Last Words

This is the speech that my childhood friend Michael Pueppke gave at Dallas Baptist University just the day before he found out that his leukemia was back and aggressive.  It took his life just 3 weeks later.  This speech exemplifies the beautiful testimony of who Mike was.  His life told a beautiful story of His creator.  

January 25, 2012 - DBU Chapel

Well, it’s good to be back. I want to begin by thanking God for letting me be back. I want to begin by thanking Dr. Cook for allowing me to come and speak here. I’m going to be talking a lot today about teachers and mentors. In 2007 I watched Dr. Cook struggle through his own battle with leukemia while still leading this university from his hospital room. (As I talked to you last time, I stayed in that hospital room.) That year, I watched him speak to our Christmas assembly through a mask because he had a repressed immune system. I also watched him give out diplomas at my wife’s graduation in December 2007, letting an assistant shake the students’ hands as a precaution against infection. I know something about what that took as far as courage—when you have cancer. It’s a story for another time, but Dr. Cook has been an inspiration to me as a student, a cancer patient, and most importantly as a Christian. You are truly blessed to have leadership like him at DBU. You really are.

Before I get started I also want to thank my family, friends, teachers, professors, doctors, and nurses who are in the audience. Cancer is not a one-person disease. It affects everyone who knows and loves that person, especially your immediate family. For some of my immediate family, their jobs were often harder than mine, and the truth is in some ways I am glad that I was the one who was sick. I can’t imagine having a sick wife, son, or daughter to watch. I can take a little pain myself (and I’ve taken some these last couple of years), but it is very, very difficult to see it happen to others.  

I’m sorry if I’m getting too serious right off the back here! I mean, this isn’t gonna be just a down-in-the…you know. Okay, so good stuff happens. I tell a joke about a parrot later, okay? So just bear with me for a second here. There are some serious things I have to get out of the way first because in this experience, there are some people who have made incredible sacrifices for me, and they deserve to be recognized. So family, friends, and all of you who have held me in your thoughts and prayers these last two years, please stand and be honored.

But listen to me using phrases like “after all this happened,” like we are at the end of the story rather than the beginning. Stories don’t have beginnings; they don’t have ends. They do have rough patches, and they have joyous patches. You always want to go for the joyous patches as much as possible. But you can’t get there without going through some of the rough patches.  How many of you are freshman in the audience? I was a freshman once, too—don’t be embarrassed. It wasn’t here, though. I just got here as soon as I could, as they say of Texas.

A year and a day ago—January 24, 2011—I talked at chapel looking quite normal. I had my hair. I had a nice suit on. But I had a secret, a cancerous tumor growing in my chest. In fact I had just come from a radiation treatment in an attempt to kill that tumor. The only tattoos I have are radiation tattoos, where they tattoo you so they can lay you on the table and try and “nuke that little sucker,” as I say. And they did!

The tumor was a lymphoma, a hard mass like a flesh hamburger pushing against my heart, lungs, and nerves. But lymphomas turn into leukemia; lymphoma cells work their ways into the bone marrow, so really lymphoma and leukemia can be the same disease. Leukemia is cancer of the bones, cancer of the blood, cancer of the immune system. At the end of the service last year, as would only happen at DBU or other Christian universities, the student body surrounded my family and me and prayed for healing. For months that prayer was answered with a “yes.”

As you heard in my introduction, I’m a student just like you, only I go to SMU, study Shakespeare, and dream of becoming a professor someday. So after that speech, I went back to classes just like you did. My semester went well. That summer Dr. Rebecca Dark graciously invited me to teach a couple of classes here, so I officially became an adjunct professor at DBU. What fun! I taught Hemingway, Faulkner, and best of all Shakespeare, because remember that’s what I do at SMU. I even had the fun of covering up the less modest—the naughty—bits of anatomy that tend to show up in modern cinematic renditions of Shakespeare’s plays. And I don’t know why they have to be in every movie, but they are! It’s like finding a clean Shakespeare play is like finding a calm two year old—and I know something about that.

But then one day when I was in the middle of the second class I was teaching here, I had a routine scan for cancer throughout my body. Now, after two and a half years of battling cancer off and on, I’m one of those “be your own doctor kind of people,” so the scanbeing early in the morning and my doctor’s appointment not being until that afternoon, I asked for the digital CD and went back to my office at SMU to take a look. The scan took a while to load, but when it did I saw my bones lit up like a Christmas tree, which could only mean one thing: the leukemia was back. Not in my chest, but in my bones. Another bone marrow transplant was in my future. The certainties were pain, drugs that would probably make me lose my mind for a while, long periods of separation from my wife and child (we’d had a whole year together—a beautiful year), a huge strain on my family, medical bills, and any plan that I had for the future of my career would have to be put on hold, perhaps indefinitely. My life would have to be put on hold.

For some reason I didn’t even cry. I just calmly walked into the SMU English office, checked my mail, told our receptionist Brooke that my cancer might be back, and then called my wife and left a message on her voicemail: “I might see something in my PET scan. May be nothing but a virus or something. I’ll talk to Dr. Pineiro this afternoon and let you know. Don’t worry. It’ll be okay.” But I was lying. I knew exactly what lights in the bones of a leukemia patient on a PET scan mean. They meant another bone marrow transplant that would be harder because my body was weakened from the chemotherapy of my previous transplant and from the total and localized bodily radiation I had already received. It meant a longer recovery. It meant a slimmer chance of survival, because this second time around the doctors would try to induce something called graft versus host disease, where the newly transplanted, engrafted cells would attack the cells of the donor—me—in hope that they learn to tell the difference between me and my cancer. 

This can be an excruciatingly painful process, and I’ve seen people die from it. Last month I was asked to pray over and anoint with oil the head of one young man who died from graph versus host only a few hours later. He was having his second bone marrow transplant just like me. He was my friend through months in the hospital. He went to another Baptist college. And he was 20. He could have been my student in a class like the ones I teach here. But he was really one of my teachers, and I will never forget his faith, the faith of his lovely wife, or the faith of his family. Theirs is a story that will stay with me always.

So that is what that little PET scan on my computer screen meant as I look at it at the end of July, hardly six months ago. But let’s not focus on all that just yet. To be honest it’s a bit too hard for me to talk about these things for too long. They are still too close.

Instead I’d like to skip around a little in this story and go back a few years to tell you of God’s faithfulness. That’s what is coming at the end of this story, and it would sure be nice to hear a little of that right now. The summer of 2005 was my last summer at DBU. I had graduated the past December but had stuck around here taking graduate courses, really because I didn’t know what else to do with my life. I had rushed to graduate so quickly that I had no plans laid, and I was spinning my wheels. And I did have two problems, and they both seemed pretty great at the time. First, I was coming off a freshly broken heart. But this was one of those relationships where I realized for the first time that I could really be close friends with a girl, that I could actually like the person I was dating. 

Here’s the catcher: I was about to leave DBU without having found a Christian mate. I mean, this isn’t the only reason you come to DBU, but it wasn’t much of a confidence boost. I wondered how I would ever meet the Christian woman that I wanted to marry one day. This was even more of an anxiety because I had been around beautiful Christian women for three years and, well, hadn’t had much luck.

The second problem was a bit more serious. During a boy version of a mammogram—(can I even say that at DBU?), I had found a lump near one of my testicles, which I was worried might be cancerous. After all, my grandfather had had testicular cancer when he was thirty-five. He had survived, going on to have three more daughters. But this was me; this wasn’t him.

The long and short is that I was having to get real with God for one of the first times of my life. I started reading the Bible fervently. And it began to jump out and actually speak to me. But I was scared, crying myself to sleep many nights. And it was still hard to see that truth from our school verse that God had a plan, had a purpose for my life.

Then one day as I was thinking of all these things, driving down off campus, going slowly over those silly huge speed bumps, and I heard a voice say to me as crystal clear as if somebody was sitting next to me: “Trust Me.” I almost drove off the road and made some work for the grounds crew. Trust me. I’ve often heard people talk about when God has spoken to them. They talk about it with such certainty. There’s nothing wrong with that. But that wasn’t my experience. I questioned. Was it just a hallucination, a psychological manifestation of that which I most desperately wanted to hear? Or was it really the God of the universe telling me for the first time that, although I was afraid, I wasn’t abandoned?

Let’s fast forward a little bit. That was the beginning of the summer—that’s the strife. Let’s go to the last three weeks of my time at DBU—I had accepted a position at the University of North Texas to study linguistics and teach technical writing, and all that impressive mumbo-jumbo Dr. Cook read in my credentials was about to begin. I had finally through prayer got to guts to get my…stuff checked out, and found out they were just harmless epididymis cysts that many men have. And one night, while discussing these things with friends by the DBU apartment hot tubs, a beautiful Christian girl in a blue swimsuit sat down next to me.  And we clicked, intellectually, spiritually, and emotionally. I was down at the pool every night for the next three weeks trying to run into her. This actually worked out rather well, as she was doing the same thing trying to run into another guy. Either way, I was there and he wasn’t, so end of story. [Actually, I was looking for Mike after that first meeting.]

We talked ever night for three weeks, walking around the Mahler looking at the stars, the back of the science building, sitting in some gazebo somewhere (okay, so the campus has changed that much). This chapel, though, beautiful as it is and as much as I like it, wasn’t here. Instead there was a grassy slope, where we set up a quilt and talked about what we wanted out of life, what our goals where, and we began to realize that we wanted to share that life. As we talked one night, I reached my hand over to touch Brittni’s hair, neither of us realizing it for a minute. That’s a really intimate thing to do. We had known each other a week! We hadn’t even held hands. And the thing you need to know about Brittni is that she is an official member of the Baptist Abstinence Brigade—she probably started the thing, which is good. I’m not going to call Brittni prude, but calling Brittni “prude” is like calling the Pope a Catholic. But when we realized what was happening, we just laughed. I pulled my hand away, and we continued to talk. We talked about marriage in November, the ring was on her finger—not quite by spring but—by June, and the following year we were married on 7/7/07, to be exact, not wanting to be accused of being original or anything.

“Trust me.” God had said. The next time I would hear those words I would be lying in a hospital bed, crying to God to make the nerve pain of chemotherapy go away just for a moment. And He did. Brittni would be asleep on a chair near my bed, uncomfortable and six-months pregnant with our son Luke. And I would hear God’s voice again: “Trust me, I’ve got you.” A few months later I would be in remission, and a year later—January 24, 2011—I would be standing here for the first time talking about how God never abandons us. And now you know the story up to six months ago. And now, although it’s going to be hard, I can tell you about the second bone marrow transplant. About my dark night of the soul, about the valley of the shadow of death. About the thing I haven’t written on my blog about because it almost killed me, as I saw it kill my friend. About the thing that almost killed my hope. About the thing that almost made me stop trusting God.

The first part of my second transplant went as well as could be expected. I got my new cells, the cancer dropped out of my blood, and I was released. But then I developed a case of pneumonia, and returned to the hospital, not the cancer floor, but the infectious diseases floor, which meant that I couldn’t leave my room, because who knows what was lurking in the halls. Brittni and Luke couldn’t come see me because she was teaching and always sick with germs from her kids, and Luke was in a daycare petri dish (it’s a great school, but he does get sick a lot), as I called it in my more cantankerous moments.

Then the graft verses host disease set in. Graft verses host disease can affect any part of your body, but it usually most affects fast-growing cells like those in your eyes, skin, digestive tract, mouth, fingernails, lungs, kidneys, and liver. The last three are the fatal ones, and luckily they never affected me. (My friend's had gone to his lungs, and he coughed so hard he broke his ribs from coughing, dying cancer- free.)

Over two weeks my skin painfully mottled, my eyes closed shut and then deformed from the massive steroids they were giving to try and control the GVHD, my mouth glued shut so I couldn’t eat, sores developed throughout my esophagus, my stomach became a knot of massive pain so severe that the doctors gave me access to something totaling 3 milligrams of dilaudid every hour. Dilaudid is a hydromorphone, which means it is in essence synthetic heroine. It’s funny but it’s really not a joke: I became severely addicted to it. Many heroine addicts become such become so because they can’t get meds for their stomach pain. Another less pleasant thing: I also had constant diarrhea, which was mostly blood from the sores in my colon, and I couldn’t make it from my bed to the toilet because I had two IV poles and bathroom that would only fit one. So that was me in a little room, feeling all the pain and loneliness that I could, calling to God and hearing nothing.

But I’m here to talk about telling stories. That’s only one way to tell the story. I’ve left some stuff out. During those weeks, my dad, my donor came to sleep next to me those two weeks. He hardly left my side. He went home about every third day for an hour to take a shower. He stayed up with me all night. When I was spewing diarrhea, he cleaned it up. He wiped my eyes. He wiped the dead skin off my hands. He gave me a model of God’s love that’s so strong, so powerful, that I’ll never forget it for my entire life. That’s just what my earthly father did for me. Remember, he was my donor. His blood was exactly, genetically my blood.

And where was my heavenly Father during all this time? I prayed to Him, and I cried out, but I didn’t hear anything. I just sat there in that haze, asking for more dilaudid. He was there the whole time. Many of you have seen the “Footsteps” poster, which explains that God carries us through the most difficult times. It’s absolutely true. My earthly father was in that room, and God was in that room. And if you think about it, my father and I have the same blood, except for one little thing. My blood now, if the doctors are right, knows how to fight my cancer. Think about that as a metaphor for Christian life and for what Christ does for us. Have you ever wondered about when you first accepted Christ—that God gave you His blood, His shed blood, His clean blood? Have you ever wondered why right after you prayed that prayer—“God, I accept You as my Savior. Christ, let Your blood cover me”—why all the problems in your life didn’t just go away? Guys, do you ever wonder why you didn’t just give up pornography right there? Girls, do you ever wonder why you still went into relationships that you knew you shouldn’t have, still looking for love right there? But then something began to change in you. That blood, that Christ that got in you, started to work. And it didn’t always work fast. There were some setbacks. It wasn’t always pain-free. But you started to become more like Christ. You started—let’s just say this—you started to heal because Christ was in you.

I think about literature a lot. I think about stories, about metaphors. I think I’ve been through quite a bit, but it’s given me physically the ability to be a walking metaphor for Christ coming into our lives, changing us and healing us. [….] God is here. God hasn’t abandoned me.

At the end of my classes at DBU, I try and sum up the semester. I say, “Look, we’ve been talking about characters, we’ve been talking about settings, we’ve been talking about all these great literary terms. Well guess what? You’re a character in a setting, but you have to decide what kind of character you’re going to be and who the other characters are and how they relate to you.” I’m going to say the same thing to you now.  Here’s your setting: DBU. You’ve got the opportunity to do all kinds of mission work, to learn about yourself—you’ve got more opportunities than you can possibly know. How many people get the chance to sit in a building like this, or to sit in the classes you’re in, or sit with the professors you’re with? You’re also your own storyteller in your own way, although our Christian lingo for it is “your witness.” 

How are you going to tell your story and your witness? I’ll give you a hint how to start. Start thinking about how you got here. Start thinking about the little moments you trusted God, or the moments you didn’t trust God, and He put you here anyway. Start thinking about that. If you were in an elevator for five minutes and someone asked you why you were a Christian, what kind of story would you tell? Where would you be in it, and where would God be in it? I’ve told you a couple versions of my story: I’ve told you the selfish, I’m gonna go cry-in-my-soup, let-me-tell-you-how-terrible-my-transplant was version. Then I told you the version of how my father modeled my heavenly Father for me and how God was in it. What is your story? What version are you going to tell the world? You won’t just tell it with your words; you’ll tell it with your deeds and you’ll tell it with your heart.

The last thing I want to say is that you’re not abandoned, even if you feel you are, even if you’re going through one of those hard parts in your story. God loves you, and when you’re in the valley, remember the times you trusted Him and then keep trusting Him. And then you through your life will be telling His story. That’s an awful good place to be.

--Mike Pueppke

3 Things in 2012

I love the New Year.  It brings out the nerdy part of me that like to debrief, evaluate,  and process previous seasons and then on the flip side to anticipate, plan, make goals for what God has in store next.  In December, I typically begin to pray about what God has for me in the New Year.  This year, I felt like God has asked me to pray three things over my life.

1.  Increased faith.  Let's just be honest, I work for Curtis Jones. I am gonna need it to keep up with His faith. He is a man of great faith, if Hebrews 11 had an addendum for 2012, his name would be written in. It's sharpening me and I am loving being stretched in my faith.
2.  Deeper levels of holiness.  For the first time in a long time, I have craved deeper levels of holiness. So praying God would continue to grow that desire.  Pruning is painful- ouch!
3.  Discipline.  I want to be a leader that leads well.  And well we all know a disciplined, intentional, and restrained life is what it's about.  Dear Lord, help me!

Every morning I wake up with these three things on my mind.  The first 4 days have already proved to be painful because I have a good God who wants to answer the prayers of His daughter.  Excited for the sanctification that will result, but dreading the life lessons and fire that comes with this kind of purification.

For those that know and love me, you can be praying these over my life in 2012.

2011- Another Chapter Ending of My Story

January 2011

Got a phone call from Curtis and Amanda where they asked me to move to Houston, Texas to become staff at the new church they were planning to plant in the fall.



February 2011


After seeking my California community, I made the difficult decision to uproot myself and move to Houston, Texas at the end of the summer.  I was officially a staff member at a church.  Weird.


March 2011


Traveled to Texas to attend a dinner that Curtis and Amanda hosted asking other friends and family to join their church that they just named Bayou City Fellowship.  That weekend we bought our website url, signed up for our twitter account, and prayed that people would say yes and join us!  It was such a sweet weekend of confirmation, excitement, and unknowns.  It was the first step towards actually building the church.

April 2011

Started making my California Bucket List, wrote furiously for my capstone paper, and spent my last month attending graduate classes.

May 2011

• Participated in a blog community that blogged everyday in the month of May.  Enjoyed the intellectual, philosophical, and fun community that emerged with complete strangers. 
• I got Hood. I graduated, along with my best friend Becka, from graduate school.  We both became Master Divers and Master Lohman.  Thank you Union University for my Masters of Intercultural Studies.  

June 2011

The goodbyes started.  I spent a lot of time at the beach soaking up my last summer as a Cali girl.

• Beach Time. I love the beach.  I think I was supposed to be born here.  One last summer where the most beautiful beaches in the nation are in back yard. 
• Surprise "Weekend" Trip to San Diego.  My best friend and Kim planned a surprise trip to San Diego for Jessica and I because we were both moving across the country.  The trip consisted of staying in a hotel downtown, riding bikes on Coronado, good food, kayaking in La Jolla, Dinner at a fancy restaurant, dancing and planking, lounging on the beach, and mexican food in Old Town.  It was soo much fun!

Beach Days of Summer.

Driving in our rented convertible down PC Highway 1

Nice Dinner with Sweet friends...

Me and my Bestie.  Love her.

Coronado Island.  

Ended our weekend with Old Town, San Diego

July 2011- The Month of Goodbyes

This month was eventful because I moved across the country.  So this might blow up my blog page.

• The Perfect Day.  My best friend and her work bestie, Bru, and I went to Santa Barbara County for the day.  It was the most perfect day.   We enjoyed picnics, a breathtaking scenic drive, local food, the beautiful wine county, and joy of taking time to put our toes in the sand.

\

• I had my last shift at Starbucks.  I had over 20 people in my community come and say goodbye to me on my last shift.  I felt so loved.  And it was so much fun working with all those young students!
• Becka through me a going away party.  And she presented me with an awesome book about my years in California.  Best present that I consider top treasures that I would grab in a fire.
• I turned 28 and spent it in Las Vegas with several of my closest friends that could make it.  There was lots of crazy things that happened...But what happens in Vegas... stays in Vegas. Live-it-up late twenties!  However it did involve great poolside conversations, dancing, eating, and other fun shenanigans.

• The Ladies of 611 Reunion Tour. he two ladies that are more like sisters to me and love me more than I deserve made the LONG road trip with me Texas.   We made a few stops along the way and lived-up some of the fun Texas stereotypes.

The Beginning of the End.

Made it to the Grand Canyon.  We had to drop off another "member" over the edge.

The Riverwalk!

We Remembered the Alamo.

A Day at the Lake.

We all bought cowboy boots and went dancing!

August 2011

• Moved in the Wetherell's.  This basically means I got an upgrade in life with my living. 
• Started working at my New Starbucks.
• Settled into my new life in H-town.  
• This was my lonliest month in Houston.

September 2011

• Bayou City Fellowship was birthed on September 11, 2011.  We actually started a church and people came!
• Found out I got to travel back to India in December with As Own. 

 

 October 2011

• This month nothing significant happened.  But I do remember feeling at home this month.  Thankful for all the investments of relationships that were finally paying off.

November 2012

• Quit Starbucks and got hired at 1800 Plumber!  
• We launched our first activities with our local partners at Pine Shadows Elementary and Gracewood.
• I got to spend my first Thanksgiving with my family in like 6 years.

December 2012

• I traveled to California to see one of my best friends/sisters get married.
• Bayou City Fellowship fasted together as a church and we had our first public baptisms.
• I traveled to India again with a team from Houston's First Baptist to see how BCF can partner with As Our Own Ministries.
• I got to spend Christmas with my family.  Finally all three Divers' girls live in Texas again!

We made it to the end.  This post has made me so nostalgic and honestly just overwhelmed with the feeling of how blessed I am.  If I could coin one phrase to sum up this year it would be "A year of deep unbearable loss but sweet gain."  I started the year with no idea that I would uproot myself to Houston and I am ending feeling the love of a new family that I have found in Houston.  

God gave me the sweet opportunity to visit California and India this month of December.  Two places that have such a deep and precious place in my heart because they have shaped who I am today in my current season.  You can never gain seasons back, but you can look back at them with such intense love and gratitude that God loved you enough to give you such tangible richness in relationships, experiences, and growth.

2012, I don't know what you hold, but I can hear and sense the rustling in the wind.  God, I hope you breath on my sails with the wind of your Holy Spirit and you do more things for your kingdom in 2012 through me, your servant, than every before.  God here I am, giving you everything I have this year...use me. 

 Anticipating. Alert. Ready.  

Tangilble Christmas Gifts of Redemption

Christmas in my older age has become a little bit tricky.  Between living states or countries away from the familial unit and being poor, my Christmases have been unpredictable at best.  My first two Christmases after college were spent in Delhi, India.  I cannot tell you how much you miss family when you are stationed far away and in a country that is still discovering how to celebrate Christmas. But what I gained during my time in India is the joy of truly celebrating Christmas through the story of Jesus' birth.  My two Christmases spent in India were not filled with many gifts, or lights, busy malls, or caroling.  Instead it was replaced with prayers for opportunity to share about the lowly birth of a King, his life of perfection, and his blood spilled for forgiveness.  The Christmas season became a season of sharing and trying to accurately live out to a people what Jesus is all about.

For this reason, my first Christmas home from afar was kind of a let down.  Don't get me wrong, it was AMAZING to be with the family again, but I really felt like we had missed the mark.  I remember longing for India and the joy of the season.  Somehow Christmas since returning from India has been lacking.  Which is because I haven't been as intentional in America to share His story as I was for those two years. 
But this year, I was blessed with a gift.  I had the opportunity to travel to India again this Christmas season and visit a few girls homes.  These girl all come from places of injustice (most trafficking)  where the powerful have preyed on the vulnerable. Because of God's grace however, they were rescued not only from physically harm, but have been rescued from death to life because of the birth of King.  I have never experienced such tangible redemption in my entire life- to have physcially seen the brothels where they were born and to see them set apart and placed in a place of dignity, safety, and restoration. Beutiful incarnational redemption was in the eyes of these girls.  All because of a birth.

On our last day with these girls, I got to actually be one of the many judges for their Christmas program.  I just about died with the amount of cuteness between their dancing, singing, and choreography. The live nativity scene and song they choreographed was probably the best in the world and brought my heart so much joy.  Immediately following the program the girls got their hearts desire- McDonald's was delivered.  Somewhere between the Christmas carols playing in the background, and the joy of sharing a meal with these girls, and witnessing their performances, I was all the sudden overcome with emotion and tears.  As I was surrounded by 35 tangible stories of redemption, all because of  a King, I found myself begging God in that moment to not let me forget this memory.  I begged him to keep it etched on my mind forever and that I would remember this exact feeling when I returned home to celebrate Christmas.  I kept thinking... This is Christmas. This is why we celebrate.  I didn't want the moment to end.

I pray that each Christmas as I get older, that Christmas is always culmination of celebration because of the story of Christ that I have been sharing all year long.  That many new people will be redeemed because God sent his son in flesh to dwell among his people to rescue them.  Christmas should be a season of rejoicing with the redeemed.

Merry Christmas everyone.  I pray you find joy in the fact that you are redeemed and given new life in Christ because of this baby boy's birth, death, and resurrection.

Privilege of the Harvest

This past Saturday and tomorrow are important days in the life of Bayou City Fellowship.  We as a church body have decided to lock arms with Gracewood Homes and Pine Shadows Elementary School.  Till death do us part, we are hoping to have a strong presence in these communities.  As much planning has been going into both of these partnership it wasn't until this week that we got to actually to DO ministry.

This past Saturday our church partcipated on only in our first outreach project ever, but it was our first time set boots on the ground at Gracewood Homes.  Tomorrow we have organized a teacher luncheon for the teachers and staff at Pine Shadows.  This is also the first time that we will have a presence on their campus.

These events mark the beginning of land/territory that God has stewarded to us to bring His kingdom.  My prayer tonight as I was making last minute preparations is that we would have the privilege of the harvest.  God gives us ministry, give us salvation, give us favor.  I am asking God for BIG faith to dream big things in these places and that he would do things we could never imagine!

It is exciting times and I am honored to mobilize people towards service in our city!

God Wastes Nothing

Have you ever lived in a season of life where you lived under an umbrella of unrealistic spiritual  expectations? Me. Me. and Me.  It is important to note for me these "expectations" are self-imposed. In previous seasons, my spirituality could be understood as seasons of plently. I was able to prepare a feast and host in the most extravagant of places.  But today, right now, I don't even have a place to host and all I have to share is a few gimpy fish and a couple thin pieces of white bread. 

This is how I feel spiritually on most days--desiring to be in one and place and living day-to-day in another place.  Wishing that if phrases like spiritual disciples, and godliness, missional living, and uber-spritualness was in my outward vocabulary that somehow God would be more pleased.

But what I am most encouraged by is that "God wastes nothing."

God.
Wastes.
Nothing.


He uses every failure, every triumph, every conversation, every movement forward primarily for His glory but even more mysteriously for my sanctification.

Curtis, my pastor is teaching through 1 Peter this semester.  [side note: it has been awesome and meaty].  But in 1 Peter 2:4-5, he mentions the Old Testament practice of offering up sacrifices.

As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

I recently have been really encouraged by this concept of spiritual sacrifices.  I love that I can bring an extravagant meal or a just minuscule bread crumbs to the table and Christ somehow accepts it and makes it a pleasing aroma.  He doesn't waste it.  He uses intentionality, choices, relationships, as simple as they are, and receives them as beautiful worship, as spiritual sacrifice that puts off a sweet and pleasing aroma.  Our sacrifice translates as pleasing to the Creator of the Universe.

This translates in my life that I wish that I was running 5 miles everyday, that I was studying an hour in the Word daily, journaling, and interceding on behalf of my brothers and sisters both here and abroad, that I was dieting, that I was fasting for my current ministries and future ministries, that I was being a great housemate that always cleaned everything perfectly and made my bed every morning, and that I was investing perfectly in all my co-workers  Do you see what I mean by unrealistic expectations?   These are great places to strive for but I can't expect to get there overnight.  I need to give myself double doses of grace to get there over time. 

But when I remember that God just wants what we have to offer, in that moment,  it gives this tangibility and practicality in my life.  So instead I am working on giving God one mile of running so that I get to five, or start with one verse in Scripture that gets me in the door, or utilizing my time in the car to Worship, etc... If I give God what I have for that day for that moment then I give it as a spiritual sacrifice and trust that God will see it as worship and use it.

It takes the mundane physical things of this world and somehow transcends them to the spiritual places.  So today, I choose to offer spiritual sacrifices to the Lord.  Even if they feel pathetic and not worthy of a Holy and perfect God...trusting that He wastes nothing. 

November Blog Fest Texas Style

Five months ago, you were subjected to my daily blogging in Everyday May.  As much as I loved the writing experience, I enjoyed the community the emerged even more.  I am a slight intellectual nerd and I love to go deep in conversation and sometime maybe even a little philosophical.  So the conversations through twitter and writing and the couple of times we met in person created this beautiful community.  It seriously might go down as one of the highlights of my 2011.

So, here we are again, with the same challenge-- different name.  The kind of crazy thing is that it has exploded and there are several dozen of individuals joining the challenge to blog in November.  I guess it really is true that we all need to write- there is something deeply spiritual about it.

The community junkie that I am, is a little bit sad that I am joining on from so far away.  I freaking love all these Californians that are writing, but I am equally excited because several people in my Texas community have joined the madness!

This month I will be writing everyday but I will not be "blogging" everyday. However, I will be publishing my post in my journal here in Texas.  I love journaling and it a way that I process things with the Lord, and saly it has dissapeared over the years. And quite frankly in this season of my life, I think I need to be devoting my thoughts that are raw and unedited for just me and God and not the world wide web.  So please keep asking me how journaling is going.  And maybe some of my time with God will produce some good material this month for blogging as well.

If you want to join in or follow all the shenanigans then go to this link: http://simplebutsignificant.com/november-blogfest/ 

On Becoming A Mother

Just to clear the air.  I am not pregnant. That is not my dark corner (see previous post).  And the only children that I have are spiritual and they are scattered around the world- mostly in India.  But in January, when Curtis Jones asked me to uproot myself and move to Houston, I became pregnant with a new vision.  A vision to mobilize, send, and equip people to be on mission in both my new city of Houston and the world through Bayou City Fellowship.

While living in California and walking in the "land of in-between" I had lots of time to think about what this vision, this new job, this new city, this new community could/would be/become.  I wondered why I was fit to be the one to carry and raise up this vision.  But I guess no one feels ready to be a mom, right?  I wondered if I would like it, if I would be any good at it, or if I would even be a good carrier of this vision.  

But God has given this baby to me.

My first thought is... God is just plain crazy.

Then His Spirit reminds me, He's sovereign and He uses the idiots of the world to accomplish His will.

My second thought is... that there is someone more competent or better equipped.

Then His Spirit reminds me, that my life's journey is a testimony of preparation for this moment.

My last thought is... Lord you have to give me favor, use all of me, let me be significant.

Then His Spirit reminds me, He will be faithful because He is jealous for His fame and His glory.

You would think peace is what should follow but no, mostly just fear.  

The type of fear that is good.

That keeps you making good/wise chooses. That pushes you towards significance.

But also the kind that if you let it, it will cripple you and paralyze you.

Then it finally happened.  I moved, uprooted, relocated and...

I became a mother. 

(Holy Crap!)

Fast forward to August, I finally got to meet "Bayou City Fellowship" meaning the core group of people that had been faithfully meeting to help build this church.  My first feeling was intimidation.  And my first thoughts were..."these people are awesome, how can I lead them?!"  And for the past couple of months, I have been living in this land of intimidation. A lot fearful and a lot scared. And a lot of having no no idea what I am doing. I imagine it's similar to the feelings parents experience when they hold their baby in their hands for the first time and realize you are primarily responsible for them.  With God's help of course, but definitely your responsibility.   

But this week, I was reminded that leaders lead people through their own fear and it's okay. Donald Miller wrote a blog post sharing his thoughts on leadership.  (you need to click this link...it's worth the 3 minutes it will take you to read it.)  

These are a few quotes that I loved in the article...

"...sometimes leading just means being out front, going to the places very few people are willing to go. But the cool thing about leaders is they show the rest of us that the path is scary but ultimately safe."

 " If you’re a leader, just know you’re supposed to be a little afraid. And you’re supposed to be taking some people with you. And nobody can actually kill you in this thing. All they can do is yell boo. Be brave."

So friends, God gave me a baby or rather a vision and a space to lead others to be missional. And I am the good kind of terrified.  I will probably make mistakes and I have a lot of learning to do, but I have never loved something more.  

Movement

At the core of who God created me to be, I am a mobilizer. I love to come alongside people and help them move one step forward.  I have a reputation in ministry for my encouraging yet challenging tone to those God has given me stewardship.  There have been seasons in life where experiences or people have mobilized me and caused my previously stagnant life to be filled with fluid movement that rewarded me with great joy, purpose, and significance.  This joy layered with God's faithfulness has caused me to long for movement in my own life.  And even more so, it has produced in me a desire to mobilize others and to see supernatural movement in other's lives.

But what happens when I (Alicia) become immobile?

Satan has this clever and unique ability to take the God-given gems that he has given us and distort them to use against us.  Because I am a mobilizer, Satan can have victory in my life by making me paralyzed.  Paralyzed to move. And my honesty will share with you that I am in a current season of paralysis.  

Yesterday, I was having lunch with my pastor's wife and through our conversation I realized how clearly  Satan had been accusing me of so many things in my personal life that were the root of my current paralysis.  He has accused me of so many things from laziness, to ugliness, to  lack of spiritual maturity, to convincing me that I am the last person on the planet that is equipped for my job at Bayou City Fellowship. It wasn't until sharing all the things that I was struggling with that this theme of accusation became so clear.  And that my feelings of lack of worth and position in Christ was less about me and more about Satan's accusations against me.  Satan has been working over-time in his accusations towards me and sadly I have believed every single accusation. The result has been paralysis and stagnancy. He's sooo very clever. If he can paralyze me, then I am noneffective and not living in truth.  Yet, the TRUTH  is that Christ purchased with His own blood,  all of my sin and shame and He accuses me of nothing!

Yesterday evening, I also had the joy of sitting with a new sister Crista, and share my entire life story and all my dark corners and all the accusations that Satan has been holding over me. There is such freedom in Truth and bringing light to dark corners.There is freedom in accountability and letting people know you.  Today, I feel so much freedom.  I feel movement and fluid leaking back in my bones. I feel joy and purpose returning.  And I am un-threatened by the accusations, even today, that Satan has thrown in my direction. Victory.

There is no more freedom and joy than what we can find in the gospel (life, death, burial, and resurrection) of Jesus Christ.  He paid it all.

What are the God-given gifts or things in your life that Satan has distorted to use against you?  I pray that you can find truth in Victory today.

I am ready to meet Her.

This Sunday is the big day.
The day that Bayou City Fellowship opens it's door to the city of Houston for the first time.
I couldn't be MORE excited.

I can't wait to meet our church.
We have been talking and preparing, and flirting with the idea of Her for so long.
But on Sunday, the Blind date expectations will be over.
We will get to meet our church finally.
She will be beautiful.

We will get to know what She looks like.
Who She will attract.
What She can accomplish around the globe and in our city.
Whose lives She will transform.
What She will be most passionate about.

But more importantly, I am ready to get my hands dirty.
I am ready to grow in love with Her more than I already do.
I am ready to serve Her.
I am ready to give my life to Her.

Bayou City Fellowship, I can't wait to meet you!
I know you won't disappoint!

Impressions as of late

I can't believe that I have lived in Houston for over a month now.  I know many people have been asking for an update or wanting to know how life has been in my new city and in my new role as a church planter.  Life honestly is normal and not flashy.  I am adjusting to living alone, eating lots of meals in different people's homes, serving lots of coffee, and navigating my new city with my GPS in hand.  I am this sick human in the fact that I see my adjustment as very academic and can predict my own stages of culture shock.  I had kind of a rough lonely week at about week 3, but knew it was about that time of my adjustment and that it should happen and that it would pass. However, these are some impressions or thoughts that I have had along the way.

1. Living with Andy and Corey is like taking a class in home ec and wood shop 101.  They make quite the pair.    Andy is quite the handy man (saws, air guns, routers, and work benches) and Corey is quite creative crafty (glue, paint, stain, signs, and the perfect eye).  Their weekends home have been spent building tables and signs for the opening of our church.  They let me help out and it makes me dig deep into my creative side.  I am still loving living with them on the weekends, they are one of my biggest blessings.

2. I find myself on my new churches website ALL THE TIME.  I am obsessed with seeing fruit of something tangible of what God is doing and somehow I just keep ending up there.  There seems to be something new added everyday.  Today we got a link for online giving!  

3. The men at my church have made an impression on me.  It has been awesome to see so many men who are loving their wives, parenting, established in their careers, and helping build the church.  No bans here. 

4. I have had the joy of hearing different families stories of how God called them to plant Bayou City Fellowship. It has been beautiful to see a God who is on the move, rearranging lives, and moving people towards mission.

5. I have never been so honored to serve under a pastor who understands missional living and will be relentless to teach it from the pulpit.  

6. Our church has not had to raise any money thus far for our church plant.  How crazy is that?!  Another handprint of God's faithfulness.

7. I have visibly seen the body of Christ working together to be the Church.  It takes a lot of amazing gifts and talents both spiritual and tentmaking.  It has been awesome to see each person contribute their piece to the puzzle that is building this church... from budgets, to coding websites, to leading worship, to becoming a business, to everything.  The body working together is beautiful and I have a tangible lived out example that it will forever mark this season of life for me.

8. I haven't  been excited about ministry and what God can do through the Church in my entire life.  I am excited for the days to come.

9.  Starbucks for some reason decided to tell me I would get full-time hours, but in fact has been only giving me 20.  So I am kind of in a pickle.  Trying to see about transferring, but don't want to.  So we shall see.

10.  I am kind of bored these days.  I should probably be busier, but life is just simple right now.  No school classes or homework, no trips to San Francisco, a very small but growing community, and trying to manage my time that is free for something productive.  I fight lazyness and the heat.  

Hope

Today, I got the privilege of visiting my good friend Michael. Michael and I are education buddies. I started attending the same private Christian school as him in third grade and he was one of the 13 people I graduated high school with. And it turns out, that my encouragement for him to come visit Dallas Baptist University our freshmen year was the reason he eventually transferred in our sophomore year. He became a good friend during our college years and a friendship that I knew would last for awhile.

For the past several years, he has been battling Leukemia. He started another round of chemotherapy this morning and will have a bone marrow transplant soon. It's amazing how life can always turn out differently than you expect. But it's always encouraging to see people of God take the difficulties that life throws them and take it with grace, humility, and hope. This is what he wrote about Hope yesterday, the day before he starts another round of chemo.

Hope

Hope has a good memory, but he knows what is worth focusing on.

Hope thinks bad things are causes and good things are effects.

Hope understands Faith better than anyone.

Probability and Statistics are jealous of Hope because he knows more than they do.

Hope lives on the same street as Fear and Anger, but he can shut them up when they throw loud parties.

Hope likes nothing better than winding up Thankfulness and letting him rant.

Hope is hardier than a cockroach and has a longer shelf-life than a Twinkie. He can come back to life, even when you think he is dead.

Hope seems dull in the sun, but he shines in the shadows.

When Hope breaks wind, he owns up and moves on.

Hope knows how to laugh at himself.

Hope cares about the body, but his real business is with the soul.

Hope has many faces. He looks like you and me when we pray for and encourage others. He always looks a little like Christ.

When Hope gets down, he leans on Love and Trust.

Hope is a little taller than Suffering.