India Mission Blog

We as a team decided to create a separate blog for the India trip instead of just using my existing one. You can keep up with my trip there!

psccindia.blogspot.com

Time

I haven't posted on here in quite a while, but I think I'll give it a go. I could ramble on about all sorts of things; update from the holiday's, TFD interview, work, church... but that would take to long. Besides most of those things are in the past anyhow! Nothing like the present. C.S. Lewis said that the present is the moment in which time touches eternity.

So what is my present right now. It is 6:25 am, I am hungry, wearing a sweatshirt and sweatpants with wool socks because I am cold, struggling with my typing, trying my best to just be a servant of Jesus... Why is it that I have such a hard time thinking in the present. I notice that I am usually thinking of the future, what I am going to do today, plans for later this week, even looking forward to next month. Sure all of these future times have challenges and issues that will be unique to them and I do need to take some simple steps of preparation, but this moment... Am I able to grab all God has for me in this moment.

If time, finite and limited that it is, connects with eternity, infinite and unlimited, at this moment of the present, then that means that God is near, right now in the present. God is outside of time and is not able to be limited by it, so when time connects with His reality, eternity, then we who are governed by time can connect with Him, because that is where He is. No more looking to the future and hoping that I will meet with Him next Sunday, or even looking to the past and dwelling on past meeting with Him. All I have is this moment.

One of the responsibilities of the present is to prepare for the future, so here is some preparation. I am leaving for India in 8 days, on a trip with 4 other wonderful men. We will be visiting many different areas of the country and seeing many different sides of the Indian people. We arrive in Cochin (SW India) and will spend 4 days there as a part of the national conference of the India Pentecostal Church. Some 60,000 native believers will be there to receive teaching and ministry. We will be called upon to minster to people as the Lord leads. After the conference, we will travel north to Mumbai (Bombay) and from there take a train to Ludhiana (not on map). We will be meeting with leaders, church planters, evangelists and pastors in the area. This will be a significant teaching and imparting time to those leaders, but the real secret is that the teaching and impartation will be actually happening to us. Our time in India will end in New Dehli and we will fly out of there.

As far as air travel, we will be leaving on the 15th, quick hop to San Francisco and then boarding Singapore Airlines to fly to Seoul, Korea. I have heard that this is one of the nicer airports in the world, so I am excited to see it. I have also heard that the entire country of Korea smells of Kim Chee. We then fly to Singapore and have a 6 hour hotel stay. From Singapore we will fly in direct to Cochin. We will return the same way, leaving India out of New Dehli and making it back to Seattle on the 29th.

I will be posting here on this blog as often as I can. I know, I know... whenever people go on these types of trips they promise that they are going to keep up with the blog, but I really do want to make this a priority...

So there is my soon future, but back to this moment in the present...

Random Question

Along with being terrified/excited for my Oral Board with TFD, I have some things I need to accomplish first.

1) Study and prepare! This is not the typical interview, it is a pass/fail thing! I am pumped, because I like to think that I thrive in situations like this.

2) Get nice clothes. I need a nice suit for this, because of the whole pass/fail thing.

3) Cut my hair :( I have been growing it out for almost 16 months and I will be sad to see it go, again the whole pass/fail thing.

So here is the random question. What should I do to my hair before I cut it? It is long enough to do cool things with, so what should I do and take pictures of? Let me know!

Pendulum

Do you ever feel like your life is a pendulum and that you are swinging from one side to the other? That has been me the last few days. Through three separate events, I have been swung from one side of the emotional spectrum to the other, so I find myself in the middle once again trying to process.

I have been working a ton lately, I just finished an 8 day stretch of night shifts in a row. I was also responsible for training one of the new EST's as well. He is a great guy, Andrew, and I think that he will do very well in the ER so I really enjoyed getting to know him and working with him. On Sunday night, we had a trauma come in that was very nasty. I don't need to go into details here, but suffice it to say, it was a 17 year old kid who broke up with his girlfriend, got drunk, rolled his car and ended up dead. My streak is still alive, no one has died in my ER while I am on shift, this young man passed up in the ICU later the next day. His family was obviously very upset and distraught. I got to interact with them a little bit, but what can you say to people in this situation? I am called to be a pastor, but in times like that all you can do is pray, there are not words appropriate for that depth of sorrow and pain. In the past, I would have just let the emotions bury themselves and rationalized it by saying that is what you have to do in my line of work. There is a lot of things that I see that are sad and hard, but I am paid to be there for the people in those situations, so I have to function. This one bugged me though... I have some processing to do.

Ok, so I don't get much sleep and I go to work Monday night. We had a mother come in and deliver her baby in one of our triage rooms. This would have been a cool thing, intense, but cool if the baby had been full term. It was only 23 weeks, 3 months premature. Again to spare all the details, the baby did not survive this, despite valiant efforts from the NICU nurses and doctors. So, I haven't processed the night before and now I have this mind searing incident to process through. I will never forget the scene I walked into, never. This happened about 4:30 am and I still had 2 1/2 hours left of work. Again, I had to delay the processing of this tragedy until later.

You may be thinking, "Wow, Samuel should quit his job, that is too much!" If I leave this business, who will shine the light of Jesus in the way I am supposed to in my ER? Jesus has called me specifically to this job and provided a way for me to thrive here, despite all the hardship. So, join me in praying for the two families that experienced horrible tragedy this last weekend.

Jesus, I pray that You would bring Your peace and a strong sense of Your love to these two families. Cover them in Your Spirit and minster to them in the way only You can.

Now, most of you know that I stay up after work usually. I go to the YMCA and swim, get coffee, spend time with Jesus etc... This morning, I had arranged to hang out with Justin Wirtz (my favorite skinny 16 year old punk who hurts my back) and get coffee. We had a great time together sharing life and growing... still haven't had a lot of opportunity to process the emotional overload from the last few nights. On my way home, I am beginning to think about all this hoping to begin the process of healing, when I get a phone call that could change my life...

It was the Tacoma Fire Department asking me to continue in the hiring process. Brief overview, TFD hires every two years, if at all. 1300 people applied, 900 took a written test, 400 took a physical test that only 240 people passed. From those 240 people who passed all the elements of the testing process, I heard that 75 people got invited to interview for the job, and I think that they will hire somewhere between 20-40. You can read some of my past blogs and my thoughts from other steps in the testing process. I was asked to interview, and I have the Oral Board, as it is called, on December 19th at 9:30 am. The Oral Board consists of 4-5 ranking people within TFD and is basically you proving yourself to them in an intense fashion. They have difficult questions designed to trick you and see how much you have prepared for the interview. My job in this Oral Board is to communicate to these people, in spite of the difficulties presented to me, how well I will do in their department. This phone call is a big deal and the pendulum has now swung emotionally once again.

I now get to process 2 separate spectrums of emotions, pain & suffering : joy & anticipation.

The pendulum of life swings as the Lord wills it. In the past, I would have not thought to spend time processing all this. Now, as the Lord challenges me to be honest with myself, in every way and to do away with the facade that I put up, even to myself, I need to process this. I recognize this as a huge step in my maturity as a man, but that doesn't make it much easier.

What are you thankful for?

We are approaching Thanksgiving, so I will join the parade of probably every other blog online and write about some things that I am thankful for.

1) Music. I have been writing more and more, challenging myself to expand my musical knowledge. I was planning on playing at the One Heart Open Mike tonight, but I am really not prepared so it will wait until after Turkey Day. Some friends and I got together and wrote a 80's inspired metal anthem about the wrong way to share the Love of Jesus. It's hilarious and if we ever record it I will post it for you to hear. I have also been listening to some cool stuff that is expanding my sonic landscape.

2) My job. I had my 90 day evaluation and I am considered a valued employee with a few areas that I am exceptional at. I wish I could work 12 hour shifts, just so that I could work the same hours with more days off. In order for me to get 40 hours a week, I have to work extra days. This usually means that I am working 7, 8 or 10 days in a row. That can wear on you after a little bit. I have some amazing friends at work and I look forward to getting there because of them. It is true that the people you work with make all the difference.

3) The Internet. We finally got wired at the house here, so it is nice to be able to myspace or blog or just keep up with e-mail. Seems silly, but my generation is so wired...

4) Church. I have a pastor who is willing to call me out when I need it. I was in the dumps the other week and he saw right through what was causing it, challenged me in it and provided the opportunity for me to grow. I am also going to be less busy at church now, which will be nice. I have had my hand in many areas, but I will be focusing on my LifeGroup now (shameless plug... life-line, Thursday's; 6:30; Mandolin Cafe).

5) Being single. It sucks, but I have not had another single life circumstance that has challenged me more, or forced me to grow as much. In the past, I thought I was ready for a relationship, yeah bring it on! I am just now starting to realize how much I had to learn and how short sighted I was. Being single, I get a unique perspective on marriage by watching the great marriages around me and seeing how people I love make it work. The Lord can bring my future wife to me (or vice versa) whenever He wants, but I don't want it a moment before then.

6) India. In case you haven't heard, I will be going to India with some men from church in January. The Lord is providing the way for me to go, and it is cool to see it coming together. I heard that Pastor Kaj was going to India in January and I ran out of excuses not to go. We are called as Christians to go, not offer excuses. I have never felt the call to foreign missions, I believe God has me in Tacoma now and for the foreseeable future, but that doesn't release me from going. I will post the whole testimony of how God is providing for this trip later, because it is cool and He deserves glory.

7) Savior. This is cliche, I know. But none of the other things I am thankful for would be possible without Him. There is a song that I love, Mighty to Save it talks about Jesus being Mighty to Save, and I realize that if He was just mediocre to save, I would be screwed. Thank You Jesus, that You are mighty and that You have saved me. Help me to grow in love and deepen my relationship with You.

Well, I am sure that there are many other things to be thankful for... I haven't even touched my family or close friends... that is later for sure.

My Heart

There are a lot of things that I want to write about... I have found a few things out about myself lately. I seem to write that a lot here, but it is true. I also seem to only write when I have had some profound learning experience to share, but I don't mind that so much. Honestly, I am too busy to function most times. I thought that my life was full during college and I would nod knowingly when people would tell me that life just gets busier after college. I didn't think that was true... I know better now! It is a different kind of busy then college, but at any rate...

I had a wonderful experience this morning. In order to fully understand it, I need to tell about my weekend. I work every other weekend from 11 pm to 7 am with some days in the middle. This weekend was my weekend off, but as I usually do, I picked up a shift on Friday night/Saturday morning. I got off work and made my way to the church because I had a few projects to finish up for the weekend. While I was there, I met up with a handful of guys and we began a project in the sanctuary to completely redo the video projection equipment. My project was to install 2 new projectors and wire them appropriately. So, I haven't slept (I am even still in my scrubs) and all 6 of us are working our tails off. This was one of those projects that gets bigger as you start working on it. We finish just in time for Saturday night service to start, about 6 pm, a good 8 solid hours of work most of which for me involved being up on a rickety orchard ladder. At one point, the ladder began to kick out from under me, so it was lucky I grabbed one of the sprinkler pipes and held on to the ladder with my feet.

After this, I go home and was in bed by 7:30 fast asleep. I woke up at about 5 am, I knew this was going to happen, so I was ready for it. I went to Starbucks and spent time in the word and then got to PSCC early for service to fix any problems with the new system and to play on worship team. The day ended with ReWire Afterhours and me falling asleep at Nate & Cori's place while watching Indiana Jones...

Yesterday, I spent the vast majority of it asleep... either in bed or on the couch. My body was recovering from the abuse it had endured from my last few weeks of work and especially the weekend. After a long day of napping, I went to bed and woke up at 2 am this morning. I stopped kidding myself about going back to sleep and went to Bertolino's... enough back story?

I opened the Word and began to read. Something I have been challenged in is my discipline about reading the Word, so I have been getting better about spending time in Scripture. I also have been journaling more and this has borne great fruit. I find that when I started the whole journaling process, I wasn't being honest with myself and in turn I was not being honest with God. I am becoming more honest with myself... not condemning myself for having emotions, acknowledging the fact that things sometimes are not OK etc... The craziest thing happened, I began to dream... Not the practical looking to the future and speculating as to what it holds, but to dream! What would I love to do, what seems impossible but would bring me the most joy. The very presence of God was restoring my ability to dream, not just to plan the future, but to see what kind of crazy things are in store for my future. I spend a lot of time planning and strategizing things, and I am decent at it, but to dream... that is a gift from God.

I read something in "Secrets of the Secret Place" by Bob Sorge that really spoke to me. Being in the presence of God is like radiation therapy for cancer patients. I have a cancerous disease, it is called sin and being in the Lord's presence is like getting Chemo, except this is the surest therapy ever. My desire for the things of this world decreases and my desire for Him increases. He allows me to dream again. My existence has been bleak lately... same thing, different day. But to dream again... it feels good.

So, since 2 am this morning, I have been dreaming... and this is way better than sleep.

until next time I have a profound learning experience.

On taking tests and passing (out)

So today I got to take the Physical Abilities Test with Tacoma Fire... I passed the test! The test consists of 9 seperate skills that you have to complete within a time limit... 7 minutes and 30 seconds... and I completed everything in 4:48. The guy running me through the test said that was a smoking time, anything under 5 is a good time. After the test, I was cooling down and all of a sudden, I just did not feel good. I got dizzy and sick to my stomach, I had to sit down and put my head between my knees. I thought it would pass, but it just would not go away. If there is a great place to feel sick and almost pass out, it would be the Tacoma Fire Department training center with a bunch of firefighters around. They sat me down and gave me some O2 and started loking at my heart rhythm and vital signs. My blood pressure was 92/74! Usually I am 130/90 so this was really low. It would not go away either! My pressure came back up a little bit, but it went down again when I stood up... long story short, I had to refuse to be transported to the hospital. We figure that it was just dehydration and I feel a lot better now.

There are other tests that I am taking in life right now... I think that I am passing them. One of the things I am thinking about is how I don't believe that God would give me good things in my life. For instance, I was scared to take this test because I was afraid to pass and advance to the next phase of the hiring process. Do I honestly believe that God will give me things to do in my life that would make me happy and bring a smile to my face. I am used to the God who is into changing me and making me different, but how can I understand the God who is into blessing me and seeing me prosper? This is different than anything I have gone through, because it requires a fudamenta change in my thinking, not just a surface level of change or rearranging.

God is good. He is also God. Do I really see Him as a person who loves me and haves my best in mind?