Words of Encouragement

I just read this on Mike Colón's blog tonight. Mike is an incredible wedding photographer, and in high demand. His post is a fabulous encouragement to me, and I hope to you as well (it is applicable in FAR more than photography).

Right now, there have been some developments with J and I, that have been very surprising. I'll explain more later when we have more details to share, but it has really reminded that Christ is our true provider, and that God works out everything in his perfect timing (and often so contrary than we would ever think!!)
I hope you are encouraged, with that, I'll turn it over to Mike Colón.

This post goes out to all of you wedding photographers and business owners just starting out. I'm not sure why I felt like talking about this tonight but I just want to give some words of encouragement to those of you currently struggling with where you are right now in your photo biz.

My wife and I have been through a lot these past 8 years. We've experienced probably every emotion that exists to mankind. We've cried together, danced with joy together, stressed out together, and have spent many hours on our knees praying for miracles in our business.

I remember one occasion very clearly. It was about 6 years ago when Julie and I were newlyweds. We were having an extremely rough month financially and I remember being totally stressed out because nothing seemed to be working no matter how much we tried. I was racking my brain for marketing ideas and was seriously getting to a place of desperation because we did not have nearly enough money to pay our bills which were due in a matter of days. I just remember pacing around in the bedroom of our small apartment feeling like I was going to lose it completely and have a nervous breakdown.

God must have known that I was at my wits end because all of the sudden I realized something. I was trying to do everything on my own without asking God for help. I remember grabbing Julie and telling her we need to pray. We got on our knees beside our bed (using pillows because I had a feeling we'd be there for a while) and started praying. We didn't pray for help as much as we prayed for forgiveness for forgetting who our provider is. It was like He was saying, "I am your provider, stop trying to play my role. Give me your business and I'll take care of everything. You can rest now."

Now this is the cool part... As we were praying, the phone rang. Now you'd think I wouldn't answer the phone during such an intense prayer session, but I kinda knew that I should answer it and sure enough it was a bride calling to book. This was just the first one. Over the next 48 hours we booked 4 more weddings. It was absolute craziness and I'll never forget how God intervened in our life that weekend.

It seems that every time I try to push forward on my own and forget to trust God, I get nowhere. Looking back now, it has always been those times when I give up and rely on God that stand out as times when our business grew by leaps and bounds.

The moral of this story is to simply give up and trust God. He'll take care of you!

I love this scripture in Matthew 6:19-34

"Don't store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them, and where thieves break in and steal. Store your treasures in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.

"Your eye is a lamp that provides light for your body. When your eye is good, your whole body is filled with light. But when your eye is bad, your whole body is filled with darkness. And if the light you think you have is actually darkness, how deep that darkness is!

"No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.

"That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn't life more than food, and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds. They don't plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren't you far more valuable to him than they are? Can all your worries add a single moment to your life?

"And why worry about your clothing? Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don't work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith?

"So don't worry about these things, saying, `What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?' These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.

"So don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today.

This weekend

If you are in Minnesota and not doing anything this weekend, check this out
http://www.aclarioncall.org/index.html
You really should go.


Unfortunately, we have another missions event that we are helping with at our church, and so we can't make it to the main event, but I will be attending a small afternoon session tomorrow, meeting with the speakers.

If you can't go--Pray for this event!

The Ordered Biz Card

After some playing around, we decided on a color image on our card.
Here's the finished product (front and back), though the edges will be cropped in a bit.
I'm very excited to get them!

looking for a dog-sitter

so we're coming up to Christmas, and realizing that while it's exciting that we get to go visit my fam in Portland, we are still in need of a dog-sitter for the two weeks we will be gone. :-(
Anyone have any ideas? We've never looked for a dog sitter before, and I hardly know where to start. I'm not super excited about kenneling him, both because of then environment and the expense...
Guess we'll add it to the prayer list.
Cool that God even cares about dog-sitting. :-)

the egg-speriment

So recently I have been musing on how wonderfully versitile eggs are--and even better--incredibly cheap. For people wanting to stay on a food budget, eggs are a great healthy option (unless of course, you are adding tons of sugar, such as in the recipe below).

With that in mind I thought it would be fun to start compiling egg recipes and ideas. I am planning on making some of them staples in our weekly menus, and thought perhaps you would like to be in on the experiment. So, in the holiday spirit, and to get us started, I am posting a recipe from the American Egg Board
www.aeb.org
So here ya go

Classic Cooked Egg Nog



(1 1/2 quarts or 12 (1/2-cup) servings)

• 6 eggs
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt, optional
• 1 quart milk* divided
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• Garnishes or Stir-Ins, optional

In large saucepan, beat together eggs, sugar and salt, if desired. Stir in 2 cups of the milk. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until mixture is thick enough to coat a metal spoon with a thin film and reaches at least 160°F. Remove from heat. Stir in remaining 2 cups milk and vanilla. Cover and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled, several hours or overnight. Just before serving, pour into bowl or pitcher. Garnish or add stir-ins, if desired. Serve immediately

Now I know that there are better recipes for eggnog, and even for eggs... so send your ideas my way, if we get enough, I'll start a new blog just for recipes. :-)

Sushi!

Last week my lovely friend Emily invited me out for sushi.

It was a fantastic lunch, we both consider ourselves fairly adventurous, and so trying the Umi (Sea Urchin) was par for the course... However, when we asked the Sushi Chef to recommend our last dish--it tested the limits of our adventurous spirit.

He prepared Aji for us. Aji is Jack Mackerel, Raw.
You have to understand that our first sight of the fish looked like this



He then proceded to filet the Mackerel in front of us, and said that part was to be deep fried. The filet's? No not the filets... the remaining head, bones and tail. We were told when deep fried they

"Taste like a cracker"

After the carcas was done deepfrying the end presentation looked like this.



Very pretty actually.

The end result was much tastier than we originally thought it would be. We cleaned up the fish, and even tried the deep fried cracker. We couldn't quite bring ourselves to try the head or the eyes though... Here's the end result.


The moral of the story?
Trust the Sushi Chef, and don't be afraid of the Aji.

for more on sushi, check out this cool blog sushi master
(pictures taken with my camera phone... not as bad a toy as I would have thought)

street art

I am a big fan of ingenuitive and creative art... this guy really made me stop and take a look. He creates chalk drawings on the sidewalk that look like three dimensional images.
check it out

for more, go to Julian Beevers street art

entering the digital world

Our church finally has sermons up online. I'm so excited!!

I love our pastor!

Eagan Hills Podcasts

Eagan Hills Church
Last week October 22nd, 2006