Merry Christmas!

It's a beautiful white Christmas day and I am very blessed to be sitting in my home with family. A lot has happened, good and bad, these past months. I know everything has happened with a purpose and the God is shaping me and molding me according to His plans. I am reminded this morning how much I have to be thankful for. My family and our health, friends, shelter, food, and most importantly knowing that 2,000 years ago our Lord became flesh and sent Jesus to die for our sins. He was born to die. What a marvelous, selfless, incomprehensible act of grace and mercy. I don't have much more to say besides this and that I pray everyone has a wonderful Christmas and spends time thanking the ONE who made it possible for us to be here at all.

I also wanted to share this song that really touched my heart about why we should celebrate Christmas at all. It's called "You're Here" by Francesca Battistelli. Love it!

P.S. - I received my new camera and have been taking a LOT of pictures. Check out my flickr for some new pics.

Home Sweet Home

I am glad to be home. Last week was definitely an emotionally draining one, so I ended up arriving back home a couple days earlier than I was supposed to for Thanksgiving break. There have been a lot of things going on lately that have been weighing on me and it's been a little difficult to endure, but I am not going to let it get the best of me. Just please pray for me and for the situations that have occurred recently that need prayer...

First, please continue to pray for the Brutton and Hessel families. I watched the funeral stream live on the internet. What a blessing Kathy's life was and continues to be! I have devoted my last few blogs in Kathy's honor, so please look back at those if you don't know what I'm talking about.

Second...I don't want to be all discreet, but I feel in this situation it is necessary...a dear friend of mine is going through something that is very sad and draining and I wish she would never have to go through. I gave her a call last Friday and decided that I needed and wanted to come back to see her. She has always been there for me and it would be the least I could do just to see her in person and try to comfort her. We only got to spend a couple hours together before she had other family events to attend, but I am thankful regardless that we got to hang out.

Thanks for reading and your prayers. 

 Anyway - I am definitely glad to be home! My family always has a lot of fun around the holidays and I'm anxious to continue to the traditional festivities. We have been decorating for Christmas and my mom and I have been planning for Thanksgiving. It ends up being a two-day cooking fest for the dinner we have on Thursday. Can't wait!

Peace and God Bless

In Memory of Kathy

Our friend Kathy went home to Heaven today. My last two posts have been about her to pray for her. I ask that we still pray in rejoicing, for Kathy is no longer in pain. I ask that we still pray for the family and friends that loved her so much. She was a strong woman of God that I have admired since I was a teenager.

Mike's blog post after her death was short, but powerful. The post was titled "Victory" and he said, "Her battle is won."

She fought a great fight with more faith, grace, and courage than I could ever imagine. 
                                                   
I am so thankful that I was able to visit her this past Saturday. My friends Amy, Kelley, and I were able to chat with her and Mike about good memories at church and laughed a lot too. Honestly, I was nervous about going to see her because I did not want to act any differently around her or say anything that I should not. It was a wonderful visit and I praise God for that 40 minutes I was able to spend with her. I knew it would probably be my last time to see her on earth, which was difficult.

I cried on the way home that day. I am crying right now. My tears are tears of both sadness and rejoicing. At this moment, I got a text from my dad who got a text from Kathy's father, my former pastor, saying that she appreciated my visit.

I do not have much else to say but that my heart goes out to this family right now in their time of need. Continue to pray for them to be comforted in this difficult time. May God wrap His arms around Mike and their children Maddie, Sarah, and Colin.

"Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need" Hebrews 4:16

Kathy will be greatly missed.

"Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer." (Romans 12:12)

I found this verse to be very fitting for right now. As I write to you write now at 12:30 a.m. through tears, my heart is aching for the Brutton family. Mike has just updated their blog. He told the kids the news about Kathy because she is still in the hospital. Hopefully she will get to return home tomorrow to be with her family as long as possible. I see this incredible faith continue to shine through the tragedy. It almost confuses me as to how they can be so strong in such a sad time for them. But then I realize - it is God. God is the only one who can get me, Kathy, or anyone else through our pain and suffering. Living on this earth is not to build glory for ourselves, but to the Creator. He is the only reason I am breathing right now. So why not praise Him for it? The title of this blog is "Living Intentionally". The Brutton's have brought me back to remembering why this is so important. We need to be living each day with intention. We never know when our last breath will be, so we should live each moment as our last and be thankful to God that we are still breathing life.

What I find most comforting in the midst of the sadness is how the Brutton's have looked at their situation as an opportunity. Rather than dwell on the sickness, look to the One above. Mike wrote that he hoped that Kathy's story would turn people to the Kingdom. I believe it will. It already has for me. God has a purpose for everything that happens on this earth.

Please keep Kathy, Mike, their children, and the rest of the Brutton/Hessel family in your prayers.

Where are the words?

I found out last night that a friend of mine's cancer has returned. She had her stomach removed due to the cancer but it has shown up again after having tests done in the last week. The doctor's prognosis is grim. There is nothing more that will be done for her. Kathy Brutton is 32. She is married and has three children. Her husband Mike updated their blog last night. It brought tears to my eyes reading these unimaginable words. Mike said, "Please pray for Kathy and I as we tell our children that their mommy is going home to heaven." I cannot even imagine having to process this. My heart breaks at the thought. This really does not seem right. After reading the blog (which I hope you will read it as well), I had no idea how to respond. Where are the words? I ended up writing on her wall among the dozens of other posts that I will be praying for them. Prayer is all we can offer to them now. That is all they ask for.

Even in the midst of this painful news, the Brutton's are still remaining strong in their faith. I believe many who have undergone such things as cancer have questioned God's presence and meaning to why He would allow such travesty. The Brutton's do not live this way. They understand that God still has a purpose for them in all of this. They hope to further the Kingdom because of Kathy's cancer. Pretty amazing, huh? I am truly in awe and inspired by Kathy's courageous outlook she has had all along. She is a wonderful woman of God that I have had the privilege of getting to know. Kathy and Mike were my Sunday school teachers when I was in high school. I don't want to play favorites, but I have to admit they were probably the best Sunday school teachers I have had.

So please help pray for the Brutton's as they endure this time. Pray that if these are the last moments of her life that she will be able to live them out happily without pain. Pray for comfort to the family.

May God wrap His arms around Kathy and the Brutton's.

I can update my blog from my phone now so hopefully I can stay more connected through txts and pics!

Life

Wow I definitely got some things put into perspective for me yesterday. All day Wednesday I was complaining about all the stuff I had to do. Granted, I literally have eight papers I am currently working on, but still...I was reminded how I need to rejoice in everything that I do. Last night I saw a friend's facebook status that a friend of ours who is the church secretary at my home church was in a car accident. I immediately called my mom to see if she knew about it since I know she would just be returning home from Wednesday night church. She said she hadn't heard anything there, which I thought was odd. Well it turns out that April was probably on her way back from working at church yesterday around 4:30 and her heart stopped. Her. Heart. Stopped! This is just devastating news to me. She was found by police not breathing and was sent to the local trauma center where she is now in a coma. I'm not a nursing major anymore, but I do understand how serious this is. It is a miracle already that she is still alive after not breathing for so long. I immediately changed my facebook status to alert anyone else that knows her or doesn't to pray for her condition. The doctors cannot fully diagnose her until she is out of the coma which could take 24-48 hours. I cannot imagine how frightening this must be for her husband Jeff so if you are reading this, I ask you to please keep them in your prayers. I pray that April will wake up without too much significant damage to her heart or brain from the loss of oxygen that was not entering in the time she was not breathing.

This is just so scary for me to hear. I have to say that I felt a little guilty for complaining so much about the business in my own life when I really should be thanking my Father in Heaven that I even have a life and that I am breathing right now.

Every Step

Every step of the journey has to be on mission. If not, it's a show not a ministry. This is something that really hit me over the weekend while was in the Lake of the Ozarks for Getaway Conference. I had a great weekend being rejuvenated in Christ and just being able to focus on Him without distractions. Lately I have been in another downward slump in my walk. I always feel so guilty when I get to this point and I wish I never had times like this. The weekend was really eye-opening in that I need to keep His plan in mind. One of the speakers said we need to stop telling God what we're going to do in our lives. Partially obeying is not obeying at all. I was reminded how much I have been doing this and I am thankful that the speakers and scriptures turned my attention to what I need to fix in my life.

I was also able to get a lot of photography practice in over the weekend. I ended up helping out by taking pictures of all the international students and the events going on for them. It was fun! I cannot wait until I can have a better camera. Hopefully this winter I will be able to purchase my first SLR...too bad they are so expensive! Anyway...I have been able to take some really great pictures for my assignments in photojournalism as well. My professor is so great! He is really teaching us how to develop a good eye for capturing the right moments to tell a story. Here are a few pics to show some of my progress so far!

Capturing motion

I took pictures of TOMS shoes for product assignment

My roommate for a higher perspective angle

A car with some cool lighting

I have a lot of writing to do for classes so even though I would love to keep writing on here to update you more, I think I've procrastinated homework enough.

I'm Back

Hello! I'm sorry this post is long overdue! It's Friday and I am so happy it's finally the weekend because I have had a really awful week! My trusty computer decided to not be so trusty anymore after it decided to crash on me Tuesday. I took it to Best Buy and had the Geek Squad take a look at it only to find out that it needed to be sent in to be further diagnosed but of course, drum roll please, my extended warranty just expired in July. I obviously was not about to spend $80 just to find out what was wrong with it so I ended up buying an external hard drive to make sure I saved everything on my laptop before it fully dies. Right now, it still works while I have it on but I fear that it won't be much longer before I lose it. This really has not been my year for technology considering my ipod was lost/stolen last month and now I don't have a laptop. Anyway...enough with the negative.

Well I'm back to school for my second year at Union.I am taking all classes for my major and while I'm excited to dive into them, I'm also a lttle nervous. I have a ton of work to do already, but it should be fun also!
I successfully moved into our dorm, which are the newest buildings on campus. There were a few flaws in the buildings (like leaky toilets and showers streaming water from underneath into my bedroom) but I do like them overall. The new furniture is nice too. Seeing everyone has been nice...I have definitely missed my roommates and friends here. We have a new roommate this semester, too. She's really sweet and funny...I just hope we haven't scared her too much with our weird ways haha. Tonight we are decorating the dorm for fall and I'm super excited to just relax and have fun.

Many Blessings,
Katlyn