[Prayer] O-Show Countdown 12 days

For any of you guys who have put on a show, or performed, or competed, I think all of you can agree that the few days or weeks leading up to the event is terrible. Anything that can go wrong usually does go wrong, and if it doesn't... well it usually is the calm before the storm. I don't know if this is the case for some of you, but I firmly believe that in these times, we are under spiritual attack. In Overflow, I can't help but feel like we are being distracted or tempted to be lead astray from worshiping and praising God with unburdened hearts and at full throttle. Maybe it's the stress or the lack of sleep and the consistent bed time of 5am, but I can't help be a little negative and short tempered. I think a lot of us who are preparing for upcoming events feel the same thing. Thankfully for me, even though I've been negative or been stressing over a lot of other things, Lent has been a great. I've been spending more time in prayer and doing devotionals. It's been keeping me grounded and sane.

Amidst all this chaos and confusion though, there has also been a lot of blessing through prayer and fellowship. Whether its God placing images or things in our heads and we have the same convictions, or even if its a strung out sister who has so much stuff to do yet still thanks God for Overflow every day, I can't help but feel blessed to be where I am. It's one of those invincible feelings that because we have Him, nothing is going to stop us from working our hardest over these next 12 days to dance for Him with reckless abandon.

Pray Unceasingly

Lent

I'm getting in to this habit of posting approximately once a month. It's a terrible habit and I definitely need to fix it. By not having posted something in such a long time, my thoughts get all jumbled up and I don't know how to organize and articulate what I really want to say. Lucky for me, I am frustrated and discouraged enough that my mind hasn't wandered off too much.

Looking back these past few years, I have never really challenged myself with lent until this year. Maybe I have challenged myself in the past, but in comparison to this year, lent is definitely much more difficult. In past years I've given up caffeine, anime/manga, eating past a certain hour and some other things. Thanks to a brother, I challenged myself to add something to my life instead of taking things out of my life during lent. The mentality to this being that by challenging myself to increase my devotional time each day, the extra things in life will naturally be filtered out or eliminate themselves in order to stay disciplined and keep to my lent promise. It's been working great and I am truly loving it. However, two days before lent I was also convicted to give up drinking. By no means do I go crazy and go drinking all the time. What drinking usually entails for me is meeting up with a few friends and close brothers and catching up once a week. We share and blow off some steam and its usually a relaxing time.

I was pretty discouraged by some of my brothers tonight. They were aware of my giving up drinking for lent, and knew my convictions/reasoning behind doing it. Even so, tonight as I got dinner with them and caught up, and the idea of going to the bar was brought up, I decided that I would not go so I would not even be presented with the temptation. Thankfully, I have my best friend keeping me accountable and reminded me that going home was definitely the best idea. However, the thing that really irked me was that my other brothers literally tried to drag me with them. I just found it really discouraging that brothers who know what is going on in your life, consciously decide to tempt, distract, lead you away from your convictions.

Accountability is only as strong as you as a group make it. Please in the spirit of lent and fellowship, if you share what you're doing for lent with a brother or sister, keep them accountable and remind them to stick to their convictions. Don't be that person who is trying to lead someone astray. Were supposed to be sacrificing things during lent to remember what God has done for us, and as I'm finding out, it is really hard to do. Don't make it harder on your brothers and sisters.

1 Corinthians 10:13

Song

So I don't know about any of you guys, but I can only listen to certain music depending on my mood. Lately I've been having issues finding a song that I enjoy listening to while at home, or on the train to class or wherever I'm off too. Usually if I can't find a song to relate to, that means one of two things:

1) My music library needs to expand more

2) I don't know what mood I'm really in

It's taken two weeks to finally find a song. It's like comfort food, or cake for the fat kid. Finding the right song is just comforting. The lyrics feel like their being spoken right to you, or they are lyrics you can see yourself belting out in the shower on your own. Finding those songs for whatever mood you're in is such an intimate thing. It leaves you with some additional comfort that there are other people out there who feel you. :) yay for music!

ALIVE!: A Prelude

So... I haven't written anything in a month. That's surely a bad sign. This past month of silence has been rough. I've been sick twice in three weeks, stressed with constant applications, burdened by so many thoughts and things, and NOT laying them down before me like I should be. In many ways I have been off the grid this last month. To those brothers and sisters who I've neglected, and to those whom I have responsibilities with, I am sorry for you having to pull extra weight, but I am back. Maybe I was just a little out of focus. Regardless, I want to focus on the retreat that most of you guys who read this are going to tomorrow. I don't know about you, but for once, I am actually going to retreat seeking things. Aside from the basic definition of retreat and the need to just get away from the world for a few days, I need Him to stretch me once more. As I've been going through applications and sorting out what is going to happen to me after I graduate this semester, I feel God tugging at my heart asking me "Who's kingdom are you building up? Yours or mine?"

It's a tough question. It makes one reevaluate everything they have and what is going on in their life.

I know whose kingdom I want to raise up, now the thing that follows is "God show me in which ways I build up my own kingdom, and let them be broken down and rebuilt so that I build up more of You and less of me."

So I ask you, what are you going in search of? It's more than okay not to know or have something you are searching for. Like I said, this is the first retreat in years that I'm going to where I actually am searching for something.

Retreat is in fifteen hours. BRING IT! :)

Winter Break. /Reflect

This by far has been the toughest winter break and Christmas holiday I've ever experienced. For those of you guys who I have spoken with, thanks for being there for me and hearing me out at a time like this.

My uncle, Martin Low, passed away this past Christmas Eve from a massive heart attack. None of us saw this coming and were quite shocked when we got the call. Martin left behind his wife and two daughters who are the same age as myself and my younger sister. You can imagine the toll it took on my family. Martin was the same age as my parents and he was gone in a blink of an eye.

It was amazing to see family rush to each other at a time like this. East Coast, West Coast, same town, or a couple states over... all my aunts, uncles, cousins and close family friends dropped everything they were doing on Christmas Eve to either rush to the ER where my aunt and two cousins were, or to the nearest airport in this ridiculous snowstorm to get to Chicago as soon as possible. In such a sad state, it was such a blessing to see how strong love really is, especially on Christmas Eve.

Although the past few days have definitely been an emotional roller coaster, it made me take inventory of the things I value most. My family here at home, and my other family in my other home. My best friends, girlfriend, big brothers/sisters, little brother/sisters. I know I said I want to overflow more next year, and I want to add to my resolution that I learn to love more. You never know when something can disappear, and should try to cherish it as much as possible.

For my own sake, I'm leaving what I wrote into the guestbook for my Uncle here. Just a little something to remember him by for myself. I hope you like it. :)

"I do not know how I have managed to remember something like this but I do. When my family and I still used to live in Illinois, our neighborhood was next to Alyssa, Alex, Auntie Jane, and Uncle Martin's. There was this occasion where I was angry with the babysitter so I decided to run away. I hopped on my bike and jetted straight for the Low house because even if Alyssa and Alex weren't there and I had no one to play with, Uncle Martin would be.

Uncle Martin's comic involvement in my social life reached an all time high when my mom and Hilary were staying in Chicago. At that time, he had just learned how to text message. Whether I was talking on the phone with my mom, or it was just my mom sharing what was going on in my life, I was one of Martin's texting guinea pigs. If my mom and I were having an argument or debate, he would text "Listen to your mother!" while I was on the phone with her or on more poorly timed occasions he would text to ask me about a girl and inquire the date of the wedding when the aforementioned girl was in possession of my cell phone and intercepted the text.

With an exception for my dad, my family has a knack for crashing on the Low household. Hilary and my mom lived there for nearly a year, and I spent three summers there. THREE SUMMERS! I'm really surprised Uncle Martin didn't get sick of me. If I was him, I definitely would have gotten sick of me. Instead he would joke that he was lucky because he would have all the perks of having a son with little to no hassle. He didn't have to worry about my schooling, and whenever he saw me talking or hanging out with a girl, he would never have to give me one of those father/son, man to man talks. I will sorely miss Uncle Martin and his comic insight in to my life."

Choreo... Why I Overflow

So I've actually never used my blogs to target a certain group, but I felt like writing this here instead of an email. To my dearest OverFLOWERS, I hope you read this, and can see through me a little bit more. To those of you reading this who aren't in Overflow, I hope you guys get a little understanding for why I Overflow for the Lord.

Overflow isn't just about the message in the piece that we life up to God, and hope others will hear and digest. Dave has said this a dozen times, and Jason before him, that Overflow is more than a ministry. It's a lifestyle. While we pour ourselves out through dance to worship God, we should also be pouring ourselves out in our families, church, friends, relationships, work, and whatever else it is that we do.

People inside and outside of Overflow have said that we've become more performance driven, that we are more DANCE and less MINISTRY. While I partially agree with this statement, I agree from the point of view that we as a ministry needs to spend more time in prayer. Some of you guys have said we don't spend enough time in prayer during practices like we used to, and I am sorry, and I promise we will definitely be spending more time praying together this upcoming year. But... that should NOT stop your relationship between prayer and Overflow. This lifestyle is 24/7. It doesn't mean we just pray and Overflow on Mondays, Saturdays, and on stage.

It's tough, I promise you that. And any on of the leaders will tell you that we have the hardest time trying to continually embody this and were sorry if you catch us in one of our down moments. But back to the point, While some may say that Overflow has become more DANCE than MINISTRY, I don't see the difference. It's not just about the messages that we want to send through our skits. While Overflow definitely aims to embody family and fellowship, there is a personal level to it. The dance is our personal worship. Every move, every angle, every isolation... we should be pouring out our utmost for His highest. Every time we do a run through or learn a dance, it's more than motions in which we learn or rehearse. Every single time we do it, it's worship. Think about it like when you're at a revival or even Sunday service, where we yell with arms high and hearts abandoned... that's how I feel about Overflow. Every single thing we do, should be because God fills us, and we pour out.

That brings me to choreography. I love choreography. You could have asked me last year about it, and I would have told you I'm petrified of it and that I will NEVER do it. That it's really scary and that I'm really nervous about how it turns out or how people will view it. It's not about that though. I love choreography because just like how we pour ourselves out into learning the dance, I throw all my energy and every inch of my body into worship. I find so much joy (lee? :D) from choreography. It's like free flowing body worship that I get to share with you, my brothers and sisters in Overflow, and you (you guys that watch us and support us).

All this being said, this is my new years resolution. That no matter how dry I feel, that God will continually use me to OVERFLOW and pour out in to others and in to whatever it is that He has planned for me this upcoming year.

O-Show Choreo COMMENCE!

P.S. Mark it down in your calendars. O-Show is April 9th, 2011!!! Be excited and please pray for us! :)

A Day Living in Maryland... (With No Sailboats =\)

It's amazing how while I do not consider Maryland my home, I still end up crashing when I get here. Without fail every semester for the past three semesters, I have came to this house and end up passing out for 10 hours at a time with 3+ hour naps. To me home is somewhere I find comfort, and without a doubt that is Philly. I have people who I find comfort in, a church that I call home, and many other things. I guess it's such a blessing to remember that, while I fight and bicker with my parents, and yell at them to stop smothering me, and all these other ridiculous things, I still find home in my parents.

I visited my parents church today for the second time in two years. I guess I really don't come back and visit them enough. It's so easy to tell that my parents are lonely without me and my sibling going at it and trying to kill each other for the last snack in the fridge. The first two things my mom said to me when they picked me up from the train station were "Zip up your coat," and "Buckle your seatbelt." Man... I really felt like I was in the fifth grade again.

But I digress, back to visiting my parents church today. It's a really nice church... although, I don't remember the name. The pastor was really nice and he came up and shook my hand. We spoke for a good 10-15 mins about where I goto school/church/ stuff about Philly. I loved the message and what he had to say. He was speaking about personal relationships. Relationships with our spouses, boyfriends/girlfriends, close friends, and most importantly God. It was a reminder message that in a personal relationship, the more personal the relationship, the less control you have over yourself. So the more intimate we become with God, it means we are giving more of ourselves

While I am really enjoying spending time with my family, and even the really laid back and spoiled lifestyle here, it's already been a day and a half, and I'm missing Philly. I think this break is reaffirming that I don't want to come back here after school is over. I need a city with more things to do, places to be, and people to see, be it Philly, or wherever God leads me.