The Best Days in History

The past month has been a crazy blessed month. I can't even describe some of the things that Jesus is teaching me right now. Probably the biggest thing I am learning right now is faith and how to "use" it properly. I have always thought of having faith but never really thought about using faith until now.

In the past month I have been on a sort of reading frenzy. Seriously I have never read this much in my life. Currently I have completed 5 books in 4 weeks and am currently about 75% done with my 6th book. I have started to slow down just a little on this last one and by that I mean it has taken me a week to read instead of 2 days. I think that I am slowing down a little because this book is rocking my world right now. I am reading the book Believing God by Beth Moore. This is my first Beth Moore book to read. I have done her bible studies and loved all of them but I have never ventured into her books. Well let me tell you...it is a great adventure. I have learned so much in the past week and I am a little sad that I did not find this book earlier.

"Nothing on earth compares to the strength God is willing to interject into lives caught in the act of believing." -Beth Moore Believing God

Come on! Who doesn't get excited when you read something like that? If you don't then you might need to check your pulse. Beth goes on to talk about a 3 step process to practice using faith.

1. Practice raising your shield of faith by repeating the five-statement pledge of faith. The five-statement pledge is so good and for the past week I have been saying it. Here are the statements.

• God is who He says He is.
• God can do what He says He can do. 
• I am who God says I am. 
• I can do all things through Christ.
• God's Word is alive and active in me.

Well yesterday I was on the phone with 6 new schools trying to talk to the Head Teacher. After talking to 5 of them and getting the usual "leave a message and we will call you back" speech, I dialed the number for the 6th and final school. Before I did I said the five-statements out loud. I said "God you are who you say you are. You can do what you say you can do. I am who you say I am. I can do all things through you. Your word is alive and active in me." I then said "I WILL speak to this head teacher and we WILL have a meeting. When I called a man answered the phone. I asked to speak to Mr. ___ (The HT). He then said "speaking"

AHHH THE HEAD TEACHER ANSWERED THE PHONE! I spoke with him for a while and he asked when we could come in for a meeting. We are meeting with him Wednesday at 10:30am. Please be praying for us.

Also we now have another school signed up for a meeting next week. And this morning while writing this blog on Faith I received ANOTHER phone call from a school that has been the most difficult to get into. We have been very discouraged with this one but alas WE HAVE A MEETING! Ahhh I was so excited I actually let out a scream that I had no idea was coming out. I am pretty sure that was the holy spirit screaming at me saying "see I told you so."

God is so good. God WILL get us into more schools and we WILL change lives!
Please keep having faith and please start to actually USE it. It will change your world.

2013 has come and gone and once again many people are making the usual promises to themselves to do things this year that they failed at last year. Resolutions like losing weight and exercising more or to start saving money or shopping less fill our brains and hearts with guilt and a sense of failure before we even start. Sure some people start off with a bang and usually break their resolution within the month of January.

Today I am dedicating my blog post to one of my heros. This gal is simply the best. I can't imagine my life without her and I am so lucky to call her...my mom.

Where can I even start with how great my mother is? She has been there for me when I am happy and when I am sad. She has given me advice and has been there to wipe away the tears when I didn't take it and things did not turn out well. She is truly a gift from God.

Today I am especially proud. My mom has overcome so many obstacles in her life and came out smiling but this one in particular was really hard and she took it like a champ. Let me tell you a little about it.

My mom married at a very young age and shortly after started the family with my older sister Kristin. I guess Kristin was a little too much to handle because they waited another 9 years to have me. (lol jk Kristin...LOVE YOU!) While my mom was busy raising a young family she realized that she needed to go to school in order to have a career. She followed my dad to mortuary school where she then became a Funeral Director. I might be a little biased but I think that I can say with full confidence that she was one of the greatest Funeral Directors ever. She cared so much about each person that came into the funeral home and I remember her coming home and telling us stories of people that she had met. My mom touched many lives in her 20 something years of being a funeral director. She has helped several family members deal with loss and has been a blessing to everyone that she meets. She truly used her gift of compassion to bless others in their time of need. My mom always said that being a funeral director was her ministry and she was right. It takes a certain person to be able to sit with a grieving family and help them make arrangements for their loved ones.

After working in the same profession for so long you can understand her shock when she learned that the company that she worked for was closing down and that she needed to find another profession. While most people would find this news traumatic and not know how to deal with things my mom (although she was sad) said no to a pity party and started trying to figure out what the next step was.

The next few months were hard but I am so blessed to say that my God is a mighty God. Every step my mother took was blessed by God. He guided her right to where he wanted her. My mother has always been good at decorating and putting things together. She is also great at selling stuff. So what better job for her than real estate? She was introduced to the idea from a friend and then was blessed with a job offer after she completed real estate school.

Now any normal 50+ woman might have heard the word school and would have given up then. But my mom didn't let that stop her. She pulled up her boot straps and signed up for school. Online school was tough and she did struggle to find the time to do classes with my little sister bopping around from place to place and activity to activity. After a meeting with her new job they offered her schooling in an actual classroom where she would finish quicker than online. God provided the funding for that and off she went.

During this time she travelled back and forth from San Antonio to do her classes. Now San Antonio is about an hour from where my mom lives and gas prices are not necessarily low right now but God knows what he is doing. When I left for England I left my parents with my little car. Now she could get back and forth from San Antonio without spending a fortune. I just love how God provides. After she finished classes she had to take her test and then that was it. She would be a realtor. Well today...SHE PASSED!!!!

I cannot explain how proud I am of my mom. She is truly my hero. She overcomes so many obstacles and when Satan is starring her in the face saying "give up" she punches him in the face and says "not today bucko." I see so much of myself in her and I am blessed to know that she passed down her resilience to me and helped make me strong.

I know that my mother has always been proud of my accomplishments and I think that she has seen them as outweighing her own but honestly I think that she has done more than I ever could. I am so proud to call her my mother and I am blessed to be able to see the hand of God working in her life.

Now go sell some houses mom! Love you!

How many of us remember saying "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me." I imagine that if I were in a room full of you then hands would be flying up all around because I am sure that we have all said it. The real question is do we really believe it? Can anyone honestly tell me that they have never been hurt by someone's words? If someone can tell me that then I really want to start hanging around them cause they sure have something special. But I think that we can all agree that at some point in our life we have been hurt by words.

I read this quote the other day and it really stirred something up inside of me.
Wow! What a thought. How many times do we say things through out the day that we wish we could take back? Well after reading this and thinking more about it I decided that I was going to try to make an effort to watch my words.

One of the things that I am passionate about is speaking life into people's lives. I don't want to speak negative words over them. I want to bless them. Several years ago when I was working in the nursery I heard a volunteer comment on this little babies appearance. This baby was probably only about 6 months old and was a little bigger than babies that age. This volunteer looked at this baby and said "look at you, you are just so fat." I am pretty sure that I had to pick my mouth up off of the floor. I could not believe that we were already speaking these horrible and negative words into this babies life. I turned to the volunteers and said "let's not start her off on the wrong foot and having a self image issue." I then turned to the baby and told her that she was beautiful and was wonderfully made by God. She was perfect and was going to change the world when she grew up.

Why do we insist on putting these negative terms on people?

Now I have always been a really positive person. I like to find the good in situations but there are some things that just really get the negativity flowing in me. Things like injustice or people not being treated fairly (myself included), being forced to do things that I really don't want to do, and a few others. Basically if I am being honest I have a tendency to be negative about too many things. So after thinking through things I decided to try to have a more positive outlook on life.

One of the ways to have a more positive outlook is to stop speaking negative words. One thing that I do to people around me when things get to be too negative is I make them say 5 positive things about the situation. I love doing this until someone turns it around on me and asks me to follow through. Why is it so hard for us to find the positive in a bad situation.

I did notice the huge change in my life after adding more positivity. I feel like the first week was such a blessing and the second week was even more blessed. I really felt God's hands in my life and His presence in situations. When you keep adding the positive into your life you tend to start noticing more of God's creation, His grace and His love in the everyday things. You have a better attitude about life and I think that you are generally better at facing the day and whatever may come your way.

I want to challenge you to find the positive in every situation this week. When things start to get to negative then list off the good things about your situation. I guarantee that there are some...sometimes you just have to look harder.

Today was just one of those days. One of those days that you lose focus and forget why you are here. One of those days that you just feel like quitting and going home. One of those days that you feel like you made the wrong choice. Today was just one of those days.

I am usually a morning person. I love the mornings. I like waking up and taking my time to get ready but lately I have just been so exhausted that I have not gotten to enjoy my mornings. Today was definitely one of those mornings.

After a great message in church I thought that maybe my spirits would be lifted a little but they were not. The gloom of my bad mood hung around well into the afternoon. I spent my afternoon watching past sermons from my church in Oklahoma and then realized that it was baptism Sunday at NORTH. I immediately felt my heart drop into my stomach and the homesickness started quickly.

After watching the first baptism any normal person would feel joyful and excited that people that they knew were giving their life to God. But I was not any normal person today. I was a selfish person. It was all about me and how I felt. So to keep feeling the "oh poor Callie" feeling...I kept watching. I kept thinking about all the things I was missing back home. I started to think "did I really make the right choice?" "Should I really be in England right now and not in OK?" "What if I would have stayed...where would I be?" Satan really had the questions for me this morning.

After spending a few minutes feeling sorry for myself and shedding multiple tears I realized what I was doing. I had so many people around me that are great people and have been put into my life and I was spending my time crying over something that I cannot change. How unfair is that to everyone around me? It wasn't until I got into Planet Kids for the night service that I realized why I am in England. I had forgotten that I was called here to be a voice. I was called to speak life into their precious lives. I was called to be an influence and a role model. Why would anybody want to be like me today???

It really made me think about why I am here and what I am doing. I think that the biggest thing I learned today is that not all days are easy. Some days I am going to be homesick. Some days I am going to feel like a failure. Some days will not be a walk in the park. BUT! It is on those days that I need to work extra hard to do what I have been called to do. It is those days that I need to pray more and stress less about the future. It is those days that I need to look at my kids in PK and remember why I am here. To be a light in their lives.

Everyday is not a walk in the park...but everyday is a gift from God. Today I am thankful for the realization of how silly I have been today and today I am thankful for the grace to start over tomorrow.

What do the top 2 photos have in common? Well nothing to a normal person but to me Jesus and a messy bun was a conversation started that could eventually change a young girl's heart. Let me explain...

On Tuesday my team and I went into our Secondary school which is like high school. It was a normal day. I attended my first 2 classes and then it was break time. I love break time because it is a chance to stand around with the students and get to know them more. I found my group of girls that I have been building relationships with and started to chat.

We talked about the usual things; school, friends, plans for half term break and messy buns. Now the messy bun is where all the good stuff starts. I asked them how they all did their messy bun in hopes that I would be able to get some tips to improve mine. We chatted some more and then it was my turn to share. Well my messy bun is a little unique. In fact it has a story with it. I started my story off telling them about my friend that taught me how to do my messy bun. I told the girls how "before Jesus" my friend got in trouble and did a lot of not so great stuff. I told them how she learned to put her hair up so fast because she had to get it out of her face when she ran from the cops. Then I said "but now she has Jesus in her life and is going to church and has a great life with no more cops."

After I said that line I thought for sure the conversation was over...nope. One of my girls looked at me and said "how long have you been going to church?" This started me in on explaining my church background and how I grew up. I then go to tell a little of my testimony and how God changed my life. Surely we would be done right? Nope. Another girl said "I want a religion." That led me in to talking about how I didn't have a religion but I had a relationship with Jesus. I got to share about how Jesus does not like it when "religions" fight with each other and lose focus on why they really go to church. Even though I could have gone on more and more and talked all day with them I was interrupted by the bell ringing. I promised the girls that we could talk more about this later and they all agreed that they would like to.

How crazy is it that I can go from talking about messy buns to talking about Jesus? One of my prayers lately is to have intentional conversations with students anytime I am around them. I don't want my conversation to be just a "hey how are you" but I want them to take away something from the conversation. I know that God is helping me have these conversations with students and I am in awe every time he opens a door to speak about Him. Now I just keep praying that I will be able to see these opportunities and not waste them.

I guess the moral of the story is simple...Jesus is in everything...even messy buns.

We are in the final days of our second week at Xcel Church. Last week we finished up our training and took a tour of a school but this week we actually got to go in and start!

On Tuesday we went and spent the day at a local Secondary School here in Newton Aycliffe. School systems are a little different here. Here is a basic outline of the school years in the UK.

(Year 12 and 13 are also called "College")

So know when I say Primary School or Secondary School you can kind of understand. One thing that I found interesting is that students are allowed to finish school after Year 11 (age 16). They can then go to "college" and choose from a list of courses to study. After college they can then go on to University. So you can understand why I got very confused when talking to a group of young people who told me they were going into college at age 16. lol.