Happy new year

Torlina

Just chillin with the family!

Man!

Its been awhile!!  im gonna make a promise to myself and you all I will blog at least TWICE a week......I love blogging its just the time issue but priorities right!  ta ta for now !  talk to yoou sooon

Just in

this will go on!
:-)

Burning One's

I have this desire, this Fire, this burning inside of me that keeps growing!  Its indescibable and I want to share this thing that I have, this passion, this relationship with Jesus! Its not just a friendship but a deep personal intimate relationship with our creator!  We get caught up in the things of this world that distract us and we get completely engulfed everything, our STUFF is what we find our hope, joy, and passion in and yeah I know it sound cliche and we hear it pretty often BUT why are you here?  Are we here to glorify our vehicles? or maybe we are here to make tons of money, because then we can be really happy and then we can buy more stuff.  The thing or things that we desire become our God.  The point I want to get across is if we can reevaluate our focus as to why we are here and not allow our circumstances to control how we live and if we trust in God and continually seek him, you WILL NOT be let down.  I want to encourage you to be on Fire don't lose that desire, don't ever settle for how comfortable you are with God because there is always more and more and more!  Romans 12:2 Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.

Fresh

Well after a much appreciated break we are back to the grind, well at least for a couple more weeks then we have Christmas break.  It seems crazy to think how much God has taught me and how huge my relationship with him has grown and Ive only been on this program for about 2 months!  With eight months to go just seems mind blowing!  Sorry I haven't blogged lately, been kinda busy and just wanted a bit of a break.  As you know I recently just got back from England and it was awesome and different at the same time.  The kids there didn't really like us, but we were there for a reason with those specific kids at that specific time and even know we didn't see the effects of us being there right away I believe we planted seeds and God is going to continue to work in each and everyone of those kids lives. (Isaiah 55) That chapter kept coming back to me while I was over there.  This past week I was able to have conversations with my parents that I never thought I would have, but these were not just conversations, I believe the conversations were God ordained divine appointments.  Even though they are my parents I know that the words that were spoke were spoke specifically for each of them, I know I was encouraged by them and hope they were encouraged by me also.  It was also pretty awesome seeing my beautiful Fiance she is, like always the flower in my life and every time I see her she just blooms, I know its sappy but I don't really care! ha ha!  I could go on and on and on with many many stories and just talk till I have no voice or type till I cant type but the only true way I can describe the experience here is to live it out and be who God called me to be!  This is what makes my heart sing! (thanks for putting it like that Pa)  and I have never been so sure in my whole life and I am so happy and honored to have Friends and Family that support me in this journey. I know its going to be the ride of my life and could be yours! Who's with me when I say I want to live a life that is absolutely and radically abandoned for Jesus? 

Oh Ipswich!

Sorry haven't had the time to really blog so I'm just taking the time now on my phone, so things Are going awesome god is great! Like always:-) I Taught at a CU (Christain union) today about evangelism in school! Its so cool to be able to teach about Jesus i'n school!! Wow
But I literally have hundreds of untold stories to tell all when I come back! Can't wait! And alot pics too I'm keeping them to myself for now so when I come back it gives people an excuse to come visit ha ha
Talk soon
Love just in

HERE!! SAFE!!

Here and safe all!  Excited to post all pics that I have so far but im a little sleepy so I will post em up after a nap!
Love
Just in

OFF WE GO!

Just left, grabbed some mickey deees and off to airport we go! Can't wait to see everyone for thanks giving!

I GOT WHAT?!

So the last week in October I had this ISOM test for Assemblies of God History, Missions, and Governance (supposedly the hardest and most boring class).  There was some confusion as to when this test was going to be, turns out that we had been studying the wrong book.  So when we found out that the test was in like four days I kind of panicked because I didn't even open the book yet.  So I'm trying to pack all of this info into four days, I'm stressing out and before I knew it I was sitting in class taking the test.  After the test the teacher told us we were going to go over the test, so I'm like cool I can see how good I did and lone behold big fat F!! I knew I wasn't going to do good but gave it my all.  So here I am talking about it today BECAUSE!  I got my test results back and didn't realize most of the questions I had gotten wrong were only half points!!  So turns out I ended up with a 79% C+ !!! So excited that I ended up passing and that I don't have to retake!  
GOD IS AWESOME!
Just thought id share that bit of amazing newsssss!

Just in

Great weekend + upcoming events

My fam visited this weekend, my parents came (Mark and Rhonda) and my youngest brother Jared.  It was really good to see them all and to be able to show them the places that we are working at day in and day out.  I needed that breath of freshness, thanks FAM :-)
Our mission trip to Ipswich, Engla5nd is coming up very soon matter of fact its in 5 DAYS! So crazy how fast the time has come and gone, it almost seems like I had just started this program.  We will be working in alot of the schools in England, its going to be great.  It sounds like we are going to be giving our testimonies frequently and putting on alot of skits and games, I cant wait.  Another awesome part of this experience is we not only will be ministering to people but we are also going to many of the famous sites!!  ill def be posting photos frequently! 
If I could ask that you just be praying that the people will have ears to listen and willingness to let God move in their lives that would be awesome! Also prayer for safety and if I could ask for you to pray about helping financially, it would be huge.  Theres a donate button at the top right hand side of my page if you decide to.
Again thanks for all of your support!
God bless
Love Just in
:-)

Order

Before I became a true follower of Christ things were Wacko!  I mean they were WACKO!  My priority's were very twisted around.  I didn't have really any direction other than to work, eat, sleep, and on my days off vegetate.  Not very fun!  I knew what was missing but didn't really want to bother with the whole religious Christan thing so I just kinda pushed that off till it was more "convenient" for me so I just went on with my life.  But apparently god had a different plan for me and Before I knew it I had quit my job of five years because of a back injury.  I had hit a point in my life to what I would like to call the wall.  Don't get me wrong things were pretty good, my family and friends were very supportive with everything I had gone through, and I was falling in love with my now fiance but the fact of the matter was I just felt empty, and nothing of this world could fill me up.  I was so so so sick of the same old things in my life that I began to kind of get angry and cry out to god.  Why would he let me go through these situations?  Why cant he just pluck me out of this crap and fix my broken life?  What am I supposed to be doing here on this earth?  How come I cant hear your voice like everyone else?  I was ticked and believe me the list went on!  The more I cried out and the more I let God be the center of my life, things started to happen.  It started with Erica (my fiance)  inviting me to a youth conference, I received a word from god there, and my prayers where answered.  That was just the Beginning, god began doing little things in my life that I look back now and I'm like wow thank you!  I believe that the reason my back injury caused me to quit was very much part of Gods plan.  We had went on a missions trip to Nicaragua in July of this year and before the trip I had to be very careful with my back, but about a week before the trip we met at my grandparents house to pray for the trip, and Ive never told anyone this but while we were praying I felt this shooting warm feeling go up and down my back and ever since then my back has been like 100% aside from regular wear and tear its been great!  God Is Awesome!  Also another miracle may I add was how I was able to come on this program as far as finances, I know I know, what finances.  Exactly lol, it was a miracle but we prayed for Gods will and this is very much part of the plan he has for me.  So from where I was before and where I am now is just huge, it wasn't easy and wasn't fast and it wasn't until God became my number 1.  Anyone who feels empty and is just sick of the same dead ends and walls, just put God first, be bold and walk in confidence,hes right there just waiting for you to choose him and take his hand! you will be blown away day in and day out, there are no dead ends and there are no walls with God.  Get things in order.

anybody see the resemblance? :-)


Just in

settling to be cows?

I was driving in to church one morning and saw something I had never noticed before,  it was cows, cows walking one behind another in a zigzagged path they had created over time.  One of the most noticeable things about these cow paths, is they often go nowhere in particular.  Another interesting thing about cow paths is a that once a cow path has been created to get from one place to another, the cows will continue to follow the cow path without question. No cow is ever smart or courageous enough to try a new, potentially faster and more efficient way to the same destination again. They will continue to blindly follow the same route time and time again.  Sometimes I feel like that is how we as humans are, creatures of habit, following the same path day in and day out.  Do you ever get tired of the same old habits we find ourselves committing over and over?  I know I do!  God is calling us not to be safe in our churches, small groups, or whatever the organization be!  But he is calling each and everyone of us to become disciples for him, which means getting out of the beaten habits, comforts, safe zones and spreading the word of god!  Lets quit talking about it and put this into action!

Luke 14:26-27
Psalm 32:8
Psalm 23:1-6
Psalm 119:105
Isaiah 55:6
Isaiah 58:11

Love
Just in

day off.....

its monday right now and half asleep so what im going to do is go to bed but i want you all to look forward to what im going to write about:-0  so its going to be about cows, rutts, paths, and spreading the word.  i am also gonna try somthing.  im not going to mention it till later today.  but hoping it works.....  talk shortly night all

im feeling like this lol this is ben by the way!

hope he doesnt mind

Camping!

 I wont be able to blog this weekend until Sunday because I will be in the wilderness camping!

just thought I would let you know so I don't leave y'all wondering!
 hopefully we don't run into

this!

just messing

but really! :-)


have great weekend
love just in

videos of entertainment...:-)

this is a short clip of metro kids a few Saturdays ago....

Ashley working away. that was about half of the boxes that we had to unpack it was incredible how much material we put together.

pretty awesome how much work goes into the setup of catalyst..

many guitars.... it was incredible

this was sound  check before the main event.

this was Kari Jobe opening for worship it was awesome

this was the opener for the second day at catalyst its like a street band.

the whole gang visiting this last Sunday!

i put this on the back of my phone :-))))))

these guys went for like 10 min  doing diff things it was pretty cool!

this guy gets launched out of a cannon  its insane he was like a couple feet from hitting steel beams, not the best angle but you can get better angles on YouTube.

this is my cool new metal bible!

these pics were in the barn me and ash lead the small group in! very cool barn!

So random and off subject but, I was on skype with my dearest last night and asked her what to blog about? because I don't want to be repetitive,  So shes like well, just write about experiences throughout the your days. So I thought back to Monday night when me and Ashley had to babysit at the nursery,  there were about 5 kids there but there was one little girl who was about 16 months old, her name was Mackenzie and she had shaking baby syndrome.  she is blind and has some developmental problems but, she about brought me to tears every time I looked at her.  Her sweet little  smile whenever I would whisper prayers into her ears or when I would touch her head, she is precious!  I know its not very much as far as blogging but if you could just pray for Mackenzie please.

And also I just wanted to announce that I recently got a brand new laptop given to me from my host home(the Millers)!! they are amazing people!  God is amazing!

So I will be blogging more now that I have full access!  I don't have excuses anymore! ha ha

Love

Just In

the long wait has come to an end!

first and foremost this was before youth united room 

and after........

pretty neat the transformation that took place..

I'm just going to add a whole mirage of photos and videos, not necessarily in order but I will explain each picture...

beginning of metro kids

bible study at metro kids

group that I was with and hung out with at metro kids

 its gonna be sweet!!

youth united....

praise and worship

opening day at The Oaks (Riversides other campus)

Nate one of our new good buds...

chillen in a big oak tree 

i told you it was big

Ashley putting together packages for Catalyst

enough said

Yep

nice view ehhh

human cannon ball shooter ma jigger

yeah my new ride... hover craft this thing goes 70 mph 

in the arena first day at Catalyst

tim anderson chillen in my new ride 

tear down after catalyst....

after catalyst....tasty cal

my new arm band

oh and if you didnt know FALL is coming yey!!!

this is viana the judds puppy dog so cute.

awesome comedian .....michael junior..

There has been many great times over the past 2 weeks, actually just too many to list all of them.  I'm not going to go into deep discussion because i really don't have words to describe the things that God has done and is still doing in my life in just this short period of time.  The only few things I want to touch base on is how important it is to have a relationship with Christ, A REAL RELATIONSHIP! not just the every Sunday church doers, but to actually live the life Christ wants us to live, walk in his will, go out of the normal, reach out to hurting people, not only to the ones we live near but to people all over the world.  We were created to glorify god, and to help lost people come to Christ!  I guess I cant really describe the way God has moved me without bringing tears to my eyes, other than to say that he is now the center of everything in my life!  Not that he wasn't prominent in my life before but there were definitely things holding me back from receiving the fullness of him.  I am very excited to see everyone soon for the upcoming holidays and am excited to share more stories.  All in all I wish I could really put into words what its like having a relationship with God but once again there are none.  So i just really really want to encourage everyone that reads this to just strive for God in everything!  Involve him in everything!  You will be blown away!  Just take that first step and grab his hand!  He's waiting!

This song sums up what i'm trying to get across.......

Nothing Compares

much love to all 

just in :0)

ps: prayer for me and ashley as we go for a big test saturday, just pray that we will retain the info as we study and that we do good on the test...thank you

Compilation coming tonight!

The new stuff is coming tonight be ready it's gonna be intense!!!!!

Forgiveness

The title is alittle extreme for what I'm about to write but forgive me for not keeping up this week. Our team literally has had about 10 hours of sleep all week, catalyst is crazy awesome I'll have many stories, pics and vids.... Just haven't had 2 min to myself yet... Hope y'all have a great day and remember no matter the situation god is with us!
Love to all of my peep! :-)
Love just-in

can we say inquant?

OK so we arrived in ATL at about 10:00 AM on Monday, with about 3 hours of sleep.  Inquant described our day Monday perfectly... Catalyst has about 13,000 people annually, those 13,000 people also get a bag of literature, so that's what we did all day Monday was put together these "attendee bags".  its very repetitive and makes for a long day but they feed us breakfast, lunch and dinner and we had met some new people and made some great new friends so I'm not complaining.  Its really cool and encouraging seeing so many people my age living their lives for and with god....very cool, so anyways we were able to get out of the arena around 6:00 pm and get over to my aunt and uncles house to crash.  We had to be up extremely early today to finish the 13,000 bags, finding out that on Monday we had done 2,500 bags for the special labs people, so we still had 13,000 bags to go but with much more people.  So again we made some great new Friends and had a very long and repetitive day but we had great food and great talks so it makes up for  the repetativenesssss :-)
So what has been on my heart lately.... well before I became a true follower of Christ I had always kinda looked up to people and really just relied on them setting standards for how to live, whats ok, whats not ok kind of thing, so basically i was a follower.  Recently pastor Corey did a sermon on running hard and falling,  so i began to think about all of the people i looked up to and realize that they are just people and they do fall and they do have faults and they are not perfect, so what I'm getting to is that I feel God has slowly became and now is my role model, my leader and my idol.   I want to not only be able to just learn from all of the wonderful people that I have met on this program and will be meeting but I also want to impact the lives of everyone that I run into.  I know that I can and never will be perfect but i will strive to do my best to become the person that God has called me and wants me to be.

God is good all of the time

I miss my fiance, my family, and my friends and my perfect little puppy :-)

Food for thought comment if you will....

How often do you feel Gods peace in your life?

Define Brokenness.

ATL here we come

Great news I did not yet post... Me and a few others will be attending Catalyst(convention i'n Atlanta GA) we are leaving on Sunday and coming back next saturday it's going to be a blast. We are going to be staying with my uncle Derek and his family which was set in stone fri, and am very excited to see them but if you could pray that we have safe travels we would appreciate it:-)

Love just in

Happy sat more to come tonight!:-)



So try this.... If someone wants to give u a high five act like your gonna do it back but instead make a fist and put your thumb up and put your fist i'n the palm of their hand and say turkey!

Happy highfiving Lol

So much To write with such great news!

I know it has been a whole week without a blog but it's very hard with limited time and sleep, and also very small screen... It's very tough to blog daily :-) next thing I get will be an iPad lol. Where to start.... Metro kids last saturday was amazing and sad but in a good way the kids that live In these Taft homes are wonderful yet hardened kids it was a blessing to be a part of their lives I'm looking to many more saturdays with them. I have pictures of alot of things this past week has consisted of it's just I have no way of getting them on here... So once I get around a computer or iPad I will post them sorry... Sunday was a more laxxed day, involved morning service and relaxation then headed to Austin and Shannons house for dinner he is the worship pastor we had a great talk about our historys and come to find out there kinda similar, so it was pretty neat hanging out with such a cool couple and their kids. Monday was my day off so I slept I. For the first time while here with no alarm ooo yeah amazing. I did my laundry and cleaned up a bit and got ready to go to think tank to brainstorm ideas for wed night youth group. Tuesday of all days was the worst ever! I was horribly sick and had to be up at 530, and didnt get done with everything until 730 at night bad day, so I'm just gonna leave that one in the dust! Lol. Wed I felt quite a bit better but, Ashley and I had been informed that we were going to be in charge of getting everything except for the message setup and ready so we spent all morning and afternoon getting ready for the youth. I will be posting a video of what we did, it consisted of 7 acts and was very distracting lol you will see it shortly, the message was about staying focused on god, it was very cool. Thurs we helped with the hope store and just helped out the oaks which is if you didn't know already riversides 2nd campus church, their grand opening is today (sat) and there is tons of stuff to do so we have been trying to help out there as much as possible. And on fri we helped again with the kids program(reaction) with visitor bags and setting up things at the oaks ... I know everything is kinda vague and summed up but with pictures I can go into detail alittle more. I will keep up with my blog more consistently. This week has just been crazy with being sick and such, sorry. All in all God is doing great things in such a small time period that I've been here it's just absolutely mind blowing! He is speaking into my life more than ever and I'm able to just focus on what he has to say it's so great. Thursday morning I was looking through my devotional bible my mom and dad had gotten me and, found a note they wrote to me that just really pushed my emotional envelope lol I kinda just thought back and relized just how ignorant I was to everything that involved god. I look back now and shake my head at the person I used to be and laugh.. I'm just so mystified at how people can't or won't believe. I feel so blessed to have the people I have in my life. You all are amazing thank you for your prayers and support! I'm going to be putting pics up tonite so watch for em:-)
Just in is officially back i'n action ha ha

Oh and the verse my parents wrote to me was proverbs 3:5-6 and I'm not going to type it out because I'm encouraging you to open the bible and read:-) do it because it's words of life:-)
Love Justin

I had to write this on my iPhone so ignore spelling errors and punctuality there's no spell check...

Some sleep...

Today is the first day I have been able to sleep past 8 o'clock and it was great! Today we will be going to help with metro kids. I'm not really sure what that involves yet but I'm sure it will be a good experience. After metro kids we will probably going to go over to "the Oaks" to help get ready for the grand opening in a week. The Oaks is another church riverside owns and riverside is remodling and revamping everything. It should be interesting trying to get everything done there, I guess they need like a few more weeks to be ready but only have one week. Hope everyone has a splendid Saturday and a great weekend!
Love just in

Good Times

Well I told you I would post something about yesterday telling everyone how youth united went but got home late and was super tired so I figured I would just post everything from yesterday today.... yesterday was a blast, we were able to meet a ton of new people, and had some pretty cool experiences.  To start the day off we read some material from our ISOM (Illinois school of ministry) classes right now we are studying hermeneutics, which will teach us how to explain, understand, and interpret the bible the way god intended us to.  We then talked with our leaders about the schedule for the day and how the day was going to pan out.  Corey our senior high pastor had been preaching about running hard and falling hard, so.... we wanted to demonstrate this somehow and came up with this.......  its a little hard to see but me and Ashley had to stand on each end and see how horizontal we could get...this wasn't us this was two other leaders but you get the idea.....oh and we won by the way... ha.

 <<<< so this is the youth united room where we have wed night service....

<<< and this is the youth united room looking from stage in the pic above.....its a pretty large room, this room actually was a pool and they filled it in... ( this Dream Center was a YMCA)

<<< this is the "greenroom" or prayer room, which is where all of the leaders get together before service and pray.  Notice that it used to be the showers....

<< Ashley playing some ping pong with some kids during the after school program... shes got mad skills

<<<< the Gaze of fury, again mad skillz...

<< just the other half of the "hang out room" where the ping pong, and pool tables were..

<< some crosses in our bosses offices....just a quick little bit of the hangout area..

I will be getting some more pics and videos soon so bare with me :-)

So far so good just a little tired 

LOve All,   Just in 

Goodmorning

Today is gonna be a very fun day, we are going to be working with the youth groups at the dream center from about 1-9! We will be setting up alot things for the skit that we will be performing and just getting ready for the youth. I don't have much time so I will let you know how it goes :--) have a great day!

Love just in

Prepared

After today alot of unanswered questions I had were answered, so I guess you could say I'm prepared in a sense, but as we were informed today, be ready for the unexpected, all of the time. I'm very excited for alot of the upcoming events but at the same time pretty nervous. Driving back from the "think tank" (the think tank is were the leaders get together and brainstorm ideas for wed night youth groups) I was thinking about what we were told earlier this morning, about how we pretty much are going to be thrown into everything that the church and dream center is involved with, which is a ton of things, and you will probably be hearing about everything very shortly in upcoming blogs but anyway, when I heard that I kinda had an uneasy feeling like, how am I going to handle all of this, so throughout the day I'm kinda stressing out, and on my way to drop Ashley off after the think tank, I just had this feeling of peace and confidence, it was almost like weights being lifted off of me, because I know that God is with me every step of everyday, And know that he will guide me and my words and that there is nothing that I should feel uneasy or nervous about especially with him!

What or who can be against us when God is with us! Nothing and nobody!

That's all for tonite I almost didn't blog because I have to be up early 5:30 yey but oh well

Love Just in. :-)

New strings! Everlasting?

Well it's the first night away from home and after a long long day I decided to put on my new elixir great tone long life nanoweb with anti rust coating acoustic strings.... Ha anyways it took awhile so I had music playing in the background and started thinking about how we always want the newest and best things, and just how sometimes we all can just be so blind to the fact that nothing in this world will ever last or make you happy forever. In the bible, Isaiah 40:28-31 "do you not know have you not heard? The lord is the everlasting god, the creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tierd or weary, and increases the power of the weak. Even youth grows tierd and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the lord will Renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."
My favorite part is verse 28, the Lord IS The EVERLASTING God.
I'm sure from time to time we all find ourselves living for earthly treasures, but I want to encourage you to seek what will truly be everlasting!

Amazing what some guitar strings will make you think of :-)

Love, Just in

break from packing and note to all

my dearest love singing oh so beautifully with my new guitar! while I play revelation song on my pa's giitterr!

me concentrating! very intense ha ha

Erica Christine and I packing away, well more her :-) she's so....words cannot describe! 

In the midst of everything my stomach is turning, a good "turning" because I know that in a very near future I'm going to be saying goodbye to everyone that means the absolute world to me!  I know that this is what I'm supposed to be doing, and this is everything that God desires and what my heart desires.  I want to thank everybody for your financial support and prayers, it means so much to me!  More than any of you know!  God is so so good he has blessed me with the absolute best parent's, fiance (The pretty one in the pics)  brothers, sister in law, aunts, uncles, cousins, soon to be family but already feel like but not legally yet :-)- , and friends that I could ever imagine!  So for now I guess instead of goodbye I like cya later :-)

God bless and follow close :-)

Love, Just in