Life As We Know It

I have decided that maybe a break from more serious topics is needed, and also, if I want this to be more interactive, let you into my life little more.

I also was exporting photos from my phone and they brought back happy memories

So here, in pictures, are some snapshot looks into my life:

1) This is me. This is also why I have obtained the nickname Ducky from one of my friends. We make cute ducks.


2) I love travelling!

The world is a book, and those that do not travel read only one page - Saint Augustine

3) I like taking photos. I quite enjoy pretty rocks too and photos of feet in different places. But I've decided just to let you enjoy the rock in this one. This was taken in one of my favourite places, a beautiful little place in South Africa.








4) I am partially Irish. I had the privilege of visiting this beautiful country last year for a family gathering. This photo was taken from a castle that my family once used to own many years ago.

Ireland is very beautiful and very, very green. There is a lot of history and it was very interesting visiting some historical sites and cemeteries. The roads are very narrow in all the places that I visited outside of Dublin. Our bus driver impressed me greatly with the speed at which he took on all the roads and corners. I also had the amazing experience to dance in Ireland! I got to do some Irish as well as some choreographies. The coolest part of that was getting to dance with some other Irish dancers. It was very special getting to do an Irish dance in Ireland with other dancers for my extended  family.

Something that I find very special about flying is being able to see things from a different perspective. On our way back to South Africa, on one of the flights, we flew through a cloud. It was beautiful but you could hardly see a thing, yet could still trust that the pilot was going to get us through and in a while we would be back in the sun and able to see more clearly. This is a very clear (aha ha) metaphor of how we go through times in life sometimes that we cannot see what is coming next or even what is going on and can't understand why we are in a cloud that can be a bit of a scary place to be, but we can trust that God will bring us out of it into a beautiful day. 

His plans will prevail, even when we cannot 

fathom them. 

What do I do with my time? (5)

Aside from writing and dancing and spending time with people and other hobbies, I work for a church. I did a missions year with them last year and this year I am working there as a part of this missions group. The group is called Citylove and you can find out more about it here: 

Citylove Facebook Page

We get to do a lot of cool things which I will explain in a moment. But first, here are some pics from a trip to PE last year:

We got to go into a few schools with Oxygen Life and attend their community groups, as well as visit a children's home, attend a youth group, and hang out with some awesome people.

Most of the time we work near our church and help with the Friday night ministries there, do outreaches to nearby places, teach some classes at a school, visit children's homes and at times old age homes and nearby locations. It is awesome being able to share Jesus' love with people through these different experiences.

 

6) I like Star Wars. A lot haha

7) I've had one operation to remove my wisdom teeth. It was a weird, although interesting experience, but worth it! I was in a lot of pain for months beforehand from the teeth growing skew, but once my mouth was all done healing (a couple weeks after the operation) I've had no more pain!

8) I enjoy learning about photography and videography. 

9) I quite enjoy painting, especially with watercolours. It's a fun hobby


10) I enjoy reading, and though I mostly enjoy reading fiction, I want the bible to become my go-to book and favourite reading.

 11) I love people! This is also one of my favourite houses to spend time at. It's so peaceful and the company is excellent!

12) I don't really enjoy alcohol. I just like tasting it and taking photos of it.

13) Road trips! They are great.

14) Road trips in Land Rover Defenders are also great. It makes them even more interesting and exciting than if the vehicle just went with no problems at all.


15) I think God makes the most beautiful sunsets and I love seeing them!

16) I have some brothers. Just a few actually, but that depends on who you ask.


17) If you can teach me something new and answer all my questions about it, and are happy to do so, I'll probably want to spend a lot of time with you. 

18) I enjoy colouring my hair temporarily.


19) I'm trying to learn Japanese. Slowly...


20) I love words! There are so many interesting words out there and they are so rich in meaning

21) I am 21 haha

This was a long post. Here is a clock :P haha. Have a great day!

Shendl

Love - How Are We Doing?

Have you noticed a theme recently? The last few posts have been about love. I didn't even notice this at first. I feel like I have been learning a lot of stuff and have been writing about it, and it all comes back to love. That makes sense though. That is basically the theme of the whole bible, and that is what God is, so it makes sense that so much rotates around it.

Okay, on we go to today's post and big question:

How well are we doing at loving God?

I don't mean that in a scale of 1 to ten, am I doing better than you or any competitive sort of way. So written in better words:

How much do you love God?

Is He most important to you? Is He first in your life? Do you love Him more than anyone or anything?

Francis Chan said something like this in the book Crazy Love: We need God's help to love Him more.  (I couldn't find the exact quote, but that is gist of it)

Honestly though, I don't act like I love God very much some days and I don't like it. I'm sure I'm not the only one though, so let's do something about this! Because I know that it's just not me. And yes, it does take time to fall in love with someone, but let's keep our eyes fixed on Him and ask Him to change our desires so that He is our greatest desire. Not with a lazy passivity, but actually make a decision that even when we don't feel like it, even when our attitudes and feelings don't reflect Him, that we consciously chose to still pursue Him and what He wants.

And as that quote illustrates, He can help us with that, but it requires effort on our part too.

Just a friendly post to say....

Hello :)

If you're reading this blog I'd love to get to know you a little. Most of my writing thus far has been to get the words out of my head and maybe, hopefully help someone. I would like it to be more interactive though, to start getting to know people in the blogging world and those that read here.

People are so important, so if you're a person, obviously that means that you are important :)

Why? Simply because God created you, and I know that my God doesn't make useless things.

So, feel free to read, comment, send me a message if you have a question or just need a friend. I'm going to try and reach out to other bloggers, read and learn from them and interact, cause thus far I've mostly been a consumer of other blogs, not interacting at all, but we, as a people, a community, are stronger. There is so much that we can all learn from each other and encouragement is also always great!

I think that is something people in general just need though, people to encourage, push, and love them.

That's what we're all craving isn't it? Love in one form or another. Love is awesome, and should push us to pursue the one that is love!

So let's encourage each other. Let's all push each other to be loving and in love with God.

The memory verse for Junior Youth last week was:

As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another. Proverbs 27:17 (I had to look up the reference. Whoops. Still got some memory work to do).

I think that is a great description of what I am wanting to get across in this post and create around this blog.

Let me know what you think!

Shendl

Don't Love To Be Loved

I like clothes with words on them. I like the extra expression it gives, but it all depends on what the words are. A few weeks ago I was walking trough the mall with a friend and saw a lady wearing a t-shirt that said:

Love to be loved

I guess there are two ways to take this saying. 

I love being loved, because it does feel good. It is awesome to have those around us that love us and also to have an amazing God that loves us so much.

Or it could mean Love others to get love. That is not a good sentiment and is not biblical at all. If we just look at the example we have been given, even from one of the most shared bible verses, John 3:16: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. Jesus died for us when we were still sinners and not at all loving towards Him. It is an unconditional love in the purest sense, because even if we don't ever choose to love God He's already done so much for us! Even giving you life and free will is an amazing act of love, even if you don't agree. 

So my challenge is to love those that are hard to love. To show love to even those that won't ever give you the love back, because aren't we wanting to become more like Jesus? Aren't we wanting to show love to those around us even though it isn't always pleasant? You won't necessarily ever know what that love shown will mean to someone that hasn't experienced much love. I think that love can soften many world hardened hearts. To someone that has always been roughly dealt with by the world, someone showing them undeserved love won't make sense and will make them question what makes you different. 

And that could be an amazing opportunity to introduce them to our God :)