10000 Hours

Inspired by Malcolm Gladwell's book, Outliers... I have started this new blog: http://10000th.wordpress.com. This is a much more general blog for anyone who is interested in keeping up with things I think about. I won't be subscribing this mailing list to the blog so this should be the very, very last email I send from here.

Thanks for reading and all your support these past couple years!

Joel

All Good Things Come To An End

Dear friends, just wanted to let you know that after a solid six month run, I will no longer be posting on 'tea for one.' Part of it is because I haven't updated in another six months since, but the other (more so) part of the change is that since I thinking about life outside UMass, I want my a new blog to start from scratch. My 'new' blog will have a specific goal/mindset in mind as I post updates. If you are receiving email updates from this blog, nothing will change in terms of receiving updates. Anyways, I'll start publicizing myself with a different blog address when it comes to it. Thanks for reading my thoughts and updates during the six month time period of going strong!

Joel

...and here's my final newsletter which you may be receiving in the mail sometime next week...

All Day Long Today

Psalm 25:4-5

Show me your ways, O LORD, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long.

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God's presence is with us all day long, so that we can hope like this. Everywhere we go, whatever our circumstance... God's presence is there. And in the midst of feeling discouraged again by the lack of rest and joy in anything I was doing or having, I realized I didn't want God's presence in these moments. Where was I when the things I deeply wanted simply couldn't be? God exists in these moments of sadness and suffering, and it is only in God's presence that I can find comfort and rest.

Yet for some reason I didn't want God. He had been the cause of all of this. He had allowed misery. Yet I never saw Him past the problems. God is also the One who brings us relief from all of this. There is hope that this suffering is not the end, and there is always something better. Somehow all of this is linked to something greater, but I am too blind to see. And this is hope, there is joy in trying to see God's presence. Wherever I am and whatever obstacles are in the way, God is there. I definitely have not fully solved this conundrum or anything, but to become eager and hopeful when we are sad is definitely something worth mentioning.

As I recount more of what this means the past few months specifically, I just want to thank you for having hope for me even when I lacked it. For trusting God even when I struggled. And for continually being part of something greater, God's kingdom, when I felt like I failed to. Thanks for your support and for sharing the Gospel with me every time we meet!

http://saharatea.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/oasis-desert.jpg

Amidst rocky, uneven terrain

Dead by toil, Dead by fear

Life sprang out of the heavens and called my name

Lo! Rise once more

You are alive today!

Blog-ging Off the Calories

With Thanksgiving over, I think it's time to starting putting that extra stuffing to work. I hope to start sending updates (regularly) again. Thanks again for all your support!

Totally Irrelevant, but in the spirit of Thanksgiving:

In n' Out

Back home for a few weeks, now it's over. I will be heading out to Amherst on Monday morning. I think this officially marks the second year, but please continue praying for the fund-raising. Thanks! I know that a lot of people who are on the missions' field are struggling with financial support, but God can provide!

The Hunt for a Car

This post is definitely edited since I did not realize how quickly things change in the consumer market during the process. I was initially looking for a car badly because I thought it was something I needed badly. I had all these questions floating in my head: How would I make appointments? How would I help out the campus if I was going to be needy? How could I learn to be responsible? These are pretty valid questions, but the real issue was my identity drawing somehow from possessing a car. And in this process of finding a car, I started seeing how it was consuming me. I am really thankful for the help I received in finding a car. Even though it was consuming me, it was really awesome spending a lot of time with my dad and a few friends doing all of this. I eventually found one, a minivan (that looks like the one below)!

The reason I am sharing all of this is because it makes me think about wanting material things in regards to the spiritual realm. I think this experience helped me see that God's existence is bigger than the things we want. I desire to possess, and God gave me much more. Relational experiences, in buying a car(?). In the same way that the whole process has been a blessing for me, I look forward to blessing others with my minivan (still nameless).

Summer Newsletter

It's Out!!! Right here:

I have put them in the mail and you should get them sometime over the next week...

Which reminds me, if you are on my email list, but are not receiving any mailings from me, please let me know so I can fix that. I am planning on sending out a newsletter quarterly as well as a couple other things. Thanks!