13 Days

Till I come home. All I ask from the Lord is let me keep my passion I have right now. Allow me to cherish the time at home with the ones I love. I can't ever allow complacency to creep into my life again.

A Letter To A Friend

Blaine I'm glad everything's going so well for you. This time away from home has been a dizzy whirlwind of an experience. My concept of God has grown so much and He's shown me how big he actually is. I've felt more growth in the last 4 months than I have in almost 2 years. This trip has left me with a thorough addiction to traveling I think. In the next month I'm vacationing for 4 days in Prague. I'm very excited to have real time alone to explore the city and reflect with God on this entire experience.

I've definitely fallen in love with the city of Amsterdam. Though it's a seemingly confusing city at first it's easy to get attached to the quaint beauty of the old architecture, hidden shops, and cafes. Fridays and Saturdays are always the busiest with tourists coming in from the UK and France mostly. Sundays are quiet and sleepy. Like my friend Matt Nanes said "Sunday feels like the whole city has a hangover." Which I think is a pretty accurate description.

The hostel in the summer time was filled with guests from all over the world ranging from Israel to the Congo. The hostel was always filled with the sounds of music from the number of talented guests that used our piano and guitar in the cafe (one night a concert level pianist from France played, it was one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard). The other sound that the hostel was filled with was drunken guests who came in at 4 or 5 in the morning. The Shelter City is chaotic and messy which is the reason why I made it very clear I wanted to work there instead of the more subdued Shelter Jordan to the west.

Besides all the joy that's found in the hostel there's also lots of frustration. With yourself and people around you. Too many times did I feel inadequate to help those with problems around me. I felt like someone who trained in a wading pool but discovered at the day of the race that you would be swimming the English Channel instead. One night that's forever burned into my memory is a woman and her child from Israel wanted a room for the night. Even without her speaking you could see from her eyes that the world had broken her down and made her bitter and angry. She explained how she had been staying at a man's house in the city but saw that he had womens clothing in plastic bags in his closet in all different sizes. This for very good reason scared her and made her decide to check in here. We could only give her a room for one night which infuriated her and she made the remark she thought this was a "christian" hostel. She then explained how every religion had failed her starting with Judaism and now Christianity had failed her now to. The woman said she was going to try Buddhism next in hopes that they were better people. I felt so sad for this woman and her child. Blaine her child must have been one maybe one and a half years old. It felt like the child had no future with this broken woman who kept moving from place to place.

But amidst stories like this I've found so much hope but I'll write about that next
time.

PS: If you don't mind I'm going to use this part for my blog as well.

Best wishes,

Jeff

The problem is this, I have nary a clue what to put in them to be honest. How in the world am I supposed to cram a week or three of information into this small space on the internet? Anyway I've decided to plug along even with this seemingly daunting task in front of me. Today was my appointment at the IND(immigration office) for my one year work visa. The directions seemed simple enough but somehow I ended up walking in circles and ten minutes late to a meeting that decided if I get to stay in the Netherlands or not. But by God's good Grace the meeting went smoothly without a hitch. When I arrived at the house I discovered I was late for MTP class. We had a visit from the Scarlet Cord today for the lesson. The Scarlet Cord is an organization that shares the Shelter City hostel building. They are a christian group funded by the government to help prostitutes that want to escape from the business. For over two hours the Scarlet Cord representative explained the realities of human trafficking in the Red Light and also the rest of modern Europe. Thousands of women are exploited and sold as commodities to the highest bidder. These men usually prey on women with insecurities allowing them to be abused and thrown away after they outlive their usefulness. Many of the representatives stories reminded me so strongly of a friend of mine. My head started swimming with past events and it made me question my actions making me wonder if I could have done things differently.

Precious girl please explain to me what you see in him
It seems like such a one way street
He destroys, You rebuild
He takes till you stand with empty hands
Like a rose trying to bloom thats being choked by a self chosen vine
I remember the words you spoke that night
would it have helped If I had yelled, balled my fists, made the choice you didn't dare to make
Past is past and it slips through my grasping fingers like water pouring from a glass
It makes me wonder if a caged bird saw an open window would it even know how to fly

Not Even The Rain Has Such Small Hands.

September in Amsterdam. For the last week the clouds have unleashed buckets of rain sporadically throughout the days. The only pattern you can really follow with the rain is how it seems to strike at the least convenient times causing pub goers and would be dog walkers to dive for cover. Though the calendar states there is well over 15 days left of summer the morning chill argues otherwise. Fall is on the doorstep and there are already whispers of winter as well. The stores are gearing up and stocking for Sinterklass already and it isn't until December 5th. Time seems so much like the rain sometimes. It seems so vast that it cannot be counted but then all of a sudden it fills things very quickly till it overflows.

I'm about to watch my flight leave without me on the 27th of this month. Booking a separate flight was much cheaper than changing my original flight. At this moment I feel no regret and no worry about the money I'm spending. I guess this would seem pretty stupid to many people but if there is some sort of need to worry there are many more pressing issues in my life than things of monetary value.

(Maybe I'll make this into an actual song someday if I learn guitar, not a fan of how I wrote this but it gets my thoughts across)

I keep runnin around the earth expecting it to be flat
But every step I take is a path that ends right back (at the beginning)
Time goes in circles and people follow where it leads
Chasing after sunlight but I hope to say that isn't me
I'm gripped by the sentimental power of memory
The ever darkening of the past
Where the edges begin to soften
is where tomorrow doesn't seem so bad
It's hard to catch the sky when you only have two hands
It's tough to calm the ocean when you're just learning how to swim
How do you gain perspective when the world agrees that their right hand is their left?
Everyone's hoarding for the future and selling off their past
It's finding "ice in the desert"
An ember beneath the waves
Holding a pearl and a seed and calling each the same
Life is full of kings and queens with tin crowns upon their heads
But I'd much rather play the fool in this play instead

Apologies for such a late update I sit here typing this on my nightman shift. It's only 1:24 am right now but it's already dead. The busy season has come and gone. Our hostel is no longer overflowing with tourists. Time is slower now and it allows for reflection. For the last week or so I've taken more than a few walks by myself to get a better feel for my new home and just to clear my head and chat with God. I honestly can barely recall what has happened in the last week except that I've learned that the only reason for me waking up in the morning is by the strength that God gives me. Though the friends around me help in the end we all stumble and fall. But there is such beauty in our imperfection for it allows the glory of God to be seen through us. When God moves us to do things people see that it is not by our wills alone we do them. For we are all selfish. I know I'm rambling and this wasn't the greatest update but I leave you with a verse that I have just started to understand recently.

James 1:2-3
"Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance."

A Great Architect, A Grand Design.

My prayer for the this entire trip was to be challenged, to be pushed to seek God deeper and to learn why I do the things I do. I've discovered that when you ask your Father for something you are answered in spades. A few nights ago I was challenged to question who I was and if I found identity in my image or in being a child of God. This question struck me deeply for it was something that I had not put much thought into for quite a few years. So my mind raced back and forth for hours testing the depths of my actions from my stretched ears to my tattoos wondering why I did such things. Did these things define who I am? If so than there was a problem. I was supposed to be a child of God before all things. If these physical things were an obstacle to that than there was no doubt in my mind what I had to do.

Self-expression can be perverted and used for selfish gain which sides your actions with the rest of the world, which follows Satan. Am I one of those individuals that uses my body to glorify myself so I get special attention? I found my answer difficult. When I was younger I would have to say definitely yes. What I did to my body set me apart from the rest of society which made me feel superior in some ways. But today I can so no. I tire of individuals rude responses to my appearance.

But does this mean I should get rid of these things? To stop in my pursuit of tattoos as well? After more talk with others and prayer I came to the conclusion that I should not. Over and over in my life I have felt the weight of conviction on me. More than a few of those times have been while I have lived at the Shelter. I felt the same conviction 2 years ago when I decided to stop stretching my ears and close them up. Why then did I decide to restretch my ears? Because I felt compelled. I realized I didn't care about what people thought about them but that I missed them for some odd reason.

Tattoos and piercings do not define me I've realized. They are only forms of expression that help better explain who I am. First and foremost I am a child of God I have died and become reborn in Christ. I strive every day to cast away my sinful ways and become a better example of Christ's love. God has made me who I am. I man who finds his expression through words and body. I finally fully accept the person that the Lord has molded me to be.