Blog, Blog, Blogski, Blogo

The past week has been very eventful. full of sadness. learning. hope and perseverance. but most of all perseverance. God has been teaching me the ways of perseverance lately by continually placing constant obstacles in not so much my own, but the life of my family. These obstacles are not simply ones that can be leapt over in our life but more over a staircase that when it seems we can stop climbing because we are at the top, but another set is laid before us where we cannot stop no-matter how sore we are feeling we must push forward until we get over it. It is hard enough to be stretched everyday by the people around me but to have that constant pull from home added on top of all that is already happening is probably the strongest shaping force in my life. For God to have me long to see my family, to long for there faces and touch, i feel closer to them now more than ever and am very excited to go home in two weeks. The past week in school we had another Professor come out to teach us yet another aspect of our faith, and that aspect happened to be Church Ministry. David Ernst definitely made the class an enjoyable one to sit through and the learning easy to absorb all the information that was bombarded onto our simple college student minds. our latest topic for an essay happens to be on whether or not women should be allowed to have a leadership role in the church. it is a controversial issue and an essay topic that i will not readily share because i do not really like having confrontations with any one of any-sort, so ill just leave it as it is. we are now moving into a week which will be filled with quietness because most of Kaleo is heading out to vancouver for the convention for youth workers for 4 days. but before that on friday night Bo, Emma, Abby, and myself all came together to run our youth service. the amount of time we took to plan this event was quite crammed compared to the amount of time it took to do youth. Youth consisted of a competition between the guys and girls for who can pickup a cereal box with there mouth from the floor. but the catch is that after every round we cut the box about 1-2 inches shorter until it was no more than a centimeter from the ground. i was astonished to see the guys surpass the girls in this competition by being able to pick up the box off the floor. following that was a popcorn eating competition that has 4 students eating a total of 16 popcorn bags and the PK ended up puking at the end of the competition. but after that Emma and I led a worship service which the students desired soo deeply to have because since we have been at Bethel we haven't had a worship service until last friday. all in all youth went over better than we thought it would and was a success. next friday the youth-pastor prospect is coming to youth and Bo and I are going to meet him and see what he’s all about. well thats all from my end. I’m signing out. and craving some LOST.....

Part 2. REMIX.. November 16-22

Week 2, prayer week; probably one of my favorite weeks so far in terms of spiritual downtime and revival. My time slot for the 24/7 week was a constant 5AM – 6AM. The mornings were usually acquainted with a clear sky that oh so much reminded me of home because usually at home it is either snowing partially cloudy or clear. And for the most part it is clear with an abundance of shooting stars. When I would go into the room I would look around the room for any new additions of praise and prayer requests then quickly turn off the lights, and sit by the window staring at the stars quietly whispering to God for answers, comfort and requests. The week started out strong for the first four days but near the end I felt strongly exhausted from my early mornings and was on the verge of falling asleep. But let me backtrack a bit. During the week I was able to do my QFX with the maintenance crew and helped them take apart a rotting girls bathroom! I know! Exciting! I was thinking I was going to be smashing everything but instead we were trying to preserve every little bit we could so we would save money on the next build. It was a great experience to come alongside the staff and have a great male bonding moment in the dismantlement of the bathroom. It took some crazy turns, which included a spider battle and a very insightful lesson on servant-hood but in the end we stripped that building bare.

On Friday I was able to go to youth for the first time in a while but when I got there I realized that it was nothing but a movie night and we were watching star trek. Not my favorite movie and I have come to loath space movies because I cant help but notice a universe being portrayed as a universe without God. Such a thing repulses me and I came prepared and finished my textbook that I brought to read. Something that I am very proud of accomplishing is starting and finishing my second textbook on Saturday. Start time 11:00. End time 5:00. 243 pages of a decent book… finished. Sunday came and here I am. After church I had a desire to get out of the buildings because lately I have realized that we are spending most of our time indoors and I wanted to go for a walk. I decided to walk up maple mountain where near the top is a clearing that I have heard of that has a cross and a beautiful view. It is just around a 40-minute hike past some great waterfalls. It was a very eye-opening walk and a great set of downtime to be had at my destination. I would like to include that on the way back from the gym one rainy night my I pod fell out of my rain jacket pocket and onto the wet path and in the rain. I realized this when I returned back to the lodge and looked in my pockets. I came to the decision to never put it in those pockets again because they have holes in them for some reason that is I pod-sized. Apparently TheNorthFace is not I pod friendly and desires all I pods to fallout into the rain. Of course this was a bummer because my pod is used every night to lull me to sleep and now it appeared to be broken. But after some prayer and a heat vent and uncooked rice it somehow works still! Tragedy avoided! Tomorrow is the Twenty-Third of November. A very big day for my family. Pray it goes well and the Lords healing hand is upon the Boyda’s in more ways than o

Part 1. REMIX.. November 9-15

First of all I would like to apologize for my slacking for the past two weeks and previous weeks before. My blogs have not been filled with very much content and have been quickly growing shorter. I intend to make an improvement on these shortcomings starting now with a different approach to writhing them. Now lets fill in the gaps for the past two weeks….

The morning of November ninth was a very exciting one because not just anyone was coming but DON TAYLOR was going to start teaching us about the Old Testament! At first I was discourage because I was thinking “what? A test? Memorize ALL the books of the Old Testament in order AND remember how to spell them ALL correctly?? OH NO!!!! These were my initial thoughts. At the start of the week but I was still pumped to learn about all the scandals, lies, murder and battle associated in the OT and at the end we were going to have a movie! Exciting eh? I thought so! As the week progressed the reality of the movie turned into a few late night/ early morning sections throughout the week but none of us are like the trooper Trent who pulled basically 2 all nighters, what a chief. But at the end of the week the movie turned out to be a fantastic film with effort put in from the whole Kaleo community. I must admit, because it was basically caught on film… the water in November is really… REALLY cold but it was worth it to add some Epic-ness unheard of in the film.

When the weekend came around I was slightly bummed to see that I was working again (but I signed up for that weekend so I really did that to myself) and Friday night consisted of me directing traffic. But this wasn’t the first time I directed traffic, the first time I did it alone but on my second attempt I was given an older and more “experienced” person to tell me how to tell where cars are to be parked. I never knew it before…but directing traffic is FUN! I remember watching at the airport where the men with the flashlight batons would wave where to place the planed by doing a little dance on the spot and that’s where the plane would go! And finally I got my own baton… which Brendan eventually threw on the ground after much provocation on my part and the flashlight cracked in half… nut it wasn’t mine nor was it a high quality light. In fact it was a low quality. So your welcome camp Qwanoes.

On Saturday I was on maintenance all the hours of the average North American workday except for the time of activities where I was doing ropes on the sky-scraper (giant 3 person swing). For those of you who do not know what ropes are on the giant swing; the cable that pulls the occupants up to the top gets unhooked from the riding swing thing and it is my job to pull that rope back to its original spot and prepare for the next ride. As it may not sound, this job is strenuous and tiring. In the end I got arm pump and couldn’t hold on to anything with my hands and had to find a replacement.

Reading week/Jr. high weekend retreat/first day of Old testament literature.

stress, stress, stress, crunch time. those four words have been dominating the past week and will be ruling for the next 2. its not that i am behind, its more of there is much to do and little time to do it.

this past weekend, there was a junior high retreat and the only thing i was scheduled to work for was directing traffic for an hour on the first night. so for the entire weekend i hung out with the children and councilors for the time i could on the weekend. it was interesting to be able to be there for the retreat but have no obligations to the kids but to be there and play the games, worship in Q-town and sit in during meals and talk with joke around with them by talking in a british accent and tricking them into thinking i was british!

because i worked i was unable to go to youth, in fact, our whole youth party of Kaleos were unable to go to youth an on sunday i was the only one to attend the service.

Today we started OT lit. and it is unbelievably interesting! i am very excited for this week of class despite our limited time for homework and i am looking very forward to working as a class for our project

Photos, Not Photons....

This past week was a definite contrast between the week earlier. instead of class, we went surfing in tofino! Instead of a mildly stressful weekend with children, it was a mildly stressful weekend with Homework! and i was able to go to church and youth on sunday and friday! that was a good time. Friday Youth happened to be our halloween party which consisted of pumpkin carving, an interesting discussion with the youth and a game of sardines (hide and seek with different rules). It was interesting and good to finally have a time where we can engage in a message with some good questions to get the youth talking, thinking and breaking out of their boxes a little with each other. it is quite different from the youth back home dealing with a more emphasis on "parties" and fun times over messages and times of worship. This realization has make me more appreciative of when i used to help set up for youth and there was much emphasis on "atmosphere" and at the time i thought it was dumb but now i see how every little bit helps. church on sunday was very interesting because i attended a different church than my usual one. its number of attenders was quite less and the age category was through the roof! it made me thankful to be in the church i am stationed in. surfing in tofino was a blast of a time! i didn't do much surfing due to a previous motocross shoulder injury but had a blast and a half simply running around the beach taking pictures. all in all it was a good week full of good memories and now on the reading week its time to do some more H-work