I'm Le Tired

   Aloha, frands. Today was a delight. We started off this fine Saturday with an hour of quiet time, as usual. Then we had a testimony from one of our fellow interns. It was powerful. It was a true testament to how God can use any insane amount of crap in our lives, mistakes we've made and seemingly unforgivable things we've done to REFINE us. This girl had the gnarliest story. So much for one person to have gone through and experience. We so often ask God why we're going through this hard time, why is this happening, what's going on, why aren't you here?! Wahhh. Bad things are going to happen. We and this world are full of sin, there's no escaping it. So use it. God can heal any wound, if you let him. So let him. He's bigger than any amount of shame, pain, guilt or weight you're carrying. Don't let it break you, let it make you beautiful. We learned the difference between justification and sanctification this week. Her story was the wildest example of sanctification through Christ. It's been a process. Like an oyster goes through hell to make a pearl, my friend went through hell, and now that she's handed it over to Christ and sought forgiveness and a relationship with him, she's theee most beautiful pearl. To us and to God. Love, love, love this.
   After that lovely starter, we had outreach. My outreach team is called Nai'a (I think I spelled it right), which means dolphin! We're on Community/Wahiawa Outreach this month, so today we went to a church on the North Shore and did some yard work. If you know what California grass is, (not weed), then you know it was hard work. This stuff slices you up and leaves little prickly hairs in you like a cactus. It sucked, but we conquered it! We cleared out a real big space. I started with weed whacking, which I loved until the fuel line broke and started spraying me with gasoline. I was so sad when I turned around and realized it wasn't rain. Using clippers, machetes and other tools, we cut all the grass down and then the real work started. We had to uproot each of these plants using ice-pick-lookin' tools. I haven't worked that hard since I quit crossfit. We felt so good when we were done and so blessed to have been able to bless someone else with our work. 
   After closing out the work day with prayer, we hightailed it across the street to the beach for a dip. We were gross. The waves were crazy and quite large, being from the Puget Sound area... But I ventured in anyway. Getting in passed the waves wan't too hard, but getting out I got annihilated. Full on drowned rat, pummeled into the shore and sloshed around, sand up the yin-yang, crawling out of the foam to safety. May or may not have semi flashed the whole beach, but whatever. Only a hand full of interns and locals, right? After that hilarious tragedy, we took off for home and Surfers Church. 
   Surfers Church starts out in the Surfers Coffee Bar, where all of STN and whoever of the public shows up hang out and enjoy free dinner together at 6:30. Around 7 or a quarter after, we head next door to the Yamada for worship and a message. Tonight we had the new pastor from the church down the road, (where we went last Sunday), and some of their congregation here. He gave the message and between that and the worship, it was an incredible night. After that, it was back to the coffee bar for cookies, coffee and socializin'. I love interacting with people here. I was dog tired, hot and had a headache, but I couldn't leave. The openness of everyone here and the communal seeking of growth and closeness with God is just so dang exciting and attractive. People are fascinating. I eventually did pull myself away though, procrastinated writing this for a good while, hanging out with roommates instead, and now I am here, it's late and I must sleep. Good night, sweet friends.