1st Snag - Please Pray

So I've run into my first major snag, and I'm hoping you guys will pray about this with me. I have be planning all along to live with good friends when I'm studying in Boise. Something we have really been looking forward to.
But I got a phone call last night saying that in order for me to live off campus I need to have my own vehicle, (the school is telling me this). I don't have my own vehicle to drive while I'm down there, and don't have the money to get one either. And I've already purchased my plane tickets down there. Arghhh.
I don't know what the solution is for this, I can live on campus (US$300/month), but I would really love to be with this family, and I believe the chance to live with them is a gift from God.
Would you pray that God will provide a solution for this and that the best situation for me living and studying would succeed. Also please keep praying that God will bring together the funds for the whole course of this commitment. Thanx so much, I love you all!

101 Wishes

Do you dream big dreams?
There's an article on 24-7 right now about dreaming big dreams. So often our sights are set on the attainable... maybe the sensible. But if God has promised to give us the desires of our hearts, if all things are possible through Him then maybe we should try to dream a little bigger.
What would happen if you were to take out a page of loose leaf, or A4, or a new Word doc and start making a list of things you dream of? What if you set out to make a list of 101 Wishes?
That's the challenge of the article, to take the time to dream a little bit. I bet that your list would get off to a roaring start, the first 10 or 20 flying from your fingers. But eventually (perhaps sooner than later), they'd probably start to slow down, and you'll be left to imagine the impossible, the far-fetched, the idealistic.
So I'm extending the challenge - write your wish list. I haven't yet, I'll have to work on it, but off the top of my head I can guarantee you that my list will include:

• I want to learn at least 4 languages.
• I want to swim with a Manatee.
• I want to be an excellent midwife, to deliver many-many babies!
• I want to play jazzy piano.
• I want to be less selfish, to love others more.
• I want to run a 10K.

What about you?

Waiting...

I'm still waiting anxiously for the little Landon baby to make its entrance! My friends Jenn and Jeremy (J&J from now on), are set to have their first baby any day (read:moment) now and I'm on high alert. I had to make the 2 hour trip from home to work this morning and now I'm waiting for that cell to ring to let me know its time to RUSH back!
Yes, I'm being given a truely great gift. J&J have asked me to be there for the birth, and I'm both really excited and honored. Jenn is a really good friend of mine and we've had a lot of fun talking pregnant talk for so many months. Pregnant talk is funny, most of you men get kind of squeemish at the first word, but I think some of you are closet-listeners.
Anyway I'm actually writing to say that I'm waiting, and as Madonna says "time goes by so slowly for those who wait" (why is Madonna still making music??). And time goes by so slowly waiting for that phone call. Waiting for a little baby to born, and the chance to witness a miracle! I'll have pictures within the week to let you see this precious bundle. And you can check out Jenn-in-waiting right here.

PS: Why is Madonna still making music?
Doesn't she realize its been 20 years? Hmm...

Flight Booked

Okay 2 in one day, ridiculous, I know! But I have news to share.
I booked my flights this morning! So I now know I'll be leaving GP on June 7 - 1:00PM.
That's it - that's all, 50 short days left. And then...
"I'm leaving on a jet plane, don't know when I'll be back again."
You can all plan to come crowd the GP airport, (shouldn't be too hard), to wave and cry and blow kisses. Or something. Mark your calendars!

Seven Rules for Daily Living

1) Seek to give much, expect nothing.
2) Put the very best construction on the actions of others.
3) Never let a day pass without at least a quarter of an hour spent in the study of the Bible.
4) Never omit daily morning and evening private prayer and devotion.
5) In all things seek to know God’s Will and when known obey at any cost.
6) Seek to cultivate a quiet prayerful spirit.
7) Seek each day to do or say something to further Christianity among the [lost].

-1894, written inside the Bible of Canadian
missionary Jonathan Goforth in China

The Calling - from March '06 Chronicle

The Question.
What are going to do when you grow up? It’s the question we ask kids from the time they begin to toddle. And the pressure only gets worse through high school and college, as everyone wants to know what direction you’re heading in. Some people seem to be born knowing what they will do, others of us have to search and wait. Almost four years out of school, I have searched and waited and searched some more. I’ve always been very interested in missions, but I’ve fretted about choosing an education and career that would work both here at home and away. The world offers a smorgasbord of options and I was beginning to feel that I was drowning in the middle of them. One day I stopped asking God to help me choose well, and started asking Him to choose for me. I don’t know if God always answers that kind of request, but He answered this one. He answered by giving me the clearest sense of a calling that I have ever known. It is a calling I am ecstatically excited about, and I think I’m well suited to, but I never could have expected it.
The Calling.
Did you know that over half a million women die each year in childbirth? Or that 32,000 children, under the age of five, die each day of preventable causes? Both of these tragedies are complex and require much prayer and work for those numbers to fall, but both of these statistics can and must be changed! Seven weeks from now I will begin a mission-midwifery school that will prepare me to assist women in having safe and loving pregnancies and deliveries. And to offer health education regarding the care of young children. On June 12 the 2006 Mercy In Action midwifery school kicks off with three months of condensed study in Boise, Idaho. Followed by a year of clinical work providing free midwifery care to the poorest of the poor in Manila, Philippines, where we will learn and use skills to literally save lives. After completing this school I will have the certification required to register and work as a midwife nearly anywhere in the world! And hopefully, the chance to go as God calls and offer compassion to His children.
The Future.
What the next two years will hold for me, I can barely imagine. I expect they will be both very exciting and very difficult. As I step into this calling I hope I can be the hands and feet of the GP Church of Christ offering mercy in the Philippines. I am hoping to build a team of people here who support me and this work that God is drawing me into. If I have piqued your interest, or if you have any questions for me, feel free to send me an email, or stop me at church on Sunday.

“Mercy and truth have met together, righteousness and peace have kissed each other.”

Psalm 85:10

$2.4 Million Prayer-Buster

Harvard has just released the results of a whopping $2.4 million dollar study (that's Yankee bucks, so pretty much 100s of billions in Canadian). What could be important enough for all those benjamins? Apparently the power of prayer for the sick. Or more precisely - does knowing that someone is praying for you improve your recovery outcomes?
And what did they find? They found that knowing of a stranger's healing prayers led to a 7% increase in recovery complications! Not what you'd expect, not what the researchers expected either. So what does it mean? What do you think?

" 'God is not just another therapeutic nostrum in a doctor's black bag,' said Dr. Sulmasy, who is also a Franciscan friar. 'It seems fundamentally sinful to conceive of God as our instrument.' "

The Other Side

I feel like you folks are only getting to know the one side of me. See, on this page I leave my serious stuff, the countdown entries, the God-stuff and everything about my trip (which I suppose is the purpose of this page). But I'm running another blog on myspace and its mostly the opposite side. I write about getting lost driving to Fort St John and how there are too many spiders in the world, I write what is trivial. I need both, they are my balance. But I don't want you to know just the serious me! Maybe I will write more trivial things here. I should write more often.
But to be sure you are getting a full understanding look into myspace. There's a whole new world...okay maybe not really all that different. But there's more.

Mercy In Action - Manila

Here is a brief glimpse of where I'm heading this fall! I have borrowed these images from a past student to give you a quick look at our maternity center near Welfareville.

- Mercy In Action Sign "Free Services"

Birth Room in Maternity Center -

- "Mercy babies" - born in the Maternity Center

Worship @ the clinic on a prenatal day -

- A rough hand-drawn map of Welfareville. This slum in/near Metro Manila is only 1km square but houses 62,000 people! It is more densely populated than anywhere in North America!

I stole these images from Stephanie Iseko, thanx!