After God's Own Heart

This next week over 150 Josiah Venture missionaries and nationals will gather in the Czech Republic to be together as we see how our personal lives can be transformed even more than they are now.

This is hitting me at a real good time! I have been back for 3 months now and I can feel myself getting into ruts that I don't want to get into. Comfort zones that I don't want to settle for. I want God to transform the way I think, feel, live and value! I want my heart to become more transformed than it is now. I am ready for jumping in deeper! I am tired of the clear shallows and desire to jump into the deep waters!

Please pray for us this week. We are saying good-bye to several JV missionaries and hello to quite a few new ones as well as nationals. It is a time for transition. With transition, comes transformation. We are in a time in all of our countries where transformation is the only way to continue growing.

Please pray that my heart will be open to what the Spirit to show me. I want to be more like Jesus!

Poland has truly become the consumer leader in Eastern Europe!

Our family joke is that my dad will someday buy the one item that my mom absolutely hates!! A chocolate fountain! I think my dad would secretly wants one! We have all been given a strict command from her, "Don't EVER get me a chocolate fountain!"

I was looking around at the mall (yes we have a mall, in fact it is said to be the largest in Eastern Europe!) and look what I came across! A CHOCOLATE FOUNTAIN!!!! Well, I had to take a picture of it and wonder if mom would like a special fountain from Poland. . . huh mom? Mother's Day is coming! :) I could sent Polish chocolate to go with this wonderful invention of man! :)

MOOSK at H20!

Last weekend our city-wide youth group, MOOSK went to our organization's camp to help clean it up. Thirteen young people came and did a GREAT job. What was fun for me was that I am putting a promo video together to encourage both North Americans and Poles to help out. It was great to hear their hopes and dreams for this camp.

News Flash: I 'm Married!

Okay, don't get a heart attack. . . I am not married, just the meter maid near my school thinks that I am. The word for "must" and "husband" sounds very similar to me. I was trying out my Polish and said "My husband is learning Polish." when I thought I said, "I must learn Polish." It is very easy to get it mixed up! She asked me if he was from the US or Poland and I said, "USA." thinking that she was asking me where I was from. My mind was on getting to class, not on what I was saying! That was my first mistake.

As I was walking away to class and replaying the conversation over in my head, I realized what I had said! Whoa! A husband? Where did HE come from? (Is it Matthew McConaughey? Sweet!)

So I am not going to that parking place again until I can say that I don't have a husband and that I was mistaken. I don't want to accidental say, "I don't have a husband because I killed him!" :)

I love this language! Even as frustrating and difficult as it is, I am trying to have fun with it. I just got my first real test back and I got the 2nd highest score. All of my errors were "minor" endings. I was really proud of that until I remembered that earlier, just one "minor" word got me married!

So Far, So Good

I am applying for my residency card. What a hard thing to do! I had to prove that I am renting from a person who is in residence. My rental contract was not good enough, I had to the the signature of the owner of my flat too. He lives six hours away in Warsaw,so it is difficult for him to get down here. We decided to take a small gamble last weekend as he was down here for the weekend, and have him sign the form and then write a letter to say that he own the flat and I was renting it. . . He did and so today we took all the papers in. All the lady was really interested in was the rent contract! She briefly looked at his signature and did not even want the letter. Ahh! So what I thought would take hours took about 10 minutes. Laura Hash looked a bit stunned too that it took such a short time.

So now I have two months to be in the country and get things going. I think I have all of my paper or I am getting them this next week. The next step is to see what happens with all the other paperwork. They want all sorts of details! Things that should not matter like how many days I spent in Croatia last year. Why do they have to know that? I am not apply for Croatian residency! This is reminding me that parts of Poland are still under the rule and influence of "Big Brother" Communism. I hope the rest of my cart goes as fast as today. . . doubt it, but I can hope! :)

My Website has been updated

My site has been updated with new pictures and such! Check it out!

HERE!

My Polish Brother, Łucaś

Below is a video of my Polish brother, Łucaś (Woo-Kawsh). His is a story that I desire to hear more of in Eastern Europe! He is a Jr. High youth pastor. It is VERY rare to have pastors here focus on the Jr. High age, but it is starting to happen. The video is about 9 minutes. It comes from our new bible study series called Elements. It is subtitled in 11 languages! It is a great resource for us!

Poland is taking center stage!

Poland and the Ukraine have been selected to host the 2012 World Cup! I know that this may not matter in the States, but it is a BIG deal here in Europe! We beat out Italy! Yeah, the hub of World Cup Football! In Europe, football is soccer. I just found out that there will be 4 cities in the Ukraine and 4 cities in Poland. One of Katowice's suburb cities, Chorczow will be one of them. I will have the World Cup playing only 15 minutes from my house! Hopefully, I will learn about European Football before that. I also hope to be able to understand more than "GOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAL!", by then! :)

Why do I tell you all of this? It is just one more example how Poland is quickly becoming very influential in Europe. This country is in the middle of deciding if it will just survive or if it will become a leader. It's youth have a lot to do with that. I have heard more and more young people trying to figure out how to stay in Poland. They are now leaving the country for shorter periods of time. I am hoping that this next generation will take pride it Poland.

I hope that they will see how much God loves them and wants a personal relationship with them . . . When God grips the heart of a Polish young person it is amazing what happens!

My Poland Family!

This is my family in Poland! I love these guys! They are encouraging and challenging, just like a biological family! We spent three days together looking back on last year and planning for this year! Our camp H2O is on our minds. We want to get it going by next year so that we can have even a bigger impact on southern Poland.

What I like best about this group is that we come from three different countries! Poland, Canada and America! The body of Christ! Thank you Lord for this privilege to work with this incredible group of people!

MOOSK - It means Brian or Moose!

Moosk is the city wide high school group that I am a part of. It is GREAT! Why the name? The kids just like the word and it turns heads!

I love the students and they are there because they want to be! We meet once a month and do crazy things! Last month it was a time to drink Coke and eat goldfish (the ones that swim . . . not the crackers!).

This month the theme was Identity. We used the "Incredibles" as our theme mascot. I was asked to speak at it. Wow! I have not spoken at one of these types of things in over 3 years and my weekend was FULL, but God was gracious and gave me words and passion where I did not have them.

I used the points in the movie where Dash wanted to be like his dad and how Vye could not use here powers properly until she understood who she was. When the whole family understood their identities, they were able to conquer anything. We then talked about how identity is hollow if it is not in Christ. I used the relationship of Paul and Timothy and how you influence more than you think and your identity is a huge contributor to that! Christ knew who he was (and is) and he influenced Paul who knew who he was, because of Christ. Paul in turn influenced a young pastor, Timothy who was learning who he was and more about Christ!



After my talk, our youth leader, Jaś gave his testimony on how his life was hollow until he saw that he was nothing without Christ and that now he is seeing how full life is! I have seen this young man transform before my eyes in the past year! I know this is a goofy picture of us, but this is why the kids love him! He is goofy yet, he speaks truth and is real!









This was our "Biggest Muscles" contest! You guessed it! Little Conrad, with no head won! He is a great kid!


GREAT TIME! Thank you , God!

He is Risen!

On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, "Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 'The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.'" Then they remembered his words. Luke 24:1-8

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The Sacrifice . . . His Choice . . . His Love

As they led him off, they made Simon, a man from Cyrene who happened to be coming in from the countryside, carry the cross behind Jesus. A huge crowd of people followed, along with women weeping and carrying on. At one point Jesus turned to the women and said, "Daughters of Jerusalem, don't cry for me. Cry for yourselves and for your children. The time is coming when they'll say, 'Lucky the women who never conceived! Lucky the wombs that never gave birth! Lucky the breasts that never gave milk!' Then they'll start calling to the mountains, 'Fall down on us!' calling to the hills, 'Cover us up!' If people do these things to a live, green tree, can you imagine what they'll do with deadwood?"

Two others, both criminals, were taken along with him for execution.

When they got to the place called Skull Hill, they crucified him, along with the criminals, one on his right, the other on his left.

Jesus prayed, "Father, forgive them; they don't know what they're doing."

Dividing up his clothes, they threw dice for them. The people stood there staring at Jesus, and the ringleaders made faces, taunting, "He saved others. Let's see him save himself! The Messiah of God—ha! The Chosen—ha!"

The soldiers also came up and poked fun at him, making a game of it. They toasted him with sour wine: "So you're King of the Jews! Save yourself!" Printed over him was a sign: this is the king of the jews.

One of the criminals hanging alongside cursed him: "Some Messiah you are! Save yourself! Save us!" But the other one made him shut up: "Have you no fear of God? You're getting the same as him. We deserve this, but not him—he did nothing to deserve this. Then he said, "Jesus, remember me when you enter your kingdom."

Jesus said, "Don't worry, I will. Today you will join me in paradise."

By now it was noon. The whole earth became dark, the darkness lasting three hours—a total blackout. The Temple curtain split right down the middle. Jesus called loudly, "Father, I place my life in your hands!" Then he breathed his last.

Luke 23:26-46 tmg

God Wonderful Gift!

This is our new camp. It has been a journey of YEARS to get this camp and now it is ours! We wanted to use it this summer, but there is so much to do and now that Poland is under the EU standards, we must make improvements. We are also redoing the main building so that it is more user friendly. It is wonderful facility and every time we thought we would lose it, God kept the door open for us to purchase it. Here are a few pictures:




This is an areal view of the camp. It is a GREAT place to build upon. Unfortunately, in the last 4 years, it has been left to decay. We have a lot of work to do!

There are still two large swimming pools and even a "kiddie" pool. This is what they looked like 3 years ago. Now it is a different story, since they are now in great disrepair.

This is the view from the other side of the lake. It is a peaceful place and when it gets a bit warmer, I look forward to going down and spending the day reading my bible and studying my Polish there. A great little "retreat " place.












This is the main building now. We are re-doing it! This picture will look completely different in a year. It will be a large entrance into a great room reception area! It will be welcoming and warm.















These are two of our 14 "domiks". They hold about 10 campers.

















Inside the cafe that we hope to remodel and open to the public.











This is a field that is next door. We are wanting to purchase it so we can have a official sized soccer field! This would be a great blessing if we can 1) wait for the widow to change her mind and put it on the market again, and 2) we can come up with the money that we would need to purchase it.



Why am I sharing this with you? So you can pray for us! We are also looking for American groups to come over and partner with Polish churches in remodeling and cleaning up the place. Saturday was our first work day and 60 people from different churches came to work together.

So here it is, the newest member of the Josiah Venture/Fala family: H2O!

There Is A Time For Everything . . .

There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven:

a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,

a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,

a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,

a time to learn Polish,
a time to be involved in ministry . . .

No, that is not really what Ecclesiastes 3 says, but it is how I feel right now. I had lunch with my country leader and his family today. It was a great time of reconnecting. He asked how things are going and I smiled. It came to my attention yesterday, as I was thinking through the past few weeks, that I am frustrated with the fact that my ministry is learning Polish, not working with youth. I know that Polish is my link to these young people, but it does not make the desire to just jump back into ministry (even without Polish) NOW! I LOVE to be in involved with young people and right now I can not at the level I would like, so it is a very difficult time for me!

I have been reading through the bible this year and just finished Job and getting done with Ecclesiastes and Song of Solomon. They are all showing me the passion that God has for ME! Even when things are tough and frustrating, God PASSIONATELY loves ME!

I think I have been feeling this way because last Monday I was asked to talk to our youth group about suicide and the effects on people who are left behind. It was a very emotional talk for me and yet being with the "youth group bug" bit me again and all I want to do is to get more involved with this wonderful group of "kids". I can't though, not now anyway. I need to concentrate on Polish and even though it is hard, it is my act of worship to my Father.

One great gift God has given me though is that I am involved with our city-wide monthly youth group meetings called MOOSK. These meetings are very much like my youth group meeting in the 80's when I was in high school. We get to do all of the fun games that we no longer can do in American because they are deemed too "dangerous". "Vegimatic" here I come!!! (You who understand that one will know that we are doing the WHOLE Vegimatic!) Yahoo! :) We are also doing a work day at Josiah Venture (Poland)'s new camp facility as a city-wide youth group. It is our way of teaching service to these young people. I am excited about this opportunity!