Stopped by Apex today. Spent time trying to compose a song and it actually went pretty well.
Made Pastor Rob laugh.
Then I went to Kettering Assembly.
Made Pastor Phyllis Kennedy laugh.
Caught up with the music minister Pastor Ed Romera. He listened to my song and called my a songwriter. I talked him about how I have always had mentors for my writing but never really for singing and love of music. Which is weird comming from a family musicians. But they never did much to foster my talent, just let me find my own way. I have only had male worship leaders and they are usualy married so they feel funny I think working so closely with me and they are always busy. Its been a lonely, unproductive journey for me as a writer. People like my brother, Dave Hamilton and Vida, and Scott and Amanda Have accomplished so much artisticly than I have. And David was three years younger than I and left behind a much bigger legacy. Me? I have a folder of poems/songs noone has ever even heard. I use to sing solos in church with a background tape but than started getting too nervouse and almost having panick attacks. I hung out in choir and the church I go to know does neither the soloist thing or choir. I am not talented enought to do what those people at Apex do on Sunday.
Stomach feel icky. My heart feels heavy. The number of times I used the word "I" in theis past: atleas 10
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
Thursday, January 12, 2006
My testimony
I will be giving this letter to Pastor Rob sometime this comming week. This letter was originally going to be just about Apex and the impact this church has had on my life. However, being a writer and quite long winded; I couldn’t just stop there. There is a line in a Christian song that says: Everybody has a story to tell. I’m no different than anyone else. So this is my story and a pray you can sit through it and that it doesn’t bore too much.
I was born in 1981 into a Pentecostal, musical family that did and still loves the Lord very much. My mother has deep roots in this denomination while my father actually came from the Grace Brethren/ Lutheran type back ground. Everything is very liturgical, very formal; while the charismatic church I grew up handles life the way they do worship in church: full throttle and with abandon and no thought to whatever people thought of them or their passion for the Savior.
My mother had trouble with bringing both me and my older brother, Matthew into the world. She wasn’t even suppose to be able to have children and I think even tried to make sure she wouldn’t’ get pregnant, but God had other plans.
When Matthew was born the doctors at first thought he was premature. He was very tiny. His lungs were undeveloped. He had I.V’s everywhere. However, an X-ray of the growth of the bones in his hand showed he was full term. He would struggle with asthma through out childhood. But the most amazing thing happened. Matthew is blessed by the Father with amazing musical talents. As difficult as it was for him to breath in grade school and with sometimes bad allergies, my brother now plays several wind instruments, a little bit of the piano and is As. Prof. of music at Evangel University in Springfield, MO. He no longer suffers from breathing difficulties
While pregnant with me she was on bed rest most of the time. By the grace of God, she managed to carry me to term. However, when just nine months old I had to have a surgery performed on my head b/c my soft spot was fused together. I had a very high temperature, could have ended badly, but obviously survived the ordeal. When I was kindergarten the public school system told my mother I would never learn to read or write because I was mentally retarded. But the Lord told my mother to keep my name on the lips of the saints. So my home church continually lifted me up in prayer. Today, I read at college level, there is nothing wrong with my I.Q. and I went on to win awards at local and national levels for my writing in high school and have written articles for OnCourse, an Assembly of God magazine for teens. So much for I will never learn to read and write!
My senior year of high school, my churches youth ministry went on a youth retreat. I woke up on the last day in terrible pain. I could not put anyway weight on my right foot. At first the doctors though I had a really bad sprain. As it turned out, I had something called compartment syndrome. In short, that means I had a blood clot somewhere below the knee cutting off circulation to the muscles in my leg resulting in lots of swelling. I had to have emergency surgery to release the pressure on it, but the doctors discovered that one of the muscles in my calf had already died and therefore had to be removed. During my recovery and physical therapy to learn to walk again I questioned God. I was like, “Why didn’t you just let me die.” This was a condition that could have caused me to lose my leg from the knee down or kill as blood clots can be very dangerous (as I’m sure you know). I didn’t know where my life was headed and felt like I had no real purpose. I thought it was better that I had died.
Then one day God got a hold of me. He just seemed to say,”You idiot! How dare you pretend to know better than me. You can die. That can be arranged. You’re still alive because I am not through with you yet.”
The ironic thing is while in the hospital I prayed for an older lady in the hospital bed next to me. She was having severe headaches and the doctors weren’t sure why. She was touched by my willingness to hop to her from my bed after having surgery and pray for her healing. It took me a while to realize that if God brought me to that point just to minister to her; then whatever inconvenience I suffered was worth it; knowing Christ suffered much more to bring me to himself.
God is continuing to reveal Himself. Over the years I have often struggled with feeling of belonging and fitting. But since coming to Apex, the young people have just loved me and supported me. Your message on community is exactly what I’ve needed hear. I learning so much about what it means to be apart of a community of believes. Thank you.
And I thank God for parents that went on their knees before the Lord for their children; recognizing the battle belonged to the Lord. My brother and I would not be where we are today if it wasn’t for their obedience to God.
I was born in 1981 into a Pentecostal, musical family that did and still loves the Lord very much. My mother has deep roots in this denomination while my father actually came from the Grace Brethren/ Lutheran type back ground. Everything is very liturgical, very formal; while the charismatic church I grew up handles life the way they do worship in church: full throttle and with abandon and no thought to whatever people thought of them or their passion for the Savior.
My mother had trouble with bringing both me and my older brother, Matthew into the world. She wasn’t even suppose to be able to have children and I think even tried to make sure she wouldn’t’ get pregnant, but God had other plans.
When Matthew was born the doctors at first thought he was premature. He was very tiny. His lungs were undeveloped. He had I.V’s everywhere. However, an X-ray of the growth of the bones in his hand showed he was full term. He would struggle with asthma through out childhood. But the most amazing thing happened. Matthew is blessed by the Father with amazing musical talents. As difficult as it was for him to breath in grade school and with sometimes bad allergies, my brother now plays several wind instruments, a little bit of the piano and is As. Prof. of music at Evangel University in Springfield, MO. He no longer suffers from breathing difficulties
While pregnant with me she was on bed rest most of the time. By the grace of God, she managed to carry me to term. However, when just nine months old I had to have a surgery performed on my head b/c my soft spot was fused together. I had a very high temperature, could have ended badly, but obviously survived the ordeal. When I was kindergarten the public school system told my mother I would never learn to read or write because I was mentally retarded. But the Lord told my mother to keep my name on the lips of the saints. So my home church continually lifted me up in prayer. Today, I read at college level, there is nothing wrong with my I.Q. and I went on to win awards at local and national levels for my writing in high school and have written articles for OnCourse, an Assembly of God magazine for teens. So much for I will never learn to read and write!
My senior year of high school, my churches youth ministry went on a youth retreat. I woke up on the last day in terrible pain. I could not put anyway weight on my right foot. At first the doctors though I had a really bad sprain. As it turned out, I had something called compartment syndrome. In short, that means I had a blood clot somewhere below the knee cutting off circulation to the muscles in my leg resulting in lots of swelling. I had to have emergency surgery to release the pressure on it, but the doctors discovered that one of the muscles in my calf had already died and therefore had to be removed. During my recovery and physical therapy to learn to walk again I questioned God. I was like, “Why didn’t you just let me die.” This was a condition that could have caused me to lose my leg from the knee down or kill as blood clots can be very dangerous (as I’m sure you know). I didn’t know where my life was headed and felt like I had no real purpose. I thought it was better that I had died.
Then one day God got a hold of me. He just seemed to say,”You idiot! How dare you pretend to know better than me. You can die. That can be arranged. You’re still alive because I am not through with you yet.”
The ironic thing is while in the hospital I prayed for an older lady in the hospital bed next to me. She was having severe headaches and the doctors weren’t sure why. She was touched by my willingness to hop to her from my bed after having surgery and pray for her healing. It took me a while to realize that if God brought me to that point just to minister to her; then whatever inconvenience I suffered was worth it; knowing Christ suffered much more to bring me to himself.
God is continuing to reveal Himself. Over the years I have often struggled with feeling of belonging and fitting. But since coming to Apex, the young people have just loved me and supported me. Your message on community is exactly what I’ve needed hear. I learning so much about what it means to be apart of a community of believes. Thank you.
And I thank God for parents that went on their knees before the Lord for their children; recognizing the battle belonged to the Lord. My brother and I would not be where we are today if it wasn’t for their obedience to God.
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
Road Trip Part II
But on to better news!
Its time to take a real road. I saw this book called Weird Ohio. Wouldn't it be cool to visit some of the places in that book? So whose with me? I have never had a group of friends that I've taken a weekend or week of and done something fun. Maybe we could rent a motor a home or something. That way we wouldn't half to worry about hotel and we could take turn driving addition to being able to bring food with us if it has a minifridge
Its time to take a real road. I saw this book called Weird Ohio. Wouldn't it be cool to visit some of the places in that book? So whose with me? I have never had a group of friends that I've taken a weekend or week of and done something fun. Maybe we could rent a motor a home or something. That way we wouldn't half to worry about hotel and we could take turn driving addition to being able to bring food with us if it has a minifridge
Road Trps: And other confessions of a drama queen
Best thing about Road Trps:
1.) Country roads
2.) Getting the crap scared out of you by other dirves on the highway
3.) Listening to News Boys, Christ Tomlin, Lincoln Brewster,
and other songs on K Love
4.) Getting hopefully lost
Worst thing about Road Trips:
1.) Country roads
2.) Getting the crap scared out of you by other dirves on the highway
3.) Listening to News Boys, Christ Tomlin, Lincoln Brewster,
and other songs on K Love
4.) Getting hopefully lost
I spent several hours in the car yesterday trying to get to a place in Fairfield to fill out and application. I started out with directions from Mapquest which ended up not making any since and then decided to stop at the library to see what google had to say. I think the directions were probably better but I missed my exit. So ended up comming back into the Dayton area at 3 pm or so after driving around since about 10:30 that morning. Instead of filling out out an application for the daycare I ended up filling an application for Bethany Lutheran Village and TotLots Preschool in Kettering. Today I had an interview with Totlot. The director Jane is really nice and I love the setting and everything. However, I only have my certificate. She has more interviews to do and its possible that I may lose out on this opportunity because I don't have my bachelars of applies science. Sheehs, I can barely even spell it.
Oh and I broke things off with Josh. Its hard for him to understand but things are just better this way.
1.) Country roads
2.) Getting the crap scared out of you by other dirves on the highway
3.) Listening to News Boys, Christ Tomlin, Lincoln Brewster,
and other songs on K Love
4.) Getting hopefully lost
Worst thing about Road Trips:
1.) Country roads
2.) Getting the crap scared out of you by other dirves on the highway
3.) Listening to News Boys, Christ Tomlin, Lincoln Brewster,
and other songs on K Love
4.) Getting hopefully lost
I spent several hours in the car yesterday trying to get to a place in Fairfield to fill out and application. I started out with directions from Mapquest which ended up not making any since and then decided to stop at the library to see what google had to say. I think the directions were probably better but I missed my exit. So ended up comming back into the Dayton area at 3 pm or so after driving around since about 10:30 that morning. Instead of filling out out an application for the daycare I ended up filling an application for Bethany Lutheran Village and TotLots Preschool in Kettering. Today I had an interview with Totlot. The director Jane is really nice and I love the setting and everything. However, I only have my certificate. She has more interviews to do and its possible that I may lose out on this opportunity because I don't have my bachelars of applies science. Sheehs, I can barely even spell it.
Oh and I broke things off with Josh. Its hard for him to understand but things are just better this way.
Monday, January 09, 2006
Best Blond Joker Ever.
It took me a little bit to figure this one out but once I did I knew I had to post it! Click on the title of this post and then come back and tell me what you think!:)
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