It's been some time since I've updated on how my time with YWAM York has been!

soo .....(sorry no picks to day :(

Life these days

We live and we learn! This is very true for my life right now. As the thrill off the new has worn off I have been able to meditate on my surroundings and have found myself becoming a bit weary. But just as that was gathering Easter broke with a resurrection of spirit! Having spent Easter with family and friend I have come back with a renewed excitement to see how I can work this life in mission out!

Here is a bit more about life in York!

The neighborhood and home

As the months have been coming and going our relationships with our neighborhood has been growing. We still have almost every day kids knocking on our door! I was told by one of the mom's over a cup of tea the other day that they even talk about us at school. It’s exiting to see that we are becoming such a part of their lives as much as they are being part of ours.

We just started cooking with the kids and we have a 10year old master backer amongst us! But do keep them in your prayers and us as we seek Gods wisdom in how to love and encourage them and their families. Also that we can have the wisdom to see what we can do to encourage and make our home a place that seeks all we can do to make it a creative home in the kingdom!

Also after doing a project working with a local organisation that seeks to meet the need in the community with the resources of the local church. We where able to meet a lady who lives quite close to our home. Meeting her was an encouragement to all of us. In the few times of chatting, she shared a few ladles of her wealth of wisdom. It sparked a renewd interest in me for what we are doing and the potential it has. This new friendship is one I hope to see grow. This was such a encouraging experiences for the fact that it felt like helping a family member and I was able to get a feel for what it looks like be the body of Christ where your needs are met by the family of Christ where your giving is receiving and your receiving is giving !

Carecent

Our work at a local drop in centre has been one of my personal favourites. The relationships with some of the guests we have been forming has be exciting to see! One highlight has been that I am remembering who would like to have coffee or tea! This is especially meaningful in the case of one of the guest who has been teasing me and testing me for the past month and last week I finally remembered! He was one of the guests I was not thrilled to see because I felt he was cross with me for getting stuff wrong. Now I can say I look forward to seeing him! I look forward to spending more mornings making toasts and talking about gardening and remembering who wants : coffee or tea!

Mum's and toddlers

Recently, I have not been working to much with the mum’s and toddlers group, but others of us have been forming relationships with the kids and mom's which is exciting to see. also I have been recognising the mothers and kids out side the play group witch is exiting

New stuff

Art!

Recently I have joined the York Printmakers Workshop. This is a recently opened, Studio. I am volunteering as much as time and my schedule allows. This has and is providing a great space to get back in to art making, and hanging with other artists! This has been an answer to prayer, as I was getting discouraged on how to get the arts back in to my life and how to integrate it in to my time with YWAM.

My time spent there is also providing me with insite on how to run a print shop and seeing all the possibilities and changes in doing so. As well as opportunities to see how God can use me in the conversation in the arts! Even with this all there are some challenges as as how to distribute my time as not to make it a priority over my YWAM commitments.

Romania

Coming July 23 – August 10 we will be going to Romania. We will be mainly in the Transylvania basin and will be working with a local church there. We will be doing children’s work, working with the local gipsy community, and church plants. I am not certain what this will look like, but I am looking forward to sharing all the adventures it will bring. Do pray for us so that we will have the wisdom in preparing for this trip. Also of the youth that will be going with us on this trip, as we will be taking a few high school students with us to share in this work.

South Africa

We will be going to South Africa coming this September /November. This will be in connections with the work that last year’s team did . I am not certain what our time there will look like, but as we research and prepare for this time there is a building excitement/uncertainty. But it is all part of what God has planed and I am looking forward to it! Do keep us in your prayers for this too, as this will be a longer and more intense time for us to work, as well as working with one another. There will be some unique challenges as we will be a team of all girls. Another item that I would appreciate your prayers and possible support is that I am still in need to raise fund for this trip.

Over all prayer and support need

Prayer

As I mention I would appreciate prayers in regards to wisdom for all our work and for wisdom and strength for me personally as the many challenges of working and living with people. As these are at times a personal place for growth.

Support

I am still in need to raise a couple month of my lecture fees and am in need to raise my funds for South Africa. It is exiting to see how God as provided already through people and a generous tax-return. As such I am looking forward how God will provide!

Once again thank you for your support! And for being a part of what God is doing in York and in my life.

The sun is been out the past few days and we in Yorkshire have been taking full advantage of it. From sitting in the sun, painting outside with the kids and gardening!

We do hope our garden will turn out well, even though not one of us is a gardener .

In anticipation for new season and Easter to arrive I can say I am looking forward to the coming season to see what is in store.

I had a amazing time in Manchester. YWAM York took part of an evangelism week in Manchester with Forever http://www.forever2012.com/, which is a team form YWAM that is doing mission in all the cites in the U.K. where the Olympics will have a influence.This was a week that I was looking on with a bit of dread. Never having done the usual evangelism I was not looking forward to trying it.

But as we heard talks form people who shared what the root of evangelism should look like, and all the many ways it can be done it was less daunting. I pushed myself to give it a shot. I must say it was not all that bad. I was not “saving” people left and right, but I pushed myself to be more open about my faith as well as challenged by how we can live a life of being a constant presence in the lives of people and be open at all times.

One thing that came up numerous times was a realization that just being a presence and doing something kind and out of the ordinary – like handing out sweets at 9pm as saying it was because we where christens and then just chatting – not pushing our agendas at them, was a way to reach out as christens and getting to know our neighbors in a city, and the problems they face, and learning how we can help.

Manchester was not all evangelism. It was a time where I meet new people who are on a similar journey. I was privileged to meet with others who are passionate in art at all levels as a Christian. In all my conversations that week, I can say that there is a new hope to see what will come out of YWAM in the next few years in the area of the Arts!

Fellow Pilgrims

Meeting an old soul is always a joy for me, and meeting Irish ones are even more exiting: this past few days have been a delight in that way.

Allen: was an older man could not tell you his age, but he had bright eyes and a love of Jane Austen, good literature and good grammar. We passionately talked, leafed and shared the stories of his youth and travels, simple joys of loving harts and of the county side. We shared a communion of souls that was such a treasure. As we said good bye and hugged, we two seemed to wish that we would reconnect some day. After that he stepped into his reality, of who knows what poverty, and I into mine. I felt a bit of my hart find something it was missing and refreshed with hope for what life could be and what it is missing. A new hunger and love of my fellow creatures…

Grase: a beautiful Irish grandmother, with a joy in serving, a humor and feistiness that I can only but hope to have at her age. As we served beans and toast in the most beautiful way – she shared her humor, her hart for the young boys that came in (with a mothers sharp criticism as well), her broken hart, and her new gardening endeavors. I look forward to serving with her in the future and hope to learn from this Iris gem!

We are told to rely on God and that God will provide: “all things work for the good of those how love Him” ... Now just to let you know what has been a week (well a week and 1/ 2). Many things have changed and many things have happened but for now I will just focus on one aspect In Matt 11:30 it says ‘For my yoke is easy and my burden is light’ This was something that I never understood – it was all but ironic, when I was trying to walk a very narrow path in a train station with all my belongings (save 5 boxes) and the fresh pain of having to throw everything else away. Really, how can God’s yoke be light? It was not light when I as giving 5 years of collected art supplies and bits of home away. It was not light when I was standing in a train station by myself, with bags that where breaking my back, as I went to a place that I did not know what to expect, for a time that was undetermined, and no financial stability to think off. Yes people where supporting me – I had a host of people praying for me, but I was cold and a bit hungry, tired and well, not that comfortable, and the world I once knew was falling apart. How was this a ‘light burden’? British Gypsies have more stability then I do! But as the day’s passed, and new experiences came, some good and some not so good (suffered a small panic attack). I kept thinking: well its God’s burden on me, so it is not in my definitions that I need to define it. How does this all look in God’s wisdom? If everything is temporal, as it states in Ecclesiastes and we need to enjoy the now. But how do we look at the unhappy now’s? I was thinking about this, as I was awkward singing in a time of worship, feeling out of place, and all too frustrated with the whole thing; ‘what was I doing with a bunch of charismatics ‘speaking in tongues’? As I sat there all a flutter with the frustration, I remembered it is not my definitions – it is God’s. To be happy in all situations is to see beauty in all situations: to acknowledge the pain, the fear the awkwardness, and then do as my grandmother says “relax and enjoy’ But still, how? How do you take all your feelings of the chaos, the scary of life and see beauty? How, when your hart is breaking and the world is crashing around you, how do you do this? How …… this is where my art background kicked in. The Futurists did this. They saw all of reality changing in front of their very eyes: technology was changing all of life. How it was lived, and how it was seen. Instead of seeing this change as something to be fearful of or something to hide form, they embraced it with all their creativity. They let themselves be caught up in the excitement of this new time: to let the waves of change wash over them and revel in it. Their art reflected this. The Chaos of the new loud Chaotic cites encroaching on the quiet of space, represented in bright colors. The bustling streets and all its complexities where something to be reevaluated, take inspiration from and find a new Chaotic beauty. One of my favorite pieces depicts this for me.

Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, Boccioni, 1913

It showed the forwarded motion of life and technology. Man being as if one with that uncertainty and seeing it as beautiful. I do agree that I am not an art history critic, so sorry any art history professors… But for me it reminded me to be like this odd group of artists. To see the beauty in life, the changes and struggles that my Creator has out in front of me and well, take out my tools and make the best of it.

To sit and think, well this is new, and let myself get lost in the eternal moment and see The Kingdom in it. To let myself to be like “a form in continual movement”, let God’s reality and my existence mingle in one, and race forward to His Kingdom and enjoy the ride all the beautiful chaos and love my follow creatures and share this irrational, illogical existence for something I do not yet quite know the depth of…

I have mad the big decision to attend a DTS this coming year here are some of the things that I hope to address.

The word missions and “evangelism” is some thing that I have struggled with for some time. I know that it is something that our master has called us to do – but how? How do we take out pain, apathy, discontent and transform it in the hand of Christ and become like a well watered garden and rebuilders of walls. I am hoping to see what it looks – to go alongside of our fellow pilgrims (not matter where they are heading) and share our trials and joys and in so doing, share in communion with the Divine. In doing this I am hoping to see how to live a life of complementing opposites. How do we live complete lives of enjoying what God gave us, all the while seeking to live and love and share in the lives of those who are oppressed by the injustices that we and others impose; how we do this, while living lives that are filled with the whisperings of redemption, without guilt.

I look to seek this by meeting with people who are engaging in urban missions, as well as those who are engaging in living with this conversations of justice and similar questions (even if their ideas are coming for total opposite directions). As well as learning how to live in community and learn from them

ART

Art is a big part of who I am – this is something that I hope to develop during this time with YWAM. Recently I have lost site of how to address my passion for the arts and the Kingdom. I know that this is an issue that many face and I hope to converse with those how are in this, just starting and others who are in it for some time. I am looking forward to developing this in myself and encouraging others. One opportunity to do this will be with YWAM Leeds (http://www.ywamleeds.com/), who is actively seeking how to live lives in justice and love through the Art’s in community. I also hope to develop and deepen relationships with artists who are in this journey.

Another aspect of this is my hope to discover more about how the Arts can be used in worship. Recently I have been very interested in how I can use my education in the fine arts with in liturgy and in adding a liturgical life. In this I hope to develop my own Art.

I have been very interested in the emergent church and how it look’s in the U.K.. I have been very encouraged by what I have experienced and heard regarding the conversation of communities that are seeking to embrace the faith and live a life as expressed in the Bible. This is one of the reasons I have chosen to partake in as DTS in the U.K. and in an environment that will be encouraging and open to my interest. In the past I have connected with some of these communities and have been very blessed. I am hoping to further these connections and forming others.

This decision of Partaking in a DTS has been a big one for me and one that has been roughly 4 years in coming. After almost 2 years of thinking of applying to YWAM, last year I finally did and was expected to go but I was still not at peace with it. Now, it seems to be the best time. I can truly say that I am doing this in faith. I know that there are many uncertainties in all of this but I can truly say I am giving this up to God

here it goes ...

The past 6 moths have been trying non-the-least. Being the hurricane that was my time in Philly. Now that it is over, I have very little to show for it

I have no picture of my time in Philly that are my own.

I did not let one shutter snap on my time there.

I was not able to but …….

The faces of that time will ever stay in my mind and hart. Those of

Hector: the Porto Rican gentlemen, who always had a smile for me. Almost every Sunday night, as he swept or just ‘chilled’ on his block.

Amina: the smiling little girl who would sit with me on my stoop, when I was sad and lonely.

Kenny: tall thin happy soul that was the city, beautiful, falling apart – the incarnate definition of beautiful decay.

Winifred: like the wind

and so many more of my fellow pilgrims that filled my hart with joy and my soul with a sadness that I had never known. This all mingled with the sounds of the city night in an empty house or on roof topes with laughter and stars, where hearts were poured like an offering, mingled and lifted to haven.

These stories are to be told looking into your eye’s or kissed onto your check. Not through this madam. But some day ask me, and we will have a cup of tea or a pint, and you will hear a little bit.

But for now, know that it was a time of darkness in my soul.

and when I finally understood, there was a light – it was only seen after I left the darkness. And I pray now that I was able to do Jesus’ biding, and shine in my small corner.