I'm broken and I'm colder than her

The much anticipated week of Isaiah is over halfway done with. Am I caught up with my homework? No. Am I hurting a lot? Yes. Is Isaiah a crazy book? Most definitely. So far it is my favorite prophet. It is huge though, and can seem overwhelming to the untrained eye, but to the almost veteran SBSer it's a happily welcomed challenge! This week did not start out on the right foot however. I woke up early Monday morning, excited and ready to tackle this giant book of sin, judmgent, and restoration however I received an e-mail from my mother informing me of my Grandpa's passing just the night before. It was not the happiest news to wake up to the first day of Isaiah, but I was okay. I did not have much time to dwell on this information, so I did okay the first two days of the week. Yesterday however I was reminded of school fees due by Friday, of which I have no money to offer. I also was reminded of a credit card payment past due. Two very overwhelming things stacked on top of the grief of my grandfather passing away and the burden of Isaiah's assignments. I tried to sit down to start my homework for the day yesterday, but stared blankly at the page and decided I needed to pray. I went up to my empty room and then the rivers of tears flowed. Oh how they flowed. I finally had time to mourn and express my feelings to the Lord. After a while of sobbing and crying out to God I picked myself up, well, God helped pick me up, and then I went to my school leader to just share what is going on in my head and my heart this week. He said he could not do much, but he could push back the school fee deadline for me and that would relieve some of the stress. Then, he prayed for me which was wonderful. In times like this especially, I need prayer, and I am the type of person who doesn't ask for it even when I desperately need it. I don't know why I do that, but I just don't ask.

So, to conclude my seemingly awful day yesterday, it started of okay, climaxed into an outburst of emotion and tears, then quietly concluded in a peaceful, restful even evening.

Today I look forward to more teaching on Isaiah and cannot wait until lunch when I'm free to work on homework until the deadline Saturday evening.

This weekend I am so excited to go to Pune and stay with my dear friend Karen for one of the final times before she goes to Jaipur to staff a DTS. This means I won't see her again before I go home, but I am so excited for her to staff this DTS! I also will be making tacos with Merete my Norwegian counter-part on Sunday! We have some friends here who have never eaten tacos before. Can you believe that? So, we hope that the sole import grocery store in Pune has all the ingredients needed like taco seasoning and sour cream. Fingers crossed. Also, Sunday seems to be the Norwegian National Day, so we'll also be indulging in some ice cream and donning some sweet Norwegian flag pins. Excellent.

Pray for finances. I need $353 in one month. God will provide. Will he use YOU?

Pray that I would invite the Holy Spirit into my assignments so I don't just go through the motions of charting and I would actually experience God in these assignments. I realized I have been doing them out of my own strength the past few weeks, and I want to only do them out of God's strength. With his insight, not my own.

I feel as if God is stripping everything away from me so that for the first time in my life I really only have him to lean on. It reminds me of Isaiah where he says over and over again that he simply wants Israel to rely only on him and not other nations to save them. It's like the same with me. I have no money, I get no rest, food is not nourishing, and I have lost myself in the Bible most days of the week, but my mind has lost itself in worry and doubt. I need prayer of focus and desire to invite God into sharing my assignment load.

Also, if you wish, you can throw a party on Sunday because then I'll be free of the burden of Isaiah. It's a wonderful burden to carry and I am certainly seeing many, many characteristics of God, but it's just overwhelming to basically write your own commentary on the entire Bible in 9 months, and 7.5 months into it makes a girl go a little crazy.

Sorry there haven't been many pictures in awhile. I still have not received the camera in the mail and am actually a little worried since they sent it well over a month ago. Pray that it arrives safe and sound soon.