Sunday Mornings

Sunday Mornings.

They are challenging for me for various reasons. For one, I haven't found a Church community here that I feel like I belong to nor do I feel like I can add anything to. I have a hard time with the worship for different reasons, and I basically can never focus for another list of reasons I'd prefer to keep to myself. I also haven't felt like I've gotten anything much out of the community that I've been attending since I have arrived in Saint Malo.

Sidenote:
While talking about this with my mother, she said something that struck me. "You might not be getting anything out of this community, but what do you have to offer it?" I responded "nothing!"
Well that was quite a selfish response now that I look back at it. She was right, being a part of a Church community is always about taking and giving. If everyone decides to give, then no one will take anything, because they'll be so focused on always giving, that they might not themselves grow. If everyone is trying to take from the experience, than who will be there to give?
I tend to do that a lot, and it's a problem I think the Lord is giving me a second (third, fourth etc...) chance to tackle while being here.

Well another issue for me is that I simply miss the 509 community. Back in Huntington, I would wake up excited about sunday mornings, because I knew I'd be going to a service with familiar faces (that eventually became a family to me) and also be able to enrich my spiritual life through the teachings. The worship was also phenomenal. Everything about my 509 experience on sunday mornings and throughout the week was something to look forward to, and I guess I just miss that.
I do need to remind myself that it took me a solid two and half years to come to that point at the 509. Such relations aren't established overnight, but it's still quite a struggle. I almost need to force myself out of bed on sunday mornings, and I don't think that's a good thing. It's frustrating.

So on mornings such as this one, where I had no motivation to go worship in a setting of discomfort, I decided to do what I usually do on these types of mornings, and go on the 509 website to listen to a 509 sermon.

I know the 509 community isn't necessarily for everyone, but it is and has been to me a source of enrichment, growth, challenge, and hospitality. For this reason I encourage anyone in Huntington or surrounding areas who have yet to find a Church Community that they feel they can relate to or take from or give to, to check it out!! :)

The sermon I listened to this morning was taught by Allie Brown and was focused on Luke 18:35-43. It is about the bling beggar who asks Jesus for his sight and even though everyone discourages him to "bother" the Savior, Jesus hears him and restores his sight while telling him his faith has healed him.
Allie brings many good points (such as the fact that we ourselves are often blinded by the world that surrounds us, which can easily deprive us from the sight of God's Kingdom at work in our lives and the lives of those around us) and I think anyone could learn from this teaching.

Here is the link to the website:

www.509community.com

Here is the link to all the sermons: (This one is the one from Sunday, Feb 26th)

http://509community.com/audio/audiolist.php?category=0

I really hope you check this out, and hope you are as encouraged by it as I was. Lots of good stuff in here.

Thanks, blessings, and have a great rest of the day/night :)

Dorina

STOP KONY 2012

Hello world,

Here's the deal, there isn't much more to say about this than the video already says, but some of you might not want to spend 30 minutes out of your day to watch the video Koney2012 so I will briefly explain what its goal is in hopes that you will feel the conviction to share the video to bring more awareness on this issue.

First things first.

Who is Kony?

He is basically the African Hitler. The worst of the worst. He abducts children and uses them to build an army of rebels to kill their own families, even their parents! He steals little girls and uses them as sex slaves. He's abducted over 30,000 kids and is ruining the future of this generation. This affects each and every single one of us.
He has been charged for war crimes by the International Criminal Court in 2005, but unfortunately was able to escape. Most people don't even know he exists and yet he is impacting the entire world in a very negative manner, so we are fighting to "make Joseph Kony famous, not to celebrate him, but to raise support for his arrest and set a precedent for international justice."

I have a friend who's been personally affected by all of this. She's seen most of her family get killed and is now suffering the consequences of this man's actions by working her butt off in the US to provide for the rest of her family. She is 22 and has the mindset of a 40 year old who is constantly focused on providing for their family and she can't even enjoy life.
She's lost the belief that there is even a God out there due to all she's gone through.

Let's please put a stop to this.

This video is very well made, I mean REALLY well made and the 30 minutes feel like 30 seconds, so click on this link for more information about what Invisible Children is doing to stop this and find Kony, and see how YOU can help put an end to this tragedy.

Here is the video, in case you are interested. If you aren't interesting in watching it or don't have time but still feel like you'd like to make a difference, go to www.invisiblechildren.com and sign a pledge to share this video and bring awareness to this mission we have as human beings to find Kony and arrest him.

You can make a difference. We can all make a difference by joining towards one purpose and goal. Let that purpose be peace for all humanity...one country at a time.

Let's begin today.

"I object to violence because when it appears to do good the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent." 
-- Mohandas K. Gandhi

"If the human race wishes to have a prolonged and indefinite period of material prosperity, they only got to behave in a peaceful and helpful way toward one another."
-- Winston Churchill
"I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it."

-- Dwight D. Eisenhower

Job offer!!

Hi!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well what an exciting day for me :) I just got the long awaited phone call from Tracy the British lady I interviewed with last week who offered me a job as a stewardess with Condor Ferries!!!
I feel like it's to good to be true and am waiting for the catch. I don't think there is going to be a catch to this though, I think this is it. After not having worked for a year 1/2, I am finally going to work again. I am so excited!!!

Funny thing is I read something very encouraging yesterday and was planning on blogging about it today anyway.

So as I've mentioned earlier, I've been working really hard to find work here. I spent the first 3 weeks immersed in paper work and all the headaches that come with it. You see even though I'm French, I didn't have a lot of the rights since I've never lived here. It's as if I didn't exist in their system, so in order to get started, I had to fill out a lot of applications.

Once that was taken care, I had to focus on a job target, which I decided would be tourism/receptionist. Once that was done, I had to redo my resume and type out many different cover letters. Once that was done, I mailed them out, went to hotels to drop them off, went to different agencies that help you find work to fill out applications, etc etc...
I even sat in a room full of 50 or more applicants for over 2 hours waiting for one interview for a hotel receptionist at a 4 star hotel.
I also went to a meeting in order to get paid waitressing/receptionist training and took some tests to see if I could enter the official training and be hired by a 5 star hotel. I went to an all day job fair in a town an hour away from where I live. I got a job mentor, and a job counselor to help me along the way. I did mock interviews. I mean I tried it all. God gave me energy and motivation for a solid month and my sister in law to help out along the way.

It was an intense journey. I hated every single part of it. When I finally got this phone call for an interview, my hopes were up because this whole time I thought I hadn't been contacted due to lack of experience (which is a fact since it was the correlating point to all of my rejection letters).

So Condor Ferries, a mini cruise boat that goes to "paradise British Islands" off the coast of France on a daily basis, contacted me for an interview two weeks ago. I got the interview last week and it went above and beyond my expectations. I mean it was unreal. The interview was both in French and English and done by two extremely welcoming ladies, which immediately put me at ease.
The interview went well, and while waiting for my brother to pick me up, one of the ladies came out and grabbed me by the waist and invited me back into the office for coffee. I comfortably sat down with my soon to be bosses over a cup of coffee and we chit chatted until their following interviewee arrived.

I felt great and confident following that. I mean what an amazing environment to work in right?? Work on a boat as a stewardess. haha. It sounds kind of crazy fun!

So I want to talk to you a little bit about my frustrations/experiences/thoughts along this journey.

First of all, I had no idea I would end up in this cute little town called Saint Malo. I mean the Lord totally orchestrated that! Originally, as you all know, I was planning on living with family friends in Paris. I sort of wasted a week while being there mainly because of jet lag and lack of motivation to start the job searching process. I love the girls I lived with, in fact we still call each other to keep in touch; but unfortunately because they each already had lives prior to my arrival, they couldn't help me out with this long paperwork process and I didn't know where to start without any help.

A week after my arrival to France, my sister in law arrived with the kiddos from Senegal. She invited me to spend a week with her in Saint Malo, and so I packed a week worth of stuff and came. It was fun, I loved being with my niece and nephew and since she was in the middle of job searching as well, we tag teamed and did all the work together, which is exactly what I needed to jump start this process. Since all the paperwork got done here in Saint Malo, it just seemed like the job search process would be easier here as well. Plus I'd get to be with family. So I decided to stay :) I picked up my belongings from my friend's house two weeks ago, and here I am!! I do miss my friends in Paris though. womp womp.

I realized this is where God wanted me to be and I thank you all for the prayers because a few weeks ago, that was my biggest prayer request...to be where God wanted me to be.

After getting that prayer answered, of course instead of being content and praising God for answering this important question, I moved on to the next....why do you want me here??

I still don't know the answer to that (which is okay), but the Lord has opened doors for me and will continue to do so. Living here is still difficult but God promises me in Isaiah 43: 2-5 that He is right here with me.

"When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall no be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you. or I am the Lord your God the Holy One of Israel, your Savior."

This is what I read yesterday that I found encouraging. (I'm going to bust out some Max Lucado, since you all I know how much I love him!)

"Make friends with whatever's next. Embrace it. Accept it. Don't resist it. Change is not only a part of life; change is a necessary part of God's strategy. To use us to change the world, he alters our assignments. Gideon: from farmer to general; Mary: from peasant girl to the mother of Christ; Paul: from local Rabbi to world evangelist. God transitioned Joseph from a baby brother to an Egyptian prince. He changed David from a shepherd to a king."

And Dorina: from film major to stewardess. haha. that sounds sort of ridiculous. I know this doesn't answer my question as to why I'm here, but it sure does reassure me and remind me that I don't necessarily need to know but simply to trust and embrace the experience as it comes.

Embrace your experience friends. The ride will be a far better one that way.

Thank you a million times for your prayers. Leave comments as to how I can better pray for you since it was after all, my secret new year's resolution :)

Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him. Psalm 37:7

Blessings friends.

Oh here  are pictures of my future new job:

One of the three boats owned by the small 60 year old company

One of the British islands it travels to called Guernsey

The other island it travels to called Jersey

And the best part of this is that on my days off, I get to roam around these islands!! I cannot wait to take pictures of these places :)