A Wee Clarification

A wise friend who reads this blog suggested that I identify myself, since it's been over a year since my last post and those of you who have posts emailed to you do not see the actual web address.

So, this is Erika. :) I apologize for any confusion.

Thanks so much for reading these posts, long ago and now. Upon my return from Outreach, I fully intended to share about the experience promptly. I found the processing/summarizing process to be much more challenging than I expected, however, and the days turned to weeks and then months... Maybe it took the last year for me to realize that my approach was wrong and that "it's not about me"; maybe that's why it's been so difficult to sum everything up. I'm still thinking about these things and learning from them though, so perhaps there will be more to share soon.

May the kingdom of God come soon...

Shalom,
EJ

God Let Me Participate

Contrary to what my flesh believes, it's not about me. It's not about what I can do. My contributions are only noteworthy in that they reflect God's tremendous grace. That He would allow me to participate in the things that He does is truly humbling and remarkable. 

"So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth." 

1 Corinthians 3:7

In light of this truth, I'd like to share a few things that God let me participate in during the Outreach Phase of my school overseas (much later than I had planned). 

~ I was given the opportunity to spend time with students on campus at a Muslim university with a diverse student population. We were welcomed to the university by the tourism department, and were given opportunities to give presentations about our home countries/states. We were also given opportunities to talk with students in their classrooms; we discussed lots of things about our cultures, ideas, and faiths. We became friends with some of the students, and were blessed to spend time with them as they toured us around their city. I believe that God used our times together to challenge us all, to stretch our minds and theirs, to make room in all of our hearts for more of his Truth. 

~ I was given the opportunity to spend time with a ministry that reaches out to some of the world's poor and forgotten living in slums. My friends and I were privileged to spend time with some of the littlest people living there; playing, teaching, and caring for them in their preschool. We were honored to spend time with their families in home fellowships, where the Word of God was taught. In one meeting, I had the privilege of sharing how God used authentic Christian community to shape my life and my friends' lives during college. This community in a slum has tremendous potential to experience relationships the way that God intended, and I believe that God is making it happen. It brought tears to my eyes and shook my heart and soul when a mother genuinely thanked me for sharing my story that seemed so simple to me.

I am so thankful for the full-time ministers of the Gospel in this place, and for the opportunities we had to come alongside them for a short time. I got to see God use them to provide food and medical care, as well as spiritual food and emotional care. What an honor it was to walk in the footsteps of His faithful ones there. 

~ I was given the opportunity to serve with an organization that, by the power and grace of God, does tremendous work on many fronts to break the cycle of poverty in the country. We were blessed to get our hands dirty and release some creativity painting walls in a girls' hostel. The young women living there are absolutely lovely and full of potential. Some have been literally purchased out of abusive families, and all are given persistent care and training in how to work and care for themselves and each other. They are taught how to not live on the streets, as many of their families have done for generations. These girls are introduced to Jesus in many ways, and to the hope that He offers. It was a privilege to paint for and with these lovely ones, and to spend time talking, eating, laughing, and praying with them. 

~ I was given the opportunity to walk the ground, stand on the rooftops, join with the people, and pray for the welfare of a nation that is quickly growing in influence in the world God created. May His kingdom come soon!

Father in Heaven, may your Name be honored. May your kingdom come soon, and may your will be done on Earth, just as it is in Heaven.

Off Again!

Lecture phase has ended and I'm on to the next part of the adventure. :) Oh how I wanted to summarize all that I've learned in detail... but alas, I depart from this house in 6 hours... and there are other ends to tie up...

But here are some of the things God taught me here.

*God IS love. He loves me more than I can imagine (and YOU TOO!), and I can only love others more when I understand more of how He loves us.

*I'm 24 years old, no older and no younger. My youth, experience, childlike spirit, and wisdom are all gifts, and they don't have to fight with each other. 

*God lets us participate in brining His kingdom to earth. The Gospel Jesus taught was not only a gospel of salvation, but the Gospel of the Kingdom of God. This world is not how it was meant to be, but it's restoration is not a lost or hopeless cause. One day all will be right again. 

*The Holy Spirit is not confined by our prayer meetings or worship services. 

*The "natural" and "supernatural" are really not different things. Each human being is a powerful spiritual being.

*I am most at peace when creating something.

*Shalom is not the kind of peace we often think of in my culture, but everything functioning as it was intended. For example, consider a car. By a western definition of peace, one might think of the car washed, waxed, vacuumed, parked, and sitting in the garage with the engine turned off. However, the same car would experience true shalom when started and driving down the street. It's so true. I have peace - nay, shalom - when functioning as I was intended.

Thank you, friends who read my blog! 

I won't be updating this in the coming weeks (probably until the end of April)... and it will be a little more difficult (but NOT by any means impossible) to contact me until I return to the UK. If you'd like to get ahold of me, send me an email and be patient please. :) 

Shalom!!! 

Stop the Traffik!

Last week a couple of ladies came to speak to our school about human trafficking. I've heard about human trafficking before, and it's always outraged my heart. People on this modern-day earth are still bought and sold! Human beings - women, men, and children - are purchased... some into forced labor, many into prostitution, and still many more into other forms of exploitation. It's gut-wrenching and sickening and so many other things... I don't really have words to describe how I feel/what I think about it. 

It seems so ludicrous that it's difficult even to believe that it still happens. And even if one does believe it, then what? When we see a problem of this proportion it's easy to feel hopeless or disconnected, assuming "I can't do anything about it." This presentation may have been the first about human trafficking that gave me hope to fuel the fight against this injustice. We have to become outraged collectively. We MUST. 

I've often heard that the easiest way to begin combatting human trafficking is to raise awareness. It has taken me until now to understand how that is helpful. (It seems like we should be doing so much more.) For me, the key to understanding the usefulness of awareness is the realization that human trafficking happens HERE. It happens in Northern Ireland. It happens in the United States. It doesn't look like "Civil War Slavery," but it HAPPENS! We need to learn what it looks like, and when we do, we need to tell each other. When we see it, we need to speak up. We need to stand up for others, and stand up for what is right. We need to make the world an unsafe place for traffickers. This is how it will be stopped. 

Further, we need to be aware of how our consumerism affects the rest of the world. Every time we make a purchase, we vote for the business practices of the organizations that produce our goods. We as consumers must INSIST on the ethical treatment of our fellow human beings. We need to be willing to pay enough for the things we want, so that those producing them can receive fair wages. We don't need all of the things we want. "Live simply, so others can simply live." 

Ahhhhh I don't feel like I'm articulating this point clearly... but I'm going to learn how... I really am. 

http://stopthetraffik.org

Awaiting the visitors...

My parents are coming to visit! I met them in Dublin over the weekend, and we traveled to Galway and back together. It was really nice seeing them, but a whole lot of riding in busses.

Now, today though, they're coming HERE to see my little life I've been living. :) I think they should be arriving any minute... I'm growing a little impatient.

Onions make me cry.

I've noticed lately that if I ever rub my eyes, they burn... This confuses me sometimes, because in my life, I'm accustomed to being able to touch my eyes (in moderation, of course) pain free.

Why does this happen??? Why can I touch my eyes in the US but not in Northern Ireland???

Some wise women have pointed out to me that I cut onions A LOT. This is truth. I would say that I chop onions or garlic nearly every day... or at least 3-4 times a week. We cook with SO MANY ONIONS and SO MUCH GARLIC! In truth, I LOVE it. I've grown accustomed to my clothes and self smelling like food (because I help cook dinner for ~30 4 days/week and sometimes on weekends), and I'm over the fact that my hands usually smell like garlic/onions. In fact, I forgot that my hands always smell that way until just now... But it's a new revelation that the onion juice sticks around enough to burn my eyeballs when I'm not even cooking.

That's my story. I hope you enjoyed it. :)

Peace!

God is SO GOOD!

Today I am thankful for the following...

1) This morning some friends from the base and I got to help scrape old paint off a brick wall on a community center (so it can be repainted all pretty-like). It was really fun. Here's the best part: at one point I realized that I'd been bending over and scraping paint that was about foot/shin-level for probably about 15 minutes, and my back didn't hurt at all!!! This is especially wonderful because I've been praying for my back a lot lately, and this week I had muscle spasms for about 3 days (the awful kind that have tended to happen about once a year or so when I'm too stressed). God is good! "I believe that you're my Healer. I believe you're more than enough for me..." :)

2) My taxes are filed! Woohoo!!! It's always such a relief. Also, since I'll be traveling again soon (ask me where if I've neglected to tell you.), I'm really glad to have some extra money coming. (I was foolishly worried about that this week too...)

Christmas in Northern Ireland

I realize that it's now February so it seems a little silly to talk about Christmas... but since I didn't describe it before, here's a brief description.

One of the students on our DTS comes from a big family (with lots of wee ones and teenagers) in a nearby town. She and her family graciously invited our WHOLE SCHOOL to their home for Christmas Eve and Christmas morning. So, all 17 students and 3 of the staff went to their home to experience a real family Christmas. :)

Our friends' home is a historic, thatched-roof "National Trust" house. We had a lovely supper of curry-beef with rice, and then played games and watched a movie and enjoyed each other's company. Then we had a giant sleep-over. (You should have seen the girls' room! It was about 14 girls in sleeping bags all in a row in a big room. Lovely.)

On Christmas morning, we had a "proper fry" for breakfast. If you'd like to know what that is, check Wikipedia for "Ulster Fry." It included eggs, beans, black and white pudding (sausage), bacon, tomatoes... and I can't remember what else... Then we watched the kiddos open their presents, and we opened our stockings!!! (And presents that we all got to unwrap too - Play Doh!) We all hung socks from the mantle on Christmas Eve and they were stuffed with candies, glow sticks, party noise makers, and the like while we slept.

We came back to the base around 1:00 on Christmas afternoon, just in time to catch the end of the yearly plunge into the Lough. (It's a Rostrevor tradition for townspeople to jump into the water on Christmas Day.) Some of our own from the base participated. :) I think we arrived just as they were jumping in, but we were in time to greet the cold and wet friends.

In the afternoon I joined a few other girls to open gifts that families had sent us and to read the Christmas story from the Bible.

Later in the evening, I prayed and worshipped the Lord with some friends.

All-in-all, a lovely day.

Returning Soon to a Blog Near You! (Or maybe nearer to me...?)

Dear Friends,

Thank you to all of you lovely people who noticed my lack of updates and got on my case about it! As you can see, for your viewing pleasure, I've changed the background! This is a view of the Republic of Ireland (from Northern Ireland) taken from a mountain behind my house.

I will post more about my life REALLY soon. (Hopefully tomorrow?) So, stay tuned for more news of this adventure... :) If you get my blog posts emailed to you, I will apologize in advance for the clogging of your inbox that might ensue. I'll probably break up the updates from the last month and a half into a few posts.

Also, I realize that with changing the background picture some of my text has become difficult to read. If I don't fix that soon, please bug me about it until it's fixed. Thanks!

Thanks!
Love, Erika

P.S. If you're sad because you sent me an email weeks ago and I haven't replied, I sincerely apologize, and hope/intend to make it up to you very soon. I was without my computer for... I think it was nearly 2 weeks, because I fried my power chord. Thanks to a wonderful long-time Apple-loving friend, I can now use my laptop again, but I've not caught up on emails since then, and they've been a-piling! The plan is/was to catch up on those tomorrow.

Lest I forget...

In case I never told you this, here are my priorities for being here.

1) Learn to love the Lord, my God, with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength. 

    (This includes expression of that love through serving others.) 

2) To figure out what's next in my life...

Please remind me of that if you think I'm forgetting (or even if you don't...). 

Thanks! 

Caught the cooties again...

I'm sick. Boooo! I've got a cough and a stuffy nose and sometimes a headache and a tummy ache... grrrrrr...

But I'll be fine. Pumpin' the echinacea again... and I think I'm going to nap.

In other news, we have a base Christmas party tonight. :)
(Don't worry, we'll also celebrate on the 25th with those who are in town.)

I'm really behind on responding to emails.

Thank you all for your patience. I am way behind on responding to emails. I've read at least part of most of the emails I've received in the last week and a half (because I have a phone that I'm able to check email on), but I owe lots of people responses (because it's a pain to try to type an email on a phone). Sorry for the delay. Thanks for emailing me! I'll catch up! I really will (but not tonight because I have to go sleep...).

Much love!

Some vegetables have different names here too...

Eggplant = Aubergine
Zucchini = Courgettes
Cilantro = Coriander

Myers Briggs - ISTJ

During Lecture Week #3, we covered personality and identity. Part of that was looking at the Myers Briggs personality preference assessment. The week was quite interesting, and SO INTENSE emotionally and spiritually. There was much introspection, and it was so easy to pass emotions from one to another (especially the exhausted, sort of negative kind). However, we're better now (moving from "storming" to "norming" I think), and I think it taught us a lot about how to relate to and understand one another.

My personality profile is ISTJ, which stands for introvert, sensing, thinking, judging. I don't have enough space, time, background, or willpower to explain all of what that means at the moment, but you can Google it if you'd like. The thing I remember most that I read about people with my preferences is that we tend to be rather dependable, and have a very strong sense of duty. Yep...

Thanksgiving!

You may or may not know that Thanksgiving is actually my favorite holiday. I really enjoy spending time with family and friends, and I have so much to be thankful for!!!!

Almost every Friday evening, we have a "Community Meal" at An Cuan. It starts with a liturgical prayer of thanksgiving, and is followed by a meal with all of the students and staff here to live and/or work at the base. We usually have some lovely guests as well. On the Friday after America's Thanksgiving, we celebrated together by having a traditional American turkey dinner for our community meal together. We went around the room and shared some of the things that we're thankful for, and enjoyed wonderful food and fellowship together.

I was struck by the diversity of nationalities represented at our tables. There were participants from the U.S., Canada, Northern Ireland, South Africa, New Zealand, Finland, Sweden, Palestine, England, Argentina, Brazil... and probably a few others. I think it was a simple picture of what Heaven will be like. Some of this week's teaching covered the banquet described in Isaiah 25. Check it out. Wonderful.

Happy Weekend!

Here is a picture of some pretty flowers at the Botanical Gardens in Belfast. 

They remind me of Christmas.

This past weekend, I was blessed to be visited by this wonderful lady!

We spent Sunday together in Belfast.

Here's proof that we were together... (at the Botanical Gardens!). 

Here's proof that we were in Belfast. Christmas Market = MADNESS... but brilliant. 

(The word "brilliant" pretty much means "awesome" or "great" here.) 

Here's what the Christmas Market looks like at night.

We had dinner in a pub.

When we left the pub, the streets were almost EMPTY. It was CRAZY! 

They'd been BUZZING with people when we went in. 

And for serious, we weren't in there that long. 

While we rode the bus back to Rostrevor, it started snowing! 

Here's the view of the snow on the mountains from the front of my house on Monday morning.

(There was a lot of fog too.)

I am so BLESSED to live in a world where a friend can travel across an ocean to spend time together,

to have a friend who would and could make the trip, and to live in such a beautiful place! 

Mail me pictures?? :)

I can't believe how long it's been since I've last had time to post... Life's been busy! Soon I hope to describe the wonderful Thanksgiving experience I had last week, my recent Myers Briggs Personality Assessment experience, and some more about what my life is like here. However, dinner cooking time starts in about 15 minutes, so it might not be today...

I do have time for a little request though... If you're bored or thinking, "how can I make Erika's day overseas?" I would LOVE to have some pictures of you lovely people... because I really like you... and I only brought 2 pictures with me (thanks in large part to Ariell...). :) The catch is, I don't have a printer here, so it would be EXTRA wonderful if you snail-mailed a picture or two... but email pictures are grand too! (Saying "grand" was very Northern-Irish of me just now...) 

Being Real... and Newcastle!

So, to be fair, here are some minor struggles I've experienced in the last few days...

• I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm homesick, but I did get to a point of missing being around people who really know me. I'm feeling better now though.
• I caught some germs... I have a little cough and a sore throat. Moderately lame... but I found a health store in Newcastle yesterday and bought some echinacea drops and I've been putting them in my tea! Mmmmmmm....
• I put the wrong Skype name on my prayer cards. If you have a postcard with my face on it (that's lying to you) and want to Skype me, try erikarjohnson. 

Here are some pictures from yesterday's Saturday adventure to Newcastle. :) 

Sea of Ireland!!

 With Mountains Too!

By the way, I LOVE this raincoat! Thanks, G&G!

I don't know this guy but he really wanted to take a picture with us... 

He'd had some choice beverages I think... It was 10 AM. 

Family, don't be alarmed. Isolated incident...

We had fish and chips, thinking it was the thing to do. 

We later found out that we should have gotten it in a different town...

These are my friends.

Here's me with my fish and chips. 

No, I couldn't finish all of that.

Yes, the grease really upset my stomach. 

Sure, it was kind of tasty. Nothing to write home about though... except I guess that's what I'm doing. 

Lecture Week 1: The Father Heart of God

Last week's lectures were all about God's character, especially His Father heart. It was wonderful. I learned so much about His love!

I was struck each day by how blessed I am to have an earthly father who has always shown me what a true father heart looks like. It's amazing how God made dads able to point their kids to Him. I love you, Daddy! :)

Similarities Between Northern Ireland and the UP

They use the plural you, "yous," here like they do in the UP! I love it. 

There is a food here called a pastie, and people (at least Americans and Canadians) seem so pronounce it wrong all the time... It's different from a UP pasty though. These pasties are a mixture of ground up potatoes, cheese, and spices (and sometimes ground meat?) mashed into a patty and deep fried. They're eaten on buns - "pasty baps!" 

It's really pretty here. :)