in him is the fullness of all things

So this morning I was listening to a teaching on identity and was totally wrecked by this passage in Revelation 2:17 that reads:   “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives  it. ” Here are some of the truths that the Lord ministered to my heart as I read this passage. 1) The Lord gives us a new name , a secret name.   This signifies intimacy. You only have special names for those with whom you are very close to and care deeply for. The fact that God will give  me a new name etched in stone,  that is unique and different than the name that he gives to his other kids speaks volumes of the uniqueness of my relationship with him. 2) The white stone signifies justification .  Apparently in the days that John wrote this passage, stones were very important in determini

Let me first begin with a tiny little vent-sesh. Our school has a goose problem. A BIG ONE. It's bad enough that the geese squawk loudly every morning waking the poor souls that just want to sleep in an extra 10 minutes. It's bad enough that they congregate at the sidewalks and don't give a rip as to whether or not they are in anyone's way. But the ABSOLUTE WORST thing about them is that they defecate. EVERYWHERE. Well mostly just the sidewalks. But it is so unbelievably obnoxious because you literally can't take a step without trying to dodge a pile. You heard correctly. You know how bird poop is usually all white and liquidy? Well goose poop is more like a doggie doodoo. Cylindrical. Anyways, onto the main purpose of this blog. Humility. It's something that the Lord has been teaching me a lot about lately because, contrary to popular belief, I am not perfect! Let me paint a picture for you. I am walking home from the library after a long study sesh. Acro

Well folks, I have officially been in pharmacy school for 7 weeks! God has been very gracious to me during my time here. Its funny how much growing up can occur when you pick up and move to a whole new place and the cool thing is that God is totally present during the whole  process. We aren't alone.  This last week I turned 22 and I think it's one for the history books. Not because I did anything over the top crazy, but because I realized how truly blessed and loved I really am. I was completely blown away by my friends here and their desire bless me with decorations and gifts! My friends Nina, Emily and Alyssa decorated my dorm room door and snuck into my room and filled it with balloons! And to top it off, the balloons were decorated with my favorite things: babies beards birds sriracha sauce oregon beavers tim tebow ... I was very impressed with how well they know me already! In addition to that, friends from Oregon literally lavished me with cards and

'sup ya'll. I just wanted to do a quickie update and let you know that though I feel it on the inside due to all that studying, I am in fact NOT DEAD. Just totes cray busy up 'n hurrr. I cannot believe that I am more than halfway done with my first term!   Here are some awkwards and awesomes for the last few weeks: Awkwards thinking my headphones were plugged in to my computer while I was listening to an australian man teach me the basics of the stretch reflex on youtube while sitting on the silent floor...they were not plugged in...everyone could hear. when people wear sunglasses inside...weird! trying to eat my applesauce without a spoon. Essentially I was drinking it...not the quietest way to go about consuming food (again on the silent floor!) when the automatic toilet flushes whilst you are...ahem...taking care of business. when the worker at the dining hall calls you "sweetie"... sneezing super loudly (on the silent floor of the library) wh

Day after day, week after week, I continue to be astounded by the goodness of my Father. Leave it to him to lead me a beautiful congregation on my first Sunday...he would :) In the weeks and months leading up to this huge transition, I was told by a few people that had done their share of moving that it can take a while to find a church and I was fully prepared for it to take a while. But God certainly has a way of exceeding our expectations! Those of you who I have spoken with since being here know that I comprised a list of 8 churches that I wanted to check out. I couldn't even tell you what it was that lead me to search for yet another church...But somehow I found myself on the page of Church in the City and even though it was a half an hour away, I just felt like I needed to visit it.  From the moment that I stepped into the building, I felt so welcomed, so comfortable. I really appreciated the fact that the congregation wasn't too large; the people seemed a bit more

Well folks, I have finally jumped on the awkward/awesome bandwagon (c/o Sydney from The Daybook )and I am going to take a moment and share some of the highlights and {awk}lights of my week! I don't normally do this and I can't promise that I'll do it again because most weeks nothing particularly awkward happens to me. This week was a little bit of an exception. So without further adieu... AWKWARD The fact that it took me 5 tries to spell awkward correctly. Showing up to my class an hour early and then proceeding to stay in the empty classroom for the extra hour until class started. Eating by myself in the cafeteria. Getting to this new home fellowship 15 minutes early and awkwardly walking up and down the street until 7:30 instead of owning up to the fact that I was just so excited to be there that I got there way too early. Walking into a Walgreens seconds before they were closing Being on the phone while trying to check out and apologizing both for being on the

So I have reached the two week mark here in Chicagoland and I've made a few observations that I feel are worth noting: Everyone and their mom wears Sperry boat shoes. (many)People from the midwest cannot pronounce Oregon correctly. They prounounce it like "Or-eee-GONE". Chicago sure looks a lot like Oregon when it rains. Gas is flippin' expensive here. What do you know, even in grad school Pinterest can still serve as quite the impressive distraction!  Did you know that you can pay ~$35,000 a year in tuition and your school can't even afford a decent gym? Well now you know. No one knows where Corvallis is. All these things have only made my love for Oregon grow exponentially! I am counting down the days until I get to return to the luscious, green northwest. But in the meantime... Pharmacy school isn't too bad! (I'll probably look back at this and want to kick myself in the face for ever uttering these words...) Everyone said that I would h

So it's been a full 8 days since I've been here and I'm trying to soak up every last minute of freedom before school begins. TOMORROW. Aside from orientation, which was obviously the highlight (not) of my week, I can't say that I've done much. I did however, take a trip into THE CITY which ended up being a bit of a self-discovery experience for me as well. You see, as most of you know, I grew up in Corvallis, a small (ish) town that can hardly be considered a city. In fact let's be honest, it's kind of a farm town! I've been kind of torn as to whether or not I am a city person or a country person. What I can say without any hesitation is that I AM NOT A SUBURB person. As soon as I stepped off the train and was greeted by the tall buildings and bustling people, I felt as if someone had poured cool water on my soul. I love this city! I only wish that I lived closer to/in it. With that being said, I think my ideal living situation would probably be on a

For all you Corvallis/Albany natives: Have you ever gotten on highway 34 or highway 20 and thought to yourself "Gee, this highway is so deplorable, I really wish that I was charged a small fee every time I got on it so that the city could 'maintain' it!" ? What's that you say? That's what our tax dollars are for? Yeah, I am aching to give a good kick in the rear to whoever deemed that to be a good idea. However, that is one of the many ways that I've noticed that the Chicago area is different than Oregon. Aside from that there are the other small details of sales tax, pumping my own gas, HIGH gas prices, and SIDEWALKS( or the lack thereof)! And bike lanes. But this whole experience has really opened my eyes up to how blessed I was to be living in Oregon...the rest of the U.S. has to deal with this stuff on a fairly regular basis! Oregonians are spoiled!* *But I would say we make up for it with the amount of rain we get, yeah? On Tuesday and Wednesd

Well, it has been nearly 24 hours since I touched down in the windy city and let me tell you, it has been NOTHING like what I expected it to be. First off, the rain I encountered upon arriving would have seriously given Oregon rain a run for it's wet money. I kid you not, there was seriously a flash flood advisory for the evening! However, unlike Oregon, the weather was probably 75 degrees--something I was NOT used to. Luckily, I didn't have to spend too much time in the rain because my shuttle driver had arrived on time and was ready to whisk me off to my hotel in the 'burbs. *here is some free advice: when traveling to somewhere you are not familiar with like, say, CHICAGO, check to see if the airport has a shuttle service--that way you do not have to pay up the wazoo in taxi fares.  After a somewhat awkward ride in the shuttle bus,(while taking a shuttle may be the cheaper option, keep in mind that you get what you pay for. In my case, since the driver was not expect