Benefit Dinner and Concert

June 14th
6:30p
Free Will Donation

Featuring Brenden Stark

@ Home Acres Church
21 Murray St. SE
Kentwood, MI 49508

just a random thought...

it's 85* in Hungary right now...
YES!

I can't wait!

When God Speaks...

Shhh…

Be still.

Do you hear it?

Do you hear Him?

He is calling out

Crying out…

Out to you, can you listen?

Can you hear Him?

When God speaks, there is no question

No need for wonder or translation

No excessive floundering of words

Or useless verbs

He does not, will not

Leave room for curiosity or worry

Over menial things

Like time, money, materialistic relief

He is more than that.

When God speaks, there is authority

And pure understanding.

It is not to be debated

Or to be taken lightly.

It is to be immediately acted upon

Spoken

Done

It is to be done.

It is His will be done

Thy will be done, Lord

Thy will and only Thy will be done

When God speaks, He speaks directly

He says “Go.”

He says “Stay.”

He says “Worship.”

“Serve”

“Love”

“Pray”

Rinse, repeat…

Rinse,

Go forward.

When God speaks, He is persistent

Insistent

Never faltering

Never pausing

Continuing and true

Until you comply,

you do

When God speaks, He does not speak

Through words or rhyme

Or through that song we’ve sang

A thousand times.

He speaks through circumstance

God knows our circumstance

He knows us more than we know ourselves

More than my momma that bore me

More than my friends that console me

More than Pastor Darrell or Wayne

Or even you.

He knows my comings and my goings

When I sleep and when I wake

He knows the hairs on my head

And the life that I’ve lead

God knows my circumstance.

He knows my sin, my wounds

My joy, my sorrow, my insecurities

He uses our lives, our stories
He uses our circumstance.

When God speaks, it is not by chance

It is with direction

Not like the voice on your GPS

Not like mapquest

It is without earthly destination

It is like Abram leaving without knowing

It is like Isaiah saying “Send me” and going

It is like Paul, a disciple called

A man’s life doing a complete 180

When God speaks, you hear

His voice is not the loud thunder

Or the roaring fire

Or the earthquake from under

Your feet

No.

Freeze.

He is the calm.

He is the peace

He is the whisper that is louder than

The bass on the teenagers car next door

He is serenity

Tranquility

When God speaks, He speaks with wisdom

This is the truth

The truth is what sets you free

He knows you

He knows me

He is calling us each

To do his will, his works, his deeds

To serve and love

Not boast or be proud

To go and to grow where He sends us

When God speaks,

Listen.

Just listen,

He speaks.

this was written a while ago and posted on facebook - and it will be used in our upcoming CHAOS Sunday... since it's really what God's calling me out on recently. He's still speaking, I'm not always listening. Are you?

Long time, no post

Well, I wanted to update you on everything going on, but it seems there is more going on in the world than my journey.
I was greeted with sadness in my inbox this morning when awoke. There is a lot of violence happening in Hungary toward the Roma people.

Check this:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/27/world/europe/27hungary.html?_r=1

TISZALOK, Hungary — Jeno Koka was a doting grandfather and dedicated worker on his way to his night-shift job at a chemical plant last week when he was shot dead at his doorstep. To his killer, he was just a Gypsy, and that seems to have been reason enough.

Prejudice against Roma — widely known as Gypsies and long among Europe’s most oppressed minority groups — has swelled into a wave of violence. Over the past year, at least seven Roma have been killed in Hungary, and Roma leaders have counted some 30 Molotov cocktail attacks against Roma homes, often accompanied by sprays of gunfire.

But the police have focused their attention on three fatal attacks since November that they say are linked. The authorities say the attacks may have been carried out by police officers or military personnel, based on the stealth and accuracy with which the victims were killed.

In addition to Mr. Koka’s death, there were the slayings of a Roma man and woman, who were shot after their house was set ablaze last November in Nagycsecs, a town about an hour’s drive from Tiszalok in northeastern Hungary. And in February, a Roma man and his 4-year-old son were gunned down as they tried to escape from their home, which was set on fire in Tatarszentgyorgy, a small town south of Budapest.

Jozsef Bencze, Hungary’s national police chief, said in an interview on Friday with the daily newspaper Nepszabadsag that the perpetrators, believed to be a group of four or more men in their 40s, were killing “with hands that are too confident.” Military counterintelligence is taking part in the investigation, Hungarian radio reported, and Mr. Bencze said the pool of suspects included veterans of the Balkan wars and Hungarian members of the French Foreign Legion.

Experts on Roma issues describe an ever more aggressive atmosphere toward Roma in Hungary and elsewhere in Central and Eastern Europe, led by extreme right-wing parties, whose leaders are playing on old stereotypes of Roma as petty criminals and drains on social welfare systems at a time of rising economic and political turmoil. As unemployment rises, officials and Roma experts fear the attacks will only intensify.

“One thing to remember, the Holocaust did not start at the gas chambers,” said Lajos Korozs, senior state secretary in the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor, who works on Roma issues for the government.

In the Czech Republic, where radical right-wing demonstrators have clashed with the police as they tried to march through Roma neighborhoods, a small child and her parents were severely burned after assailants firebombed their home in the town of Vitkov this month. The police in Slovakia were caught on video recently tormenting six Roma boys they had arrested, forcing them to undress, hit and kiss one another.

But nowhere has the violence reached the level it has in Hungary, spreading fear and intimidation through a Roma population of roughly 600,000. (Estimates vary widely in part because Roma say they are afraid to identify themselves in surveys.)

Last Wednesday, Mr. Koka, 54, had just finished a cup of coffee and brought his wife supper in their bedroom when he went outside to start his orange Opel Astra for his nightly drive to work. His wife, Eva, said she heard his body hit the ground, but did not realize it until she went outside and found him lying in a pool of blood a few paces from the doorframe.

“I tried to lift his hand and his head, but he didn’t say a word,” said Ms. Koka, whose brother rushed over from his home across the street and tried to perform CPR on Mr. Koka, who had been shot in the chest. “If he had not been dead he would have said goodbye to me,” Ms. Koka said in an interview at their home.

Viktoria Mohacsi, a Roma member of the European Parliament, said the police — who still decline to explicitly name ethnicity as a motive in the cases — were slow to recognize the blossoming violence against the community. “At the beginning, they said it was illegal money lenders or that it was Roma killing each other,” Ms. Mohacsi said, as she visited the Koka family here in Tiszalok on Friday.

“In the past five years, attitudes toward Roma in many parts of Eastern Europe have hardened, and new extremists have started to use the Roma issue in a way that either they didn’t dare to or didn’t get an airing before,” said Michael Stewart, coordinator of the Europe-wide Roma Research Network.

The extreme-right party Jobbik has used the issue of what its leaders call “Gypsy crime” to rise in the polls to near the 5 percent threshold for seats in Hungary’s Parliament in next year’s election, which would be a first for the party. Opponents accuse the Hungarian Guard, the paramilitary group associated with the party, of staging marches and public meetings to stir up anti-Roma sentiment and to intimidate the local Roma population.

The group held a rally last year in Tiszalok and in 2007 in Tatarszentgyorgy, the town where the father and son were killed in February, an act that some residents deplored while in the same breath complaining about a spate of break-ins in town that they blamed on Roma.

“The situation is bad because of the many Roma,” said Eva, 45, a non-Roma Hungarian in Tatarszentgyorgy who declined to give her last name, out of what she said was fear of reprisals. “When the guard was here, for a while they weren’t so loud. It helped.”

Since the attacks in Tatarszentgyorgy, some local residents have joined their terrified Roma neighbors in nighttime patrols, looking for strange cars armed with nothing but searchlights.

“We are living in fear, all the Roma people are,” said Csaba Csorba, 48, whose son Robert, 27, and grandson, also named Robert, were killed by a blast from a shotgun shortly after midnight in the February attack. They were buried together in one coffin, the little boy laid to rest on his father’s chest.

The child’s death in particular shook Roma here. “It proved to us it doesn’t matter whether we are good people or bad people,” said Agnes Koka, 32, the niece and goddaughter of Mr. Koka, who relatives said loved to bring candy and fruit to his grandchildren. “It only matters that we are Gypsy,” Ms. Koka said.

Hungry for Hungary Campaign - Solo Mission Update

So, it's day 4 of my 24-day fast. I'm feeling the effects.
My body was in serious detox mode yesterday, which left me feeling dirty and used.
My mind is set on bending toward thoughts of food all time, which is leaving me feel empty and abandoned.
My heart is set on God and His purpose, which is bringing forward a step at a time, into peace and hope.

My prayer partners have been amazing.
My financial partners have continued to jump on board.

I couldn't be more thankful.
As soon as I get a chance to set up my camera, I'll be providing an update with information on my actual assignment.
That's right, I know where I'll be working!

Peace, Love and juice...

Hungry for Hungary Campaign #1

So, here goes nothing:
I'm launching the first step in my "Hungry for Hungary" for Hungary with a 24 day juice fast.

12 days for each of the 12 months I will be away
12 days for each of the $1000 I need to raise.
I will start at 12a on February 11 (which means no pastor lunch or dinner with my church family that night...)
I am looking for 100 people to pledge $1 per day.
I am also looking for 24 people to be prayer partners - one per day - someone that I can call during difficult times in order to pray with me and keep me accountable when times get rough.

My fast will be heavily monitored by my doctor and she has given me the "go ahead" to do this.
Weee!

My breakfasts will consist of fruit juices (apples, oranges, grapes, pineapple, watermelon etc.) and a multivitamin.
My lunches will be fruit/vegetable combinations.
All snacks will consist of green juices (celery, kale, sprouts, spinach, etc)
My dinners will be strictly vegetable juices (tomato, celery, cucumbers, beets, carrots)
After dinner, I'll allow myself to have fruit juices.

The point is not to starve myself, so I'll allow myself to have as much as I need to stay full and away from fainting. I'll be getting a better juicer and juicing as I need, but having several containers of juice readily available. Depending on the size of my juicer, I'll be either carrying it with me (suck!) or taking several different bottles with me wherever I go.
Water will also be a staple and the multivitamin will be essential in case my iron gets low (it shouldn't with all those nice leafy greens, but just in case, cuz we all know my iron situation).

I'll be breaking my fast on my re-birthday - March 6th, at 11:59p.
I cannot wait to spend my last 24 hours celebrating new life, and also rejoicing in God's goodness and drawing closer to Him.
Breaking the fast will almost be harder than the fast itself and will be introducing things slowly... very very slowly.
I plan to lose a lot of weight, but not be frustrated when I start to gain it back. That's just the way it works.

I'm so excited!
If you're interested in supporting me, you can make checks payable to Home Acres Church so that they're tax-deductible or you can paypal me - trazylyn@gmail.com. Obviously, PayPal is not tax-deductible if you do that sort of thing.
Also, at this point, I have every day available as a prayer partner.
Thank you in advance for your support!



HUGE "Thank you!" to DanS, MaggieS, ThomM, Rich&ChrisS, RebeccaA, LizW, Diane&MeganM, DavidG, MichelleA, Larry&KathyO, RexG, KevinE, MichelleF, PriscillaF, Cheryl&PattiJoW, MayP, JoyceD, LisaB, MaryJaneM, BruceG, Wayne&SueO, DarrellD, JaneJ, Ken&JeanetteM, Jim&ShariW, Pete&ArleneS, MikeN, Joyce, DanA, Fred&HazelS and Home Acres Church for your pledged financial support. It has brought me to over 13% of my total goal!
Also, thank you to DanA, MichelleA, KarenB, AngelaH, JoyceD, ChrisS, JoyceA, PattiJoW, JeremyM, DarrellD, KevinE, ShawnR, WayneO, SueO, RachaelH, BrendenS, AlexH, JeanetteM and KenM for your support as a prayer partner. A better support group could not be found!

There is a dream coming true, kids...
there is a calling being heard...
there are lives changing and hearts moving...
there are places to go and people to see.
remember me.