driving

Driving into Auckland at 2am this morning was beautiful.

So peaceful. Driving down the motorway with lights lining each side, the rest of the highway stretching into the distance, the lights showing our journey's path.
Driving into Aucland at night shows you the beauty this city has which is missed in the rush of live.
I wish I could have taken a picture.

It is at this time you realise how small we are. When there are more stars in the sky than lights on the ground. When the only thing else moving is the trucks, their lights drawing close and disappearing behind us.
People stuck in a trucks cab without anything except their destination.

It would be lonely being a truck driver if you have to drive all night, never seeing another sole. Reminds me of Blue Like Jazz. People need people. You don't remember how to communicate if you go too long without it.

Sometimes we forget that when we're in the truck on the seemingly empty road, not sure of our destination, that Jesus is in the front seat next to us.
Driving is so peaceful when you're playing worship, when you're cuddled up with a pillow looking out the window at the stars.

I like night time. It's a time to think and a time decide and a time to discover.
A time to know that Jesus is there with you.

to go.

auckland + holidays + macbook + prizegiving - exams + usa + parachute = EXCITEMENT

So leaving at lunch today, I went to Nana's and tried on my dress.
I'm happy to stay I am slightly more happy with it and will consent to wearing it.
My theory is who cares what I look like. I only have to wear it for 4 hours and then I can take it off and put on something nicer [like jeans, t-shirt and hoodie]

After being at Nana's I was bored. And after a moments hesitation I drove slightly further up Carrington road and reached the Wiese's.
Glory, it's been far too long since I saw them.

They've been in Australia on the sunshine coast for a month.
. . . I was kind of jealous to say the least.

I like Jo. I like that she's always so enthusiastic, so encouraging and so interested in whats happening in my life.
I haven't seen in in almost two months but even just dropping by randomly this afternoon she was so pleased to see me and that makes me feel so valued.
She's been someone who I can always trust and turn too. She's given me advice that was so invaluable. She's giving me perspectives on life and decisions I've made.
I've missed her input into my life these past few months.
I've missed her kids. They're so lovely.

She's definately one of those people who has your respect because of her love for God and the people around her. She is so genuine. I'm very thankful for getting to know her this year and being able to randomly turn up at her door sometimes and that she always makes an effort to catch up.

I like having people like Jo in my life. They give me hope for my future.

learning.

"What do you live for?
Living for something extends beyond fashion, glory or recognition.
We live for what we believe.

If I live what I believe, then I don't believe very many noble things. My life testifies that the first thing I believe is that I am the most important person in the world. My life testifies to this because I care more about my food and shelter and happiness that about anybody else.

BUT. I am learning to believe better things. I am learning to believe that other peope exist, that fashion is not truth; rather, Jesus is the most important figure in history, and the gospel is the most powerful force in the universe. I am learning not to be passionate about empty things, but to cultivate passion for justice, grace, truth, and communicate the idea that Jesus likes people and even loves them."
Blue Like Jazz - Donald Miller

Yess. I totally believe it.
I may not be perfect, I may think more of myself and care about myself more than anyone else right now but I am changing.

I am trying to show that the love Jesus gives was not given just for Him, but for us to spread to the world. So I am slowly changing. Sometimes it doesn't seem quick enough but I know I'm moving forward.
I know I'm learning.
I know I'm becoming who I'm meant to be.

Sorry it's taking so long.
♥

random.

i like the internet simply because it is a fantastic place to find random awesome, cool stuff, like the above. i stole this off someone's bebo site that i don't even know along with a couple of others because they were rad. basically if you put something awesome on bebo it's just an invitation for other people to take it and use it for their own purposes.

there's a song i recently found from a blog on myspace by the To Write Love on Her Arms people. [pretty much the only reason i still have a myspace] They were discussing it and the band and i decided i had to find it.

it's a fight song. not an 'i'm going to smash you' kind of song, but an i'm going to make it, i can get through this, i am not going to give up. the kind of song that you get so into that you end up screaming along with and can't help but believe you really are going to make it.

i dig those songs because sometimes i feel like i really am not going to make it, and when i hear one of those songs and i start screaming; i remember that i am given the armour of God. it's the realisation that the devil has no hold. that there is hope. that there is nothing holding me back except my own over-active imagination of why i could not, should not and can not.

it's called So, In this hour and it's by a band called the Rocket Summer. maybe it's really not that great but it is... in a wierd kind of way.

i love running listening to fight songs. sometimes i feel so retarded because i'll be running along and it'll come to the chorus where it just busts out into awesomeness. me being me will just start sprinting and running and jumping and shouting and singing along and have the volume up far more than i probably should. and then i won't hear a car coming up behind me and it'll pass me and i'll be so shammed because i'm pretty much skipping and sprinting and jumping and yelling and laughing down the road.

so shame emma. shaaaame!

now you know that although i'm awesome, i'm really kind of spastic at the same time.

i've been procrastinating [maybe not such a good idea to start a blog right before exams] and am now going to go study for chemistry first thing tomorrow.
brilliant...

faith or lack of it.

i worry. i really do worry quite a lot, most of it needlessly. such as today.

So the course i want to do at uni is very hard to get into. and the only hostel i've applied for could get full very quickly.
so basically if i don't get accepted into my hostel i'm screwed. and i don't even need to worry about hostel unless i do well in these coming exams. if i don't i don't even have a course i want to do.
eek.

so this has led me to an afternoon of stressed franticness. searching other uni's for courses i want to do. and then looking at other accomodation in auckland in the hope of finding something suitable and in all of it i forgot a few important things regarding the life i live.

1] i don't have to worry. there is a plan and a purpose. i will always have something to do with my life
2] a month ago i was all about taking a gap year. if i don't get in i start working until i figure out what i want to do. there is no rush.
3] in all of this my lack of faith that God will provide for me shows the backsliding that has been happening and the seeking of Him that i really need to do.

so i am applying for auckland uni. no others.
i'm applying for the baptist hostel and probably O'Rorke Hostel.

If these don't work out life has not ended. it will go on and i will go on with it, secure in the fact that i will always have God's plan. i will stand reassured in the hope of God.

it's pretty sweet really. i have no reason to worry.
worst comes to worse i stay in new plymouth and work....

eek.

Leaving

My first 'blog' and I'm caught up with leaving.

Seeing the place I will be living next year has turned into a sudden realisation that nothing is forever.
Even the life I move into next year is only for four years and then I once again will be finding myself in the same place.

I'm in a vulnerable place at the moment. Maybe because I have made some very important decisions recently and am second guessing myself, maybe it's because I am worried about the future, about leaving my friends and family, about leaving all I know. But most likely it's that feeling of being very small in a very big plan and not sure where I'm being taken.

On returning home from Mt Maunganui/Auckland I picked up a book and began to read. Donald Miller's book Through Painted Deserts is something I have not read yet. I have read Blue Like Jazz and the beginning of Searching for God Knows What but not Through Painted Deserts.
Through Painted Deserts is about Donald Miller leaving home. Slightly ironic considering leaving home is what has been on my mind all weekend.

Check out Donald Millers work. I'll let you borrow the book. You'll like it. Promise.

From Authors Note:
'I could not have known then that everybody, every person, has to leave, has to change like seasons; they have to or they die. The seasons remind me that I must keep changing, and I want to change because it is God's way....
Everybody has to change or they expire. Everybody has to leave, everybody has to leave their home and come back so they can love it again for all new reasons.
I want to keep my soul fertile for the changes, so things keep getting born in me, so things keep dying when it is time for things to die. I want to keep walking away from the person I was a moment ago, because a mind was made to figure things out, not to read the same page recurrently.''

So I think this is one of the reasons I am going to do this, as we leave, as we change, I want you, my friends, to be able to know where I'm at, to see where I'm going. Even when we are in separate cities, I want you to know whats on my mind.

I'll try my best to be transparent, to tell you the truth and to make this as deep and exciting as possible.

=] muy bien gracias.