Guatemala

I have finally gotten some pictures from Guatemala to show some of the beds that have been purchased with the money that was go graciously donated. To those of you who donated, I really appreciate the kindness. I have gotten many thanks from Ashley, on behalf of the families in the ghetto who have benefited from your kindness. I want to ad one more interesteting, yet chilling bit of information.

You might remember me talking about Elmer, one of my new friends in Guatemala. I spent time with him in January when I was there, and he had gotten out of the gangster lifestyle, and was following Christ. Well things happened, I won't go into all of that here, but he ended up back on the streets and hanging with a different gang. I did get to spend time with him again when I was there in September, but he had changed a lot. His spark was gone. Well, a few weeks ago he was shot. He had to have surgery to get the bullet fragments out of him. Anyway, he is now getting better and he has relayed his thanks many times to me, and to those who donated, for the awesome bed he has gotten to sleep in for his recovery. He lives in a house where there are a bunch of people living and they usually are 3-4 in a bed. Since they just received a new bed, he has been able to have a bed for himself during his recovery time so that he does not get kicked or hit by anyone and tear open his stitches, which by the way he has running from his belly button straight up to chest. I would post a picture, but it is not all that lovely to look at.

Thanks again to those of you who have helped in any way for my missions to Guatemala, whether it was financial for my trips or beds, or donating clothing for my Sept trip, or praying. I hope that God will open the door up again soon for me to get back there. I miss the people in the ghetto! I have such a passion for them, and hope to see them again soon.

I hope you enjoy the pictures. Sorry there are not more pictures, but Ashley has been having trouble getting them to me, and I wanted to go ahead and post what I have for now. There were more beds purchased than what I have pictures of. I will try to find out the total of how many beds were purchased and will post it as soon as I find out. I did have a list of names of all the families but I lost it...........sorry.

The above picture is Elmer, the one who was shot. I decided to put the pic of him before he was shot rather than the one of his with his stitches showing.

I Am A Loser

I struggle with something that I will share. I am not about to get all personal, deep, emotional or anything like that. No, this is something that most Americans struggle with. Weight. I love to eat, therefore I gain weight! As I said, this is a problem most of America has, some admit it and try to do something about it, some people are told by their doctor that if they don't lose weight their health will be jeprodized, and others are happy the way they are.

For the past several years I have not been happy where I am, weight wise, and I have tried and tried to change my habits and lose weight, but it was just not happening. I would commit to myself that this is the day, things will change, but nope, it never did happen. I felt like I was in a never ending battle, until one day, the first Sunday of 2009, I was at church, and the pastor asked us all what we would like to give to God. This is not like a new year's resolution. I hate those and one year vowed to never make one again, and so far, that is the only new year's resolution that I have ever kept. No, this was not a resolution he was asking us to make, or even a goal. He was asking us what we ned to give to God. My first thought, I need to give God control over my body, specifically over what I put into it and how I care for it. This was not an easy decision and I did not take it lightly, but I did just that. I gave this control over to God. We were asked to actually write this down, and as a sign of giving it over to God, we were asked to come up front, and put the paper that represented what we wrote into a bag. Rod, the pastor, would then burn them. So, this was it, I gave it to God.

Right after I made this commitment, things kept happening to remind me of what I had promised. I receive a daily devotion in my email. For the next several weeks, it was about how us taking care of our bodies is an important part of our spirutial life. This was definately an encouraging way to start out in this new commitment. Then, about the 3rd week of January, there was a "biggest loser" contest that started at work. I decided that I might as well join in as further motivation to keep my commitment. I mean, I can use all of the encouragement I can get right now!

You are probably wondering by now how things are going.........either that or you are bored out of your mind, but hey, I am not making you read this. You an stop at anytime. But, I am glad to say that I have been doing well at my committment. I have lost 15 pounds since the first of the year, and this past week at work, where we weigh in once a week, I was the biggest loser of the week! I was quite surprised when I heard that I had won for the week. I was needing that encouragement though, because this has not been an easy battle, and I have a long way to go. I guess that is part of why I am blogging about this. Sometimes I feel like I am in this battle alone. I know that I have God on my side.......but it might help to also have some others on my side who might be a bit more vocal to me. If anyone reading this feels like coming along side me with some encouragement or accountablity, please let me know and please do so! I would definately appreciate it. I need to be asked and held accountable for two things. How I am doing with my eating habits as well as how I am doing with my exercise habits, the second of which I have not been doing well on.

Thanks for reading...I know this is not the most interesting blog, but I felt that if I share this with more people that I will have to do that much better to make sure I keep up my commitment!

I have a scripture to add to my message. This scripture is not in the context of weight or keeping ourselves in shape, but I do believe it can apply just the same.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20
19Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.

I Am Going Back To Jail - and I am excited about it!

It has been a while since I have written. I guess I just did not have anything to say that I felt was worth writing about. However, I have some interesting news that I am excited about now. Actually it came about last Sunday. I was asked by the director of the Clark County REC #5 to be in charge of putting together a music team for the weekend. If you have been reading my posts, or know me, you would know that I was on the music team for the Clark County REC #3 last year. I was definately hoping that I would get to do that again soon. Well this time, I am not only getting to play, but I am actually putting the music team together. It is a huge responsibility, and I am honored to be given the task. Now, as a drummer, it is kind of hard in dealing with the chord sheets and stuff for the singers and other musicians, since as a drummer I could care less about chords......but, I am pretty confident that I can make it work. I already have most of the band put together, and they are all very excited to be a part of this ministry.

The REC is basically an Emmaus Walk for those people who are in jails or prisons. If you don't know what an Emmaus Walk is, it is a weekend of getting away from everything and having time to focus on your spiritual walk, your relationship with Christ, and to help Christians become better leaders in their community. The REC is similar, although it is adapted for those who are incarcerated, and is more evengelical in nature, since many who attend are not already Christians.

I am looking forward to this opportunity to visit the jail again and to worship the Lord with a group of people who, sadly, are forgotten by many in the community. Ya, they have messed up and are there for a reason, but through Christ they can have the same eternal freedom that we are all promised! I think it is awsome that our theme song for the weekend is "I Am Free." We want to show these ladies that although they are not physically free to do what they want, if they choose to follow Christ, they are free indeed!

John 8:32 "Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."

The Big Game

Today I went to see my niece play basketball.....she is 4. Her team is called the Black Knights and they played against the Bumblebees. I think this was her 2nd game but it was the first one that I have been to. It was too cute. They have these little short goals, and a miniature basketball. They basically take turns on who gets to bring the ball down the court, and of course there is no passing, and not much dribbling, but.......they have to start somewhere.

I posted a little video of Faith bringing the ball down the court. For some reason, when she has the ball, she can't seem to say on her feet. It is pretty funny. You will notice how she loses the ball to the other team and they give it back. How cute is that. They love to take turns.

Part 2 of Last Weekend

In my last post I said that I was going to post a part 2 of my weekend that I had....last weekend. I guess since this weekend is already here, I should probably do that. I dont know if anyone even reads my blogs, so maybe no one has even been waiting for part 2, but here it is anyway.

Last weekend, besides playing in the band for the Rise to the Challenge middle school retreat, Mike and I also sponsored Patrick on a Chrysalis. For anyone who does not know what that is, it is similar to an Emmaus Walk but it is designed for teenagers. For those of you who don't know what an Emmaus Walk is...just read my old blogs and you will learn all about it.

I felt very blessed to get to sponsor Patrick on his Chrysalis, as he is one of my best friends. I know the blessing I got from going on my Emmaus Walk, and even more so from working on an Emmaus Walk and an REC. I was happy to be giving Patrick a chance to receive those blessings as well.

When we got to see Patrick it was great to see that he had experienced God in a new way...and mostly through the selfless love of others, mostly people who he did not even know. I prayed and continue to pray that this experience was great for him and that in some ways I got to and still get to help in his continued Walk with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Love you Patrick!

Rise to the Challenge Blog Part 1

This past weekend was a very busy but very fulfilling one for Mike and me, as well as many others. A while back I was asked to put together a band to play for a retreat at the Highland Hills Middle School. It was for junior high aged kids. I put together a band of people who I already play with regularly, and it turned out awesome. Barry on lead vocals and guitar, Andy lead guitar, Mike on bass guitar, Thomas on keys, and myself on drums. We had an awesome time playing together and it would seem that the crowd, kids and adult workers as well, really got into the worship big time and loved praising God through the music. Since we were set up in a gym and playing for young teenagers, we really got to rock it out as big as we wanted to, and boy did we take advantage of that opportunity. It is not too often that we get that chance. It was so awesome to see the kids raising their hands, jumping up and down, dancing and holding onto friend, just so excited and happy to be worshipping God. You saw at the beginning of the blog some pictures and below is a video. It too way to long to upload this, so here is a link to my youtube page where all of the videos are uploaded. You can hear first hand what we did, and in some of the videos, you can see the kiddos jumping around and having a blast.

http://www.youtube.com/amym1130 (click here to view all of the videos)

My weekend also involved another exciting event, which I will blog about in part 2, so come back soon.

Wii Fun!

Much to my sister-in-law's surprise, yes, I played a Wii for the FIRST time on December 23rd. We were at my best friend, Laura's house and we played it and had an awesome time. I loved it. I always figured I would enjoy the Wii more than traditional video game consoles, because of the more "involved and active" nature of the games and the controller technology. Well I was right. I played it and I was hooked. So the next day...on Christmas Eve, Mike and I are out looking for a Wii. Now, we are sensible people and realized that we would probably not find one, and we didn't, but it was worth a try.

Last night, we had our Christmas gathering with my dad and family in Madison. We got our Christmas gift from my dad, which is money, and the thought is that when we can find it, we will get the Wii. On the way home we decided to stop in the Walmart in Scottsburg, and I went straight for the electronics area. I see what I think is a Wii console but I figure it can't be, it must be the Wii fitness or something like that. There was a Walmart worker standing there so I ask, is that a Wii? He says ya..."we just found it. We told someone a little while ago we were sold out and then we found this one back there. We just put it in the case 5 minutes ago." Of course I quickly say I want it and we got our other things to go along with it and made our purchase.

I have already throughly enjoyed my new toy. Mike and I stayed up too late last night playing, knowing that we would be getting up early for church, but it was worth it! And yes, we did get up and go to church! Then after lunch today, "our boys" came over and we had hours of Wii fun playing.

So that is one of my Christmas fun stories. I know we are not to relish material things, and I can say I am one who does not do that, and I think most who know me would agree to that. But, I do think that God allows us to have fun things and He enjoys seeing His children have fun, and I can't help but wonder....were we prompted to leave Madison just at the right time, and prompted to stop at that Walmart just in time to find that Wii? Hmm....makes you wonder. I know for sure that my God works in the big things in my life AND the little things....