I'm Back

Hey guys,

Sorry I've been gone for so long. Actually, it's probably only been three weeks. I don't think that I'll be able to blog twice a week. When you're in a class room every morning for lecture, then spend pretty much the rest of your day doing homework, you don't really have the time.

Anyway, I will be posting my Basic Required Information (BRIs) for all of the books of the Bible. I will be posting them in the order that I wrote them. It's just info on the book, like when it was written, to whom and by whom, etc. They're really useful for inductive Bible study.

It Begins

These past few days have been intense. My brain feel like mush, but the good kind of mush. The intelligent kind, not the kind you get after watching Spongebob. :)
We've gone over the book of Genesis and our homework for this week was to write a BRI (Basic Required Information). A BRI is basically a history paper on the book of the Bible that we are studying at the time. We have to gather information on the author, the OA (Original Audience), who are the people in the 'story,' the OR (Original Reader), who are the people the book is written to, the culture of the time, etc. It's intense, but once you get the hang of it, it's easy.
I'll try my best to post them as soon as they are graded.

I discovered something that blew my mind earlier.
Genesis 4--Cain is a sociopath.
With that in mind go read that story...

In the Beginning...

In the beginning...
That phrase is used a lot in the Bible. And now it's sort of my theme for this CSBS. I was reading my Bible this morning and I wasn't really paying attention to where I was reading so my Bible was just open to Genesis 1. Then that first verse that almost everyone knows caught my eye. In the beginning... Beginning is what really stood out to me. I feel like this will be the beginning of the best chapter of my life. I was also really scared. Scared that I wasn't actually supposed to be here. Scared that I wouldn't actually understand anything that we learn. Scared that I would fail at this. We were talking about our feelings about the upcoming months and I shared this with my group, which also happened to be two people from my DTS, Kate and Derek. They were really good at encouraging me, and then I had some time to pray about it. God said to relax. And so relax is what I'll do. I'll let God carry me all the way through the next 9 months and see what happens.

Settling In...Again

Last night, a girl from Sweden arrived. Her name is Emilie. Today, Emilie, Eva, Jill (one of our staff), and I went to Target to pick up some needed items. When we got home, one of the guys and two more girls were here. It's so weird being back. I don't think it's hit me yet. Anyway, I still have my own room right now. Kate and Derek from my DTS get here sometime today. I'm very, very excited for tomorrow, when everyone is here and we all meet each other and become a family.

I got to see Emily from my DTS today. Actually she's sitting in the computer lab behind me.  Eve, my roomie, is here too, but I haven't seen her yet. I'm hoping to see her at dinner or something.

I started a diet today. I realized that I need to be in shape for the next season of my life. I think a lot of this realization came from realizing that I'm worth something. I downloaded an app for my Kindle Fire called LoseIt! It counts your calories and tracks you exercise and helps set your goals. My goal weight it still far away, but it has me there by 25 May, 2013.

I hope to be able to post at least twice a week to keep you updated as much as possible.

Peace.

Safely Arrived

I made it safely to the base. Since I'm here so early, I can't stay in the trailer for CSBS. I have to stay in the Mission Builders trailer, since I'm considered a Mission Builder right now. I can move into the CSBS trailer on Saturday. There is a girl from Germany, Eva, who has been here for four days now. She's also doing the CSBS. We're sharing a room right now, in the MB trailer. I'm not sure whether we will share a room in the other trailer or not. From what I can tell, we get to choose what rooms we're in.


I was talking to Katlyn (from my DTS), who's on staff here now, about how I need to find an apartment here in the LA area. She said that she does to, so we might end up getting an apartment together. Emily (also from my DTS) lives in Burbank now, and had sketchy housemates, so Katlyn said that she might want to share with us, if we end up getting an apartment together. Which is great, because it will, obviously, make the rent cheaper if it's split three ways.


Anyway, I'm really excited about life after CSBS, and during, as well.


That is all.

8 Days

As you all know, I am doing a CSBS with YWAM LA. Mom was able to pay off the first quarter, but there are still three other quarters that will have to be paid off by the beginning of each quarter.  Then there is the issue of doing my laundry. The base is not able to have machines on base for the students, except in rare cases, so we have to do our laundry off base at a nearby Laundromat, which cost money. There are times that we will be out doing ministry, and will be out for a long time. Most of the time, ministry times will go longer than planned or expected, bringing about the need to eat a meal out. Since these are unplanned moments, the base is unable to pay for the meals, since it wasn’t budgeted. So the students have to pay for their own meals. Most of the time, several students will put their money together to be able to pay for a larger meal that they share. There are times when a student doesn’t have a large group of people who they know will be able to support them, both spiritually and financially, so we, as a family, will all try to pitch in and help in any way we can. So there are a lot of reasons that YWAMers need to be supported.

If you feel led to send money for my tuition, you can send it through this website:

http://payments.ywamla.org/

If you want to send money for any other reason, you can put it into my PayPal account. The email address for it is chefmadelinebelle@yahoo.com. Or if you don’t have a PayPal account, you can send it to my wonderful mother, who will put it into my account.

If you just want to send me an email, the address is MadelineBHendley@gmail.com

This coming year is going to be awesome. I can feel it. I don’t know what is in store for me, but it’s going to be great. I’m excited for it, and ready to be in a new chapter of my life. I also get to see several of my DTS friends, as some of the staff from my DTS will be staffing my CSBS, Katlyn, and Viktor are on staff on the LA base, although I don’t think that they are staffing CSBS, Kate and Derek will be my classmates again.

I want to thank you all again, for being my loyal followers, even when I haven’t been blogging as much as I could have been.

Memory

Yesterday, I found out one of my closest friends was killed the day before at the hotel she worked at. I was shocked. She lived in a small town in Oregon, whose biggest event each year was a rodeo. “A real wild, wild west town,” was how she described it to me.

Even if you were meeting Amyjane Nicole Brandhagen for the first time, she was immediately your best friend and you loved her like a sister. She was the warmest, kindest person you could ever hope to meet. She always did her best to cheer you up when you were down, to hang out with the people who were by themselves.  She had a huge heart for God, and was always talking about how she wished she could do more and more for Him. During our DTS, she would schedule weekend ‘soak sessions,’ where she and whoever wanted to come would sit for hours in the Prayer Chapel, praying and soaking up God.

Whenever Amyjane was around, there was never a dull moment. She was the life of the party, easy to laugh with, and easy to love. There’s no way anyone who knew her could ever forget her.  

I know that right now, she’s dancing and painting and laughing at the feet of Jesus, and she’s happier than she was here on Earth.

Dedicated To:

Amyjane Nicole Brandhagen

1992-2012