Peace

'One very wet and windy Autumn morning I was looking at the garden out of my kitchen window. The rain was teeming down and the Silver Birch tree was taking a real battering from the gales.

As I looked, I noticed on the bottom branch, right against the trunk of the tree, a little dove sitting calmly and peacefully, waiting out the storm. It was totally undisturbed by it's uncomfortable, noisy and chaotic surroundings.

A lovely truth came to my mind. It is possible to have complete peace and calm in our hearts, even in the middle of the turmoil and storms of life.

That little dove had settled on the strongest part of the branch - next to the trunk, and was perfectly safe.

God has promised that He will keep us in perfect peace if our hearts and minds are trusting in Him.'

This was put in a card from a friend to encourage me as I went back to teaching after being ill. In the midst of the uncomfortable, noisy and chaotic surroundings, I can say that God has been giving me a peace beyond understanding and I'm just waiting out the storm, until my placement is over.

21 parts of me

On Saturday 21st January I turned the significant age of 21, so I've decided to share 21 things about myself. Some things will change with time and others will always be apart of me, however they still bring colour into the outline of who 'Daisy' is. There is also much more to me than these 21 things that I don't even know about myself yet.

1) I am a small person in height but this is so God can show His greatness through me.

2) I love photos - “A photo says, you were happy, and I wanted to catch that. A photo says, you were so important to me that I put down everything else to come watch.”

― Jodi Picoult

3) I can be quite impatient unless it's with a child - God's working on it ;)

4) My boyfriend is my best friend and I love him for simply who he is.

5) I love film scores; 'The Holiday' film score will always be my first love <3

6) Waking up early is easier when there are beautiful sunrises that are full of pinks and oranges.

7) Skype chats with my brother Al are special :)

8) I am a big twilight fan!

9) I enjoy a lovely piece of cheese.

10) I like to collect things: mementos, shells..I even used to collect stamps.

11) I am learning to play the beautiful instrument that is called the piano, it makes me happy.

12) 'Shall we watch a film?' :D Drama has the power to move people; it is a passion of mine, both watching it and being involved in it.

13) I love it when God uses me to encourage the people around me with His words and pictures.

14) PINK.

15) I support the football team Arsenal but not greatly. I enjoy to go to the odd match with my boyfriend when I can afford it.

16) I've tasted travelling and I want more.

17) Hot chocolate and prayer, and wine and laughs..yes!!

18) I am a leader - house group, youth, children; wanting my teacher Jesus to lead through me.

19) Swimming for exercise, for fun and relaxation is just immense and I miss going every week.

20) I could sing and dance for King Jesus all day long if I could.

21) Hearing little people giggle makes my day.

There were 5 in the bed..

Today I was woken up by members of my family calling out my name. I asked 'yeah,why are you calling out my name?' and my mum informed me that my mum, dad and two sisters were all in my mum and dad's double bed. Hearing the sound of giggles, I got out of bed and joined my family. We chatted, laughed and cuddled. It had been a stressful week with a lot of lesson plans to write and this moment was what I really needed. I wish my cat Tigger could have been there :( Only a short time, not even an hour of my life yet it will be a memory I will treasure. It's the people that make life special so of course I made those special people tea in bed :)

I will not die an unlived life.

'I will not die an unlived life

I will not live in fear

Of falling, or catching fire.

I choose to inhabit my days,

to allow my living to open me

To make me less afraid,

More accessible

To loose my heart

until it becomes a wing,

a torch, a promise.

I choose to risk my significance;

To live

So that which came to me as a seed

Goes to the next as a blossom

And that which came to

to me as blossom,

Goes on as fruit.'

Dawna Markovna

This is a prayer I want to tell my Heavenly Father for my life in 2012. I want to live out of His fullness in me, trust that worrying is a worthless hobby and step into all the plans He made for me. I want to learn how to love from Love and then let love gush out of me wherever I go. I want to attend the seeds planted in me, enjoy watching the petals develop and then pass something beautiful to someone else. I want to be thankful in everything because I know from my journey last year that this produces much joy. I want to not be satisfied with comfortable but unfulfilled because actually my life is a gift which I want to give back to my God out of loving surrender.

Athentikos

PLEASE SUPPORT ATHENTIKOS TODAY!

Isaiah 58:6-12

⁶ “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:

to loose the chains of injustice

and untie the cords of the yoke,

to set the oppressed free

and break every yoke?

⁷ Is it not to share your food with the hungry

and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—

when you see the naked, to clothe them,

and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?

⁸ Then your light will break forth like the dawn,

and your healing will quickly appear;

then your righteousness^[a] will go before you,

and the glory of the LORD will be your rear guard.

⁹ Then you will call, and the LORD will answer;

you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.

“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,

with the pointing finger and malicious talk,

¹⁰ and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry

and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,

then your light will rise in the darkness,

and your night will become like the noonday.

¹¹ The LORD will guide you always;

he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land

and will strengthen your frame.

You will be like a well-watered garden,

like a spring whose waters never fail.

¹² Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins

and will raise up the age-old foundations;

you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls,

Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.

I see a need. When I heard who Jesus was, the King who stopped for the poor, the broken and the needy I realised that helping those that have a need is a natural heart response if you love the Lord Jesus because you can't help but care about the things He cares about. However, to have this revelation on my own isn't good enough. I want to raise the alarms, I want others to see the need too because of the love they've encountered from the living God. The video above is a video created by my big brother Alex showing a need and showing a hope. A need in Guatemala that isn't going away any time soon unless more people start to join together to respond and it crushes God's heart but an amazing hope that there is a movement of motion pictures aiming to raise awareness for God's people to respond to this need. I will be showing this video tonight to the group of young people that I help to lead. I want them to see the need. See Guatemala's struggle that they are trying to push past and see the potential in God's beautiful young people that live on the street.

There is hope because there is LOVE.

Fogo de Deus!

God told me that I'm made to be someone who, like a bee travels from flower to flower tasting their sweetness, travels from place to place and marvels at the beautiful things God has made. I went to Italy on Friday 21st September till Tuesday 25th September with some others of the older youth age to spend time with a Brazilian church 'Centro Alleanza'. Treviso, the town that we stayed in, was so beautiful and I noticed a similarity there between China and Treviso; in that there was such a relaxed atmosphere as you walked down the street unlike busy, busy London. It felt so surreal as Katie and I sat in the back seat of a car with no seat belt (!), without a clue where we were going and listening to the Brazilians chatter away to each other in Italian/Portuguese. The different languages that we spoke I originally thought that would be a barrier but one thing I took away from this trip is that with God's love there are no barriers. I can't say grazie/obrigado enough to the people from Centro Alleanza because they welcomed us with open arms, literally! We embraced their culture and they did the same with ours. It was as if family was coming together as we took it in turns to sing the line in a song 'nothing compares to the promise I have' in our different languages. It touched me every single time when the pastor would tell everyone during worship to prophesy over each other and the people next to me didn't hesitate to hold my hand and start praying for me. In my head I was thinking 'this is church!'. So I took back with me in my heart that I would do all I can to make church about love and relationships. It was then in the midst of love that the fire of God came down, hearts were changed by messages of God through worship, dance, talks and drama that our England team presented. We took a day trip to Venezia where we had a lot of fun shopping and looking at picturesque views of clear water and elegantly designed buildings. Now did I mention the food?! Pizza and pasta! ahhh yum! I don't know how all these Italian girls stay so slim! I'm really looking forward to where God is going to take me next :)

As I looked out at beautiful Edinburgh...

Change is part of life and as some things in my life have been moving out of their comfortable positions lately, this truth hits me straight in the face again. I arrived in Edinburgh on Tuesday morning to the smile of my good friend Avril who goes to university there. One of the things we decided to do was climb Arthur's Seat. Arthur's Seat is the main peak of a group of hills that are an extinct volcano, which rise above the city to a height of 823 ft. The climb was tiring and at various points my legs were yelling 'you've seen enough!' but as I looked out at beautiful Edinburgh I knew I wanted to reach the top to see the city in all it's glory. I pondered as I climbed that sometimes God places experiences in our lives that can be tiring and all up hill but all of that 'climbing' is worth it when God reveals through it a different perspective and blesses us in ways we can never imagine. When I got to the top...wow! The view was magnificent. All the different buildings that I saw close up, I saw how they looked in the grand scheme of things. Then God gently reminded me of the Louis Giglio talk 'Indescribable' where he shares facts about God's amazing universe and how small we really are, and I thought of how small I really am standing on this huge extinct volcano that seems so big to me: a tiny speck in the grand scheme of things but God still loves me more than I can ever imagine. So as I was overcome by these thoughts that were brought on by the fantastic view of Edinburgh city, my unsettled heart finally settled with the acknowledgement that God is so big and therefore how could I not trust Him? I can definitely trust that He's got me.