The Campers Review.

I would love to say how much fun camp was this year, how much enjoyment I had listening to the messages, singing to the songs, playing the games and feeling all good about myself.

I can't.

It felt more like somebody repeated hit me over the head with a two-by-four every time our speaker, Jack Hager, began to speak to us. God speaking through him pointed out so many things about myself that were just so....out of whack, that every morning, and every night, he gave me something new to chew on. My mind was in constant processing mode, and I know I missed some of it, but I got so much out of it too. God showed me so much in that short span of 5 days he spoke through Jack, and I can't believe how much of it I had already been struggling with for months now.

I learned how distorted my priorities were; I placed so many things above God that I couldn't even see him anymore. I thought so many things about guys that I know I shouldn't, and that was harming my relationship with Him even further. I will always struggle with things like forgiveness, love, trust and so many things, but I know God will preserve me. It hurt so much, but it felt so good to become broken and renewed in him. It was also so encouraging to see so many other people begin to grow and bloom in The Lord, and I can't wait to see how God will use them!

On the last day. Jack asked us to sign a agreement, sign a pact, make a pledge. To become Christs disciple; to become his servant, to take up my cross and die to myself daily so he can be glorified through all I do. The road will always be hard, and I will have to give up everything daily to follow Him! My love for him should be so big and so bright, that in comparison my love for my friends, family and myself would be hate. 

Others signed the same pledge, each I pray understanding what road awaits them. I will try to pray for my brothers and sisters daily in their walk and that they would be strong in The Lord and hope that they pray the same for me also.

Like I said, a hard road awaits all of us who choose to take up our crosses daily to follow him, but I know that it will be a road that will show his glory through and through.

I ask for prayer for something God laid on my heart a few months ago. My town is so broken and so sick, and I believe he gave me a heart for it. No matter how much I hate Fernwood, God placed me here for a reason. Please pray that I have the courage to help my town come to Christ, or even a small portion of it. It isn't how big or how small that matters, though; it's if you're willing to listen to Gods calling.

In other, less life changing news, I'm getting sick! It might be from my cabin leader, or it might be my body saying 'die', but it doesn't change the fact that I am indeed, sick! So you can pray for that, also.

Signing out,

Winter.

Snow is Starting to Sound a lot like Sheol Right About Now............

Yes, wonderful way to open up the blog post, eh? It's a free country, deal with it. Don't worry, theres always a method to my madness.........most the time.

Soo........This morning I woke up, and couldn't tell the difference between the flat land and the hill in the back yard. I'm beginning to doubt that Global warming thing more now. They say Global Warming is to blame for no snow, and BAM, there is two/three feet of snow within a 4-day period and more to come. Yay.

I guess I shouldn't complain though. I mean, wasn't it just last month that people were complaining that there wasn't any snow? I mean, it was like 'theres no snow,' 'theres no white stuff' 'I want a snowman!' 'waaan waaan waan' And now we have snow, and now everyone isn't exactly complaining, but they aren't thanking the Lord for it either. It reminds me of how much we whine about the current situation, then when it changes, we whine that it changed. I'm not pointing fingers, but I am sure some of you have, more then once, wished you didn't have snow. They make the roads harder to drive on, it's colder, it's hard to walk through it, it gets in your socks, shirts underwear. Snow, for those unnaturally grumpy adults, is like white dust from hell. Snow, for us less-then-grumpy people of the world, find it as enjoyable as it is inconvenient. It's fun to play in and you can make stuff, but it's cold and gets wet when you enter hot places. As long as it snows, you get nice, fresh white powder as well as the stuff that came in the night before, but you also find that when you get more and more of it, bunched together, it gets harder and harder to maneuver through it.

Not so much fun for us people who have to feed animals in the snow.

I genuinely enjoy the snow. I like sitting inside, reading a book and watching it, or drink hot cocoa while standing on the porch to watch the snow fall at night. I'm not a very keen person on playing it it, one of the factors being I have no snow clothes. The other...well, it's wet. I dun like wet.

For me, snow makes me as happy as it makes me slightly sad. I don't know why, but theres something depressing about all that white, makes me feel a bit like crying sometimes. Like, there's a story behind the white blanket. It kinda reminds that I'm as white as that snow, but not by myself. I'm white as snow because He came down from Heaven, wept with us, hurt with us, felt pain like us, and died to take away all our transgressions, because he LOVED us. Because he wanted to make us white as snow, like him. Interesting thought, isn't it?

So I guess, in light of that thought, it makes me a little more grateful for the change in season from Autumn to Winter. The white that falls from the sky reminds us of how a unblemished Lamb cam down and made us like him. Blameless.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you have a grateful, fun filled time in this change of weather.

~Winter

Fish Bowl Thoughts

To contemplate my recent years would be like watching a fish swim in his/her bowl- constant, not really changing, and expecting the same routines day after day. Nothing really changes, and we get used to the present, not really expecting any BIG change. Sometimes, though, our lives are not always confined to our fish bowls. Sometimes life changes without warning, without plausible cause or really any viable reason. My life has been changed a lot recently over the past few years, or maybe even just last year. New friends, new relationships, broken and rebuilt friendships, and all in the span of but maybe what, two years? My life as I know it has been going on a wonderfully eventful ride for the past several months now, as well. Dams overloading, tears spilling out like waterfalls, that sorta thing.

As most of you who know me, I do not speak much. My feelings have always been in a tight bundle of what I called self-preservation. I don't like getting hurt, and keeping to myself usually prevents the hurt others can cause, but lately keeping it in has been hurting me much more then before. I've always had this, probably crazy, idea that if I kept to myself, kept my feelings from seeing the light of day, nobody could get close enough to hurt me.

I was wrong.

Apparently, God must have had a sense of humor when he made little ol me. He gave me a very big, nurturing heart. A mothering heart, I guess. I don't know why, but my heart is as playable as guitar strings. I grow firm attachments to my close friends, and even though I never really gave much of myself (I know I should, and am doing better now), my heart hurt for them, loved for them, and was angry for them. Sometimes, I would feel betrayed by my friends, but my anger doesn't usually last long when they have wronged me. No, it's when they wrong my family that I have a problem. It's bad of me, but I can hold a seeping anger for months on people who have hurt my family.

Recently, I've been pondering why God would give me such a caring heart. Well, recently, meaning that I'm actually beginning to try to understand what God wants for me, instead of sitting in my own little bemoaned world where it is woe is me, I'm alone and sad and useless and I don't matter to the world. Yeah, not fun.

Anyway, the question is why did God make me care so much? Some people I don't really know but friends with, I get worried for them. Worry-wort me ^^

But, anyway. I'm learning to deal with these annoying changes in my life, and who knows, maybe one day I'll understand why God gave me the heart I have. I have some ideas, but I'm not really ready to share them via world-wide internet. Sorry, stalkers out there.

Thank you for reading my ramblings, and maybe I have said something that will make you ponder yourself a bit?

Here to ramble always,

Winter

Cleaning Spree!

Today my mom said 'Time to clean!' And that's where I, being the lazy person I was this morning, groaned. Cleaning is not my thing, okay. Most people LOVE cleaning, but I dislike it strongly. I don't hate it, but its work and work is like my number 1# enemy, besides chocolate. So after feeding my horses with my little brother as my slave. We began to move boxes and such.
Loading the car with boxes took only about 15 minutes, then we would spend 15 minutes driving, unpacking, and taking a load from the trailer, packing it into our car, then unpacking it into the storage shed AGAIN. We did that about 4 times today.Then we worked on dishes. There's not a dirty dish in this house YAY! Then I had to clean the stove, which is one of the chores my daddy so gracefully blessed me with. So I vacuumed it, then took my trusty sponge and scrubbed it, let it sit, then scrubbed it some more, then dried it off with a dish towel.
Then me and my mom went to take some dirty laundry over to the other house, where my daddy was moving our extremely, over-sized trailer. The hornets were NOT happy with my family today!

All and all, I didn't complain ONCE! I was happy to get rid of the junk and whatnot. Well, at least my mom said I didn't complain. I complain playfully, so it doesn't sound like I'm complaining.

God taught me today that work is good and you earn special privileges when you work! (Like sitting here on the computer)

With love,

Winter.

Yay.....

More like ugh...Since I shall stay true to the name of this blog, I shall ramble about myself, other people in my house, the world....

Today has been fairly quiet and quick. I don't remeber anything exiting today happening other then my dad giving us a lecture on how wrong we were yesterday. I guess that was well deserved. I'm not gonna talk about how bad my brothers and my sister were, that's past and the past is behind us, at least me. I guess it's easy for me because my mom said I didn't do anything considerably bad except yell at my brother and sister when they ran off while we were in a line.
I draw. Anime, animals, you name it, I just like to draw. Ever since I could hold a pencil I've been doodling. Fron stick people holding...well sticks to very strange looking people holding giant swords.

I guess this entry has no meaning expect to ramble about a short portion of my life, maybe next time I will actually have something to talk about.

With love,

Winter.