Not easy, but worth it

This has been a pretty incredible week! It was our last week here in Chiang Rai, and I am so excited to be leaving in a few hours. But so many great things happened, for me and for other people. I have learned and grown so much. This week I have really been struggling with some things, yeah I know, what's new.. But I feel like I was definitely in the right place. Being here surrounded by so many people who are believers and who just genuinely care about people helped me to deal with a lot of my issues in a positive way and start to move past them.
Something really great that happened this week during class was we took an offering near the end of the week for people in Laos, people traveling to Chiang Mai, and for the rest of the expenses for this DNA conference, since not everyone had paid and some people weren't able to. I think they said that we needed almost 200,000 baht. At the end of the offering we ended up with about 300,000 baht, which was way more then was needed, or expected. It was just so wonderful to see all the giving and to see how much everyone cared about it.
Last night a bunch of us went onto the roof of one of the girls houses and lit off ten floating lanterns. It was so much fun, and when there were a bunch up in the sky at once it just looked so incredible. We were going to light off bottle rockets as well, but someone from below us came up and said we were being to loud so we couldn't:(
Please pray for me that I will just be able to fully give over every part of my life to God and not hold onto anything and not hold anything back from Him. Also I am running sort of close on funds, so I need to decide what to do about that. But I have already experience how God provides so I know everything will work out. But I would still appreciate the prayer!
Thank you guys! I love and miss you all

Golden Triangle

Today a lot of the people here at the DNA conference and I took an all day trip to the Golden Triangle and Mae Sai. The Golden Triangle is where the borders of Myanmar (Burma) and Laos meet. Mae Sai is the border of Laos and Thailand. The day overall was a blast. We all got crowded into four song taews ( Thai baht buses) and headed to a lookout spot over the river where all the borders meet, forming a triangle. We then went down to the river and all got onto two boats and got to take a tour of the river and go up to the borders. When we got to Laos we got to get out and take pictures and stuff. That is when something that I really don't like happened. When you first step onto the ground in Laos there is a little market that you need to pay 20 baht to go into. We didn't go in, we just stood outside and took pictures and prayed for the people and stuff. But the officer in charge of the boarder told us that since we had all stepped onto Laos land that we should all pay. The guy in charge of bringing us refused to pay and told us to all hurry and get on the boats. That really upset me because for one thing it is their land and we were on it. We need to respect what they want, even if we don't think it is right or it might be corrupt. Secondly, we are a Christian group and even though they may not have known that we are Christians, we still should be representing Christ in everything that we do. I paid the charge and so did four of my friends. But I am still really bothered and upset at the way we represented not just the places that we are from and our organization, but also how we were misrepresenting Christ to those people. That was the only downer to the day though. After that we went to a big market in Mae Sai and got a bunch of pictures and a few souvenirs.
I really enjoy traveling with this group because everywhere we go we pray for the city/town/country and the people in it. It has already become a habit to me and I think it is really good to pray for people everywhere you go. I had never really even thought of doing that before I came to Thailand and we visited a big temple and everyone started praying and it just hit me. It was like "Oh! I shouldn't just feel sorry that these people are so lost and don't know the truth, and I can do something about it even by just praying!" And it is really like that everywhere you go. Even just to the grocery store, you can pay for the people who show you where stuff is and the person that checks out your groceries.
I will be putting a bunch of pictures on facebook later tonight. And I really love hearing from you guys, so please feel free to email me or message me on facebook!:)

Chiang Rai conference

I am really enjoying being here in Chiang Rai. We are only on day two of the conference but I really like it. Darlene Cunningham is a great speaker, as are all of the others who have spoken. The people here are really great as well. They are all so friendly and welcoming. I have met a lot of people from all over the world, as well as a few from Washington state and found out that we know some of the same people back home. So it is really cool being able to talk and get to know other people. I'm also making some great connections with people who work with YWAM and can get me started working with them if that is the direction God wants me to go. I really feel like Thailand is where I am supposed to be, but I am still praying about it and I really appreciate all of your guys' prayers too. A lot would have to happen for me to be able to do what I want to do, like finding support and a place to stay.
I really feel like God is doing a huge work in my life and I really appreciate all the help you guys have given me. I wouldn't have been able to do all this without all of you. Thank you so much!

Chiang Rai

Hey all!
Tomorrow morning we leave for two weeks of conferences in Chiang Rai. Please pray that our hearts will be open and that we will be able to get a lot out of the teachings.  It is pretty awesome that we get to go because usually it is only for YWAM staff, but they said that our whole DTS could come.  I think we will have internet access there but I'm not sure, so if I don't respond to messages for a while it's because I'm there and there is no wireless.
Also, this week we have been having pretty intense dance classes! We have been learning three Thai dances.  Two to worship songs and the third is a Thai county song.  The country one was the most fun to learn I think.  If you have facebook I will hopefully be posting the videos of them soon so you can see what they are like.
This has been a pretty good week. The teaching this week was on church and what our roles in it are and what our spiritual giftings are.  I'm still not really sure what mine are, but I was really interesting to just sit and talk about everyone's and see what different ones there are. There are so many, and everyone's are a little bit different. No one is exactly the same and I think that is so awesome.  It just proves that we all have different roles and that everyone plays a really important role in the church. Hopefully I will be able to figure mine out soon!
Thank you all so much for your prayers, I really appreciate them a lot!

Hard week..

Well this week has been really challenging.  The teaching was on coming to God with a clean conscience.  It was really hard for me because it brought back a lot of hard memories and things that I have done that I didn't want to remember or admit, but I finally gave up my stubbornness and just admitted everything.  I am still dealing with some things but it is getting better.
I am still loving it here, I am convinced that this is the greatest place on earth! Even though it rains a lot. I just go out and sit in it or walk in it and it feels so refreshing. They also have the best coffee and waffles here, I get it every Saturday and Sunday morning. And I don't even like waffles. Last Saturday me and two friends went into Chiang Mai searching for a Mexican restaurant and we ended up getting lost and walking around the city for about two hours. Guess who was leading... My bad. Hitch hiking is pretty fun around here too. If you have facebook you should check out the videos I posted.
I'm getting pretty tired of rice and eggs though.. We have it for every single meal. The other day they made a ton of fried rice, so we had it for three meals in a row. So today I will be traveling into Chiang Mai again for more Mexican cuisine. I love going into town by myself, it's so fun to just ride around and explore the city. Hitch hiking home in the dark is a bit of an adventure though..
Sorry that this is all so randomly put in here, I'm really tired and my mind is going in tons of crazy directions all at the same time haha.
Well I love and miss you all!