Nuns on the River

Apparently, that's what the name "Nuneaton" stands for. Nuns. On a river. There used to be a covent in the area...near a river, I presume... The details are all pretty foggy, as I was told them yesterday, in a car, en route to the YWAM King's Lodge base after a full day of travel, meetings, and waiting around Euston station, London, for three and a half hours.

I also now know why it's called "luggage". I did more lugging over the past three days than I ever wanted to accomplish in a lifetime. I have huge muscles now. I'm a tank.

Staying with Sarah was, so far, the highlight of my trip to the UK - not merely because I was downtown London (and, as we all know, I heart the city) but because of how strongly God managed to (again) hijack my carefully scheduled plans and surprise me with gifts, dreams, visions, prayer, coincidences, and information. Scrumptious.

After visiting with Mark, Paul and Neil in Kingston (involved with something called Street Pastors in Kingston, as well as a few other incredible community-oriented initiatives) on Thursday, I took a train, subway, and another train to Nuneaton...with a three and a half hour stopover at Euston station, London. Ask me how unfun that was.

Now, at King's Lodge, I'm doing a lot of what I was doing at Holmsted which is a whole lot of nothing. Well, productively speaking. I'm responding to emails, loading pictures (check out my site for the London album, recently added), journalling, and praying.

London Calling

I've moved yet again. I'm now situated in the region of Earl's Court tube station, central London. I'm staying with a great girl named Sarah Smith, whom I just met last Saturday. I have yet to meet Mark Rodger, who "introduced" us (via email) - that, most likely, will take place on Thursday in Kingston. Such is my current state of transience. I heart it!

The following has occurred in the past 24 hours:

• I departed Shay and Duncan's home in Roehampton to catch the bus and subway to Old Street tube station.
• I located the London Boiler Room [aside: if you are not already aware of the 24/7 Prayer movement that is currently rocking the UK, please take a moment now to school yourself]. Get this: it's on the corner of Worship and Tabernacle streets, down the road from The Prophet and The Angel pubs, and in the general area that John Wesley was when God stirred things up in the 18th century...God has a sense of humour, hm?
• I was able to meet with Jude Smith, the "abbess" of the London Boiler Room, over tea, to discuss the push we have both been feeling (and the similarities between TACF, 24/7 Prayer, and YWAM's new visions). Jude's quote: "Aslan's on the move." Nicely put.
• Sarah Smith, two others named Sandy (works for London's clubbing industry) and Simon, and myself joined in prayer for the clubbing prayer/worship dream that God has put on Sarah's heart and many others'. Lots of confirmations, shared sentiments, identical verses, and other links. God is so creative and amazing!
• Sarah and I came back to her apartment (where I will be staying until Thursday) and, as I was getting ready for bed, she tucked a copy of Pete Greig's book Red Moon Rising, which I was told about by Rhonda Puddle (get THIS: Rhonda works at and attends TACF, and I know her from YWAM Cambridge...is this fun, or what?) just days before I left for the UK, under the blankets of the spare bed for me. Inscription: "To Sarah H, with much love from Sarah S". Did I mention that I just met Sarah three days ago?
• I then discovered that the foreward in Red Moon Rising was written by...Floyd McClung. Renowned YWAMer. I had to laugh.

Exhausted, after having lugged my suitcase up three flights of stairs (66 steps...I counted today) to Sarah's flat, I fell asleep completely overwhelmed by the wonder and excitement of the life God has blessed me with.

Have fun clicking on all those links!

Blog Tag

Sweeping the blogging nation....

4 jobs I have held:

1. Hostess for a fancy Italian restaurant in the Beaches, Toronto. Fun job, until one of the employees approached me asking for a loan in order to skip town to Mexico in order to avoid the cops who were after him in regards to a deal involving fire arms and plutonium.
   
2. Worked at a bakery. It went under. Was hired by another bakery. It, too, went under. Decided I was bad luck for bakeries.
   
3. Event Coordinator for the Television Bureau of Canada.
   
4. TESL teacher for Korean children.
   

4 movies I can watch over and over:

1. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
   
2. Amelie
3. Anne of Green Gables
   
4. The Matrix
   

4 places I have lived:

1. Newmarket, Ontario.
   
2. West Sussex, England.
   
3. India.
4. Pyongchon, South Korea.
   

4 TV shows I love to watch:

1. Friends
2. Sex & The City (don't judge me...I love the fashion...and Aidan Shaw)
   
3. Seinfeld
4. Lost
   

4 places I have been on vacation:

1. New York, New York.
   
2. Montreal, Quebec.
   
3. Frenchtown, New Jersey.
   
4. Fort Myers, Florida.

Strange how the countries I go to for ministry purposes are much more exotic than the places I go for "vacation"...

4 of my favourite dishes:

1. Swiss Chalet chicken.
   
2. Pad thai.
   
3. Sushi (yes, AJ, raw fish is where it's at...).
   
4. Big, thick, fat, juicy steak.
   

4 websites I like to visit daily:

1. Google.
   
2. Nik's blog.
   
3. Andrea's blog.
   
4. apple.com/trailers
   

4 places I would rather be right now:

1. Queen Street West, Toronto.
   
2. On the beach of Koh Samet, Thailand.
   
3. In my kitchen with my mom, drinking tea.
   
4. In Kate's car, driving...anywhere.
   

4 people I am tagging:

1. Andrea Schaaf.
2. Nikolas Delic.
   
3. Andrew Rennie.
4. You.

Leave a comment here of your blog link if you end up doing this...it will be fun to read others' answers.

Go together like a horse and carriage...

Love and marriage. Children. More children. It's all quite nice to say, think, even feel that we want these things but I'm reminded of a scene in Lost In Translation that made me think differently for the first time:


BOB: ...it gets complicated when you have kids... that changes everything.

CHARLOTTE: That's too scary.

BOB: When they're born it's like Vietnam. It's terrifying.

CHARLOTTE: No one ever tells you that...

Some questions of my own have been surfacing since getting a front row seat to my friend's marital/parental life, which include:

• How do you take a shower with a two-year-old, awake, running through the house?
• What does discipline look like?
• Who does the laundry, the dishes, the bills?
• Do you ever have a spare moment to yourself for sixteen, eighteen, twenty (or, in my parents' case: thirty) years, as your children grow up and, eventually, move out?

Or, forget children for a moment, and let's focus on marriage alone. I mean, you're adding another human being to your life. To everything you do. As Penelope Cruz' character, Sophia, in Vanilla Sky says, "Holy God. This is going to change my life in a zillion different ways. I must be nuts."

Or, in The Way of the World by Congreve (thanks, Nik):

My dear liberty, shall I leave thee?  My faithful solitude,
my darling contemplation, must I bid you then adieu?  Ay-h,
adieu.  My morning thoughts, agreeable wakings, indolent
slumbers, all ye DOUCEURS, ye SOMMEILS DU MATIN, adieu.
I can't do't, 'tis more than impossible.

Perhaps it is because I didn't jump the gun at twenty, and get married when emotions and hormones were high and logic was at an all-time low (not with everyone, but definitely the case with me), that my logic now outweighs my emotions and hormones? Why does it suddenly irk me to think that I might reach a stage in my life where I can not shrink away to read in a corner, or go see a film, or travel the world; that to do so would be irresponsible?

Thoughts, anyone?

That's my King. Do you know Him?

Yoinked from Andrew Gazaneo's blog is THIS tasty little bit of streaming audio. It's like old-school freestyling...

Step of Faith

Horses are much stronger than me...

I'm staying at my friend, Shay's, house in London, England. Shay and her husband, Duncan, have a two-year-old named Jayda. I, therefore, have been enrolled in a crash-course in Life With A Toddler 101.

Jayda has a non-stop vocabulary (first born girls...we're speaking from day one), so I've taught her to say "evidently". She says it now. We're working on "superfluous". For the most part, she toddles around the house, engaging anyone and anything she finds in conversation. Mum, dad, me, a crayon, her Paddington bear doll. For a Canadian's ears, her developing British accent provides extra entertainment.

She has four books, in a series, which are each about a different farm animal: horse, cow, chicken and sheep. Disconcertingly enough, the chicken book states, and I quote:

Chickens are much smaller than me...
They say "cock-a-doodle-do!"
I can say that too, can you?

Which is erroneously leading the child to believe that chickens, and not roosters, say cock-a-doodle-do. And, as I have been recently researching, this would be a grave mistake to make in many fundamental evangelical denominations of the West. What would Paul have to say about chickens crowing, hm? The things they teach kids these days...

I must now go and answer the pressing question, "What's doggie doing?"