Beforehand

"For we are his workmanship. created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." Ephesians 2:10

I was reading Francis Chan's book Crazy Love today and at one point he refers to this verse and talks about how God knew us before we were born and how He had created theses things for us to do. I know that some people get uncomfortable talking about the idea of predestination that they feel that you cannot have free will and predestination at the same time but I am wondering if you can. Tonight our church had an all church gathering which meant that the people from all three locations got together. It was amazing to see a bit of the "bigger picture" of Evergreen. Part of the service was a baby dedication. This was a time for parents to bring their babies forward and share with the church their hopes and dreams for their child(things like growing to be wise, and generous and loving, to be full of joy, to be an example to those they meet of Christ's love) and then the pastor prayed over the baby, prayed for these hopes and dreams and desires to become true. And as I watched this I began to be overwhelmed with the love of God and I could not help but cry. It hit me that no matter how old we are God IS our Father, and He has these hopes, these desires, these dreams or as it says also in this verse in Ehpesians, these "good works" that He has had for us from beforehand, from before we were even born. And I thought of how much these parents love their children, how much they will rejoice when they do, Lord willing, see these children grow up and become wise, and loving and joyful...and I thought of how much joy it must bring God to see us accomplish these things that He set forth for us to do beforehand. Does this mean we do not have free will? Do these children not have free will? Of course they do and we do as well. We do make our own choices, we can choose to live life based on our wisdom and our desires and God allows this, but I think it breaks His heart. However when we choose the things He has put before us to do, when we are living the life He has designed for us it must bring Him so much joy! Maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm missing some part of this...but I don't think I am. I know for me this has brought to me a depth of God's love that I've not known before. There is to me this freedom in this verse. I don't have to work so hard to figure out my own way, to create my own "good works". There is a freedom to live and to live fully. I think of my friends who I love, since I don't have my own kids yet. And I think about how much I love to see them thrive in life how much I love to see them live full and beautiful lives and how much it hurts to see them choose things that harm them and others. And my love for them does not change when they are not living full lives. Nor do I think God's love changes for us when we do not choose to live the full life He has laid before us. But who wants to live a life that is not full, that is harmful, that is meaningless? So let us choose to live, to live a full life, to live a life where we get to discover these things that God has set out for us from beforehand. Let's live this life resting in the hope and joy that small children who know they are loved deeply by their parents live in. Let's walk away from the things that have entangled us, that have discouraged us. There IS hope! There IS a life to be lived and enjoyed. Sure, circumstances shift, really bad things will happen along the way but there is always a deep deep love for us from our Father who delights in us and who knew us long before we even entered this world.

What does this look like more directly in my life? In the adventures set ahead of me? Well I have been working on putting together a team from our church to go to Czech this summer. This is Evergreen's first ever short term mission team. They've sent missionaries out before but it has been more of an individual thing. It blows my mind to think that God may be using me to bring about this change. That He may be using me to launch Evergreen into the world of short term missions. So far nobody had committed to join me in this and I've begun to get a bit discouraged. to feel like this whole thing is far too impossible...BUT I've been remembering last year as I set out to go to Czech and how I wrote the blog here about how God makes impossible things possible and that shortly after I published the blog all the support I needed came it. God showed me the truth of what I had written. So I know and I trust that God knows what is going to happen this year as well. He knows my heart and the hearts of those at Evergreen. He alone knows the "good works he has prepared beforehand" and so I trust that if this indeed part of what He HAS set apart from long long ago, that it will happen. And if not, I know that He has something even better. I am supposed to know in a week if we have a team or not so that I can tell Josiah Venture. So we will see how God works and leads.

So here is to living life full of joy and hope trusting and resting in the truth that God knew us before we were born and loves us with a love so deep that He considered the death of His one son worth it so that we could be made clean and whole and we could enter into a relationship with Him. May the gospel become more and more real to each of us on a daily basis.

Emily

Ways to join the adventure:
-Please pray for God to speak to some people from Evergreen to join in the Czech trip. Pray for a guy leader and a few others to join.
-Pray for God to provide more summer interns for Josiah Venture. There is a big need for guys especially. This is what I did this past summer.
-Pray for God to reveal to you an ever increasing knowledge of the depths of His love

Three Months

As Long As I was Gone

Today is the three month mark. I was gone three months, from May 26-August 26 and now it is November 26th. I think I read somewhere it takes however long you were gone for life to feel like normal on the other side of your mission trip too, or to be readjusted. So I guess we'll see what that looks like. The past three months have been challenging as I've tried to find where I fit back into life here but they've been good too.

A Day Of Thanks

Today is also Thanksgiving. As I reflect on this past year there is so very much for me to be thankful, my heart spills over in thanks! I had to work for several hours today but then I was able to join my best friend Sarah and her family for some good food and good company. So what is there to be thankful for? Well...quite obviously there is the summer in Czech, the fact that people prayed for me and decided to support me to get there. It was, as you may remember quite a miracle that I even made it there. I am thankful for all the new friends I met in Czech this summer. I am thankful for the team I got to spend the summer with. I am thankful for the friends I met in Phoenix. I am thankful for the old friends I was able to revisit while there. I am thankful for technology that allows me to keep in contact with my friends in Czech and Phoenix and Minnesota and Indiana. I am thankful that Nate and Emily Hughes were able to come visit last month and were able to come see Evergreen. I am thankful for a church that causes me to grow and think. I am thankful for my nephew. I am thankful for my friends here who have been patient with me as I've grown and changed, who love me however I am but always encourage me to grow. I am thankful that I got my job back the day I landed. And I'm sure there are other things too but those are the things that are most near my heart at this time as I reflect.

Life, Death and A Strong Faith

As the holidays approach and are, I guess, now here, I have been thinking of my friends who have lost people who are very dear to them. Some I knew, some I did not but still, I've found my life affected as I've watched my friends deal with death and continue to hold fast to their faith in God. There was Laura and Tony who I wrote about earlier in the year. And at the same time, Pavel. And recently my friend Jenn lost her fiancee Joe. In ways it seems it would be easy to just blame God for these deaths, to believe that He cannot be good when young people die, when people who are in the prime of their lives and are so full of faith die, some may become angry at God. But I have watched my friends deal with these deaths by choosing to still trust God. To believe that He is good and that He somehow has a plan still.

How to join the adventure:

1)Take time to thank God for the good things, the hard things, all that has made you, you this year. Tell those who you are thankful for that you are thankful for them, because the truth is you just don't know how long they'll be around.

2)pray for The Silva family, for Pavel's family and girlfriend Tessa, for Pavel and my good friend Mark, for Jenn and Joe's family and Joe's son as they all have their first holiday apart from those who they love deeply.

3)Pray for God to continue to direct me concerning Czech and next summer.

Thank you so much! Love to you all,

Em

On The Other Side Of The Ocean

A Month

Its been just a little more than a month since I've been back. For the majority of that month I had bronchitis (again) so I was pretty out of it. But I've been feeling much better the past couple weeks so now I'm trying to sort through how I fit back into life here.

Portland

If I had to wake up in Prague and fall asleep in any city, Portland was a good city to fall asleep in. I have some really good friends here and I was told by a friend I met this summer from Northern Ireland that Portland is one of the most European-like-cities he's been to in the US. Its getting cold here as fall is definitely arrived. But I am enjoying the sunshine before the rain sets in. I am just really thankful for the church I have here and the friends I have here that I have known for almost a decade now. Its nice to have friends that will remain my friends despite the changing seasons and years gone by and the summer I spent away.

Continuing The Work

I am really excited because I am going to be serving with Young Life this year. I am working with a school called Reynolds High School. We will begin our Club next Monday night. Then we will be doing campaigners which is more of a Bible study every-other-Sunday night and as I get to know the girls I will start to meet with two or three of them individually for coffee and discipleship each week. I really think this is going to be an amazing way to continue the work I did in Czech this summer and to continue to be involved in students lives who are right here around me. That is what I'd be doing if I were to spend more time in Czech long term so what a great way to put that into practice right here and now.

Wrapping up my time in Czech

Havlickuv Brod Camp

Camp started out a little slow. I think we were all tired being that it was our third camp. There was actually another town that joined us too, Podebrady. Usually at camp I find I connect pretty quickly with two or three students. This time I felt like I wasn't really connecting with any one certain person. But I realized I kept finding myself eating meals with the Podebrady students. Then, there was also a guy I'd met while we were visiting in June and over the course of the week at camp he and I had some really interesting conversations about politics and God. He has been going to church every-now-and-then but before camp was not a Christian and wasn't sure he wanted to be. He had a lot of questions about God and felt that he was fine just being a good person. But after camp he wrote us (the Americans) a message telling us that his life was changed at camp and that he has faith that is now his own. He thanked us for our hard work teaching English and for being there to relate to him and the other students there. Amazing!

Debrief and Depart

We had a good final week together in Prague. Eat some delicious food and just had time as a team to reflect on our summer. I loved being able to hear what God had done not only in our team but the other 5 teams. The Kingdom was advanced here in Czech.

Picking Up Where We Left Off

After Chris and Sarah left I took a small nap and then checked out of the Czech Inn and then spent the afternoon with my old friend Marek Macak and his good friend who became my friend this summer, Martin. It was a beautiful afternoon in Prague. We went on a row boat on the Vlatava and went to a really cool book store. It was so amazing to see that tho I hadn't seen Marek for 5 years he and I were able to pick up where we left off. That night I went to Hradec Kralove to go to Pavel and Veronika's wedding. Saturday night I went to Vysoke Myto and spent a couple nights with this girl Autumn who is a full time missionary here with JV. Sunday morning I was able to go to church where many of the people from my first camp seven years ago go. It was so amazing! I was so encouraged to see them still passionate about God. And I found that the same was true with them. Tho for them it had been 6 years it was almost as if it had just been last week. I left there Monday and have spent the past couple days in Cesky Tesin.

One Week

I only have one week left. Today I go to Frydlant for lunch with Mark Krupa (a missionary here who has really been a huge encouragment to me though the years. Then I go to Litomysl tonight. I will see more people from that first and second summer I spent here while there. Friday I go to Olomouc to see my friends Jered and Daniella from Boise who are now living over here. Saturday I will spend the day with the group from Podebrady and then Sunday I head back to Prague to see my friends from there that I haven't seen in 5 years. I leave next Wednesday the 26th back to Portland.

Thanks again for your support of me though the summer. Its been amazing to be here. I look forward to catching up in person soon!

The Beginning Of The End

New Family

One of the things I love most about Christianity is the way that all of us who put our faith in Christ are part of a large, ever increasing family. I love meeting brothers and sisters in Christ and knowing that we automatically have a connection, a common ground in Christ. For the camp we just finished with Prague KS we were joined by a team from Arizona. And they were AMAZING!!! I really fell in-love with each person on their team. Zach and Caitlin Moore led the team and they are both 26. The rest of the team was made up mostly of students from the youth ministry that Zach leads. I can't wait to find a way to go visit Arizona. This was their first time doing camps with Josiah Venture but you would have thought they had been doing it for years. They just jumped in and served whole-heartedly and were a HUGE blessing and help to me and our team. Also two girls from my class became Christians! So we have two new family members in Czech! It was a really incredible camp. It started out pretty rough. The kids from Prague are just more rough around the edges than those in Hradec Kralove. Its the edgy-ness of a big city. Many more students coming from broken homes and just harder back grounds. So at first it seemed maybe we'd all just have to take a deep breath and press though but it was really amazing to see the hearts of these students soften over the course of the week. And I am confident that the work that God began in the hearts of these students will continue.

Health

My health has continued to be well. I lost my voice for the first part of the camp but my throat didn't hurt. I think I was just yelling too much. The biggest health-like issue our team has been facing since I last wrote is an injury Chris got while playing soccer. At our last training we had, the day before we left for camp, they had a soccer tournament and not too long into the game Chris came down wrong on his ankle and at the same time was pushed so he had to go to the hospital. He had a cast put on it but was finding it hard to ice it with a hard cast so the nurse at the camp cut off the cast and got him a brace. Its getting better slowly but surely. Its just hard cuz Chris is a really active guy and so its been tough to have to be low action. We found out while in Cesky Raj and then through the summer Brad and Lucie have been telling more people that Lucie will have a baby!!! It was really cool that Chris, Sarah and I got to be some of the first people (after Lucie's mom) to find out. So Lucie, who is also usually really active, has also had to take it a bit more slow too.

The Rest Of The Summer

So the past few days Chris, Sarah and I have been in Sumperk where Hawaii (a guy who's real name is Josh but everyone calls him Hawaii cuz he is from there) team has been staying. Its been nice to just relax and not have much to do for a few days to be rested for our next, and final camp. This afternoon we will head to Havlickuv Brod and stay the night there. Then we will head to camp w/their youth group and Saturday camp begins. After camp our two teams will go back to Prague for debrief and we will meet up again with Brad and Lucie there. This session of camp Brad and Lucie are doing a camp with Vsetin youth. It will be a sports camp but they will also teach them English. Then Chris and Sarah take off August 14th and I will go to Hradec that night so I can go to a wedding there the next day of Pavel (the youth leader there) and Veronika. Its going to be in a castle near Hradec. Then I will see my old friends Daniella and Radek in Vysoke Myto. Then a couple days in Cesky Tesin then there's a few days I'm still figuring out and I end up in Prague somewhere around the 22nd and I will leave Prague the 26th. I am going to really really miss Sarah and Chris. I am excited tho to see my old friends from past years here. So I will try and  write again before I leave CZ but if not I will update as soon as I get back to Portland.

How to join the adventure:

*PLEASE pray for Chris' ankle. Pray it heals quickly so it can be better by the time he heads back home.

*Pray for unity with our team and Hawaii's team, that we can be a solid group.

*Pray for God to keep pursing those students who came to the Prague camp.

*Praise God for the amazing unity He gave us w/the Arizona team!

*Praise God for our two new sisters in Christ!

*Praise God for the baby inside Lucie! Pray it stays healthy.

*Pray for travel as we are having to carry Chris' bag as well as all of our bags

*Pray that God softens hearts of the students in Havlickuv Brod

*Pray for Brad and Lucie's camp in Vestin. That they will have energy to lead it and that God will work in the hearts of the students there.

Thanks guys! Love you!

Em

For the Love of Camps...

From top to bottom: Pavlina and I. She and Veronika were such great hosts to me when we visited for the weekend and for follow up too. Dani and I, Dani is a new friend I met. He is not a Christian yet. He and I had fun teaching each other our languages. Vita and I...Vita did the filming of this past camp and I have a lot to learn from him. He is a good brother. Sarah, Chris and I on top of the White Tower in the square in Hradec. And the last is of Hradec from the top of the tower.

One Camp Done Two More to Go

So Hradec camp went really well. There was potential for lots of comparisons to be made between this camp and previous years because this camp was run by a new Czech youth group leader and a new American youth group team leader. Many of the same people who had come to help in years past were not here. But the students didn't complain. They all embraced the newness of camp and jumped in. I had all girls in my class this week which was pretty fun. We had a higher level than usual in the beginning class so I had to work to make my lessons harder but it was fun in the end. My main goal was to help them use the English they already knew. One day we had a "girls day" and talked about personality and boys. Camp seriously FLEW by. It felt like three days not one week. I had a lot of fun improving my Czech language as well. I cannot tell you guys just how much I love camps! I'm sure it is because I grew up going to camp myself. So I think part of my love for camp stems from my own experiences but I think I also really love the time we get with these Czech students to share English and to share the hope of Jesus. So we have a team arriving from Arizona to help us with the Prague camp. 

It Is God Who Chooses

At the last American team training they had a couple of Czech's who are interns this summer share their stories about how they became Christians. One was really into Darwinism and thought that Christianity was just for elderly people or people who were not smart. The other used his intellect to often argue against Christians and did not want to be a Christian. He went to camp a couple times and was fighting against God and becoming a Christian but eventually found that no matter how hard he tried to resist it, there was God's love for him. Hearing these two stories before camp was really encouraging for me. And I often would remember that its not me, or my team, or anyone besides God that is going to cause these students to give up their atheism and to trust in the hope of Christ. A verse that we read a few times in the morning sessions also encouraged me in this...John 15:16 "You did not choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name." I also was really encouraged by reading again about Paul's conversion. He was chasing after Christians in hopes of imprisoning them when he was met on the road of Damascus by Jesus. So you see, I really believe that, if we were all honest with ourselves, we did not choose God. It was not on our own initiative  that we who are Christians became Christians. In each of our stories if we are looking, we will see the truth that it was God who chose US. I feel like that gives me so much for freedom in sharing the gospel. Its not up to me to save the students at camp, all I can do is share the hope and truth and joy and love that comes in Christ and then leave the rest up to God and His timing.

Time flies When Your Having Fun

The summer is about 2/3 over. In one month from today Sarah and Chris will leave. I wish I could find a way to slow time down so this month could somehow feel like a year...to somehow find a way to get MORE time with these two, who have become my summer family and my dear friends. This is one of the hardest parts of the summer, building relationships with people you may or may not see again. But it is always worth it. My life will never be the same now that I've met Sarah and Chris. They and Brad and Lucie have impacted me a lot and I am blessed to get to spend another month with this family.

How you can join the adventure...

*Praise God for my restored health!!! Thanks for ALL your prayers. I still have a small cough but its more just regular asthma cough now. So thanks again. 

*Praise God for the work he began in the hearts of students at camp! Pray He continues that work

*Pray for the health of the Ottowa team that was helping us. Many of them got sick.

*Pray for our relationship with the team arriving from AZ and the Prague youth group. 

*Praise God for the unity that we had with the Ottowa team and Bri, Amy and Breanne.

*Pray that Sarah, Chris, Brad Lucie and I can continue to go deep with eachother that we can keep building these bonds. 

*Pray for safe travels between Malenovice and the camp.

Thanks guys for staying involved and for all the support and love. To God and His glory!

Em

July Has Begun!

Czech Paradise 

Brad, Lucie, Chris, Sarah and I spent five days as a team exploring Cesky Raj (ches-kee-rye) which translated means Czech Paradise. There were lots of really cool rock formations in the forest and caves and view points. It was a really fun time of bonding and feeling adventurous. I had a bad cough most the time but I still really enjoyed myself. It felt kinda like if Arches National Park were to meet the north west. With this towering rocks and deep forests.

And Now It's July...

July equals camps. Our team is being joined this first camp by six Americans from Ottawa, IL, two girls Bri and Amy from World Harvest Missions and an old intern Breanne from Colorado and the youth group from Hradec Kralove to start our first camp. This camp is at the campsite my first camp I ever did here in Czech so its really cool to be back here.We are going to spend this evening setting up the meeting room and preparing our teaching boards then the students will all come tomorrow The 4th Of July! And we will end the evening with fireworks. I will be teaching beginning level English again and will also being doing camp motions for the songs with Breanne. After camp we will go back to Hradec to do follow up and then we will go back to Malenovice for the second American team training session. I will write more then with stories from camp. Hope you guys have an amazing 4th of July and that you take time to think about freedom and where your freedom comes from. May you find it in Christ. 

Joining The Adventure:

*Pray for the students that are coming to camp, that they will see the love of God in and through us.

*Pray for team unity between our different teams represented this week.

*Pray for english class, that we will tach useful and helpful English lessons.

*Pray for our evening talks about The Story Of God.

*Pray for my lungs to be healed. I was diagnosed with bronchitis but I am taking antibiotics and am getting better slowly but surely.

*Pray for rest, for our teams.

*Praise God that He has brought us all here together for this time and that He knows the hearts of the students that will be here and has brought us all together in His wisdom.

*Praise God for my team. I love them more and more every day.