Ashley...this is changing my life...

So I had this revelation a week ago but I've been consumed by it all day today. I'd actually like to share with you a story about a friend of mine.

Approximately 2 years ago, whilst I was living and attending church in Calgary, I was asked to start up a cell group for young-adult women in my church. I guess I prayed about it because I took on the challenge of trying to find girls and coherce commitment from them. It proved to be a difficult challenge what with people avoiding the uncomfortability of an new intimate community type environment. However, within a month or so, my stellar stalker gifting had paid off and I had a regular meeting group of 4 girls from my church. It was then that I met Carrie. Carrie had been raised in the church but had had a very disfunctional growing up, including some very painful circumstances, and after graduating high school left her home town as well as any association with the church or Jesus. The next approx. 8 years were filled with addictions, heartbreak, and deep pain. A couple of months before I started my cell group she started attending my church and reunited with Jesus. So when I approached her to attend the group she was actually really excited and herself and I began meeting usually once a week away from the cell group just to talk about struggles and life. Looking back I still smile at the fact that God put us together. We were not two people that I think would have ran into each other on the street and decided to be friends. But in our hearts we were so alike--both trying to figure out intimacy with Christ and both struggling with deep-rooted identity issues. Anyways, over the year that followed she made huge leaps in breaking off addictions and I can honestly say that there are few people I know who I've seen throw themselves onto Jesus the reckless way she did. Towards the end of the year however, satan really attacked her and she found herself regressing into her old lifestyle. She was so upset with herself for turning back into that stuff and she actually tried to break off ties with our cell group. Unfortunately for satan, I didn't give up on Carrie and as she withdrew, I agressively went after her with Jesus' love. I officially left the cell group a year ago right now, but in one of our last meetings she was sharing with our cell group how she was dabbling again with what had been a really serious addiction. The girls in our group, wanting to lead her in righteousness, really attacked the addiction and her involvement. Carrie had been struggling for so long that being attacked at cell group was really going to break her. I hadn't said anything yet, but I interjected at this point, told the other girls to be quiet, and told Carrie how proud I was of her for coming so far and how much I loved her. I reminded her that she had conquered so much in that year and that she was strong. The few months that followed that, before I left the country, were hard months for her as Jesus just solidified things in her and as she actually broke off the past and cemented herself to Christ. I sat with her many evenings those months, crying with her, praying with her, and believing with her. Until last week I had actually forgotten about that cell group meeting so long ago. Last week, in front of the group, Carrie told me how that moment had changed her life. How my loving her despite her current state of rebellion and addiction had opened her to healing. How my display of grace inspite of her sin had encouraged her to keep fighting. Until last week I had no idea that I had done that. Please don't think I'm great--there were MANY weeks that I absolutely dreaded going to cell group because of the stress. I've since had to repent of my attitude. Everything that changed Carrie's life was Jesus. I've been thinking about this all week and I realized that the reason I offered such love and grace towards Carrie was because I saw her like Jesus did. I probably didn't do such a job with all the others in my group or in my LifeForce team. But my deep deep love for Carrie enabled me to view her sin differently.

I realized today that Jesus looks at our sin differently than we look at it. Please don't misinterpret me--sin was serious enough to require Jesus death and still has potential to seperate us from Him. But I think that's the crucial part of sin that grieves Jesus: that it seperates us from him. He constantly offers out to us His forgiveness, grace, mercy because he views us as His beloved's, who have sinned. Because of my love for Carrie I was able to call out the Jesus in her who had pulled her out of a hopeless life, and that love impacted her. Jesus has far beyond my love for Carrie. And for me. And for you. I've been struggling with the realization that I let down some people on my Lifeforce team and it's been breaking my heart. But I just keep remembering that Jesus looks at me with a love I do not deserve and that from that love I find new mercies everyday. If I can look differently at the sin in the people who I love...how much more differently must Jesus look at it in us whom He loves perfectly.

I've been crying this whole blog just thinking about Carrie and Jesus, but in my tears I feel hope. Hope for loving everyone I meet like Jesus loves them. Hope that I will chase being so abandoned to Christ's love so as to be holy. Hope and not defeat.

Ashley...hiding in my cave...

Ok so I am having a fabulous afternoon. I've just been praising and worshipping and argh...ok well I'm going through a bunch of boxes of mine to see what I want to bring with me for the next 2 months and in addition to realizing that I own way too many books, I am finding myself realizing how far I've come. About an hour ago I found a box of my journals that basically start from when I committed my life to Jesus in 1998 and go till, well now. I skimmed through them and almost started crying at the recurring theme I found. My spirit has always been crying out for more of Jesus. Even in my seasons of doubt, fear, frustration, pain, joy, dreams-realized--my very soul has been desperate to be consumed with Jesus. There have been so many moments in the past months/years that I have felt like I might actually be regressing in my walk towards Jesus, but just realizing that every moment of every day Jesus is still waiting for me, fills me with renewed hope. Let us not lose faith in who Jesus is calling and creating us to be. Let us put our confidence clearly back on the Perfecter. I love that He consistently calls us nearer, consistently offers grace and forgiveness, and consistently opens His own heart to consume ours.

I want to share with you something I wrote on November 13, 2002. (During LifeForce bootcamp, my second year, Africa team) Please do not consider me proud in anything...I share in Paul's confession of being chiefest amongst sinners yet redeemed by Jesus.
"...God just reminded me that He is desperate for my heart--ever corner and ounce of it. He wants me to give up the fear and shame, wich are not of God, and come and meet with Him. To meet with Him the way Moese met with the Lord--with such a commitment and passion to seek God's will and strength in everything He did; to speak with God as a man speaks to his friend. And God promises He will not leave us hanging empty, but as we seek Him with all sincerity from and honest heart, we will see His glorious presence pass before us. There are so many reasons why God wants me to give up not being honest with Him. Being fake and hidden with God brings so many barriers and hinders my relationship with God. It keeps me from really knowing myself and from knowing God. It keeps me from really having to deal with the things that stunt my growth in Jesus. I so long for and desire with all my heart to be intimate with God, but my pulling back from Him restricts intimacy. I want to know my best friend, Father, and Savior in fullness and be continually be made in His likeness, but that is hindered when I am not open to His calling and voice. He wants me to give it up because it causes me pain, and God is unable to pour into a heart of superficialness. My Jesus wants to talk with me and our fellowship is restricted when I lack in responding in truth. He wants me to give it up so my heart will be pure and we will be able to truly draw near to each other. I, Ashley Lynn Neustaeter, am not yet all that I one day will be, but with Jesus Christ intoxicating every fiber of my being, I will press on to win that prize, and meet my best friend at the gates of heaven one day, when this race is done..."

Ack. Pour out your hearts to Jesus. Let our prayer and praise and everything start there. Let's be truly honest and vulnerable before our Jesus. All of a sudden I just want to call every single friend I have and tell them how much I love them...oh Jesus I love you.

Ashley...falling asleep with Him...

"God will fill the hungry because He Himself has stirred up the hunger. As in the case of prayer, when God prepares the heart to pray, He prepares His ear to hear (Ps.10:17). So in the case of spiritual hunger, when God prepares the heart to hunger, He will prepare His hand to fill."--Thomas Watson

Argh. All day long I've been thinking about prayer, and there has been a thought that has just been reverberating through my mind. I was reading quotes and stories about revival and praying and I've been thinking that the greatest thing I can do with my life is be spent in the intimate presence of Jesus Christ. I want to be aware of His presence with me every moment of my life. Whether that be in actual conversation with Him, conversation with others about Him, sharing His gospel, reading the bible, worshipping...there can be no greater meaning to my life. Since last September when I started leading a team with LifeForce God has been really impressing my spirit to pray. I've always had this underlying hunger for intercession but I've never been really great at a consistent practice of it because whenever I start praying I can't stop and that takes so much time. I know that might sound horrible but it's the honesty of my flesh. Then today I wondered why I've fretted about taking so much time to pray. Time away from what? From doing wasteful, meaningless things? When I became a Christian I asked God that He would make my life exciting and that I might be able to play a role in something big that He would accomplish in my lifetime. Over the past 5 months my perception of what that really means has changed. I spent alot of time praying in Trinidad & Tobago for a couple of reasons: Reason #1--I was painfully aware of my shortcomings and as such was desperately realization of my need for Jesus. The frustration, weakness, overwhelmingness, and daily struggles constantly reminded me that I can do nothing without Jesus. My deepest moments of agony are my greatest moments of realizing the power, love and greatness of Jesus, so I am very happy in my weakness because it is there I can most clearly see God. Reason #2--I was surrounded by a prayer warrior, my co-leader Nathan Densley. This guy takes prayer and intimacy with Jesus to a whole different dimension. If anyone has taught me to pray it is him. Everytime I heard him pray, or saw him pray, or was aware that he was praying somewhere, the spirit in me would groan and ache to go spend some time myself with Jesus. I think that's because I knew that He was doing something that was of more worth than a thousand school bookings or a million hands of Rook--I knew that He was experiencing Jesus and I was jeleous to be with Christ myself. I've been away from the team and him for over a month now and he still comes to mind almost once a day when I turn my heart towards communion with Jesus. Seeing him encounter Christ has spurred me on to chase after God with even more commitment and passion and love. Ask God to give you people around you who are zealous for prayer. God will give you what you need to birth and develop passion for His presence.

Something phenomenal is going to happen in my generation--of that I am sure. I don't care if my name is associated with what is to come or not, and quite frankly I hope that it isn't. So long as I can pray with such fervancy and commitment that I can share in the reward that will come to the intercessors who weep and ache and agonize over the lost, abandoned and broken people. There is nothing better, no One better, to abandon my life to.

I didn't mean for this to turn into a sermon...it's just been on my heart all day and for the past couple of weeks. You haven't heard the last of my journey into the heart of prayer...it's beginning to consume me.

Stargazers under the finish line.............Amber

Wahhhoooooo!!! First half marathon is done! It was one of the most amazing experiences in my life! I can't even describe the feelings that came when running with 12,000 other people all over Winnipeg. It was just beautiful! The weather was perfect (rainy and downcast...I hate running in the sun)and there was this real sense of comradity. Got to talk to so many other runners along the way.

But I was really having trouble with my knee this week. On Friday I couldn't even run 5km because my knee was killing me! So I left it until Sunday...and when that morning came, I seriously had no knee troubles what so ever! I guessed that I would finish the race in about 2:30:00 hours but I came in at 2:04:44!!God is so so sooo good! The run wasn't even painful, I could've run longer than the 21km no problem and I even sped up the last 5 km, so I just got to enjoy it even more!! And then I finished the last 800meters with my friend Jay!

So when I got home late last night I was so tired, but so happy. I made a fire in my backyard and tried to do some devotions, but it was werid because none of my pens would work. So I just laid there and waited for the stars with God.

Just like adrenaline makes up for loss of energy...is like the way the Holy Spirit covers me in terms of being prepared for the things of life! After I've done my best, God's grace takes me to the finish line in a way that can only be described as supernatural!

Oh boy......Amber

This week at the drop in centre we spent most of the days cementing our walk way and new BASKETBALL COURT!! As much as I'm overwhelmed with joy about having my favorite sport being present at my favorite place in Stonewall...there were more interesting things than that this week.

I was amazed at what happened when they guys started cementing...all of a sudden the boys who have been the hardest to deal with and love (including one guy who was arrested a couple of months ago) were getting their hands dirty and helping! All week these guys just worked and sweated together and it was really neat to watch the older men teach the younger guys. It was like some kind of automatic reaction that I wasn't expecting.

I like that stuff. It's so cool to watch......

Live for today and dream for tommorrow......Amber

A few blogs ago I published a passage from a book that I was reading. It was a dialogue between an older man to a younger man who was about to start a journey. It hit me so hard when I read it but I didn't really know why, so I didn't comment on it.

But now I've been asking myself over and over again..."have I learned all that I need to know ?" MORE PREPARATION!! Will I be ready for this exam on Saturday? Have I been organized enough to run this summer program? Have I prepared enough to be ready to enter into my hardest year of school this fall? Have I trained hard enough to finish the half marathon on Sunday? Will I finish the race God has put me on...then there are more personal questions that I"m asking myself. What is the state of my heart in regards to things present and past...Is it still soft enough to be broken by what breaks His Heart?

Since when did I plan life?! I enjoyed life so much better when I only had to react it. Acting on instinct and seeing where that lead me. Now I spend months planning and praying over ideas and dreams of ideas; investing into what God is doing in this community has made it hard to walk away. It's become a part of who I am...whether that is right or wrong.

Anyways...am I ready? That's a question that has been hard because where is the line between performance and grace? Like performance is never the answer and no matter how perpared a person can be for something...he/she can't be prepared for EVERYTHING. Then you can't sit around, be lazy and do nothing and abuse grace. To be responsible with what God has give you is important!I'm just having trouble finding the balance and I'm not sure if I've been completely responsible with the task at hand just because I have no idea what I'm doing!! hah! How much is determined by me being prepared and how much is determined by God's grace alone? Sorry...all i have are questions tonight.

But God knows my heart and it goes back to the fact that He loves these kids a million times more than me; He has things prepared. :)

Top 5 favorites of this week:

1) Russian man at the driver's examination centre
2) Watching birds splash around in puddles with Jo (birds are such nicer creatures when they aren't swooping).
3) Sitting under the blow dryer at the Y for like 15 mintues and thinking about nothing else but how nice it feels.
4) A surprising story of redemption from an "almost" stranger while doing erans (took 1.5 hours to get a movie!)
5) Late-night-long-distance phone conversations

Amen...Jesus I love You....

Ash...everyday is a winding road...

Delete delete delete. How many times can I start the first line of a blog and then delete it? It's not that I have nothing to say...I'd say it's a combination of having a mosaic of thoughts in my head and icy cold typing fingers. So in the last 4 weeks I have been in 3 different provinces, slept in 6 different towns in 8 different beds, and I'm finally figuring out what Jesus was up to in taking me all over the place. The fog of frustration finally started clearing on Sunday. I went up onto a mountain and stood by this lake as a huge thunderstorm was coming in. The wind became furious and clouds were rushing towards me and all of a sudden I remembered the one thing that my flesh keeps forgetting--I am free. Freedom. I let confusion, the fear of disappointing people, fear of disappointing myself, chain me. So in the last half a week I've been getting who I really am back in the game. I've started drawing and writing again, I've put my charming confidence back on (ha--I threw charming in to encourage myself that my confidence is a good thing), and I've remembered how beautiful reckless abandonment is in the eyes of Jesus. It's all good. I'm really getting excited for this summer of camp and Street Invaders, and I'm getting SO excited about Winnipeg.

I am not afraid to be poor.
I am not afraid to be unveiled.
I am not afraid to be vulnverable.
I am not afraid to live in the unknown.

I am not afraid to live fearlessly.

What a strange blog this blog eh? It just kind of came out of me. What are things in your life that are keeping you chained? What are you now unafraid of?

Ahhha hahahaha.....Amber

I couldn't resist! boy do I love coffee, but aparently I'm not addicted....

You Are a Frappacino

At your best, you are: fun loving, sweet, and modern At your worst, you are: childish and over indulgent You drink coffee when: you're craving something sweet Your caffeine addiction level: low

What Kind of Coffee Are You?

Prayer in the Health Care System......Amber

It is Wednesday night and I think that I've finally recovered from the paper that caused me to stay up all night this past Monday. I'm taking a course in Anthropolgy of Illness and this was just supposed to be a short 10-12 page essay. I got to choose the topic and my course covers a lot of social and cultural issues of healthcare; issues such as witchcraft, shamanism, and a lot of alternative medicines.

So I thought that the effect of prayer and faith in the healthcare system would be a really good topic to use. Interesting and a really good conversation starter. But it had to be an academic paper...which meant that I can't use my own ideas and everything has to be from a peer reviewed journal. It's almost like a scientific view on prayer.

Then there was one article where the author Kevin Masters talks about how prayer has failed in the world of science, but that we shouldn't be using science to even discuss the area of prayer. He says it better...

"The basic premise of science is the functioning of a mechanistic and predictable world but the basic premise of the Biblical deity is that God acts according to God's own purposes and is not constrained by physical limits. God is metaphysical, science is physical. Natural processes are the proper domain of sciene but supernatural processes are the domain of theology" -Masters, 2005: 274

Not being able to write what's on your heart about a topic that is extremely meaningful to you...proves to be very frustrating. This paper on "prayer" caused me to spend most of the night praying about prayer and how God wanted to put this paper together. I restarted my paper at so many times that at 11pm, my computer screen was still blank.

But God is so good! And I was really encouraged to be reminded that God cannot be put into a formula and figured out. That you can't use the natural to predict His actions because He works in the Supernatural. That even the limits of the natural are like nothing to Him because He made the natural. Faith is a strange thing

"Reason is always a kind of brute force; those who appeal to the head rather than the heart, however pallid and polite, are necessarily men of violence. We speak of 'touching' a man's heart, but we can do nothing to his head but hit it."
-G.K. Chesterton

This may sound bad but I've always seemed to be more of a "feeler" than a "thinker", but I think that it's become more even over the years. I would've loved to write in my paper all of the amazing experiences in prayer I've had and how it's changed my life, but I couldn't.

Is Ignorance a Cop out?!........Amber

It feels that there has been only one phrase that has been running through my head this past week. "I don't know". Whether I'm saying it to myself in my car, to God in my devotions or to a friend that I'm venting to....that has been the theme of this week.

I don't know.
I dunno.
No clue.
God, You know

I guess that life does go on even if you don't have everything figured out. For some reason I'm convinced that I must have the answers to every question in order for life to happen "the way it's supposed to". Even if that answer is, "well you just have to rely on faith"...that's an answer in itself. Something for me to wrap my mind around. There will always be uncharted territory for us to explore and questions with answers that remain unattainable.

I have been accused of both not thinking and thinking too much. But this week God has just been releasing me from the burden of figuring things out. That's really the only way to describe it. With the drop in centre, family, different relationships, the process of restoration, leadership....I suppose that ignorance is a werid sort of bliss...or is it a cop out?! I'm not sure yet. But I do know that the more I find out the more I know I don't know. I'm not sure why that still surprises me.

"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else." -C.S. Lewis

I think I'm done this blog but I'm way too sore and burnt to move....

Ash...on the road again...

Well this probably won't come as a surprise but I'm going away for a couple of weeks. This all happened so fast that it's as surprising to write as it is to realize. I'm leaving this afternoon to go to Moose Jaw for the weekend to help my friend Cher with renovating her home/yard, then on Monday night I'm going to Regina to sleep in the airport and then I'm flying to Abbotsford, BC for 2 weeks. This is quite unexpected, but my grandparents asked me to go to BC to help out my aunt--which mostly means playing with Katje and Pieter, the two cutest kids on the face of the planet. I'm actually happy to do it since I don't have to pay for it and because it's not like I have any pressing business here...maybe this is why I've been hanging out around here. God is good. I'll let you know how it all goes.

Oh also, my friend Greg wrote this great blog on prayer and it really inspired me so please go read it: emericksheat.blogspot.com

Ok. Later...Amber, I miss you and love you!