The Obstacle in Our Path

In ancient times, a King had a boulder placed on a roadway. Then he hid himself and watched to see if anyone would remove the huge rock. Some of the kirig's wealthiest merchants and courtiers came by and simply walked around it. Many loudly blamed the king for not keeping the roads clear, but none did anything about getting the stone out of the way. Then a peasant came along carrying a load of vegetables. Upon approaching the boulder, the peasant laid down his burden and tried to move the stone to the side of the road. After much pushing and straining, he finally succeeded. After the peasant picked up his load of vegetables, he noticed a purse lying in the road where the boulder had been. The purse contained many gold coins and a note from the king indicating that the gold was for the person who removed the boulder from the roadway. The peasant learned what many of us never understand. Every obstacle presents an opportunity to improve our condition.

Inspiring song of the moment....

East to West
by Casting Crowns (totally met these guys!)

Here I am Lord and I'm drowning
In your sea of forgetfulness
The chains of yesterday surround me
I yearn for peace and rest
I don't want to end up where you found me
And it echoes in my mind
Keeps me awake tonight

I know you've cast my sins as far
As the East is from the West
And I stand before you now
As though I've never sinned but today
I feel like I'm just one mistake away
From you leaving me this way

Jesus can you show me
Just how far the East is from the West
Cause I can't bear to see the man I've been
Come rising up in me again
In the arms of your mercy I find rest
Cause you know just how far the East is from the West
From one scar[r]ed hand to the other

I start the day the war begins
Endless reminding of my sin
Time and time again
Your [T]ruth is drowned out by the storm I'm in
Today I feel like I'm just one mistake away
From you leaving me this way

Jesus can you show me
Just how far the East is from the West
Cause I can't bear to see the man I've been
Come rising up in me again
In the arms of your mercy I find rest
Cause you know just how far the East is from the West
From one scar[r]ed hand to the other

I know you've washed me white
Turned my darkness into light
I need your peace to get me through
To get me through this night
I can't live by what I feel
But by the truth your word reveals
I'm not holding on to you
But your holding on to me
Your holding on to me

Jesus, you know just how far
The East is from the West
I don't have to see the man I've been
Come rising up in me again
In the arms of your mercy I find rest
(The arms of your mercy I find rest)
Cause you know just how far the East is from the West
From one scar[r]ed hand to the other(x2)

(Just how far, the East is from the West) (x3)

From one scarred hand to the other

I finally did it!!!!

I fell over on my bike while clipped in! I told my padre I was more coordinated on a bike than walking, which is still true. I was on my bike trying to get the gate open so I could get out and go for a ride. I thought my pedal was flipped over so that I couldn't clip in, but it wasn't. My shoe decided it wanted to clip in just as I needed my foot to stop me from falling. So that was the first time I fell. Then, 4ish steps later when I was shutting the gate, it happened on the other side. Pretty much same thing. So to all those that I have laughed at when they clipped out left and fell right, I still laugh at you and now I laugh next to you. Joy.

Once I finally did get to riding, it was a great ride. For once I had gotten out and back before the sun went down completely. It was a beautiful sunset! Perfect weather! I rode about 18 miles, to Belmont and some backroads of doom. So many freakin bugs!!!! Ewww! The entire time I was biking I had Hillsong United's song The Stand stuck in my head; I just didn't know all of the lyrics. But it's an awesome song! So awesome that the lyrics will be the next thing on this post of joy.

"The Stand"
by Hillsong United

You stood before creation
Eternity within Your hand
You spoke the earth into motion
My soul now to stand

You stood before my failure
Carried the Cross for my shame
My sin weighed upon Your shoulders
My soul now to stand

So what can I say
What can I do
But offer this heart O God
Completely to You

So I'll walk upon salvation
Your Spirit alive in me
This life to declare Your promise
My soul now to stand

So what can I say
What can I do
But offer this heart O God
Completely to You

So I’ll stand
With arms high and heart abandoned
In awe of the One who gave it all

So I’ll stand
My soul Lord to You surrendered
All I am is Yours



Love this song!!!! No matter what the circumstance is, no matter what I'm going through or dealing with, no matter what kind of junk gets brought to the table, I'm going to stand with my arms raised up and my heart open and ready for God to come in. I'll stand in amazement and awe of my Creator. I surrender my all to my God, my everything. He is my purpose, my reason for living. Without Him I am nothing. He took my fall.

A vision

While on Spokefolk in MA, one thing we did was "take 5." Basically it was a 5 minute retreat of silence. Not nearly as cool as a 3 hour one you'd take up at Cedar, but it was enough for God to speak to me. I was struggling with a few things at the moment. I close my eyes and tried focusing on God and praying, but there was this wall in the way. This wall was made up of things things pointing at me. These things were doubt and frustration and everything else that was telling me I'm not good enough and I am not a good leader on this trip. I felt worthless. But behind this wall of crap I saw a figure standing there. I verbally said "I need you Jesus" and this figure crashed through the wall like a bowling ball. Pretty sure that was Jesus.

There are plenty of other things going on in life that point their fingers and me and tell me I'm not good enough. Verbally saying "I need you Jesus" has gotten me through many of those struggles. I hope this can be somewhat of an encouragement to you reading this. Know that Jesus loves you, cares for you, and desires to crash through the wall of your issues and come in to save the day. He is walking next to you all the time. When you only see one set of footprints in the sand it's not yours. Jesus is carrying you.

Places I've been, things I've done... where am I?

Ok, lets start at the beginning. June 29th was the last day of the Wisconsin Spokefolk tour. I was out to eat at DQ with everyone, including Eric and Hillary. I was ready to go home and continue with the rest of my summer and wait for the last semester of college to be here and gone. Well, it didn't happen like that. Sometime at DQ I was convinced to do the MA tour. Long story short, I did it. I eventually made my way out to Buffalo, NY to catch the end of the NY tour before heading to the Boston-ish area. We picked up Dave in Albany, then went to Phil's house in Foxboro. Spent the next day wandering around downtown Boston, then did some other things, then tour started.

Again I was the instrumental director for the tour. Again I was trying to prepare myself to play every instrument possible because I had no idea what kind of talent I would have. I ended up having an amazing drummer who could also play anything else you give him, a guitar player, a bass player, and a couple keyboard players. Yay! I got to play my electric for once!! Training went a little rough. It was hard to keep in mind that everyone in the band except the keyboard players and myself were 15. They were good musicians and had a lot of talent, but also liked to get off track a lot. They were so awesome though! Definitely surprised me with their talent. Our first setup at our first church in Woonsocket took 15 minutes. After that we just kept getting slower. Something about that seems a bit backwards... Many eventful things happened on tour...

Currently I am sitting in Stoff's bedroom waiting for her to get home. I'm somewhere by Flemington, New Jersey. I've covered a heck of a lot of states in a matter of hours. Since I've been out here, I've been to Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia. The majority of those states were just in the last day or two. I'm hanging out here for a couple days, going to a Yankees game on Friday, then I think I'm heading home on Sunday. We'll probably stop in Ohio to visit some other SFers on the way. Dave has to get back to Chicago, but might go up to the Twin Cities with me. I'm going to hopefully hang out up there for a day or two before figuring my way back to Platteville. It's an adventure. And officially a road trip because we got lost and someone didn't bring the GPS!

I should be careful though....I'm not wearing a helmet...