The EPIK process

I won't lie. I'm not looking forward to the whole EPIK application process to work in Korea. Background checks, recommendation letters, resumes, transcripts, notarized and apostilled blah blah blah. No to mention applying for Korvia Consulting, and filling out the application, and having various interviews. Oh and did I mention that I'm going to start online courses soon to get TEFL/TESOL certification. I'm also learning Korean on talktomeinkorean.com.

It truly is an EPIC undertaking. The bright side of things is that my sister is going too, so we get to struggle through all this together.

Busy Busy!

Here's a picture of the city that we want to live in: Daejeon

Babies and Travel Plans

Woah! I have not written on this blog in months! Shame on me. As usual it just means that life got too busy.

Here's a quick update and maybe I'll go into detail when I have the time later!

1) Went to visit my nephews again! They are getting so big!!! If you ask Alex how old he is, he says "I'm 4 1/2 and I play soccer." While I was down there with my sister, I got to watch him play soccer. I'll use the word 'play' lightly since he was whining and crying during most of it because he got hit in the head with a ball. Yes, he is a big baby, but he'll grow out of it soon...I hope. Nathan and Quinten, or as I affectionately call them, NaDaddy and Quinni the pooh, are doing well. They're so much bigger and full of energy and giggles. Quinni still has a few struggles because of the scar tissue on his esophagus, but he's doing well. He also has to where a helmet some times to round out his head. It's hard for a baby who was in the NICU for almost a month. NaDaddy loved to jump on his little bouncy seat and has sooooo much hair! He really looks like a porcelain doll of a hobbit! They are all cute!

Alex

NaDaddy

Quinni the Pooh - or Megaman cause of the helmet

2) I also got to spend some time watching my other nephew, Julius and he even spent the night. He lives a lot closer than the others so I tend to see him more often. He's crawling standing, and trying to walk. If only he wasn't so stubborn ;)

Julius a.k.a. JuJu

3) The other big news for me is that I am planning in moving to S. Korea next August. YIKES!!! I'm excited but it is such a big decision. Not so much moving to another country...I've already done that with New Zealand...it's more that Korea is SOOOOO different and involves another language. I'm studying like crazy now to learn all I can before I begin taking the TEFL course. Honestly, I have no idea why anyone would want to go teach English in another country without knowing how to tech, or even some of the language. There are so many people who go over there and by the end our their year they still don' know any Korean or even how to read the characters. Shameful! Why would someone go over to Korea to teach people about English and English culture and not bother to learn anything about Korea. Again, shameful!

I'll get more into everything soon, but I am so excited for the adventure ahead and everything that God is doing in my life right now.

Till next time ;)

Buy some art so I can move to Korea ;) 

http://www.etsy.com/shop/ArtbyCara

Skype and Nephews

I love talking to family on skype, especially my nephews. I can't believe there are 4 of them now!! I've put some pictures below. Aren't they cuties! My little hobbits.

Alex - 4 1/2

Julius - almost 10 months

Nathan - almost 10 weeks

Quentin - almost 10 weeks

I have an art blog too!!!

I've started an art blog!! Mostly so I can do post my art from illustration fridays and The Sketchbook Project. Great motivation! Check it out below.

Cara A. Gabriel, Artist: Illustration Friday - Obsession: "Lately I've had trouble feeling motivated to do art. Today I heard about this cool website called Illustration Friday (IF). Basically they g..."

The Babies. The Babies. The Babies.

The twins were born June 10th! Two new hobbit additions to the family ;) I am now the proud aunt of two amazing little boys...Nathan and Quentin. That brings my nephew total up to 4! Although I wonder if nieces will ever be in the picture, I love my little nephies and can't wait to meet the two newest members of the family.

Nathan / Quentin

Nathan Michael was born at 5:21pm 5 lbs10 oz, Quinten Avery was born at 5:23pm 4lbs 7oz. Quentin is still in the NICU, and had surgery so that his breathing tube and eating tube were corrected, but he is doing very well and will most likely be out of the hospital in 2 days :). It's amazing how quickly babies heal and adapt!

I'm flying down to S. Carolina again to see them and help out during the month of July. I'm super excited!!! I'm glad that my bro and sis trust me again to help take care of their kids!

That's all for now.

T-4 days till I leave.

Meditation

Today was the first day of beginning the study of the 12 spiritual disciplines with my amazing women's group. Scary! And awesome! Love it! This week I'm focusing on meditation of scripture and reading Job 38-41. I'm learning about my own insignificance compared to God, and yet he loves us so much and conquered sin for us through Jesus' death and resurrection. It's crazy! My journal is going to be filled in no time. ;)

And then afterwards I had to listen to this song because it reminds me of how I feel today. Check it out!

Heartbroken

I'm not gonna lie. Sometimes the sin of the world is just so overwhelming...

I've been following an organization called Women at Risk International who try to rescue women and children from the sex trade industry all over the world. They help the women in so many ways, including counseling, bringing them to a safe house, and training them various trades so they can make a living, and reaching out with the gospel of Christ. The stuff that these women and children are going through all over the world is appalling, and disgusting, and heart-shattering. The fact that people are so eager to sleep with prostitutes and abuse children and treat them in such a horrendous way is overwhelming to me. The fact that some many people are kidnapped and used at big sporting events including the Superbowl is crazy. And the fact that there are so many sex slave trading strongholds even in America is horrific.

Well, anyway, today at the Women at Risk facebook page, they posted this article about the devastating truth behind the porn industry, siting a webpage of a former porn actress, Shelley Lubben, who has since come to know Christ, gone through massive counseling and had help in dealing with the trauma of the sex industry. Since 2002 she has been reaching out to others in the porn industry and people who struggle with porn-addiction, showing them the true effects of the industry and sharing Christ with them. Here website and the stats below can be found here: http://www.shelleylubben.com/

Porn Industry Statistics ( www.shelleylubben.com/)

36 porn stars died that we know of from HIV, suicide, homicide and drugs between 2007 and 2010.

66% of porn performers have Herpes, a non-curable disease.

2,396 cases of Chlamydia and 1,389 cases of Gonorrhea reported among performers since 2004.

Over 100 straight and gay performers died from AIDS.

26 cases of HIV reported by Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation (AIM), since 2004.

70% of sexually transmitted infections in the porn industry occur in females according to County of Los Angeles Public Health.

Chlamydia and Gonorrhea among performers is 10x greater than that of LA County 20-24 year olds.

The largest group viewing online pornography is ages 12 to 17.

More than 11 million teens regularly view porn online.

There are 4.2 million pornographic websites, 420 million pornographic web pages, and 68 million daily search engine requests.

50% of men and 20% of women in the church regularly view porn.

Of 1351 pastors surveyed, 54% had viewed Internet pornography within the last year.

Of all known child abuse domains, 48 percent are housed in the United States.

At the 2003 meeting of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, a gathering of the nation’s divorce lawyers, attendees revealed that 58% of their divorces were a result of a spouse looking at excessive amounts of pornography online.

Child pornography is one of the fastest growing businesses online, and the content is becoming much worse. In 2008, Internet Watch Foundation found 1,536 individual child abuse domains.

Worldwide pornography revenue in 2006 was $97.06 billion. Of that, approximately $13 billion was in the United States.

It breaks my heart. Sin is so ugly and dark and sometimes I think we forget that Satan is working hard to destroy lives... I am so thankful to God who is so much more powerful and loving and is bringing people to him everyday and breaking the chains of bondage to this sin.

If you or someone you know struggles with porn addiction or sex addiction, a good resource to check out is Setting Captives Free (http://www.settingcaptivesfree.com/).

Drifting Away

I was listening to this song today called "Drifting Away" by Tal & Acacia. I hadn't listened to their music in awhile, but God brought the song to mind today.

And it got me thinking...

Why is it so easy for us to drift away from God? Things go well and we forget him? Things fall apart and we forget him? Why do we try to fix the problem ourselves and think we don't need God? Or if things are going well, why do we take all of the credit for ourselves? That's crazy!

I don't want to be that way. I know it's because of our sinful nature, but I don't want to be that way. I don't want to play the 'Christian' game that so many of us are playing where we pretend all is well at church and yet spend our time getting drunk, or swearing up a storm, or lying, or sleeping around, or living in habitual sin, etc, and not caring. We all struggle with sin, but do we care? Do we really understand the bondage we're in and our search for something to satisfy? Do we realize that satisfaction can only be found in Christ?

I don't want to drift away from God just because I can't be bothered to think of him and all he has done for me. I mean, seriously, how can we forget God? He created this world that we spend all of our time in. He created out bodies, our minds, our skills, everything. It's like we wake up each morning and willfully forget God. Then later, we lay down to sleep and realize that we haven't even thought of God today and vow to do better tomorrow. As each day goes by like this, we begin to forget to even feel bad about it. And we drift away, into our own thoughts, actions and abilities, and life, thinking we have it all together. That is, until something comes along to knock us down. Thank God he cares enough to knock us down. He cares enough to get our attention so we will turn back to him and realize that life isn't really about this life.

I don't pretend that I am perfect, for I am very much not, and I don't pretend to have it all figured out. What I do know is that we HAVE to spend time in relationship with God. Not for homework, or a checklist of 'good Christianity' but because we NEED God. There are so many lies thrown around out there in the world. How are we going to seperate the truth from the lies? How is God going to transform our lives and make us more like him? How are we going to live in freedom and be that bright beacon of light in a dark world for others?

Food for thought...


"His love is the thing that made it begin for the first time.
And his love set it right to keep us goin' on.
But we keep drifting away,from the love that makes life.
We keep drifting away from his side."

You know what? I've been lazy in blogging for sometime now. Usually I post a song, or video or excerpt from a book instead of writing much about myself and what's going on. What's the deal? I have heaps of time on my hands, I just use it doing something else.

That's gotta change.

Let's start with this.

I am a writer. I love writing music, short stories, and short film. As of late, I haven't done much except for writing music. While that's pretty good, I need to do more. Just recently, I've found a few friends who also share this interest in writing. We need to encourage and challenge each other. Hmm.

I like to learn new things. The past few weeks I've been learning to crochet. It's fun. My first project was to make a scarf. It turned out well. Now I'm working with a difficult yarn and making a baby blanket for one of my twin nephews who's on the way while my sis makes one for the other one. It's slow going, but not AS slow as I thought. ;)

That's good for today. Sweet and short. Cheers!

Hold Every Thought Captive

...Your heart is a fertile greenhouse ready to produce good fruit. Your mind is the doorway to your heart—the strategic place where you determine which seeds are sown and which seeds are discarded. The Holy Spirit is ready to help you manage and filter the thoughts that try to enter. He can help you guard you heart. He stands with you on the threshold. A thought approaches, a questionable thought. Do you throw open the door and let it enter? Of course not. You 'fight to capture every thought until it acknowledges the authority of Christ' (2 Cor. 10:5, Phillips).
You don’t leave the door unguarded. You stand equipped with handcuffs and leg irons, ready to capture any thought not fit to enter. For the sake of discussion, let's say a thought regarding your personal value approaches. With all the cockiness of a neighborhood bully, the thought swaggers up to the door and says, 'You're a loser. All your life you've been a loser. You've blown relationships and jobs and ambitions. You might as well write the word bum on your resume, for that is what you are.'

The ordinary person would throw open the door and let the thought in. Like a seed from a weed, it would find fertile soil and take root and bear thorns of inferiority. The average person would say, 'You're right, I'm a bum. Come on in.' But as a Christian, you aren't your average person. You are led by the Spirit. So rather than let the thought in, you take it captive. You handcuff it and march it down the street to the courthouse where you present the thought before the judgment seat of Christ. 'Jesus, this thought says I’m a bum and a loser and that I’ll never amount to
anything. What do you think?' See what you are doing? You are submitting the thought to the authority of Jesus. If Jesus agrees with the thought, then let it in. If not, kick it out. In this case Jesus disagrees.

How do you know if Jesus agrees or disagrees? You open your Bible. What does God think about you? Eph. 2:10 is a good place to check: 'For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do' (NIV). Or how about Romans 8:1: 'There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus' (NIV)? Obviously any thought that says you are inferior or insignificant does not pass the test - and does not gain entrance. You have the right to give the bully a firm kick in the pants and watch him run.

Let’s take another example. The first thought was a bully; this next thought is a groupie. She comes not to tell you how bad you are but how good you are. She rushes to the doorway and gushes, 'You are so good. You are so wonderful. The world is so lucky to have you,' and on and on the groupie grovels. Typically this is the type of thought you’d welcome. But you don’t do things the typical way. You guard your heart. You walk in the Spirit. And you take every thought captive. So once again you go to Jesus. You submit this thought to the authority of Christ. As you unsheathe the sword of the Spirit, his Word, you learn that pride doesn’t please God. 'Don’t cherish exaggerated ideas of yourself or your importance' (Rom. 12:3, Phillips). 'The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ is my only reason for bragging' (Gal. 6:14). As much as you’d like to welcome this thought of conceit into the greenhouse, you can’t. You only allow what Christ allows.

One more example. This time the thought is not one of criticism or flattery but one of temptation. If you’re a man, the thought is dressed in flashy red. If you’re a female, the thought is the hunk you’ve always wanted. There is the brush of the hand, the fragrance in the air, and invitation. 'Come on, it’s all right. We’re consenting adults.' What do you do? Well, if you aren’t under the authority of Christ, you throw open the door. But if you have the mind of Christ, you step back and say, 'Not so fast. You’ll have to get permission from big brother.' So you take this steamy act before Jesus and ask, 'Yes or no?' Nowhere does he answer more clearly than in I Corinthians 6 and 7: 'we must not pursue the kind of sex that avoids commitment and intimacy, leaving us more lonely than ever.... Is it a good thing to have sexual relations? Certainly--but only with a certain context. It’s good for a man to have a wife, and for a woman to have a husband. Sexual drives are strong, but marriage is strong enough to contain them' (6:18; 7:1-2, MSG). Now armed with opinion of Christ and the sword of the Spirit, what do you do? Well, if the tempter is not your spouse, close the door. If the invitation is from your spouse, then HUBBA HUBBA HUBBA.

The point is this. Guard the doorway of your heart. Submit your thoughts to the authority of Christ. The more selective you are about seeds, the more delighted you will be with the crop."

— from Just Like Jesus by Max Lucado, Word Publishing 1998, pp. 177-182

We Will Run

This song speaks volumes to my heart. It is exactly how I feel right now, with so much bad in this world and so much pain and suffering...and rejection of God. And my own hesitant heart that can't seem to care enough for God. Rebellious. Selfish. Unloving. Oh, God. Bring us back to you.




We will run - Gungor

Create in me a clean heart
For I have turned my face from You
Save us from our ways oh God, oh God
For we have turned away from You
Lord have mercy

We will run to you, we will run to you
Turning from our sin we return to You
Father heal your world, make all things new
Make all things new

Your love and mercy build us shape us
Break and then recreate us now
Lord have mercy

We will run to you, we will run to you
Turning from our sin we return to You
Father heal your world, make all things new
Make all things new

Oh, bring us back to you

2010 and 2011 - wouldn't you like to know

Oh, ah, I guess I forgot to do the whole "what I've learned in 2010" and "Goals for 2011" thing. In fact, the Christmas tree and decorations are still up with no end in sight. Oh well. Here it goes:

What I've learned in 2010:

• That forgiveness towards others is an ongoing lesson that I will face often in my life
• When you pray and ask God to grow you, he will, but not in an 'overnight' or 'easy' or 'painless' kind of way.
• That I will never again work for the US Census Bureau
• That my self worth is found in God alone
• That God is fully capable and more than willing to set us free from life-long sin struggles
• That my heart needs to remain open, even when hurt...that some friendships can go deeper than others, but that I should never stop trying to be open and honest with others.
• That I love taking care of kids, especially my nephew
• That music, art, and encouragement are still my strongest spiritual gifts by far and therefore I need to find ways to use them more often
• That seeing friends and bands from New Zealand is an acceptable temporary alternative to not being in New Zealand
• That I need to live by the Spirit and what God's telling me to do
• That exercising regularly is possible
• That God has me where he wants me to be right now
• That being single opens many doors to awesome opportunities like traveling and moving down to S. Carolina for a few months
• That no matter how long I've been looking for a job, God will always provide for what I need. And that my definition of need is sometimes different that God's.
• That selling art is something I no longer want to do. It kills my spirit. I just want to paint and give to whomever is blessed by it.

• That people should really not be concerned with whether or not I'm married right now. I'm enjoying my singleness and I am glad to be free to do what God has me to do

Goals for 2011

• Eat healthier and exercise. Cliche I know, but I'm serious. I'm doing a Bible study course and eating plan that will help me in this area and will help to put the focus on God and not myself. If you want to know more about that, I have another blog entitled Elohim, My Heart's Desire
• Have an International Night every month or every other month to cook food with friends and learn about other cultures
• To hold art nights to paint with whoever is interested
• To travel somewhere this year, if even just to Canada
• To find a job!!!!
• To grow in my trust and love of God
• To care about others and show love to them
• To be content in where I am and what God has given me

So that's what I have thus far. I'm hoping for a great year!