Be Thou My Vision

    The past few day I have been thinking ahead about the challenges and new things there will be to learn as we live in Guatemala. Simple things here that I take for granted like paying the electric bill, going to get chicken at the grocery store, and getting gas for the car will all be different and new when we move. I will have to learn a different way of doing those things and it makes me anxious and scared. 
     However, last night at worship team rehearsal we were playing the song Be Thou my Vision. It's an Irish hymn and we were having fun with playing it in different ways and with different sounds along with adding a current chorus by Ascend the Hill in with it. It was then stuck in my head all day today as I was pulling weeds and digging out bushes. I think God was trying to get my attention and tell me something.

Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart; Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art. Thou my best Thought, by day or by night, Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light. 

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word; I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord; Thou my great Father, I Thy true son; Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one. 

Riches I heed not, nor man's empty praise, Thou mine Inheritance, now and always: Thou and Thou only, put first in my heart, High King of Heaven, my Treasure Thou art. 

Oh, God, be my everything, be my delight. Be, Jesus, my glory My soul's satisfied. My Jesus, you satisfy. 

God is my vision and my eyes. He will show me the path to take and how to overcome these challenges I run into. He is my best thought. I need to put Him first in my heart and He satisfies.

What a powerful song that God spoke through to impact me. So awesome how God works.

On another note I just bought a Spanish/English parallel Bible which I'm pretty excited about :)
  

We have also had a few questions regarding giving one-time gifts. These gifts will be used to help with one-time expenses such as plane tickets, residency fees, and housewares, and furniture for our home once we move. They will also be used to help us eventually buy a vehicle. So unless otherwise specified one-time gifts will be used to help us with whatever is priority at the present time. If you are interested in giving a one-time gift I would love to talk with you more specifically.

It was also brought to our attention that the link to give financially to help support us was working incorrectly. It has now been fixed. Here is the working link.  http://hopeforhome.org/donate.html  Make sure the letter 'd' in donate is lowercase - that was causing some of the issues.

I also wanted to remind everyone that we will be speaking at Dillsburg BIC on Sunday evening April 10th at 6:00 and a Guatemalan style meal will be included. All are welcome. We will also have fresh Guatemalan coffee, chocolate covered coffee beans, hand-made scarves from the market in Guatemala and coconut woven bracelets for sale.

Time keeps moving

Wow, the first part of 2016 has flown by. It’s crazy to think we have already been married for four months. We recently started writing events on the calendar for the next few months and we already have things planned for June and August – crazy. 

Now an update regarding our move to Guatemala. We were invited by my family to go on one last family vacation to the beach with them at the beginning of August so our move date is now a little more official. We will be moving to Guatemala in the middle of August! A lot will be happening between now and then, but we are taking it step by step. As far as preparing for raising support the prayer cards and business cards are printed, a letter has been written and will be sent out soon, some churches have been contacted, and a powerpoint presentation and brochures will be accomplished in the next few weeks. When I look at that list it seems like we have completed a nice amount, but looking ahead there is so much more to do and we have to trust God through it.

I helped at our church’s youth group this past weekend at the ’30 hour Famine.’ The theme was “Stories.” There were a variety of people brought in to speak to share their story. It was encouraging, inspiring, and challenging to hear all these people’s testimonies and to see how God has worked in their lives. One of the ladies stories really hit home with me. She had ministered in some way in 65 different countries throughout her life. What??!!! That’s unbelievable. She also helped to write this training curriculum for church leaders and she just finished the final of 45 books a few years ago. That curriculum has been used in over 375 churches around the world. Crazy!!! I want to be someone like that who gives my life to the gospel of Jesus Christ. God can do amazing things if only you trust and listen to Him.

 

I was also reading in 1 Samuel this morning. In chapter 2 is says, ‘And the boy Samuel continued to grow in stature and in favor with the Lord and with men.’ I wrote in the margin beside this verse ‘sounds like Jesus.’ I want that to be me as well. I want to continually be growing in favor with both my Father and with those around me.

I will be updating this blog more often now as we continue to make progress on the mission God has called us!

Oh  also another little plug. We will be speaking at Dillsburg BIC on Sunday evening April 10th at 6:00 which includes a meal. You are all welcome to come and hear our vision for what God has called us too. We also will have fresh Guatemalan coffee, scarves, and bracelets for sale to help support us.

-Andi

Thanksgiving

As I reflect on everything that has happened in the past year I have so much to be thankful for. Last year at this time I would have never guessed I would be married and watching my wife make pies as we watch the Macy's Thanksgiving parade. Crazy what God is doing and what He will continue to do.

Well as a little life update the past month has been crazy. A month and two days ago we were married in Guatemala. A few of the pictures below.
         

              

After the wedding down there we spent a few more days in Guatemala then headed back to Pennsylvania. We settled into our house after a little delay regarding insurance and then had our wedding here.

We then went to Williamsburg, VA for our honeymoon and after returning we both started new jobs. Shauna at the Goddard School as a Pre-K teacher and me at Katapult. If you are wondering what Katapult is and what I do, watch the first part of this video!

We will soon be transitioning to begin raising support as we prepare to move back to Guatemala this coming summer so if you would like us to come speak at your church or small group or any other gathering let us know and we would love to tell you what we feel God is calling us toward!

So there's a little life update! We are celebrating Thanksgiving with the 4 "F's" today - Family, Food, Fellowship, and Football. We are also looking forward to begin the Christmas season as we do some decorating tomorrow and as we watch Elf! We hope you are thankful today as well as you remember to give thanks to the true Giver of Everything.

What am I up to Now?

Well many of you have been asking what I'm doing right now. So I thought it would be a good time to give you an update. Well I'm still currently working for Red Rock Landscape mainly mowing lawns (boy do we need rain!). On days I'm not mowing I help out on projects like this!

A 2 -tiered patio/ retaining wall with water-feature. You can check out
more pics from this job and others at Red Rock on facebook!

So it's nice to break up the week ocassionaly with something different then mowing. Last week youth group at church (Thrive) started back into the swing of things on Wednesday nights and I help to lead the middle school group. This month I will be in charge of leading the lessons before taking a break to go to Guatemala to get married ( I think that's a pretty good excuse). I'm leading some lessons based off of I Am Second videos which are pretty cool videos based on real people's stories of how God worked in their lives. I also have been helping out a good bit with leading worship on Sunday mornings at church. Another thing I have been working on has been Spanish. I'm on a 21 day streak of at least 15 minutes a day! I only have 8 more little circle levels to unlock if you know anything about duolingo.com. Its been a little weird not going back to Messiah when a lot of my friends went back last week, but that time in life came and went and I'm ready to move on and I don't really miss the work that's for sure :) I had to go back yesterday to see some people and to catch a little bit of some sporting events though :P. I have also been working on odd and ends regarding wedding planning and looking into what we will need when we live here after we are married. As far as ministry aspects go we will be spending a good bit of time in November and December preparing to speak at churches and getting handouts and letters ready to go so that we can start raising support as soon as possible. Side note if you would like to have us to your church or just meet with us in person to hear Shauna and my goals and vision for ministry in Guatemala let me know! 

The Phillies season has been gettting extremely long which means I'm pretty excited for Thursday night at 8:30! If you have no idea what that time means then you are not a true fan. The Steelers kickoff the NFL regular season! So excited for football to be back!

So there's a little update into my life right now! 

As I read in my devotions the other day I want to have fearless confidence like the disciples had in this passage from Acts 4:31. While they were praying, the place where they were meeting trembled and shook. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak God's Word with fearless confidence.

And to close this post with a quote from Doug Miller (radio voice for Messiah women's soccer), "Be blessed but more importantly be a blessing."

What do I do? Go to God

Wow sitting listening to worship music is so awesome. However, let me back track because the past three days have not be so awesome.

I've been struggling alot to know how I can prepare for my next steps in life. I feel like I'm currently in this limbo. I feel like I'm floating with nothing to do at this point. There's not much wedding planning to do until closer to the time. I can't start working on ministry stuff until some other parts begin to take shape and happen. My best friend is 3,000 miles away. I've felt useless the past three evenings. I felt kind of depressed and very alone. Although if you know me I love to work ahead on things and prepare, so that's why this time is a struggle. I knew in the back of my head I had not been putting my relationship with God first and it has been on the back burner the past month or so. I get up in the morning read a few chapters out of my Bible, write some things in my journal and that continued day after day. On Sunday I started going crazy and I knew I had to change something. So I started doing something different for my morning devotions and went back to the SOLO book (all my Thrive friends should know what that is!). That helped a little becuase I was able to get out of a rut, but didn't totally help, becuase I still felt like I wasn't accomplishing anything in my free time and in 3 months I know I'm going to be extremely busy. I felt depressed tonight too. I tried videoing Shauna and that didn't work so I was extremely depressed. I decided to watch a movie (Draft Day which I highly recommend if you are a football fan). That movie lifted up my spirits a little and got me pumped for football season coming up! So I was feelign really pumped so I decided so sit down and listen to some recently released worship music and make some new playlists on spotify. Wow, God challenged me in this past 45 min so much. I sensed God was telling me 

"You just need to take time to be with me. You are bored and depressed because you are not seeking me in your time. You are bypassing me and trying to fill it with other things. Seek me and you will be fulfilled. You will find me and you will never run dry." 

Some more lyrics "I choose to find You in this hidden place. I choose to find you here. I choose to listen. I learn the sound of your voice." So awesome. God told me that when I feel lonely, depressed, annoyed, am struggling I need to take time to be with Him. When I have nothing to do I need to Go to God.

That can be a motto through everything in life, "When you question what you are to do next, Go to God."

So for those who read this. I would love prayer so that I can continue to seek God through this time of limbo until things start to take shape for my life ahead. Also if anybody would like to chat with me about my future plans I would be more than happy to do that. :)

You can contact me via facebook, e-mail (abrucrew1@verizon.net), phone, or text (717.585.4099).

-Andi

Strong God

I love it when you can sense the Holy Spirit's presence in a time of worship. People raising their hands in worship and giving glory and praise to our amazing God! This is what I sensed this morning in church. We sang the song Strong God (Vertical Church Band) and the chorus of that songs says:

Sing out, lift your voice and cry out Awesome is our strong God, mighty is our God Sing out, raise your hands and shout out Awesome is our strong God, mighty is our God

As I continue to look ahead I am so excited to see what God is going to do in my life! I'm excited, but also am afraid of the unknown, but more than anything I'm just laying that burden at Jesus' feet (as the song from the gift of music this morning mentioned).

Life update:
Weddings plans are coming together (a little over 3 months away!!), and even more will come together for the Guatemala wedding when Shauna heads back down there. She leaves PA in a week :(. It's going to be hard being apart, but it will definitly be a time of growth for both of us before beginning life together! We will be living here in Dillsburg for awhile after our wedding here as we look to raise support to go into full-time ministry in Guatemala. God has placed it on my heart to use sports as a catalyst to tell kids and others about His love and grace. He has given my the passions and abilities and I am blessed to be his servant to spread His Word. I spent time talking with Daryl Fulp this week about ministry questions and information regarding Hope for Home which got me more excited. It's going to be a good bit of work as we figure out details, but I know this is what God has called me to and it's going to be so awesome!

God is a Strong God and He will carry me through!

All I Have is Christ

Last night there was an event at church where we spent time praying for persecuted believers. I had the opportunity to lead a time of worship and we played the song "All I have is Christ." It was the last song of the musical worship time. We sang through the chorus of that song without hardly any instrumentation and it was a powerful time of sensing God's presence.

"Hallelujah all I have is Christ, Hallelujah Jesus is my life."

If we believe that to be true then Jesus is all we need. Jesus is our life. Without Him we are nothing, but with Him we have a purpose we have a meaning in life. It was just amazing reminder and sensing His presence.

I also had the opportunity to play guitar in a band at Mountain Ridge Church on Sunday morning and the message was about just quieting your soul and hearing God speak. "Remember you aren't feeding the root, the root is feeding you." He is feeding us. We just need to take time and be with Him. As Shauna and I sat in church I mentioned to her a verse I thought was funny and so I  told her multiple times, "So don't get cocky and strut your branch." (Romans 11:20 MSG) Without the root the branch is nothing. Without Jesus we are nothing. All I have is Christ. It was just cool to see that idea come full circle from the morning to the evening.

It was a reminder for me to be aware because God is always working!

Here's the song for those who don't know it.