Not Home

First let me say that I am terrible with keeping in touch with my friends that are not in the same town as I am, and in fact I very much so dislike programs like xanga because they are sort of a cop-out of actually having to put effort into keeping up with those relationships. I suspect this could be my last xanga post and may God increase my drive to keep in touch with those I love on a more personal level.

I think that almost everyone that reads this knows that I have moved away from College Station. But I will just recap for the few that do not. In the Spring I felt like the Lord was calling me to move closer to my parents to do my student teaching (and indeed I still do feel like that is my present calling) and thus I am no longer in College Station where I have a church and friends. Instead I am in Austin living with my sister (and what a blessing that has been!) Truly, the Lord has blessed me with an opportunity to live with my sister and be closer to my family.

However, I can also say that this summer (minus the 3 awesome weeks I spent in Italy) has been really hard. It was hard during my first three weeks here because I was living with my parents and not really getting time with the Lord each day and I was finding it really hard to get plugged in to the church my sister has been going to for two years. And then I went to Italy. Italy was such a sweet time. It was sweet being back among people I knew (even though the majority I did not know very well) and people that I could reminded me of home. After going to Italy and getting another taste of the fellowship that I once had it was all the more harder to adjust to my new life here in Austin. I have tried sticking my foot into the crowd to get connected into this church which is solid in the Bible and 3 times as big as my church in College Station. The Lord blessed me by introducing me to a Community Group and showing me their heart for him. It was so cool that the first person I talked to in that group has a heart for the Muslim People and is actually going with a group from this church to a Middle Eastern country this week. I felt like I could connect in this group, and I am hoping that I can. But I still feel like I am not in fellowship when I go to the Sunday service, and I do not see the people in this group other than on Thursday nights. I know that I need to give it time and more effort on my behalf, but I do not see how I fit here. I see now that although I came back "home", I am not home. May he open my eyes to see what he is doing and help me find joy here, for he is Joy and he is here.

Another Sister?

It's pretty late and I am quite tired but I have some stuff that I would like to write about and I know that if I put it off(like have the past few things I wanted to write about) that it will never be written about. I am going to keep it short and hopefully get around to writing a little bit more sometime this week.

So I was over at my grandparents place last Saturday night (Memorial Day Weekend) and I was playing cards with my sister, my Dad and my paternal Aunt. It was getting late and my aunt casually mentioned that she was going to leave soon because she had to be up early to go to church. Those of you who know a little bit about my family might be just as excited to hear those words as I was. My family consists primarily of non-believers with the exception of my 2 sisters and one of my maternal aunts (Praise the Lord for my aunt continuing to seek the Lord!) Of my immediate family my father is the most against Christianity and any related to it. I get the impression that his attitude also exists in his side of the family but is maybe less hostile since there has never really been anything for it to be hostile against. I would guess that my paternal grandparents and uncle (would have stuck my aunt in that group to) think that Christianity is stupid and a pointless thing to pursue, so when my aunt mentioned she was going to church I was completely stunned but excited. What is more I was over there again last night and say a stack of books containing a Bible (with a bookmark in the NT) and 2-3 devotional books. Today I thought I might get an opportunity to go over there and either play cards or decorate for the Tarock Tournament that we are having tomorrow and so I sought the Lord for an opportunity to talk with her about the church and faith without any hinderance from my Father. Well it turns out that my sister and I went over there to decorate and we got to spend some time with my aunt alone without my dad! How great is that. We got to talk a little bit about church and she talked about how the Pastor spoke on Grace and that she really enjoyed it. It turns out that her neighbor invited her.

I don't know where she is at or if she is reading the Bible but the signs sure point to it. Please join with me in prayer for her- that the Lord would continue to draw her to himself, that there would be no barriers caused by family whether that be my grandparents, uncle, dad or her children, and that her neighbor would be filled with the Holy Spirit and continue to reach out to her and connect her to Godly women. Finally pray that my sister and I would get to have good fellowship with her. Maybe soon (if not already) we will have another sister!

4032!

First I must say that I am really impressed with those people that regularly update their Xanga. I suspect that at best I will update every two weeks or so. I have had things to say for the past week or so...really...but after they started to build up I didn't know which was more worthy of the time it took to write about it so I didn't write at all. After writing a really long post, regardless of how much I want to say and whether or not I said it all, I don't really like to write more so if I want to say something I want to make sure I say the best things first and not last. If I wait until the end to say the best things the best things will not be said and I will have wasted my time on the not best things.

Now that that introduction is out of the way I will venture to say that I am finally at home and I think it has been good. I have not gotten as much time to relax as I thought I would, and the time I do have to relax I don't really know how to spend it. One of the things that I was wary of about living at home was making time and taking time to spend with the Lord. I have gotten a little bit of time with him but my desire is that he would increase my desire for him. Other than that my time here has been good. Time with parents has been good and I have even gotten to spend some time with my grandparents who live just down the rode from us. One of my favorite things about being at home is going over to my grandparents' house and playing cards. Those that know me know that my heritage is Czech. We play a Czech card game called Taroks. Taroks is kind of like Spades, only it is played with a special type of cards and you don't have the same partner every round. The card shown is the highest card in the deck and beats everything.

 Each card has a different point value and at the end of each round, the team that has the most points wins. The number of chips (it is played with chips like poker chips) they win is determined by taking the number of points they have subtracting 53, adding 10, multiplying by 2 and then rounding to the nearest ten. For example if a team has 63 points. The process is 63 to 10 to 20 to 40. So they pay 4 chips. 4 chips is kind of an average pay off. 10 is considered a lot and anything over 10 is painful. This past weekend I played with my dad, and two of my cousins. The way the hand fell caused one my cousin to choose to play against the three of us (it is a little more complicated to discuss how this works if you are really interested you can click here). He ended up having to pay 4032 chips! This is absolutely unheard of. I finished the night out with 1000+ chips...certainly it was my highest amound ever. Poor Chris.

I train for my new job tomorrow. I am really excited. The Lord blessed me with a great job at a child development center called Stepping Stone. They have a number of different locations around Austin and I will be acting as a substitute teacher for them, probably teaching at several different locations each week. They promised me 40 hours which is what I wanted and it is working with kids. They are also willing work around my two week mission trip to Italy. How great is that!

Alas it has happened again...I have some more stuff I could say but it'll wait until next time. Don't touch that dial.

My First Entry

Wow...it is amazing. I finally decided to join Xanga after being faced with the choice between Xanga and Facebook, not really liking either, but wanting to keep in touch with people. I also have some stuff I can put on here that is worthy of my very first post.

Almost everyone that knows me knows that I am a racing fan. NASCAR racing that is. This weekend the race was at the best location for NASCAR races, Talladega Superspeedway. Located in Talladega, Alabama, the Superspeedway is over two miles long and can boast some of the best racing in the sport. At this track the officials of NASCAR have implemented a restriction on the cars called "restrictor plates" that restrict the amount of horse-power the cars can put out. This results in close racing and unpredicable finishes (last years winner came back from 10th in the last lap!) We often see 30 cars all bunched up together sometimes 4 or 5 wide on a track that can comfortably fit 3 wide. Add 190mph speeds and we have a recipe for large wrecks that often include over half of the 43 cars that race. Every race at Talladega has one of these huge accidents which has caused the slogan at Talladege to be "Avoid the Big One."

The race was postponed until Monday afternoon due to a rain delay on Sunday. Usually races are not aired on network television if they are postponed, but to my luck this time it was. You can't miss Talladega.

(Almost) every person that likes NASCAR has a favorite driver (or two or three or many). My personal favorite is Elliott Sadler in the #38 car. Sadler has had a rough start this season with only two top ten finishes, but this weekend he showed his fans exactly how good he is. Sadler qualified in 1st place posting an average lap speed a full mph faster than second place Tony Stewart (1 mph faster is a huge gap in qualifying!) He started first and was at the front of the pack the entire race.

The commentators agreed that his car and the #24 car of Jeff Gordon were the two fastest cars on the track. It was not uncommon to see them two running 1st and 2nd. Sadler was running great and was looking good for the win until about 20 laps to go. With two cautions in the last 20 laps, he somehow lost position and slipped back into the pack of cars. Once in the pack it was hard to get back to the front. He finished a disappointing 16th, ironically just behind Jeff Gordon who finished 15th. Despite the poor finish, Sadler reminded everyone that he is still a driver to contend with.

My other current favorite, Matt Kenseth in th 17 car finished 6th after starting at the back. Kenseth is currently 2nd in points for the year.

Other than good news in NASCAR we also have one day left of the semester! WHOOP! I am looking forward to the summer, to going to Italy and being closer to home. I am praying and hoping for great things and looking out for how the Lord is planning on using me this summer.

End of first post!