Wow 7 days before I leave! Thank you so much to ALL of you who have been supporting me!! Your prayers, emails, checks, questions, and time have meant so much to me! I am so glad I listened to my church. They encouraged us to seek support from people in our lives for prayer and financial support. At first I was not very enthusiastic about having to ask people to support me financially. However, God has opened so many doors through this process! He has shown me what amazing people I have in my life! What generous and thoughtful people support me everyday and I take it for granted. THANK YOU!!

I went to a marriage conference this weekend called A Weekend to Remember. I believe I was the only single person there! There were about 300 couples! So you are probably wondering why I went. Well because starting August 17th I will be leading a Marriage Prep class at my church. For over the past year I have been researching and developing a marriage prep class. I am sooo excited about it. God has developed a passion in me to help couples start their marriage off right. That means for them to build their marriage on the foundation of the one who designed and created marriage...God! When you get something new you are excited about, but it comes in pieces and you have to put it together it sometimes can take a lot of work. Let's say you have a new fancy beautiful desk. You have two options. First you can put it together by looking at the pieces and guessing where things go and hope it turns out right. Second you can look at the directions and follow it step by step. The problem with the first one is you might have pieces left over at the end which were supposed to be used and then you will have to go back and figure out what you did wrong by using the directions. This just waists time. Or you might use all the pieces, but two years down the road learn you didn't use them right because your desk fell apart and furthermore your computer and lamp fell and broke too. So....what is my point? Well marriage comes with instructions also. It's called the bible. If you start your marriage off by using the instruction manual you will be building your marriage to last. If you don't it could quickly experience problems which could have been avoided or it could completely fall apart years down the road.
I really felt led to share this! I hope it helps someone.

Something else I learned is it takes three essential ingredients for a marriage to thrive. I believe these ingredients are also true in any relationships. So do a self check. How you doing with the following:

1) Extravagant love: expressed often, places other's needs above your own, it is a choice not a feeling, it reflects God's love
2) Generous Forgiveness: begins with humility, is offered quickly, applied freely, expressed graciously - keeps no record of wrongs, without your relationship will be filled with bitterness, with forgiveness you will have security.
3) Enthusiastic Encouragement: believes in and motivates others, openly affirms others, avoids critical words, maintains positive attitude even in hard times, leads to unity.

So how did you do? Are you an extravagant lover? A generous forgiver? An enthusiastic encourager? If not then pick one today and ask God to help you to apply these ingredients to your marriage!

I was in the car with my mom on Sunday and she was telling my aunt I was leaving in two weeks. Wow two weeks! I knew I would be departing on July 2nd, but hearing "two weeks" seems so different.

During my prayer this morning God laid on my heart James chapter 3 and Philippians 4:8-9. It is amazing how powerful our words and thoughts can be. Paul tells us in Philippians "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me - put into practice. And the God of peace will be with you." Then in James we are told to tame our tongues. The tongue can bring the greatest joys and the greatest pains. Today before I left my house I chose to make today a day of positive thoughts and words! What a great day I had! I shouldn't be surprised...God seems to know what he is talking about! You should try it! Focus on what is good, noble, true, unselfish, admirable and focus your words on the things which will bring joy to people and you will see! As you can imagine I have had a lot to do over the past of couple of weeks and these next two weeks will be even crazier. I noticed today I had so much more energy at the end of the day and I truly believe it is from living a James chapter 3 and Philippians chapter 4 day!

? Did you know ?

(facts from 2006)

• Each day nearly 8,500 people die due to AIDS
• HIV infections are found in every country in the world
• Nine out of ten children living with HIV and AIDS are African
• Nearly 6,000 young people between the ages of 15 and 25 are infected every day!
• Globally, unprotected sex between men and women is the predominant mode of transmission of HIV
• India now has an estimated 5.7 million! people living with HIV/AIDS, making it the country with the greatest number of infections in the world.
• Of the 950,000 people living with HIV in the US, as many as a quarter do not know they are infected!
• About 40,000 new HIV infections occur each year in the US.
• Adults and children estimated to be living with HIV in 2005:
• - North America: 1.2 Million
• - Caribbean: 300,000
• - Latin America: 1.8 Million
• - Western & Central Europe: 720,000
• - North Africa & Middle East: 510,000
• - Sub-Saharan Africa: 25.8 Million
• - Eastern Europe & Central Africa: 1.6 Million
• - East Asia: 870,000
• - South & South-East Asia: 7.4 Million
• - Oceania: 74,000
• AIDS is the first epidemic of a new disease since the 1400's

For awhile now I have been wrestling with talking to someone about a situation that I have been concerned about. I honestly didn't want to have to be the one to have this conversation. It's been for at least six months that I have been fighting against having to do this. And even longer that I have been thinking about it. So over the past week, this concern has grew and more people were making me aware of it. All week I prayed, journaled and spoke to people that I respect to try and figure out the best way to address this concern. Not once did the right words come out of my mouth and I couldn't even write them on paper. However, I truly felt God was asking me to be responsible and to step up. So I made the appointment. As I sat in the parking lot the morning of my appointment I said to God, "If you really want me to do this, you are going to have to talk through me because I have not been able to say this clearly." Soon after Elizabeth called me and encouraged me and prayed for me. My heart stopped pounding and I felt at peace. As soon as I opened my mouth during my meeting God showed up! It was amazing. I can truly say God spoke through me. Everything I needed to say was said and in my opinion it was as clear as could be. Questions were asked of me that allowed me to state the things I needed to say and provided smooth transitions in places I was anxious about. God is so good! He is so faithful! I know that God was asking me to do this because it was only through Him that I was understood, accepted, and heard.
I know this entry is very vague but I really wanted to share with you how God is faithful!

By the way...at church today Isaac preached about Jonathan (Samuel's son) and how he stopped saying "someday I'll..." and he stepped up and said "today I will." There is always "someday" but at some point "someday" has to turn into "today". What better time then now? Is there something God has been asking you to do? Something you need to quit, start, or do? If so don't say, "I'll do it tomorrow" make it today!

Today me and a few friend fasted as a way to prepare for our trip. I have never fasted completely before. I can honestly say it was a great experience. Through out the day when I would get hungry or my stomach would growl I would remember why I was fasting. At that moment I would pause and pray for the people of Malawi, my friends prayer requests, and my own personal needs, such as patients at work and guidance. It is amazing how many times I prayed today because I had physical reminder through out the day. I was also surprised that instead of complaining I was hungry my mind went right to God with prayer. I didn't even get cranky! I highly recommend fasting. When Elizabeth suggested it I was quick to say, "No way I can't do this." But later that night before I went to bed I had a peace about it and I decided to trust God in getting me through the day on his bread, his word. It worked and it was very powerful for me to depend on God all day.

My prayer: Thank you God for your support today. For being my strength to say no to those two boxes of donuts in the office all day! For listening to me. For showing me how you are with me every step of my day. Help me to call out to you everyday for support, guidance, and gratitude even when I'm not hungry. Help me be hungry for a relationship with you. - Amen