Hawaii rain and lighting

I had to unplug my computer for fear of it blowing up or something. I was laying in bed and then noel said, "do you feel rain coming down on you?" ....why yes I did. It was raining so hard we got slightly rained on in our rooms. Lighting or thunder hit right above us which was pretty sweet.

People are really quite stupid. All of a sudden everyone rushes outside into the rain and lighting. Dumb. ahhhhhg! The rain just picked up again. Scary. Oh poor noel. I just looked up and she is forced to place a pillow over her body as not to be rained on in bed. sad.

Anyways, its pretty freaky weather. Oh, also, sidenote. If you are a girl...always wear more clothes then you think. There may come a time when you must run outside...be it to check the rain out or escape an earthquake...and you realize you only have a tank top and undies on. Thats what happened to one chick. I didn't get it much better wearing a white nightgown??? Wear clothes. Helps kick awkwardness out the door.

Making Disciple Makers?

So...in 25 days I have not one clue what I'm supposed to do with my life. Great. Thank God for AMAZING friends here. Cliff, my bestest male friend a girl could have, is fasting/praying with me. We're going to have a time to just pray. Who does that? I feel so blessed with having friends who are so intentional and truly WANT to see me walking in the will of God for my life.

Fellowship is so wonderful. This woman looked at me and said, "even though YWAM has its ups and downs, never take this time for granted". This next month is so precious to me. I'm eating every second up. Trying to take everything I can in, for I know its not long when I won't be here. Thats hard to think about....

There is a great chance (if I find my passport!!) I might be doing the MDM (making disciple makers seminar) in Amsterdam. Ryan, Kari, Jaimie and maybe Cliff are headed out there this summer. Its a 9 week course on intensive training on how to disciple. So I'm praying into that. I thought I was going to the east coast a month back, and maybe I'm still to go. I don't know yet. I just want to make sure that whatever I end up doing its the word of the Lord...that I have a "handlebar word of God" that I can hold onto. I want to be passionate about the next step. Its been a hard few weeks. I'm trying to learn how to be on my own again in a sense. not depending on someone else. It can be hard to make choices when there is someone in the back of your mind. I'm trying to move on from that position and into the position God has for me. Thankfully I have amazing friends helping me TO move on and upwards. I also have such a wonderful support group so even though I feel life is a wilderness, I don't feel so alone....

I can be so cruel

I am such a shmuck. I wish I had a mind of a guy sometimes. Get out of this over-emotional girl body that I must dwell in. I wish my reaction to hurt would be to take it and run to Jesus. Unfortunately I would rather hurt people instead. BAD MADIE! I want to be the kind of person who does the right thing, but hurting feels so bad. I wish I could erase past mistakes, erase the past year and the memories that I hold in that year, but I can't. Pain shapes us. Pain shows us who we really are...big messes. Pain draws us closer to Jesus and it reminds us that there is still grace at the end of the day.

I wish the one person I truly cared about didn't have to hurt because of me. I wish that person knew how deeply sorry I am for expecting so much and not respecting him. I wish I could make it right and fix it, but I'm all out of tricks. Give it back to God AGAIN and let go. Let go and let God as my friend Andrew told me...right? Let the pain in and let the hurting start. Its gonna be a long journey but this too shall pass.

Madies one and only blog about relationships

I don't write blogs about relationships or advice about them (God knows I don't have good advice when it comes to them) so this blog will most likely be the one and only time I write something along these lines so bare with me here...
I was at Jaime Klines (excuse me...Jaime Bates) wedding the other night. She was beautiful by the way. Jeremy West was there to give a blessing.Jeremy has a way with words. He said:
"Dustin love Jaime...Jaime be easy to love"

...now I just figured he would tell Jaime the same thing, you know, "Jaimie love Dustin...etc". But he didn't. He went to tell her:

"Jaime, respect Dustin...Dustin, be a man worthy of respect".

Whoa there. Respect?? Really? Not love? I've been thinking and pondering this statement for the past few days now. I have come to the conclusion that as women... we are naturally prone to want to love. We are nurturers, we are the ones that believe in happily ever after, watch chick flicks, cry at commercials, talk about the man of your dreams, and deny that we ever do all these things. But we do. Secret or not. We want to give our whole heart to a man, serve him and love him. Its natural for us to love. But RESPECT. Man...

Respecting a man for who he is can be hard. Respecting a man for wanting to pursue God and not you is hard. Respecting a man for his choice to pursue a vision and not back away from that can be hard too. Respecting a man for his choice to pull away from the things that he wants and doing the right thing (even though it hurts you in the end) is hard. Respecting and Honoring a man is hard for a girl...or maybe just me. Maybe its the other way around for men. I don't know. But as for me, I'm learning that loving is easy, but respecting someone is the thing I lack and am wanting God to instill in me. And this is not just about guys, this element of respect exudes far beyond just that. It is a respect to God, to family, to friends and to the world. Tryin to do what Aretha once sang about....

God is yummy!!

(thank you andrew york for posing in this o-so-lovely photo)
Tasting God for the first time after I haven't for so long, has never tasted sweeter. The last few months have been this constant struggle to learn how to depend on God and not others. The more we lean on others the more we lose perspective on how AMAZING God is. Its like, I go through these phases of giving my EVERYTHING to him and then, something comes in the way and Satan plants these thoughts in my head that God is boring, dull, doesn't speak, and makes me doubt the goodness of God. I then lose modivation to seek HARD after him because I feel like it's gonna SUCK!

But I was listening to Neil Mcclendon on a podcast and he said, "Is there a spiritual discipline that you could do RIGHT NOW that would bring more intimacy with God?" I thought, oh man...yes there is! So, I took myself out to starbucks...bible, journal, sermon on an ipod on hand and just went for it. Honestly, I didn't want to. I REALLY wanted to just do my thing for the day and not invite God into it. Satan and his little lies.... BUT, sucking it up and doing it was well worth it. In an INSTANT I REMEMBERED why we as christians seek God. Because he TASTES SOOOO GOOD. Being challenged, going deep within myself and hearing God speak is the most amazing experience. I'm learning that it is discipline that I need in my life. It is not hard to be passionate for God once you remember how amazing it is...it just is a daily practice.

The sermon I was listening to went through Luke 7. It talks about a master thanking his servant for all that he had done. The servant responds in the way we as Christians are to respond to God when we have been obedient to him... "I was only doing what I was supposed to do". Realizing how much I felt entitled to something from God. YWAM can be tricky. We do all these 'things' for God...these good things and it is easy to say, "God, I've done all these things...see??? what you gonna give me?" So off track! I wanna be that person who says, "God, I'm just doing what I'm supposed to do. Not because I have to, but because its just natural to do it. It just IS me."

Discipline. Becoming a person who just "Is" a Christian. Not striving for anything, or a reward, but just living a Godly life because its natural for us to want good and not evil. I'm not anywhere near that. Its still natural for me to lean towards the bad, but through discipline, diligence, obedience and knowing that God is madly in love with me...I believe that the good will become more natural in my life sooner then later. Now, go...take a big bite out of God. SOOOO oishi.