Life has been crazy as usual.  I've have been getting 4 or 5 hours of sleep a night for the past 5 weeks, and I was lucky if it was in a row.  Well it all caught up to me and I was sick all last weekend and tried to work through it all week.  To much stress and all these plans.  I have a friend from Toronto coming Friday and we are going to a couple of games the TampaBay Festival, and some exploring of Tampa (shopping in her case).  I'm looking forward to being able to do normal stuff other than work all weekend, and hopefully get some of the college and singles to join me.  The following week a friend from Columbia is coming down for a week.  I'm hoping that April will get connected with some of the college and singles down here and be able to minister to the "others" and hopefully we will all start to be "united" as a group in the near future.  If only all my friends could move here and yeah that would be awesome, but I'll leave that one up to God.  On top of all this excitement, I'm planning on returning to Moldova for 17 days this summer.  I have been blessed with people at Crosspoint supporting this trip and doing what they can to find materials to take with me that are already translated and hard to find.  God continues to bring everything together which further confirms me being here, even though it is a struggle.  The relationships still aren't there yet, but soon. 

I'm trying to put more focus on some relationships with the youth because of the potential growth of the group.  If I can reach them now and those that stay in town for college will hopefully find a reason to stay at the church and a part of this group.  I'm not expecting major things because yeah, the church is only 250 members, and very few of them are from the age of 18-30, and if they are, they are married/ with children.  So anyway, the next few months are critical  towards growing and expanding of this ministry.

Need some serious prayer right now for the college and singles group, (Unity) is key, it just doesn't exist.  I have relationships with everyone there for the most part, meaning I talk to them, or hang out with them one on one, but to get them all to hang out is well, lacking to say the least.  So please pray for God to reveal something that would cause them to unite, or that God would just do the simple thing and intervene and that we all would just spontaneously unite. 

God has been doing some amazing things hence the theme of our service in church today, "that's amazing" was repeated multiple times through the sermon in account to God's grace.  It was an obvious attempt to be seen that God's grace is sufficient enough, meaning we can't do anything to add to it, no matter how hard we try and how good we think we are.  If that was the case God's grace would somehow be humanized and lost in translation.  It is a reflection that I have been trying to come to grips with, something that I know, but honestly lost in my belief system, plaguing my very existence.  Yet another distraction from the great deceiver himself.  I really just needed to hear it more than anything.  The reason why I guess I needed to hear it from someone else is because I felt like it was something that God just wanted me to share especailly with preparing to go back to Moldova.  One thing that I tried to stress first of all was, "so what that I'm American, it doesn't make me better, or special" and second of all "living in America doesn't make things better".  Yes living in america might mean you are a part of the top 2% of the worlds richest, but it doesn't get you any closer to God, or a saving knowledge of Him.  That is something that a lot of Moldovians, and people in this world sought.  If I could only live someplace that had more wealth like America, things would just be better.  One thing I did notice is that our wealth is just a distraction to life.  We are so fast paced over here really truly do not know how to live, much less live like we truly should be living for God.  Our "lifestyles" are a hinderance to "maintaining the mission".  This is not to sound Holier than though, but I hope that what is said here will cause you to reflect on the mission that God has set before you.  Yes for many it is to be blessed in our correct status, but also realize that the way we are living far exceeds what is really necessary, and the things we pursue according to world standards are just that.  I'm not saying that having all that we have is not a blessing from God, but to evaluate it, just because we have it doesn't mean we really need it, and just because we have it ultimately does not make it a sin.

Today was great, INDY won, finally that gives Dungy a great christian coach a super bowl victory as well as payton and all the other colts.  Church was awesome, a message was presented to make everyone question where they really stand in their spiritual walk with God.  Something that was really needed, and hopefully something that we will see results in the next coming weeks.  I'm looking forward to what is going on in the college and singles group.  Ground is breaking fast and things are starting to move with the contacts I have made here and their willingness to support friends in Moldova with bibles and bible study material in their language.  I also got work of the church wanting to help support my trip when I give them all the details.  They have asked me to speak at the missions weekend and fund raiser event too.  So I have to put together a couple of 5 minute spots to present on two different days. 

In the big game, the old guys beat the young guns 77 to 63.  We were down in the fourth quarter when our defense made 3 interceptions for touchdowns to give us the lead, the offense got on the field once in the whole 4th quarter to nail in the final score.  It helps when you have 13 guys show up to play compared to last years 8 and putting 7 men on the field.  I had my best game at quarterback, throwing 6 touchdowns and only two interceptions.  I was proud of our old guys, many walking slow and struggling to get off the field as if they had just fought in a war, wounded but congratulating each other for their victory.  Watching the Defense was great, but hard because that ment we stayed on the sideline and had to watch them win the game, but I was glad to see how they finally melded together for their relentless standoff.  I smell a challenge from the youth for a repeat soon, but they will have to wait till next year just as we did.