team, but this year will most definitely be amazing too! It seems like we have had so many people drop out- due to busy schedules, prior commitments, or money- and that this year will be kind of boring. But that's just the way it seems at first thought. I however believe that it will be quite a bit smaller but we're going to be just as effective. We will be small in number, but think of the team as being more consentrated not divided. Take for example consentrated juices. There is less of the amount but what there IS is stronger. And i truly believe that that's what this year is going to be. I am just completely excited, anticipating amazing-ness, stoked, in awe, and looking forward to the Kenya '09 trip.

God. Is. Awesome.

Ok, so. I don't really know where to begin with this post, cause I'm really hyper and got approximately zero and a half hours of sleep last night.
But due to my extreme jittery hyperness there will prolly be a lot of typos, just to let you know.
I'll just start with what God did for me... Last night i went over to the holland's house for pizza [me and my dad usually go over every thursday] and Anna was on her handy dandy laptop figuring out all the money and stuff from the 'stock calling' fundraiser we've been doing. But before that my parents had decided that only one of my sisters should go, Cause unless by someone hands us a 9000$ check we will all be stressing out too much. So the agreement was that we will just take it one trip payment at a time and if God wants ALL of us to go then he will give us the money while giving us a peace about finances [or lack there of:P]. Then neither of my sisters wanted to go w/o the other one. [side note: AHH I JUST RAN OUTTA COFFEE!!, okay.. i'm back now.] So then it was just down to me and my padre like last year. And wednesday soemone gave us a check for 3000$ [Praise God!! :O] So that completely paid off my dads trip just from that one check. And anna figured out the stock calling money, and we got about 1000$ more than we expected!!!! So all of the sudden all the money we needed to pay off my trip was 64 dollars. I mean, What the heck just happened!!!!?? We went from needing 2000 dollars to just 64 dollars. We took the 64$ out of my dads car fund :P It wasnt that big of a deal at all for it to be taken out of that... Here's the funny part though, The whole time my parents were doing all of this figuring out money and talking with anna and what not, I had no idea what they were doing. So i took a bite of pizza and they said "so, danae we are going to kenya. Were also all paid off.." I was just amazed!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And ever since that I have been so jittery and hyper. It also doesnt help that i had anna holland coffee at 930 last night too.
So all of that is the reasoning for the insane lack of sleep!! :D I'm just too excited about Kenya and not having to worry about money anymore!! Between the anna holland coffee and no stress anymore, I just feel like i'm walking on air!! And usually anyone can tell how i'm feeling by what my current on-the-go playlist is. And right not its, i saw the light by david crowder band. Foreverandever etc.. by david crowder band. Beside you now by the fold. Undignified by david crowder band. Hey by leeland [all time favorite song]. Jesus is alright by dc talk. Looking for you by kirk franklin. No parking on the dance floor by midnight star. Canned heat [idk the artist:P]. and last but not least is Luv is a verb by dc talk. Whooooooooooooo I am too hyper!!!!!!!!!!
But in the end... God provided when i knew he would. Thanks to Him i am going to Kenya!!!!!!!!!!!
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH........The~end :D :O :P :)