New Site

Hey, Just in case you did not hear, I moved my blog site here.  Come check it out!!

http://journeysofadisciple.wordpress.com/


God Bless

Life Continues

Well I have been quiet recently, and honestly that has a lot to do with trying to process through the recent events in my life.  Through this all, God is speaking loud and clear into my life.  "Come to me all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." The truth of His word, truly has life. Anyway things stay the same here.  Going to class, writing papers, doing duties, and finding ways to restore my sanity every weekend. Recently, in one of my classes I needed to write a meta-narrative of the Biblical Story, and I would like to share it with you all. So here it is. Let me know what you think. 

“In the beginning, God…”¹ The focal point of this story is, remains, and will always be God and the exaltation of his glory. God, eternally existent, explodes into the scene of time with the creation of a sphere teeming with life, bursting with potential. One by one, he brings forth beauty out of nothing. Breaking fundamental scientific laws, matter bursts forth; being placed in ever increasing order. He reaches the climax of this spectacular display with the creation of man, his very image bearers among the created order. Reaching down, Yahweh digs deep into the dirt. Molding and shaping, he forms a being to be his representation and authority among the created beasts and vegetation, like a potter shapes his masterpiece. God infuses his breath of life into humankind and anoints them as priests in the land, to tend, subdue, cultivate, and reflect the glory of creator God throughout the whole earth.

This scene does not last. Fast forward years in this garden, and evil comes onto the scene through one of the Almighty’s fallen angels. Mankind is deceived, and moves to extend their own glory, in their attempt to be like God, they shatter the perfect bond enjoyed between mankind and the Creator. The human race from this point on, became infected with a disease; a disease that spreads throughout each generation in the seed of man. This evil is seen in every cry of pain, every death, every killing, in both the human and animal race. God, in an act of grace banishes Adam and Eve from the garden, sparing them from living forever in this fallen state.

From this point on, the world degenerates where evil is so pervasively threaded into the fabric of mankind, that every waking thought of man was evil, similar to how poison spreads through the entire host. This greatly grieves the Lord until he regrets his act of creating these beings. At this point, God graciously bestows favor on one man, Noah, in hopes of redemption. In a swift act of judgment, God consumes the whole world in a massive flood.

The flood subsides and Noah’s family line lives as the only humans left; mankind flourishes, evil corrupts at the tower of Babel, and the Lord disperses humanity, confusing the languages. God interacts with several people from this point on, to establish a people for his own possession and glory. He confronts an idol-worshiper named Abram and through him God blesses all the nations of the earth.

Through this line, God seeks the restoration of people for his name’s sake and eternal glory. He steps into the scene through the person of Jesus, born of a virgin, born without the seed of man, lacking the curse of evil, and having the nature of the Divine. This man was God with us; Deity in flesh. Jesus lived a spotless life, became the subject of the wrath of God for the redemption of humanity on the cross, and salvation to the nations when he rose three days later.

Coming is his eternal supreme kingdom. One in which he will sit on the throne eternally, reigning with the saints from the previous age. Evil will be vanquished and God will rule triumphantly throughout eternity. There we will glorify God by enjoying him forever.

1 Genesis 1 English Standard Version, Good News Publishers, Wheaton, IL 2001

Grace and Peace to you all . 

-Dan 

 

Peace

“and the peace that passes all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

I was thinking about peace the other day. I have truly not experienced peace as such I am experiencing now. 
Peace is a funny thing actually, so abstract and seemingly fleeting and unattainable, yet when experienced even in the most temporary sense, is an overwhelming force that can either calm any chaos life throws at you,  strengthen you with courage, and spur you on, or crush  you in the emptiness of its absence. Like many of us I have experience both of these extremes, but this is the first time where peace has been put to the real test in my life.   While I am not going to sit here and pretend that moving fifteen thousand six hundred and fifty-six miles away from my family, friends, and everything else that I had known about life to start a virtually new life has not had me slightly stressed at moments, it has not been overwhelming in even the slightest sense of the word. You see, the Lord told me to come here; quite clearly, he laid this before my heart and tugged my stubborn soul along to it. And because of this simple fact, I have been able to rest in peace that only can have one source.  I see that being the case for lots of people here.  It is a cool place, actually, almost of the people here just have a great story of how they got here and how the Lord has been there every step of the way.

                I am starting to think that this may be one of the first lessons that God is showing me, the power of simply resting in his peace. The peace that passes all understanding:  a peace that tells you that things are most certainly out of your control, yet entirely in His, a peace that does not blind you to the circumstances, but points your eyes to the one who holds the world in His hands, a peace that is not conjured up by music, or warm-fuzzies, but one that anchors the soul steady on the Rock of Ages.  

Time is flying

Yea, it’s been awhile since I have been able to post, and quite honestly, so much has happened since. So let’s take it one step at a time.

I took a life the other day; it tasted pretty good, after it was cooked.  Yea, I got to kill a chicken.  It was kind of a weird thing to do; I wouldn’t say I necessarily enjoyed it, but not like I am going to need to see a therapist either. I’ll leave some of the more graphic details out for now.  I grabbed the chicken and it willingly laid its head down on the stump.  My first swing wasn’t so good, and consequently it slipped away from me, so I needed an extra set of hands to help me out a bit.  I got it on the third swing. I will say, though, that I got a bit of insight into why many tribes respect the life of animals especially in death.  It’s something that I don’t really notice when I am eating meat, but life is sacrificed for our eating.  Now, I am not going to become a vegetarian or something, but I think it adds a certain amount of thankfulness for my food and leaves me less likely to waste.

                A couple weekends ago we took a trip and it was incredible.  I got the opportunity to head out on a camping trip to Cradle Mountain and then Stanley Beach.  We set out after dinner on Friday, donned in our sick 2 dollar camping hats that we found at Kmart, and drove till we reached a place called the Promised Land, figuring that was a good place to set camp for the night.  So we drove a bit into the forest, down a winding path that led to a lake at the bottom. We couldn’t really find a good spot by the lake so we drove back up the road and set up camp on the shoulder of the road.  It was an abnormally large shoulder so it worked well for camping.  We put the car between us and the road and set up a sick nasty camp site, cooked some sausages, listened to Bob Marley, and overall just had a good time.

                The sleeping wasn’t so good though.  Gravel and sticks pierced my back all night long, and we only had two warm sleeping bags to share between the four of us, so the first night I got stuck with a blanket….a very thin blanket.  It was awful, my body would shiver till it passed out, be awoken shortly after then repeat the process.  Add that to all the scary noises of wallabies hopping through the woods at my feet, and that makes a night of close to no sleep for this city boy.  When we woke it took about an hour for me to warm up,  only to find out that  Dennis had an extra blanket all night… barely even using it.  Gah.

                We made it out to Cradle Mountain next.  That place was absolutely beautiful.  The mountain rose above a crystal clear, pristine lake, set in a cloudless sky.  I think it was about 31 degrees, so absolutely gorgeous day.  The trek wasn’t too bad, only taking three hours to get to the top, but us being the men that we are decided to take on the manly challenge of not having any water till we reached the top, and succeeded. It got tricky at some points, where we had to wip out our awesome tomb raiding skills, to jump crevices and slip through cracks. Getting to the top was so rewarding, I stood on top of the world, 1590 meters high, and had to scream, “I’m king of the world” (a little Office reference).  We then feasted on PB&J and water. Mmmmm.    Being on top of a mountain is a humbling experience.   I was awed at the magnificence of God and made so much more aware of my own insignificance

                That night we made the drive out to Stanley to camp out on the beach.  This is an experience everyone should have.  Camping on a beach is so chill; the sound of the ocean, the clear starry ceiling, the soft sand, and just the amazing fresh air.  Usually penguins can be found on this beach. Yea penguins, and we were completely ready to hunt one of them suckers down and have a great dinner, but no penguins were there this time. During the night, the tide came up.  Very far. A lot farther than we had imagined when we set camp.  Imagine waking up to the sound of crashing waves at your feet, looking up and seeing the ocean that was once a good three hundred feet away, was now about to crash at your feet.  Thankfully it only got about a meter or so from us. The sunrise though had to be one of my favorite parts of this camping spot.  We were on the eastern coast, and seeing the sun come up out of the ocean is indescribable.

                Hopefully I can get the video of the weekend up and some pictures, but I have limited internet usage so no promises. Try this link https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=3134580795876 if it works, its the video.  The picture of the spider was the product of a prank on me from some "good" friends. It was put in my bed...

               

Pray for me over the next few months.  I have been reading a lot about prayer lately and have become rather discontent with traditional prayer routines I have followed. Lately I have felt that something needs to change for me to go further with God, and the Spirit has alerted me to this, so I am going on a prayer journey with God. I’m excited to see where this leads me. Pray that I will persevere and that I would be sensitive to the leading of the Spirit.

Peace.

II Corinthians 12:9-10

And so it begins

Well Monday was the first day of classes.  It was a typical first day of classes, with boring introductory lectures, which consequently led to me nodding off every five or so minutes.  We only had a half-day of lectures, so not so bad I guess. The course set up here is in modules. So basically we do one module at a time, covering a year’s worth of material in about four weeks.  So 144 hours of lectures, assessment,reading, and professional practice for this first four weeks.  All I could think is, “when am I allowed to sleep”. This first module should be interesting…

After class Monday some guys and I went down to the river at the bottom of the farm to go for a quick swim.  It was such a nice day here.  Like mid 20’s! I was a little hesitant to jump in at first (because to the best of my knowledge, all of Australia is croc territory mixed with evil snakes). So like the good friends that my buddies here are, about five or so minutes after we get in they start screaming,“Snake!” , followed by sliding their feet by me, to give the illusion of a snake coming in for the kill…I should have kept my mouth shut about the snake phobia.

After that I got to try my hand at driving a motorcycle…not a pretty sight.  I got it started without stalling on the first try, but turned the accelerator a little too far… shot off through the paddock weaving left and right, screaming the whole way.  I stopped for a second to catch myself, but it stalled out of course. I got it set back up and took off, in the direction of the electric fence…weaved away after my friend Joe alerted me to it,swerving instead towards a concrete trough. As I got closer I was able to turn a bit and kick my foot of it to keep away a bit, get it stopped and manage to fall off while it was standing still.  Let’s just say I am learning humility a bit so far. 

On a side note: I got placed on the Church planting ministry team!!! Pumped!!   There are several ministry teams here with the student body, most of them doing  different ministries throughout the area, then there is the Church planting team and I was assigned to it.   Pray for me during this new experience; that the Spirit of God would work through me and strengthen me for however he may have me serve,  that he would kill what is detrimental to my sanctification and would mold me into his servant.

Last days before class

The last few days were relatively uneventful.  The weather wasn’t so nice this weekend so we weren’t able to going camping in the mountains, but hopefully we can this coming weekend.  I did try teaching the Australians and Koreans here how to play a game of knockout… but that was quite unsuccessful, in-spite of one person having seen it played in a movie once….

I would say one of my top embarrassing moments occurred this weekend though.  It was Friday after dinner, and a bunch of us were shooting around at the hoop outside of the dining hall. I had foolishly chosen to wear cargo shorts…I deked my man and went for a layup, a little bit overzealous on my approach. I left the ground and all I heard was a rip.  Yea, it was my shorts….right up the crotch…which was followed by a very long walk back to my flat.

 I drove home from church today!!   It was ridiculous.  I hopped behind the wheel, super eager to go, flipped the switch to signal that I’m pulling out…and the windshield wipers turn on.  Yea that’s on the other side too. I got to my first turn and apparently forgot about staying on the left and had to veer across the oncoming lanes, to the chorus of screams coming from the back of the vehicle.  It was pretty smooth sailing from that point, but definitely is different enough to mess with ya.  

I ended my day with learning to play ping-pong Korean style.  I’m not too bad at it actually. Now were about to put together a worship session tonight for some people on campus.  So yea, relatively uneventful, but it is always good to have a chill weekend before the start of classes.

Here's a couple pictures of part of the gang having dinner tonight.  Dennis (the guy with the long hair) and I cooked it up.  It was curry rice with eggs and parsley.  The reason it is all in one bowl is that it was the night for the guys to do the dishes….(this is also evidence that I have made friends, to all those who think i make this stuff up....*ehhm..cassie...ehhm*)

 

Oh, we also talked about the presence of miraculous signs and gifts among believers till like 2 AM this morning. It sure was awesome to hear all these different cultural viewpoints on the topic.   How does the Spirit of God move among His people? It’s hard for me to take a more conservative view on this just because it doesn’t seem that if such an amazing God exists, that he wouldn’t miraculously move among his followers.  God is supernatural, why should I be so hesitant to believe in supernatural happenings amidst his church? Wouldn’t he express his presence in supernatural ways? Anyway, really just something to think about.

So I have written a few blogs this past week. I'm going to upload them. This is my first time using a blog so bear with me here.

Cattle duty!!

Today was the official beginning to Orientation week.  Classes don’t start until next, thank God for that because I am not quite ready for classes to begin.  Overall I just kinda bummed around in my room till orientation began at 4.  I seem to have stumbled across a head cold, which could likely be the result of such a dramatic change in living locations.

So here at Worldview the students pitch in around the campus to help keep costs down.  The administrator of the school creates a roster that has a several week rotation that is based on one’s assigned duty.  So tomorrow this city-slicker begins cattle duty on the farm.  I get to feed, herd, wrastle off crocs,  and overall tend to the cattle starting tomorrow.  I can’t explain how pumped I am.  Good thing I brought boots, cuz I would flip if I get cow crap on my kicks. Now every morning at 6 I get to lug my butt outta bed and head on over to the farm.  Guess I need to learn discipline somehow. Maybe I will come back to the states a good ole fashion wrangler….

Funny how I read from Hebrews 12 this morning on discipline from the Lord, I have a funny feeling He may be using this farm duty to help kill the habit of sloth I have formed in my life, either way I am crazy excited to see how God uses this experience to grow me.

Till later

Today was a day of firsts

I went to my first Australian church service, sat through my first sermon preached by a woman, saw Kangaroo burgers for the first time, went to my first Australian BBQ (which I was a co-bbq-er), swam outside for the first time ever in February, and subsequently got my first Australian sunburn, which seems to be funny to some of the folks here…not so much to me I even became the reason for a little notice on the bulletin board..check it out.   Today was a good day though in-spite of my fried skin. During dinner, the administrator made an announcement about an "unnamed foreign student" who should learn about the magic of sunscreen.
 

                On a side note- I’m fairly certain my hair dryer catches fire every now and then because of the voltage differences. That might be a problem someday…

                Starting to make plans to go to cradle mountain to camp and climb for a few days this coming weekend, I sure hope the weather holds out for that. Also starting to learn about the best spots to surf around can’t wait. Anyway, that about sums up my day, and tomorrow is the start of orientation week, so I should go pass out somewhere….

First Full Day in Tassie

11 Feb

G-day!

Wow, first full day in Tasmania was legit. It was about 65 degrees this morning when I left the room to check out the campus a bit.  First thing we checked out was the administrative building and resource center.  The library was big. A lot bigger than I had suspected it to be. Plus I don’t need to buy any textbooks, because all of the textbooks are supplied in the library. Such a blessing.  After that we headed on over to the dining hall which was relatively small, but had a homely feel to it. It was one large room with several tables lined in rows, with a counter separating it from a large kitchen.  It was nice to see the place that will eventually add a good twenty pounds to my gut.   From there we headed down to the farm.  As we rounded the corner, the scene was immediately breathtaking.  The school rests peacefully up on a hill, with the farm extending down into the valley before climaxing with a serene river. Such scenery expires nothing but praise to such an awesome Creator.   I haven’t seen such a beautiful place before in my life.

                Anyway, later on in the day, I decided I wanted to go for a run to keep my self awake.   So I strapped on my Vibram 5 fingers and headed out the door down to the pastures on the farm.  I trekked my way down, and jogged all around the paddocks of cattle making sure to stay on the truck paths. (avoiding the tall grass for all the poisonous snakes, of course.  I learned that all of the snakes here are poisonous, wonderful...)  Then the perfect tree caught my gaze and i just had to climb it to sit for awhile . There was one minor problem though; it was behind the fence that kept the cattle from deciding to become vagabonds.  So I thought to myself, “I’m going to be smart about this”, grabbed some metal and smashed the fence against it looking for sparks. Nothing.  So all is good, right? Wrong. I grabbed the fence…..  All was not good.  Not good at all.  Let’s just say this is something that inevitably happens when you throw a city-slicker out on a farm...

Till later,

#NotAsSmartAsI’dLikeToBe

Peace

Great Start to life here

.... Missed my flight. Gahhh. It was an interesting process that led up to it at least.  It started with me waiting in line for about an hour to go through passport control, which was slightly due to the fact that they only had 5 lanes open for the several hundred people that jut had to get on line when I did. The nerve. So I get through that and I'm thinking I'm home free... Well not quite yet. Baggage pick up and the customs. I grab my three bags feeling like a full fledge woman with so many (thanks mom), and look for the line to go through customs. Well of course that line is nearing a thousand people long and they had only three lanes open this time!!!! So I zig-zagged my way through the queue maze knocking down the a total of 5 ropes cuz I can't quite figure out how to manage 3 bags {thanks again mom :) } looking like a classic dork as I do it I might add. So finally it's my turn, I have twenty mins till my plane leaves, and the guard sends me through another line so a drug dog can sniff my bags.  the dog does its job and then its race time for me. Im weaving through the crowds of people, flinging out apologies left and right for assaulting people with my outta control luggage. I followed the right signs and it led me to a uphill moving sidewalk... That was not functioning...So I gather a full head of steam and blast up the walkway, my luggage just wide enough that it could create a significant amount of friction just to spite me. As I'm about half way up an Asian man in uniform runs halfway down at me muttering something about stupidity and me...  I got to the top and made a quick turn and started running-ish, only to realize I'm going the wrong way..so i turned around and frantically dashed to the Qantas counter.  With my luggage deciding it just hasn't knocked enough queue ropes down, I erratically made it to the front desk. At this point I had sweat dripping from every pore due to the three rolling bags, the backpack strapped uncomfortable to my back and the heavy fall jacket insulating my body too well.  I got to counter, so confused at this point that I was handing all of the wrong boarding passes to the attendant..Long story short, I was about 15 mins late.... Now I'm stuck here till 3. So im sitting in the waiting area dizzy from dehydration and lack of food..too bad the vending machine next too me is broken…and im too lazy to walk back to the food court.   Can't win em all I guess..

Peace

Acts 20:24

About to leave

                                                                     9 Feb

Well it's finally happening. What started as a seemingly outrageous back in June, is finally becoming a reality..  I'm sitting Ohare international airport, and all I have been thinking of is how blessed my life has been up to this point. The father of lights who is the giver of all good gifts has blessed me with an unbelievable family. My love for them is inexpressible and is resulting in a large amount of the sadness I am feeling now. And God did not stop there, but branched his blessing to great friends as well. The only thing that allows me to be able to leave all of this great blessing behind for a time can be summed up similarly to how Paul felt in Acts 20:24. " For I consider my life of no value to me, only that I may complete the task the Lord Jesus has set before me. The task of testifying of the gospel of God's grace."

Much love

Acts 20:24