BETTER THAN I THOUGHT

I put an ad in the Saskatoon newspaper on Saturday and Monday for my condo and an ad on kijiji. People kept telling me that the market had really slowed down in Saskatoon and that it was very unlikely that it would sell in two weeks. Some even said that it was unlikely that anybody would even call until about July or August when the students start coming into the city.

Well fooey on them. The day I put the ad in the newspaper I got a call from a gentleman who is interested in it. And within a a couple of hours of putting the ad on kijiji today someone was over checking the place out and seemed very interested in it. And he had even suggested the same possession date as I had been thinking. Sweet!

The deal is still not done yet, so keep praying! But I do have a good feeling about this. I believe that God wants me to go to ND and I trusted that he would make it work. I never imagined it would be working out this well.

There are a couple of things that are making things difficult. First of all I am leaving for the weekend so I won't be around. Also the fact that my parents need to do most of the dealing and they are in another province. That's all good though, God will make it work.

ON SECOND THOUGHT...

I may not be going to ND any more. Grrrr! I wish I was more decisive, or God was clearer, or that I was able to discern his will. I still really want to go to ND, I don't feel like there is anything left in Saskatoon, and it would get me away from a certain awkward situation I have been dealing with for the last year.

I thought everything was all settled, but then my parents called said they would pay me some money to sell the condo. Well that through me for a loop, even though I don't want to stay in Saskatoon, am in debt and need all the money I can get right now. There is still the problem of me not having a job. So I have been praying for discernment for a while, and I still have until June 8th before I have to leave for ND.

I was talking to my mentor about this whole situation and she asked if both could be done. Of course by worldly standards that is damn near impossible for me to get everything together and sell the condo in two weeks. But I am not a child of this world anymore! So I am praying big. Praying that in the next two weeks the condo will sell so that I can get the extra money and go to ND. That would be so flippin' sweet!

So please pray with me, it would be much appreciated :)

HERE WE GO

The last few days I have been struggling with whether I should sit, wait and trust that God is working and will provide for me, or if I should hitch up my britches and do whatever it takes to make life work.

I have decided to just submit to God, and allow Him to do his thing, leaving me out of the loop until the last minute. That is uncomfortable for me, mainly for financial reasons. I have student loans that need to be paid off.

So here is the plan as far as I know it.

June 9-August 9th I will be in Grand Forks doing a linguistic and cross-cultural worker program. It is offered through Wycliffe, and intended to teach people intending on working in another country how to learn/speak a foreign language as well as integrating into a new culture.
I think this is where God wants me to go. I prayed that I would get some sense of direction about life on May 15th, and that is the day my papers came in so I can cross the border. Then that night I prayed that God would affirm this, I prayed that by noon the next day I would get some sort of job related affirmation. Either a no from the interview that I had or something would come up from the millions of resumes I sent out, something like that. The next morning I got an email from my part time job during school, I had quite before I left for camp, but they were wondering if I could come back to work. That would take me just until the Friday before I leave for ND. Sweet!

So until I head to ND I will be working part time, and just having some fun. I have been working very hard, taking more than a full course load the last couple of years and working at least 2 jobs during the summer. So this is my time to have fun, be with friends and relax.

After that I have no idea what will happen. I have some more fun with friends time planned for the middle of August and that is about it. After that it is all wide open.

VINTAGE CHANTAL

I thought I would take a step away from all this frustration and tell a typical Chantal story.

At MarkWest last week we learned this new type of prayer called "centering prayer." If I understood correctly it is essentially trying to block out any thought or distraction and just think about God. For a scatterbrain like me it is very difficult. Sitting in a group of people completely still and silent trying to be focused on one thing does not work for me. They say to think of distracting thoughts as little boats that just float on by, well that always makes me think of Steamboat Willy,

Anyway, during one of the sessions I decided to watch my friend's kid, an adorable 4 year old boy, so that he could attend. No big deal for me, I used to work in a daycare. During the half hour I was watching him he had to go pee. Again no big deal, and at 4 years old they can pretty much do it all themselves.

We were at camp, and in the main building there was your typical Mens and Ladies rooms. I felt he was a little to old to go to the ladies room, since the showers are in there also, so that left the mens washroom. For me it would be no big deal to take him into the mens bathroom, even if there was other men in there. As the nurses saying goes, "I have seen more penises than a prostitute." Not entirely true for me, but I have worked in a hospital and nursing home doing personal care and I have taken anatomy and physiology courses and my studying of clinical biology has included detailed study of STD's. So I could walk in and be virtually unphased. However, I know that this is not normal, and while it may not bother me, it would likely bother a man in the washroom.

I knocked on the door and then sent the little guy inside to see if anyone was in there. While the little guy could probably take a whiz all by himself, as a microbiologist I was deeply concerned about hand washing. He was not tall enough to reach the soap and paper towel. There was nobody in there so I decided that I would stand in the doorway, with the door open so that I could hear him call if he needed help.

Meanwhile, several people walked by this high traffic hallway, and I felt the need to make them aware that I was not a pervert or a peeping tom, but that I was looking after a child. Well the little guy finished the job and I got several very strange looks from people, and we just went back outside to play before supper.

At supper someone came up to me and said,
"So you are not creepy?"

I just figured that he had been told by one of the people that had seen me. Then a few more people came up to me referencing to that moment. After about seven or eight people approached me I noticed a pattern. All these people had been in the prayer meeting, I then asked how word had gotten around to them so quickly. Turns out the prayer room was right next to the bathroom and my constant insisting that I was not a pervert had been the distracting thoughts that they were trying to allow float by. Ooops!

SO NOW WHAT

I'm thinking this supposed inability to confirm a final decision on my application maybe a waiting list or something. Apparently they are sending something in the mail that I need to confirm. I can't handle anymore waiting so I think I am going to treat this as a no and move on with life. Not sure where to move to though. I have applied to some real full time jobs in Calgary and Winnipeg. I am still confused about what to do about the women's shelter in Calgary.

While confirmation regarding medical school didn't come I am praying about the summer linguistics/cross-cultural program. I had asked God for any piece of direction or guidance by May 15th, I had flippantly thrown out there that getting the papers that I needed to go to the states would come in today, but it was not a real serious prayer as I was more focused on the medical school issue. Well, the papers did come, I don't like jumping to conclusions and saying that something is from God without knowing for sure, but this a pretty significant coincidence. The problem is money, as it always seems to be, but that can be dealt with I think. A little more student loan could be thrown out, not perfect, but at this point I don't know what to think anymore.

I am going to get a good nights rest tonight, which somehow always helps when trying to make sense of things. I didn't sleep much last night, I was so excited and anxious to see how God was going to direct me and what I was going to be doing come September I couldn't sleep. Hmmm... sure glad I wasted all that emotional energy.

Despite being pissed off right now, I will always believe in God, I will always praise him, and always try to trust him. He knows the larger scheme of things. One thing I am trying really hard not to do is come up with all the possible reasons why things are working out like this, that just tends to create expectations, and well I don't feel having my hopes smashed again.

YES or NO?

So today is the day that I got the email from the U of A. I have kind of been expecting to be accepted, things have been going so well up until this point. At the same time though, I was willing to accept a "no." While I would love to go to medical school, the main thing is to get a skill that would be most effective in missions/international development.

Here is what the email said, drum roll please...

"I am unable to advise you of a final decision on your medicine application at this time."

WTF? What does that mean? Have they not finished going through the process? Am I on a waiting list? Is that a nice way of saying no?

I have been praying crazy hard that today God will give me the direction that I needed to take the next step forward today. He answered with a nice heaping helping of confusion. Thanks God, but I've had my fill of uncertainty and waiting. I am quite pissed off right now. I've talked to a few people in general terms about God not answering prayers, and the typical response is, "maybe God is saying no." I agree that is sometimes the case but I did not ask God a yes or no question.

So now I can't plan anything for the future, I am stuck in the same damn uncomfortable place of waiting. I feel like God is pulling of a band-aid real slowly so it hurts real bad instead of ripping it off in one quick pull. It would have been better if it was a no because then I could be applying for real full time jobs. I think that is the angle that I am going to take, and start moving on with my life. I have to, I have bills to pay, I can't just keep sitting around.

48 HOURS

I have been praying really hard, like nearly having an aneurysm kind of hard, that I will have some sense of direction for the immediate future on Thursday. I have decided that if God does not grant me any direction then I will just make some decisions and go on. At the moment I have nothing certain in my life, the last moment of certainty ended with my doctors appointment this morning. I have nothing left planned or secured for the coming days.

Everything seems to be hinging on whether or not I go to medical school. Even the summer. If I am not going to school then I could be looking for a full time job. All my attempts at summer jobs have failed, which is quite a contrast to last summer. Last summer I only applied for a few jobs and I got 2 within a couple of weeks. I have applied to I am sure almost 30 jobs in the last month and a bit this year and have got nothing. Tomorrow will be my last day of applying to jobs in Saskatoon and if I don't get anything then I will take that to mean that I am not supposed to be here for the summer.

If not Saskatoon, then what? I am still thinking of going to the summer linguistics/cross-cultural program in North Dakota (or BC), even though the finances are not there. Another option is just going back to Grande Prairie for the summer. Getting a job there should be no problem, and no matter what I do I will likely make more money than I will in Saskatoon.

I don't really want to leave Saskatoon, I feel like I have a lot invested here and that I still have some "unfinished business." I have a lot of friends that I want to see, and Saskatoon is a pretty central location that would allow me to travel to see them. I also want to go to bartending school (maybe even flair bartending), get a pilot license and try hitch-hiking, which I think would be safer in the prairies, with all the friendly farmers around.

So within the next 48 hours, I am praying and believing that God will guide me. I will hopefully have some answers to report Thursday night.

REFLECTIONS FROM MARKWEST

I just got back from a week long Scripture study at a beautiful camp. The location was great, I didn't realize how much I missed trees. The people were great too, I didn't think studying the book of Mark could be so hilarious. Before I left for the retreat, I really had not wanted to go at all. I was tired from exams and just wanted to rest. I told God that since he was dragging me out there he better speak something big from the book of Mark.

He didn't.

He wasn't completely silent though. He did speak to me through the book of Isaiah, chapter 61;

"The Spirit of the Soverign LORD is on me,
because the LORD has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners,"


I try to be careful about superimposing Old Testament Scriptures onto my own life because they were written for a particular people at a particular time in a particular place, but I really felt like God was saying this to me. I would bring hope and healing and freedom. It really confirmed my passion and dream for Cambodia, and every country experiencing similar circumstances. If only God would tell me when and how.

On my way home I had an interview with an organization in Calgary that works with ex prostitutes and women who have been exploited/abused. I had been leaning towards going in that direction instead of medicine the week prior so I had been expecting the interview to go really well. It wasn't bad, I got the position if I want it, but something just didn't feel right. I had prayed for some sort of affirmation or a sense of "this is where I need to be" but I didn't get that. Something about the whole thing just wasn't sitting right. I don't know if it was just because the organization was not exactly how I had pictured it or if it was God trying to tell me that it was not the right step.

On Thursday I will know if I get into medical school. I am praying that when the time comes I will know what to do. I feel stuck between two very strong desires, one for medicine and one for Cambodia. I don't know which direction to go.