missing home.

today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. [hebrews 3:7-8,15 & 4:7]

i haven't had much time to miss athens yet. we are so busy with lectures all week, and work duties, reading, cooking, cleaning, shoveling snow/leaves, meals, trips to town, even just hanging out at night so we can get to know each other better as a team. so, amidst all of that, we don't have too much free time. sometimes we have a good amount of time at night, but everyone is so tired and it's easier to just sit around and get caught up in conversation. i've tried really hard not to think about home. but today, i have free time, where there is no one around to distract me, and no work duties either. we had church this morning (still not vineyard, but it will do) and we went to a different one from last week. i liked it ok. very charismatic. very diverse in culture. it's interesting. everyone in this city knows who we are. they all say, "you have that ywam look about you." it's a little unnerving. we aren't going out and paving roads, because the roads are already paved. there is a big foundation here that's already laid, because of the people before us - like paul and karen, who have been here for 15 years. we have a lot of pressure on us, i think, to live up to what ywam dts-ers should be, do, look like. maybe it's just me, though.

anyway, everyone in the city has been really warm and welcoming so far. friday we went out, on a mission to get "happy birthday!" written in as many languages as we could on a birthday card for paul. what was the most interesting part for me was that each team (we were in groups of two) had totally different experiences based on where they went in the city). josiah and i went to all the coffee shops and all the places where younger kids hang out and we had so much fun. everyone was really cool and really interested in what we were doing. the best part was that i really feel like i could go back to those places and start meaningful relationships with those kids. (by the way, we got 11 languages.) maybe i'll scan the card in, so you can see them all. ha.

yesterday was our day off, and it was so nice. we went into the city centre and walked around, got my lip pierced, got coffee for a while, went to the mall, went to subway (yes, they have subway!), and we went to a bookstore, as well. but there was one specific shop that we went in that i absolutely loved! it was downstairs and was all organic and fair trade jewelry and indian clothing, incense, oils, etc. it was perfect. the girl who owns the place was really cool. her name's holly. we stood around and talked to her for a while and she even gave us some tips on evangelism in the market square - where the kids hang out. there are two groups of teenagers here, one of them is a large gang (the chavs - who i have run into already) and the other kids are just the alternative kids who aren't in that specific gang. it's really interesting, to be honest. and kind of scary. i haven't figured out who is who yet.

obviously there is a whole lot more that i could write, but we're having dinner in a few minutes. tomorrow i am helping lead our team worship. i'm hoping that we get to expand upon our teachings of prophecy this upcoming week. i really enjoyed it this week. actually, before i go, i want to talk about one experiment that we did thursday or friday night. we each got into a group of three and what we had to do was prophecy over each person by using an object in the room. it was really funny and really weird, but so encouraging! not because of what they prophesied over me (even though it was really cool), but because of what i prophesied over them. it's really awesome to know that god can use absolutely anything to talk to his children, because he loves us and wants us to be comforted and encouraged.

alright. time to eat. just so everyone knows, if you have questions about what i'm doing or more personal questions, just e-mail or facebook me. it would be really nice to hear from some people back home.