help me remember

I am leaving for the great city of Hamar at 1 today. I wanted to leave a blog message because to me this is not worth sending in a mass email, but it is a crutial moment of my year. I will be leaving this time of quiet, and peace and Erika time for the rest of the year. I have been able to do what I want, when I want and for whatever reasons I think I should. In this time (the last 2 weeks) I have come here hoping that God would allow me a bit of his heart to even desire in my deepest parts to stay. I was severely homesick for a little while. Upon visiting my good friend Karen and her family in the south of Norway I was welcomed with open arms and good food. I then came to fix my VISA and that was a challenging time.....I hoped it would all work out, which it did PRAISE GOD. As I was back here in Skien, I had this break down sort of.......do I go to Bergen, do I stay here and relax? I was tempted to call my plans off, but then at the last minute I had this feeling that I 'needed' to go to the West Coast. So, despite curious thoughts of how I would pay for it....I went. And very true.....I needed to be there. My friend Janelle, also a foreigner was open and willing to help me transfer my heart from the states to Norway. She is so knowlegable and her experience is true....she has had to really fight to be here and she knows the system by now. Her friendship really made me see that beyond myself here in Norway is a vast landscape of hearts not always unlike mine, but very close to it. I lastly visited Ingebjørg, a girl that will be coming to the Skien YWAM DTS as a student this year. She lives in Voss....a very beautiful place in the heart of the fjords. My visit to her helped me see that the ministry is not mine, but God has it all planned. I was excited to meet the students and very excited to see God move in thier hearts in the course of this year. It will be challenging and sometimes I won't believe that I can do what I am asked to, but like I said God has it all planned out. A little note in Ingebjørg's room says this 'Lord help me remember today that I will not face anything both you and I can not handle.' What a great reminder.

And so now....I am here...just 2 hours away from leaving for Hamar and turning the last couple pages of this chapter----'With Wind in the Wings' and I go to write the next. One that seeks quiet and sees peace. There is much deliverance in a heart that finds the hiding places in God. So I do not have quiet outside of my body, but I have quiet inside of my soul. Let it be stirred oh Lord.

Erika

Southern Tip of Norway

The fjordian gulp

it's hard for me to describe the incredible sights and
feelings that come up when i ride through majestic
mystic mountains.  thinking about who could have made
such an amazing world.  the way the 9'o'clock light
flows through the low foggy clouds.  waterfalls trail
great white paths recklessly down the craggy
mountains' edge. a wet coat of paint spilling down the
rocks, dancing clear fresh water to the salty fjord'
mouth, swallowing--gulp, gulp.  it's uncanny how close
this bus gets to the sharp rocks that have been
roughly blasted away.  curiously i lean in--shocked at
the bite.  Had it been a troll coming out of the
rocks--from the smooth rounded face of the jagged
rocky base, those that live in this fjordian-face.
Permanent puddles that made the map and have names and
have visitors, and make money.  No one bothered,
annoyed, or put out....just strolling with the trolls.
just as I go to put a thought on the
paper---darkness---no use writing poetry on the ins
and outs of mountain tunnels.  Cutting through their
insides, without shame.  How rude to demand--'Open up
big mountain let us in, let us pass, take me to the
other side of this insurmountable canyon.  We skip
around corners in this huge living room on
wheels---not always on all of them taking corners at
gale wind speeds.  And just to buy milk....living way
out here in the midst of water, mountain, and heavens.
Only then does it make sense to own a cow---and a
dairy---and a slaughter house, and dress in the
skins---but only if you lived out here, in a mountain
or in Cameroon.  And so they do...but that doesn't
explain why they tuck your pants into your socks or
never do the hair.  And when you live in Oslo, its
cool.  But when you live on a fjord, you're back of
the bus, back of the classroom, and back of the woods
redneck setting the style.  I prefer them home grown.
Why not, I mean the houses have grass atop....grown
from the ground up, why not the people too.  Mmmm, I
just wonder what sound the fjord makes as it gobbles
up the 'Danger falling trolls'...into a crisp cold
bath.  Gulp, gulp....  

Okomst til Norge

Now, i am in Norway.

This is the view from the train that I took from Oslo to Skien. The time.....10:30PM!! See how the sun was just setting?

I am very homesick actually. There are so many things that happened in this school when I was here that were so intense. Being here brings up some emotions that I thought were gone. The emotions of has beens and was and were and maybe and to come...WHAT!

My prayer right now is, " Lord what am I doing here? How did you get me here and why am I here? Guide me because I feel so weak and so inadequate."

My room is nice. I hope I can keep it. It has a closet, a desk, a bed, and lots of side wall lights. I got my luggage with no problem and I got here just fine...no problems at all. Praise God.

Tomorrow I will get my VISA stuff figured out.

TO be honest, I am really scared to be here. Really.

Day 1.......done.

Recent Paintings

She Brings the Umbrella June 2007

Self-Portrait

A Frame of Reference

July 2007

Reflections on Col 3:12

Buzzing in my head

My body is so moist right now......yes, moist is the word I used. I hate this word therefore I hate the feeling I have right now. Our house is without central air and I am packing my bags upstairs in the thick, moist heat. I wish I could freshen up.....but that blasted upstairs heat will send me crooning down the slippery slope to Sweatville.

Honestly, I am exhausted. I am just ready to be on that airplane....after all this round and round. I don't know what to decided anymore and I am to the point of sweeping choices. For example, do I take all of these skirts or just one......or NONE! one book, two, or ALL!

There was a going away party last night and I was so encouraged. I was hugging and smiling from ear to ear all day. God is faithful and he has presented His love in full to me while here in Orange City. No rock was left unturned.

How do I know if this year was good? If only one person was encouraged by the Lord this year, it would have made it worth it. That's hard to say when you are in a place that could actually leave you wondering if one person was blessed by the love of God in a whole year. But for me here I saw it. I saw God work and change people and grow them and love on them. Amazing.

Norway has a pretty high bar to reach----Orange City has set it's standard in my heart and I will be sad to leave--but truly expectant of what God is about to do here and in Norway. IT's only healthy to think like that....otherwise I will cry.

Off to the torcher chamber of death by sweat.

e.james

So unproductive, yet producing so much!

These last days have been real trials. My dad wrote a song about trials and its really peppy and creative....however when you are going through them you don't want to sing a peppy song....and I think that is the point. Take a chill pill sing a peppy song like "We will rejoice when we run into trials" oi! Rejoice we must. It seems like I am running in a slow motion dream. I have so much to do to stay 'on top' and I am delayed delayed delayed.

I have a painting to do....a wedding to play in.....and a few everythings to pack.

but....plans are coming together and I will be picked up by my friends in Skien when I arrive. I guess that is all I care about....whether any one cares that I arrived or not. THey care that I am leaving but that's only half the battle.

They care.

Let's just see if I can get there without shooting my foot first!

5 days and I am exhausted in my mind to think of it all.

Living, Dying, Going to Jail

Living

As it goes...the 18th of the month is a good one. This 18 of July did not disappoint me in the least. I was thrilled to be spending my time at the Cherokee Recording Studio finishing up my last wishes on a new cd. Well new....as in first real one done fully in a studio built for that stuff. I have been going to this studio for some weeks now....starting three weeks ago. I have written 8 songs this year and I got to record 5 of them in the studio. Many of my songs were life journey songs...ones that came about because of life experience and what was happening in my heart at the time. They are all written after meditations on scripture:
-Psalm 25-Psalm 42-Psalm 139-Isaiah 61-Isaiah 58-Romans 12:2-Psalm 19-Psalm 45

Cory Grimm on the guitar

Noah Adams on djembe, conga, tamborine, and maracas

Dr. David Klee (the recording studio engineer) on flute and bass

Dad on piano and voice

Carla Hydeen on voice

Soon the cd will be available to have. It will be quite a cheap cd....8 dollars or so. The money will go to missions in Norway. I can give it to the programs that I will be working with while I am there. Much of those programs will be music, art, dance, and drama in Norway.

Dying

Last night I gathered my gals together and they dyed my hair blonde. Well, I originally wanted it to be a light auburn blonde without going strawberry fakeness.....so we went blonde and it turned out rather copper and a beautiful auburn blonde. I suppose I was destined to be such a color.

Going to Jail

In 6 days I am going to jail.

This is the YWAM school in Skien, Norway where I will be teaching creative worship.

It's an old jail. Built in the 1890's.

6 days!!

Impetago!

Ouch! My face is eating itself! Yes, I have been scarred with the infectious disease of impetago.....or otherwise a form of it. If you have had a pimple on your lip and then popped it....you know that this is a rare and most intense pain of pressure. Yep, that's what it feels like to have a pussing rash on your upper lip. Rare.

Pray for healing on my lips...they have experiences some intense heat exposure and now this cold sore like impetago. It's either virus....cold sore or bacteria.....impetago. Whatever the case.

OUCHY!


7 days

8 days and counting!

So, I have just returned home from a trip to New Orleans, Louisiana with my church youth group. It was an amazing trip.....but it was the event that signified the check-point of my departure. I never thought that New Orleans would come and now GO this summer. We had a fun week down there....hot as hot....but worked our tails off. I brought home some souveniers--a deck of cards and a cold sore in the dip of my upper lip. OUCH! Thanks LA!

Now that I am home I have a lot to think of. I am working on a painting for my pastor at my church. He has asked for me to paint him a meditation on Col 3. I will work on that as well as packing and saying goodbyes.

I think it is the most fun week...and the one that will bring the tears in showers. My dad sat with me on my bed last night and said

"You know honeybear (that's what he calls me) all the tears that come this week are not tears of 'Stay Home' or 'Change your mind' I would NEVER stand in the way of your plans...or God's plans for you. Just know that the thousands of tears shed this week are because our hearts break as we see you leave. It has been an amazing year...we all know that."

So....those tears, I anticipate them and yet I wish they would all come at once....not in spurts. The emotional energy can never be regained from goodbyes. I know it won't take my dad much to weep....and then I get a tickle in my nose....indicating that I am about to burst.

No regrets list:
-cut hair
-mail postcards
-dye hair auburn
-paint for Jim Daniels
-finish recording in Cherokee
-pack enough for a year
-worhsip God everyday

I think I can handle this week.....can you?