:: Rest ::

Last night, RJ and I had the wonderful treat of visiting the San Marcos Summer Training Program. We got to catch up with some of our students, my bro, and staff, meet new faces, and sit through one of their large group nights. Oh wait, and did I forget to mention partake in like four games of Werewolf???  (Think Mafia, for those of you who are unfamiliar with Werewolf. It was totally the game of summer 2009).

Anyways, Tim Chou led a discussion on rest, which I TOTALLY needed! As per my last post, last quarter was THE hardest, THE most trying quarter for me, academically, emotionally, and physically. Now RJ totally called me out as a hypocrite, since I am usually on him, other staff, and students for not resting enough (I am referred to as the “Rest Nazi” in my little Nav circle), but I definitely did not take adequate time to rest for myself at ALL last quarter. And I definitely felt it.

One of the passages we read came from Genesis 2, when God takes a Sabbath day and declared it holy after creating the world and everything in it. One of the students wondered out loud whether He did that for Himself, or if He did that for the rest of us, to have an example of what it looks like to rest and the necessity of rest. I am still wondering about that today! I mean, it is not as though God is weak, in that He has infinite strength and power. But it means a lot to me that God, the one who makes the world run and keeps everything in harmony, even God took a day off to admire the beauty of His creation. Who am I to think the world will not keep running if I take time to rest? And how much beauty have I missed out on and failed to appreciate because I have not taken the time to slow down and look for it?

The second passage we read was Psalm 127:1-2, which says, “Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.”

Verse 2 particularly stands out to me, probably because I love descriptive phrases. They just help me understand biblical concepts better. =) But how many times have I sacrificed sleep this quarter, staying up late and waking up early just to get things done? How many days have I eaten the bread of anxious toil, allowing myself to be sustained by worry? Yuckers! That is no way to live! I just imagine that the bread of anxious toil is like an extra sour sourdough, except totally not delicious and making you feel completely sick afterwards. But that is what I have been doing! I have been rejecting the pure and wholesome rest God offers and choosing to sustain myself with worry, choosing to labor in vain. How would this quarter have looked differently if I had trusted God, if I had taken Him at His word that rest is a gift rather than a hindrance from getting things done? I probably would have been a LOT happier, a LOT more positive, better able to bless others, able to see the beauty around me, etc.

I am totally finding in my week off that I don’t know how to rest, like I have forgotten how to! I am already working on assignments for some of my summer classes, stuffing my face with this bread of anxious toil. STOPPPP, Alice!! I mean, luckily it hasn’t been a complete bust. Here are some things I HAVE done to rest thus far:

1. Massage/facial. Thank you, Groupon!

2. Conquered New Super Mario Brothers for Wii with RJ…along with the secret world!

3. Binging on Netflix and Lost

4. X-Men First Class date with RJ!

5. Visited the kiddos at STP and got my Werewolf on.

6. Started working with my guy, Shaun T and Insanity again! Hopefully I’ll get rid of some of the grad school hips. =P

It’s kind of a bummer that I’m thinking about these things AFTER the quarter from hell is over, but luckily, I still have summer session and three more quarters to test out God’s theory on rest. I will update you and let you know if He’s right! =)

:: Planning vs. God’s Sovereignty ::

Getting to work and class on time is a serious crap shoot. I can either be 25 minutes early or 15 minutes late, which is why I just leave 40 minutes early, even though it could potentially be a 15 minute drive. If I get there early, then I just get some time with the Lord, so I win either way.

Anyways, I came upon this passage earlier last week from Proverbs 3:21-26, and have been thinking about it since. This comes from the NLT, which I’m not a super huge fan of, but do read occasionally.

“My child, don’t lose sight of good planning and insight. Hang on to them, for they will fill you with life and bring you honor and respect. They keep you safe on your way and keep your feet from stumbling. You can lie down without fear and enjoy pleasant dreams. You need not be afraid of disaster or the destruction that comes upon the wicked, for the Lord is your security. He will keep your foot from being caught in a trap.”

I like this passage, because it reminds me that it’s important to plan. Now, I’m not a J by any means (Myer’s Briggs) but as I’ve matured and grown up, I’ve realized that it’s not just good to plan but  even beneficial for my well-being to go into situations with some plan, even if God decides to go another route. By having some plan, I’m not scrambling around last minute and can focus on the task at hand better, rather than being distracted with thinking about what I need to do, if that makes any sense. This verse has helped me as I’ve thought through what I wanted to accomplish in a family therapy session last week, but remains applicable for everything.

Now the flip side is that my rest and security is ultimately in God’s sovereignty. The point isn’t to plan so rigidly so as to prevent God from working through me, but to hold my plans with an open hand for God to bless or take away. My security is in God, not my plan. But peace also comes from planning. Confusing? Yah, I’ve had to wrestle my way through thinking about this too.  :-)

:: Freed to Freer ::

[Lucky you guys!  You get two posts in two days!]

 

“Through you I am saying to the prisoners of darkness, ‘Come out! I am giving you your freedom!‘ They will be my sheep, grazing in green pastures and on hills that were previously bare.

They will neither hunger nor thirst.  The searing sun and scorching desert winds will not reach them anymore. For the Lord in his mercy will lead them beside cool waters.

And I will make my mountains into level paths for them. The highways will be raised above the valleys.

Sing for joy, O heavens! Rejoice, O earth! Burst into song, O mountains! For the Lord has comforted his people and will have compassion on them in their sorrow.“

Isaiah 49:9-11, 13

 

I came across this passage yesterday in my time with God (can you tell Isaiah is my fav book  of the Bible?).  It reminded me of why I wanted to go back to school to get my Master’s in Marital and Family Therapy, even why I went into ministry in the first place.

God, in His grace, has freed me from so much captivity: captivity to an eating disorder, captivity to depression, captivity to anxiety, captivity to negative thinking, captivity to negative behaviors, captivity to obsessive compulsiveness…so much darkness and barrenness in my life.  In this passage He calls those previously freed to become the freers. How can I read this and not respond??  How can I be so unbelievably freed and just watch others drown in captivity??

My prayer is that this passage would reflect who I am as a therapist, that God would use my life to free others, to lead them to LIFE abundant, to lead them to His goodness.

:: Psst…. ::

As I trotted out to my mailbox (and I can say MY mailbox!), I came back with three letters. One from a mortgage insurance company…TRASH! Another from a friend who was precious enough to send us a Thanksgiving card…thanks Kristen, we LOVED it! And yet another, with no return address but a thick wad of cash inside and a little card inside that said, “RJ and Alice Matagora, The Navigators” and the other side, “Ecclesiastes, the whole book.” My first thought was, WHaaaaaaA?? My second one was, how did someone not pocket this along the way??

One of the things I LOVE about being on staff with the Navigators is witnessing all the unique ways God provides for us through others, whether it’d be forcing me to save money myself so I have enough for hospital bills, financial grants for school, or random acts of kindness through unmarked envelopes in the mail.

I wish we knew who our secret admirer is, but as they gave us no hints (though we know they’re from Eugene!), I hope they’ll read this and know that RJ and I are SO thankful for your generosity! SO SO thankful!

:: God in the Hizzouse ::

Ways we have seen God in the house-hunting process:

1.  God moving us to Riverside, CA, the only place in CA we could afford a decent house with a mortgage equal to or less than what we’d pay for rent for an apartment.

2.  Obama passing the $8000 first time homebuyer credit, even giving us a CHANCE at becoming homebuyers after one year of marriage…I had long wrote off the possibility!

3.  Joe passing along the message about a real cheap condo on sale.  Though we didn’t bite, it got the wheels in our heads spinning as to what actually could be possible.

4.  Hooking us up with sibs that make a ton of cash and would lend us the $8000 for a downpayment.  Definitely not talking about Timmy.

5.  Originally, it looked like we needed RJ’s parents to co-sign on our mortgage, which they graciously agreed to, because RJ’s employment history wasn’t long enough and the way Navs works is that if the wife was on staff before marriage, she gets the pink slip making it look like I just lost my job on paper, though I worked 4 years prior with Navs.  We began our part in May, got the full loan application done in August.  It was kind of disappointing that we’d have to have co-signers, you know, feeling like we’re still kids who need help from their parents, but then a couple weeks ago, our loan officer said she could probably do our loan without the parents!  Which leads to…

6.  God’s timing in the house hunt.   Our ideal timeline was to close on a place by August when our lease ended and get moved in before the school year started.  Not needing RJ’s parents on the loan meant we really didn’t need to wait so long to search and put an offer in.  In retrospect, we really believe it was God’s way of making us wait for the house He wanted us to have and not settling for less than His best just to make our own timeline happen.

7.  I always had my heart set on a little house, but we weren’t sure of the safety of the neighborhoods in our price range and by campus, and so we really thought we’d end up in a cute little condo.  When we were searching though, the condos were just disgusting, in horrible shape, really disappointing.  RJ and I would have had to put in $5000-$8000 up front just to make it liveable, which we don’t have.  I remember thinking, ugh, we’re buying a place that is a dump, is this worth it??  Plus an extra $230/month in HOA fees equals about our rent.  We started considering houses after visiting a bunch of condos in bad condition, and stumbled upon our house.  We drove by and felt safer than we expected in the neighborhood, and decided to officially take a look.

8.  Our realtor said inventory last year at this time was 3000 houses.  This year it is 400.  That means there are a LOT of buyers fighting over a few houses.  When we submitted our offer at market value, there was another one $15,000 higher, plus 6 other offers.  I think RJ and I had to emotionally detach ourselves from the house, but lo and behold, a couple weeks later, our realtor calls and says the highest bidder dropped their bid, and it was down to our offer and two others.  Eventually, ours was chosen, which was CRAZY!  A lesson learned in believing and trusting God for impossible things.  I definitely wrote off the house.

9.  The house is less than two miles from campus, an easy bike ride!

10.  Interest rates have dipped below 5%!  Our realtor had suggested we lock it in, and so I called our loan officer, who said it was still at 5%, which is still AMAZING.  The next day, she called me and asked if I wanted to lock in, because it had dipped to 4.87% overnight!  And she told us a week later that it had gone back above 5% after that day.

11.  Escrow can be a long process, especially for FHA loans.  Part of the stipulation was to try to close by October 29th, which would have been a 30 day escrow period, I think.  FHA are usually at least 45 days.  Our loan officer, who is off the hizzy, got our loan done in about 20 days.  Sande Wilson with Provident Bank.  She is awesome, and a feisty, sassy lady, really good with homebuying noobs like us.

12.  Closing on a home before the November 30th first time homebuyer deadline for this year. We’re cutting it close!

13.  Last year, they had a first time homebuyer credit of $7500, which taxpayers had to pay back over a span of 10 years or something.  This year’s tax credit is a straight $8000 refund, meaning we don’t have to pay it back!

14.  The location of the house is an up and coming location, right across the street from the new site of the UCR Medical School, which is required to open by 2012.  This means that the home value is anticipated to jump up another $100,000-$200,000, allowing us to have a decent down payment for a future house when we move from Riverside.

15.  An amazing realtor, who believes in the work RJ and I are doing with Navs and will be using part of his commission to put back into our new home in the form of garage roof repairs.  Bill O’Rafferty with Trademark Realtors.  He sold Brandon and Kristin their house, Joe and Joy their house, and Lee and Debbie their condo in Riverside, where Los is living now. He’s like the Nav realtor here! =)

16. The inside was in move-in ready condition, and though the price was higher, not having an HOA makes it about the same as the condo monthly, plus we get our own yard and aren’t connected to neighbors!

17. We were prepared to shell out a bunch of money for closing costs, but in the end we got a nice fatty check back from the escrow company (about $1600) because they asked for too much, allowing us to pay for a washer/dryer, microwave, and other “house” stuff that we didn’t need to buy for the apartment.

18. It’s like 2nd wedding in our home! When we were unpacking, we finally got to open wedding gifts we weren’t able to open last year and use last year because we had no room to use them. Hellooooo, KitchenAid mixer!! =) Though I must admit, I’ve gotten quite used to mixing by hand.

19. We can fit all our bedroom furniture into our master bedroom! I am beyond excited about this. All we could fit in our room last year was our bed and one nightstand, and everything was crammed up against the wall. Now we have our bed, two nightstands, a chest, and our dresser in the room! With room to spare!!

20. Our realtor was saying that because the value of our house as gone down, we’ll be paying 1/3 the amount of property tax the bank needed to previously. We needed to pay the compound property tax for this year at closing based on the previous home value, but we should get another nice check back with the extra money put towards property tax that didn’t need to be.

21. There’s an oak tree in the front yard! And we think it’s 50 years old! =)

22. The bank did a great job fixing up the house. New paint, new carpet, new floorboard, new sprinkler set, new stove, new fans, etc etc etc! And we didn’t even have to ask for any of it!

23. After living here for about a week, I am QUITE surprised how safe I feel here! And I have anxiety and fear issues, so if I’m not freaking out, then anyone will be okay! Our next door neighbor is an older man, and he said he hasn’t had any complaints since he’s moved in a year ago.

24. We’ve gotten to meet some nice neighbors the first day we owned the house and had people over to paint. They were way more personable than our neighbs at the apartment. We hope we’ll be able to develop good relationships with our neighbs and great community here.

25. RJ’s parents so generously bought us a brand new fridge, and it is AMAZING! Way larger than our apartment fridge, and probably more energy efficient. It’s beautiful!!

26. We LOVE storage! We have a garage for storage, and PLENTY of closet space! We just LOVE space! You know, at 1000 square feet, our house isn’t huge, but compared to before at 700 square feet, we are just so thankful!

27. We have room to invite more than a couple guests over! And we’ve already had guests over, which I love!

Okay, I wrote your ear off about how we’ve seen God in this whole house and the house-hunting process. I’m the kind of person that gets buyers’ remorse after a purchase and start looking into other options we missed out on, but I haven’t at all. When I start to wonder, “Is this really the house God wanted for us?” I look back on this list and am convinced that we are exactly where we are meant to be. And so I haven’t looked at the housing market since!

All in all, this is God’s house. And we’re thankful for it. =)

:: Virtual Tour ::

Just in case you’re interested… =)

:: Suicide ::

A young man RJ discipled for a summer took his own life two days ago.  RJ spent the summer with him in Estes Park as his team leader for 10 weeks three summers ago.  That summer, I visited three times because RJ and I had just started dating, and a lot of people who I really love were going.  Because RJ was his “spiritual dad” for the summer, I remember assuming the role of “mom” to him and his teammate.  I remember RJ telling me about how Salvie was doing well, was excited about getting in the Word, how he wanted to meet with RJ twice a week for discipleship, how he frequently gathered men and women for day trips out hiking, I just remember him doing WELL.  RJ said he reminded him of a “more macho, younger version” of him.  After Estes Park, when I’d see Salvie at Navigators events, I would always make a point to check up on him because of the bond developed through RJ, and then share with RJ how his “kids” were.

I remember one particular conversation I had with him at Navigators road trip after STP, where he shared that he was struggling with his walk with Jesus, he was having the hardest time he ever had with school and grades (he was pretty driven and had perfect grades), etc.  I remember brushing it off, thinking it was just a temporary thing, thinking it would pass.

The next time RJ met with Salvi was the summer we got married.  They went to a shooting range together, and Salvie seemed fine.  Then, the last time they met Salvie shared with RJ how he felt God had deserted him, and that he could almost pinpoint when it began.  He shared how he felt God was asking him to obey, but he refused to listen.  The more he refused to listen, the more he had driven a wedge between him and God.  RJ spoke truth to him, that God is ALWAYS with him no matter what, and that all he needed was to turn back to God.  That was the last time they talked.

We received the news today from his Navs campus director and discipler at UCSD, right before we were supposed to begin our group’s Saturday morning photo scavenger hunt.  RJ and I were both pretty shaken up.  His discipler made it a point to tell RJ that he had never seen Salvi thrive as much as he did when he was there at Estes Park.  I know that was an encouragement to RJ, as the natural response to such an event is, “What could I have done differently?”

People always wonder how anyone could feel such hopelessness and despair as to take their own life.  As someone who has struggled with severe depression and probably will again, I really do understand that hopelessness and despair that lead to the contemplation of life and death.  But I wonder if despair and hopelessness is a natural part of life, that there are seasons of mourning and seasons of joy, that God leads us in the wilderness just to show us more of Himself.  If we look in the Psalms of King David, he definitely had those times of hopelessness, but he almost always ends in looking to God as his final thread of hope.  What about those who don’t have God, or believe He’s deserted you?  Without Jesus, there really is no hope.  Without Jesus, maybe the greatest comfort is death.

I am thankful Salvie is with Jesus.  I am thankful he is free from mourning, free from hopelessness, free from despair.  I’m thankful that he will finally know Jesus was always at his side, and He will always be at his side for eternity.

RJ’s group at STP Estes Park summer 07 – Salvie, RJ, and Ryan

:: Because Janet Is Making Me ::

An update!  BTW, RJ and my other blog has just been updated as well.  By me.  Why not consolidate?  I am masochistic.

Just came back from Mikey and Joanna’s CA reception (congrats, Mr. and Mrs. Wang! ), where I got to catch up with my lovely Janet.  Oh, how I miss the candidness of our conversations, and how I can be completely uncensored with her and know she’ll still love and accept me.  Anyways, she made some smarmy remark about how I haven’t blogged in a long time.  So here’s an update.

House hunt! For those who don’t know, RJ and I have decided after praying to try to buy a condo or house by November 30th, to take advantage of Obama’s First-Time Homebuyer Credit of $8000, which we would put towards a down payment.  What we pay for rent now is more than what our mortgage would be for up to a $150,000 house/condo, including taxes and insurance. We don’t have much money, but with the money we do have we want to be good stewards of what God has given us and invest in something that we would own and put towards another house one day.  We believe God wants us to be good stewards of our home as well.  We would love a place of our own with more space, to open up to having staff and students over for dinner, Bible studies, discipleship times, overnight house guests, etc.

RJ and I found a house that we love across the street from where the new UCR Medical School will be in 2012.  We took a leisurely drive through the neighborhood initially to gauge how safe we felt, and it seemed very family friendly.  Kids were running around outside, meaning parents felt it safe enough to leave their kids out.  There were pretty decent cars parked on the street, meaning people weren’t afraid their cars would get broken into or stolen.  It was pretty ethnic, which I think will be really fun. And I think it’s close enough to campus to where students would be able to stop by pretty easily.

The house apparently was bought by an investor as a dump and was flipped.  New windows, new carpet, fresh paint, new laminate wood floors, new roof, etc.  This is a huge plus for us, as some of the condos in the same price range were complete DISASTERS, absolutely disgusting, with missing windows, gross paint jobs, holes punched and kicked in doors, poop looking stuff on the floor, disgusting kitchens, the list goes on and on.  Our realtor said we’d have to put in at least $5000 up front to make them liveable, which is money we don’t have.  So we like that we can move right in.  Another plus is no HOA fee, which is $230/month at the condos we were looking at.

We put an offer on the house two weeks ago, and hadn’t heard anything for two weeks.  We offered about market price, and found out right away there was another offer significantly higher than ours, as well as 7 other offers.  The first week, we called our realtor every other day to see if he’d heard anything.  He seemed pretty pessimistic that our offer would get accepted because of the higher offer, and after a week, RJ and I began to lose hope as well.

Two nights ago, we got a call from the realtor, who said the investor accepted the offer that was a lot higher than ours, but for some reason they backed out.  The investor called our realtor to see if we were still interested, and then told him that it was between our offer and two others. We thought we were already out of the running!!

I felt that was God reminding us of the little faith we have, how quick I am to forget that He is Lord of all, that He reigns, that He owns the cattle on a thousand hills and He can provide for us just the right house, no matter how much greater the other offers are.  We won’t know until Monday or Tuesday whether our offer is accepted, but we have a renewed hope in God.  Even if our offer isn’t accepted, this reminder that God can take away giants has helped me to remember and believe that it’s not because our offer wasn’t good enough, but because the house wasn’t good enough in God’s eyes to give us.

If you think of us these next couple days, please pray with us about this house!  The market is SUPER tight now.  Our realtor was saying that last year there were over 3,000 houses on the market in Riverside.  There are currently about 400 on the market, which lots of buyers are fighting over.  We want to trust God for the impossible.  This is definitely something impossible!  Never in 1,000 years did I think that my missionary husband and I would be able to buy a home in our first year of marriage.  But God works in crazy ways and unpredictable ways…this time, through our government!

:: Hello, Goodbye ::

Hello, 2009!  Goodbye, 2008…you were so good to me.

Highlights and Events of 2008:

1.  I got engaged!  (January 3rd/19th)

2.  I got married!!  =)  (August 23rd)

3.  Left Irvine, my home of six years (not a highlight…) 

4.  Moved to Riverside! 

5.  My hubby graduated from the University of Oregon…and now is a big boy!

6.  Started EDGE Corps with the Navigators…round 2!

7.  Learned to appreciate that God made people to think and process a lot differently than me…and that I’m not always right. 

8.  I have become more administrative and detail oriented…I believe that came with marriage and an even more disoriented man.

9.  Witness God provide for RJ and I in mighty ways as we begin our lives together, not only with our entire wedding, but our apartment, our furnishings, and our funding.

10.  Said an exuberant good-bye to long distance!!  No more phone calls after 9pm or seeing each other once every three months!  Or hotel lobby dates for 2 hours after driving for 5 hours.  Or softball coaches looking over our shoulders.  Or endless blubbering at the airport.  Or pent up affection.  Or…well, you get the idea…it’s just better this way.

11.  I learned to surf…well, kind of…thanks Emiliooooo!  =)

12.  Went to Mexico for the first time, which is lame since I live in San Diego!

13.  Learned that not all dogs are mean and bite when you touch them…just Oliver.

14.  I no longer NEED to wear make-up when I go anywhere…I choose to, or I choose not to.

15.  Discovered Vanilla Coke Zero!

16.  Taste preference has changed yet again from salty to fruity, slowly but surely.

17.  Went to a tequila factory for the first time!

18.  I am more convinced of God’s perfect timing, and His sovereignty in making His children wait for His plan to unfold.

19.  I went scuba diving for the first time ever!

20.  Changed my name legally to Alice Matagora…and saw it a couple months before we were married in Colorado Springs on our donor cards…trippy!

21.  I’m beginning to learn to let go of things I can’t control, and to trust and rely on God more than ever.

22.  Joyfully witnessed four good friends get married, from all eras of my life.

23.  Redefined forgiveness as trusting that the blood of Jesus covers the sins of those who sin against me.

24.  Realizing that I’m a lot more wounded than I thought, and it’s the word of God and His Spirit that breaks the hold of lies and patterns of thinking.

25.  Saw my grandparents from Taiwan again, and got my grandpa to laugh uncontrollably…I’ve never seen him do that!

26.  RJ and I found out that conflicts that existed before we were married don’t disappear just because we’re married.  =)

Now I’m positive there are more amazing firsts and events that happened in 2008, but as it is 1:24am, I can’t think of them now.  Moving on…

2009 New Year’s Resolutions:

1.  Fitness – more cardio and weights.  I used to be so in shape…what happened??

2.  Nutrition – multi-vitamins and eating more whole foods

3.  Stop the occasional cussing…completely!

4.  Complain less, encourage more.

5.  Make time with God a priority, over my husband and over ministering to others.

6.  Make music more of a priority – violin and guitar.

7.  Let go of things that can’t be changed and move on.

So here’s to 2009!  May it be even richer with blessings than 2008!

Happy New Year!  =)