"Truely letting Him make all things new"

Hello hello hello everyone!
It has been a really long time sense I've blogged.
But once again God has turned a new page and I'm in a new season
of life. it's time to start blogging again! My plan is to blog once a week, and than once a month I will send out a "newsletter" to those of you who signed up for the mailing list.

ANYWAYS.....life is going really good=]
It's good being back in Salem. Although this time around is totally and completely different from the past few times.
Right now I'm mostly just working in the "Pro Rev" office everyday. during the first part of the day I usually do stuff for them. Like this week I did a few really cool things. On thursday my fellow intern Charity and I led base intercession for Thailand/Burma/Tibet. It went really well!!! Then today we set up a Thailand themed snack break for the DTS. Anyways, thats what the first part of most days will involve is doing various things like that. Then in the afternoons Charity and I have a specfic area of study everyday for the country we will be going to longterm. So one day we will focus on country history, another day will be country religion, another will be an introduction to language learning, or support raising, etc. So far we are having an excellant time. I am learning ALOT. A whole lot about my country and a whole lot about the Western Christian worldview and how it effects other cultures as our worldviews collide, and what it means to have the a biblical worldview rather than a "western christan worldview". So far the internship has been really beneficial and it's only been a week!

It's also been really fun being on staff now. I share a really nice house with 3 other girls and a really awesome master bedroom with one of my bestfriends, Caiti. We have really been having a blast so far. It's also exciting to be out of the "dorm scene". I definitely feel more "grown up" and independent now. So thats pretty exciting as well.

But above all of this, Jesus keeps bringing to mind that it is all just sprinkles. When I was in the hospital in Bangkok, as I mentioned in my last blog, God kept impressing his terrific worth on my heart. That He wanted, and I really wanted to come to the place where I could honestly say that Jesus is more than enough for me. Where I count EVERYTHING as a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of KNOWING Him. Where everything is just rubbish. I felt like I truely came to that point when I was there. I've never felt more close to God than I did when I was going in for surgery. And now, being here in comfortable America, it's honestly not as easy. It is truely become a daily sacrifice of praise to count everything as rubbish, to give him my everything, especially my wants, desires, expectations, and dreams. But the more I struggle to give things up and live my life with open hands and an open heart, the more I realize that he is infinitely worthy all the time, not matter what. He is SO abundently good all the time. He really is all I need. He is the cake, the substance of my life, and for Him to be "more than enough" I decided that means he would have to be the frosting as well. Jesus is the frosting AND the cake. And everything else is just extra sprinkles on top.....like I said, it's a daily struggle and a sacrifice to let go of myself and come to this point everyday. Many times I fail. But thats where I am right now, and I know God will be faithful to draw me closer to himself . As I pursue Him, He is already pursuing me. Hallelujah. <3

WHAT an awesome year=]

It is my hope and in my prayers that all of you are having a wonderful new year as we have entered 2010! I’m really excited to see what the Lord is going to do in all of our lives in this next year, any year spent with the God of the universe is guaranteed to be an incredible adventure! And 2009 was definitely a huge one for me.

As most of you know, I started off 2009 attending a Youth With A Mission Discipleship Training School, from there went overseas for the first time. God took me on an incredible adventure to Southeast Asia, then the summer after I got back, showing me His calling on my life to have me go back to serve Him in M******. I went back to YWAM Salem, OR in the fall, took a basic leadership course, and then had the privilege of going back to M******! And little did I know, God had more crazy plans up His sleeves. While doing ministry in M******, I had started to experience horrible abdominal pain. After lying in bed for a few days I went to the hospital, found out I had an ovarian cyst, and flew to Bangkok, Thailand for emergency surgery the next day. Everything in Bangkok went incredibly well! The Lord was with me through it all and took the very best care of me. It was an absolutely incredible time spent with God, learning to trust Him with my life, learning how to love Him more, and even better learning more of His incredible love for me. God had been showing me how He truly is more than enough for me, He is all I need, and how ridiculously good He always is. After all was done with the surgery the doctors found that I had a 14cm by 11cm cyst. They had to remove both the cyst and the ovary, but surgery went really well and there were no complications. Also recovery has gone incredibly well and very fast! Praise God!

The past 2 weeks I have been back home here in Kent, Washington. But next Monday, the 25^th I will be going back to the Salem YWAM base. I am officially on staff now with YWAM, and I am really looking forward to what God has next! As soon as I get back to Salem I’m going to be doing a three month internship that will help prepare me for going long term someday to M*******. It’s going to be really beneficial. Every day I will be focusing on a different topic, but during this internship I will have focuses on support raising, learning about the history of M*******, learning about Buddhism(the main religion), having a biblical perspective on missions, an introduction to language learning, and quite a lot more. It should be an exciting 3 months! I will also be helping out and serving in the hospitality department on the base and in the frontier missions department on the base.

As you can see, God has really transformed my life this past year, and brought me into so many new depths of intimacy with Him. It is such a wonderful blessing and a privilege to serve the King of Kings! I also want to thank you for all of your powerful prayers, love, encouragements, financial support, and for being in my life! I am truly blessed to have you all as my friends.

Here are some specific things you could be praying for in the next few months, it would be a great blessing to me to have these things lifted up to the Lord:

1. Continued protection for my outreach team that I had to leave in Thailand. Protection from the enemy, a safe trip, and that they would grow closer to the Lord and have a huge impact on the people they minister to.

2. A safe trip back down to Salem, and a renewed physical strength for that day as I am still recovering.

3. That I would just be with God in everything I do rather that striving to get stuff done on my own. Especially during this whole internship, that I would just be with God every day. And that above all else I would get to know Him more through this.

Thank you so much for your continued love, support, and prayers! You are always in my thoughts and prayers and I hope and pray the following verse over all of you….

“The Lord your God wins victory over victory and He is always with you. He celebrates and sings because of you, and He will refresh your life with His love.” Zep. 3:17

Love, Kristina

"Truely letting Him make all things new"

Hello hello hello everyone!

It has been a really long time sense I've blogged.

But once again God has turned a new page and I'm in a new season

of life. it's time to start blogging again! My plan is to blog once a week, and than once a month I will send out a "newsletter" to those of you who signed up for the mailing list.

ANYWAYS.....life is going really good=]

It's good being back in Salem. Although this time around is totally and completely different from the past few times.

Right now I'm mostly just working in the "Pro Rev" office everyday. during the first part of the day I usually do stuff for them. Like this week I did a few really cool things. On thursday my fellow intern Charity and I led base intercession for Thailand/Burma/Tibet. It went really well!!! Then today we set up a Thailand themed snack break for the DTS. Anyways, thats what the first part of most days will involve is doing various things like that. Then in the afternoons Charity and I have a specfic area of study everyday for the country we will be going to longterm. So one day we will focus on country history, another day will be country religion, another will be an introduction to language learning, or support raising, etc. So far we are having an excellant time. I am learning ALOT. A whole lot about my country and a whole lot about the Western Christian worldview and how it effects other cultures as our worldviews collide, and what it means to have the a biblical worldview rather than a "western christan worldview". So far the internship has been really beneficial and it's only been a week!

It's also been really fun being on staff now. I share a really nice house with 3 other girls and a really awesome master bedroom with one of my bestfriends, Caiti. We have really been having a blast so far. It's also exciting to be out of the "dorm scene". I definitely feel more "grown up" and independent now. So thats pretty exciting as well.

But above all of this, Jesus keeps bringing to mind that it is all just sprinkles. When I was in the hospital in Bangkok, as I mentioned in my last blog, God kept impressing his terrific worth on my heart. That He wanted, and I really wanted to come to the place where I could honestly say that Jesus is more than enough for me. Where I count EVERYTHING as a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of KNOWING Him. Where everything is just rubbish. I felt like I truely came to that point when I was there. I've never felt more close to God than I did when I was going in for surgery. And now, being here in comfortable America, it's honestly not as easy. It is truely become a daily sacrifice of praise to count everything as rubbish, to give him my everything, especially my wants, desires, expectations, and dreams. But the more I struggle to give things up and live my life with open hands and an open heart, the more I realize that he is infinitely worthy all the time, not matter what. He is SO abundently good all the time. He really is all I need. He is the cake, the substance of my life, and for Him to be "more than enough" I decided that means he would have to be the frosting as well. Jesus is the frosting AND the cake. And everything else is just extra sprinkles on top.....like I said, it's a daily struggle and a sacrifice to let go of myself and come to this point everyday. Many times I fail. But thats where I am right now, and I know God will be faithful to draw me closer to himself . As I pursue Him, He is already pursuing me. Hallelujah. <3