Ok, God its your turn.

Hello everybody,

This past week was very out of ordinary in many different ways. I should have know it was going to be a strange week when on Wednesday night I was involved in a war of nerf guns with 3 kids and 4 grown men…it was AWESOME!! And we dominated the kids. The war was the request of Jake the son of a friend of mine from the church for his birthday party. At his request myself, Tim (his father), Kevin (our lead Pastor), and Steve (my host father) all took up our (nerf) guns and hunted down the birthday boy (Jake). It was a lot of fun even though we dominated the kids they did put up a good fight and were worthy adversaries.

The next strange thing that was happening for me was with my Sermon preparation. I was having a very difficult time writing my sermon for the coming Sunday. In total I wrote 4 outlines, 2 Sermon briefs and 2 manuscripts before I actually gave the talk and still it wasn’t sitting well with me. It was like wrestling a bull. I knew what I wanted to say, but I just couldn’t get it to sound right or fit right or just work. It was very frustrating the whole week.

On Friday and Saturday I was watching three teenage boys in Capelle aan de Ijssel for my friend’s Rogier and Sophie. That was a great time; we played video games, ate burritos and watch the Matrix. It was a man’s night, food, guns and sci-fi, ahhh. The next day I got to watch all of their Basketball games, which too was a lot of fun for me. I love watching sports in different countries to see the systems they run and how they play. It was also very entertaining, because these boys were good. I was really impressed with the skill of a lot of these players and that made the games very interesting to me. The highlight of the day was seeing a 6’7” 13 year old (yes 13!!) dunk, its not everyday you see a kid of that size who can play.

That evening I brought the boys for their home up to The Hague and then headed off to see my friend Maria get baptized in the North Sea. I was bummed out, because I was late and missed the actual event, but just seeing all the people (42 in all showed up) and then seeing Maria was a real treat. Maria has been working with me in trying to get different events going with the 20-40 year olds in Crossroads and through that we have got to know each other and I was able to hear about her story and how far she has come as a person and a Christian. The Baptism was a really special time and it is very cool to see how she is growing in to a leader so quickly. I was really blessed by the whole event.

Then Sunday morning came and I was speaking. I was so nervous, not about speaking, but about my talk. It was Sunday morning and I still didn’t feel good about what I was going to say, but I knew I have to hand it over to God. I had done my part, the study, the prep, now its God’s turn to show up. Well, the talk was good, but really choppy, even while I was speaking it didn’t flow well at all and I couldn’t get a good rhythm going at all.

After each service I had several people come up to me and thank me for the talk and say how they appreciated it, that I did a good job and expressed how they have seen me grow as a speaker. This was so good for me to hear, because I couldn’t see that, not on Sunday. The other responses I got or saw were very touching, I saw God meeting people where they were at and saw how the words God gave me to speak, even though not eloquently delivered, were still working in people’s lives.

This was humbling and reassuring to me. I was humbled to see that despite of my efforts God still showed up, and reassuring in that God was working through what I though he wanted me to say. It was a hard sermon to preach and I was really drained after the services.

I finished off the day by going to Kenny Johnson’s American Football game. It was a great end to the week. Kenny played very well and their team beat the other team by a touchdown, despite being out weighed, collectively by about 500lbs. It was a lot of fun to watch football and to see Kenny playing; he has never played before and is doing very well for being so new to the sport.

If you want to hear the sermon it will be posted on the Crossroads Website: http://www.crossroadschurch.nl/.

Have a great week!!
Jason

Prayer requests:
1) Culture shock coming back. I have been thinking that I will be hit with a bit of culture Shock coming back to Minnesota and would like prayer around transitioning back to MN.
2) Finances. Right now I am planning on returning to The Hague in the fall and the only question mark left in that plan is money. Pray that God will supply the financial needs to get me back over here.
3) The move. May 1st I move back to Minnesota, pray that their would be not complications with getting back and getting settled back in Minnesota.
4) Leaving well. I am trying to see everyone I need to before I leave and I want to make sure I am not leaving any loose ends here. Pray that I will be able to pass on everything I need to and that relationships will also be continued.