radiant.

One of the things that I really love to look at when reading the bible is word choice. Recently I was reading in Exodus 34, about Moses going up to Mount Sinai for the second to retrieve the stone tablets again, because he broke the first ones. In verses 29-35 it states,

"When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the Testimony in his hands, he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the Lord. When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, his face was radiant, and they were afraid to come near him. But Moses called to them; so Aaron and all the leaders of the community came back t him, and he spoke to them. Afterward all the Israelites came near him, and he gave them all the commands the Lord had given him on Mount Sinai. When Moses finished speaking to them, he put a veil over his face. But whenever he entered the Lord's presence to speak with him, he removed the veil until he came out. And when he came out and told the Israelites what he had been commanded, they saw that his face was radiant. Then Moses would put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with the Lord."

I really love the use of the word RADIANT here. I think that it is magnificent that when Moses had returned from speaking with the Lord that his face shown in radiance, and that he had to cover it up to talk with the Israelites. This made me take notice of my own life. I say that I have this relationship with the Lord, and in it I am able to talk freely. But can others see that? Can others see just from my face, expression or action that I have this deep and intimate relationship with the Lord? I think that I want to be my goal for this week. To just really shine for the Lord. Project radiance because of the depth of the relationship that I am able to have with Christ, and use it to help and life others in theirs.

I checked this verse in my giant study bible (best christmas gift ever..) and this is what it said about it.
"they were afraid to come near him" (V. 30)

"the people respond to the effect of Moses' meeting with the Lord in a manner similar to when they heard God speaking from Mount Sinai. However, it is the glory of the Lord in their midst that is meant to sanctify both the tabernacle and the people, which is how Paul later describes the work of the Spirit int he life of one who has turned to the Lord."

Additionally, it says about Verse 35.

"Like the pillar of cloud over the temporary tent of meeting, the skin of Moses' face shining is a sign to the people that it is the Lord who is speaking with Moses, just as he did on Mount Sinai."

Anyway, I think that is something that i am going to strive for in my Walk. I am not going to "hide it under a bushel NO, im gonna let it shine!" haha

have a good week!

Support Update:
I just wanted to extend a thank you to everyone who has supported me thus far. I am excited to say that I am at 37.4%! yay! thank you all for your support and willingness to partner with me in this endeavor. I will be praying for you all, please continue to pray for me also.
Annie

Favorite thing I saw today:

20-25 preschoolers getting off the 13 bus coming from downtown Seattle. They were heading to their neighborhood co-op day care, being lead by 3 very courageous dads. How wonderful that they decided to brave downtown Seattle to take their kids to where ever with simply a kid leash.

market

One of the things that I have to do during break is go to the grocery store. However today, I was thinking about the open markets of central America. They were some of my favorite places to hang out.

facebook.

This past week was filled with work, finals, and facebook. As i was studying for a final and trying to write a paper I was continually check my facebook to see if any one would be available to talk to, or distract me from my current unfun tasks. Someone commented once that I was on facebook ALOT. so this lead to me think...how many hours of facebook is a lot? who else uses facebook? after some research i found these:
# More than 400 million active users
# 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day
# Average user has 130 friends on the site
# Average user sends 8 friend requests per month
# Average user spends more than 55 minutes per day on Facebook
# Average user writes 25 comments on Facebook content each month
# More than 70 translations available on the site
# About 70% of Facebook users are outside the United States
# There are more than 100 million active users currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices.
# People that use Facebook on their mobile devices are twice more active on Facebook than non-mobile users.

There you have it, facebook is a world wide phenomenon, distracting people all over the world. Just think how much more productive we would all be if it didn't exist, roads would get built, babies would be born, and I wouldnt have stayed up until 3:30 working on my paper. Despite all this, I still LOVE facebook, and will just have to be ok with the fact that I will be 100% productive ever again. haha.

More than 6,000 people with pillow-related injuries check into U.S. emergency rooms every year!

Rats multiply so quickly that in 18 months, two rats could have over a million descendants.

the world.

So, one of the things that I have been super fasinated with recently is the amazing animal life in the ocean. (yes, i was a wild life biology major...i think its so cool). Anyway, i just wanted to put up this video really quick. Marvel at the world our Lord created.

the refugee project.

On Saturday I had the opportunity to participate in something known as The Refugee Project. It is though my school, Seattle Pacific University, and they partner with World Relief. It was supposed to give insight as to what life was like in refugee camps and some of the struggles that they faced. We started off the day by learning what is a Refugee.

Refugee is defined by the UN council as: someone who “owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality, and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country.”

One of the things we did was simulate what it was like in a refugee camp. We were split up into groups and we were given identities. My family was one from Afghanistan that was fleeing from the Taliban, so we fled to Pakistan. I wore a full head covering, and we were told that we spoke little English. It was interesting to go around to the different locations that they had for us: a simulation medical clinic, documents office and feeding station. At each place we had different tasks and things that we had to do. It was very eye opening to see the treatment the people received, we were often looked down up, made fun of, and I felt like I couldn’t do anything right. I also felt trapped by my lack of language and supposed understanding as to what is going on. They said that even if they make it into the refugee camps, it is not much safer. Police are only around 2-3 hours a day, food rations often get stolen, many people have to leave camp to go and get firewood or pots for cooking, and there are no real rules or regulations. I cannot imagine what it must be like to go through that for years. The average time in a refugee camp is 17 years, and we only got a small 1 hour taste of it.

After that a women came in, who had been a refugee in Bhutan (to read the whole story of conflict, click here) for 17 years, and had recently been relocated to the United States. She said that she was nervous and anxious. She has been here for 7 months and she says it is very hard. It is a constant struggle not to think about how maybe Bhutan and the camp was better. It kind of reminded me of the Israelites in Exodus. God had led them out of slavery in Egypt, yet they still thought maybe it would be better to go back to Egypt and be slaves again. I wondered why she would think that. But maybe, in some horrid way, it’s because at 20 years old, camp life was all she had ever known. I hope that she one day, adjusts to living in the United States and that God can find a way into her heart.

Following that, we headed down to Kent, Washington to the extension of the World Relief office. There we were going to have dinner with refugee families who had been resettled in the United States. I was so excited, I had been looking forward to this part all week. We again broke up into groups and went to our different families. I had dinner with a Congolese family. They had been in the US for 2 weeks! They were such an incredible family. A husband and wife, and their 3 boys. They told us about their lives back in Congo, but that they had spent the last 5 years in Nigeria. They were so warm, inviting us into their home and cooking a meal for us. They served us fish, parts and bones included, rice, boiled down spinach like vegetable, and a starch. It kind of reminded me of super think cream of wheat, but I think it was made from potatoes and grain or something. I am really hopeful for them, the spoke with such excitement about living in the US. Their kids had already been in school for a few days and they really liked it and they hope to soon get jobs.

Overall, it was a really good experience. I was so glad that I did it. I am always so impressed by the resilience and strength of people. This week, I ask that you pray for Refugees, to be brought fourth into freedom, and released from oppression.