Be a lover of His presence today.
Oh His love is so perfect and so good.
Love that we are far beyond deserving.

At times overwhelming.
Have you allowed Jesus to overwhelmingly love you?

I just want to be with You, Jesus. I need You more so much than anything, because all these things, are nothing without You.
Your presence is life to me.
Jesus, You are the glory!!!

Holly Jolly

  My roommate Jael came to Texas for our family Christmas!! She is part of the family, I say. She is another sister to me. I LOVE having her here to see and understand more of the Southern love that I always talk about. She really does think everything is bigger (and better).

It has been so very good to be home. Every time that I am here, I am reminded at how blessed I am to truly love being around my family, and sharing Jesus' love genuinely. We laugh so much that I am losing my voice. It's glorious. I thank Jesus for my family. Ahh I thank Him!

Christmas Eve Eve party in Deep Ellum. We sat at this table all night, and slapped the hands of other people that tried to eat the food...

Christmas light hoppin. Yes, that is Santa kneeling at Jesus' crib.

holiday cheer in my neighborhood 

Christmas drive through downtown 

Christmas  Eve service. Good grief, you think our family could have more girls?!

and dad is behind the camera...

just hanging my wooden shoe on the tree

wine from each place that we live

Christmas Eve dinner!

once again, dad is behind the camera 

Mom made us aprons!

Christmas chaos...

Our traditional picture in front of the tree holding/wearing our gifts

Highly appropriate for the picture below

Jael's famous Jack Daniel's cake. Looks like poo but tastes quite better :)

singing loud for all to hear

So these next pictures are from the project my friend Cammie and her brother Ben took on as their Christmas gift to Papa Thevenet...

Their family was part of founding Dallas, so this is one of pictures of the family from 1909.

pretty close, eh?

life size kites!

we helped build and set up the picture

my lovely friends :)

Papa Thevenet coming to see the surprise! 

I love this time of year! I praise Jesus, that He is here! That we get to celebrate His presence. 

My family asks every year, what do you want to give Jesus this year?

It's fun to think of all the ways we can challenge ourselves with that this year. He is so deserving.

More to come! Merry Christmas family!!

Short term mission trip to India!!

As many of you know my love for India has grown increasingly over the past year, I am so blessed and excited to be able to lead a short term trip this coming year through YWAM Pismo!!

I will be leading a short term mission trip to Kolkata, India at the end of April- first of May (roughly April 22- May 7.) 

This trip is open to anyone! So if you are at all interested, please let me know and I can get you more details. My hope is to have the team finalized by the end of February, so that we can start getting plane tickets!

We will be going to serve at Mother Theresa's, Missionaries of Charity. For about 16 days, we will lay aside all that is familiar and run into the heart of the hustle and bustle in Kolkata. 

What I love about this home is that there are all areas to serve. I desire to see people thrive in their giftings, and to be able to give and give and give of their hearts. We will be focusing mostly on the leper colonies as a team.

We will be mostly working with the leper colonies! To love and kiss the feet and hands of these beautiful people who are outcasted. You can read all about leprosy here. It is the blog that I did on Jesus' heart for these beautiful people and the lives that they live.

He has given me this overwhelming love for lepers. And ever since I was reading about the lepers in Leviticus and through other parts of Mark and the Bible, every time that I read that word I have not been able to look away. My heart aches for them to know the touch of Jesus. I desire to see these people loved and brought into the embrace of His presence. 

Kolkata has some of the largest leper colonies.

This time last year I was talking with my best friend Hailey about them, wondering if the colonies still existed because it is a curable disease. The more that I prayed for the people of Kolkata and that I sought out the opportunity to go back- Jesus has never failed my heart. My desire and my heart is to go back and to touch and love the untouchable, the outcasted. The ones that Jesus rejoices over with singing. My hope is to bring people from the community around me, to open eyes to see them fall in love with the presence of God. To fight for something that seems impossible. 

Here are some pictures from my last trip :)

I can't wait to serve alongside some of you! We pray that this would be a time of adventure! We also hope to be able to shoot a short documentary on the colonies here to raise awareness and show the love of Jesus all over! 

Listen to that tug :)

Please contact me if you are interested, 

Audrey Spurgin

audreyspurgin@gmail.com

How real are we willing to be?

I'm not going to lie: this is very vulnerable.

I have learned the value in being honest, especially with the lifestyle I live, it is a necessity. We live in America where it is easy to hide, and to sugarcoat so much. You know exactly what I am talking about...

"Hi, how are you?"

"Good. How are you?"

"I'm good, thanks!"

 But in this time, I desire to see heart's healed and loved through the reality. I feel as the more people I talk to, it's an unspoken bind that the enemy has over our hearts. My roommate desires and fights for this very thing that seems untouchable. But I say, it can no longer be put in the darkness of our hearts. I believe that Jesus wants us to fight for this very thing.

This is my very honest moment. And re-reading this before I post it, kinda turns my stomach because I know that now each of you can see and read my open messy heart.

Why Jesus do I push You away? When I live my life as a disciple, to run so hard after Your kingdom.

I don't believe You are enough to satisfy me, to really deeply and intimately satisfy me. I see You as a father, as a best friend, but NOTHING like the deep longing love. I desire that more from man, than You Jesus.

"My strength in life is that I am Yours?" Yes, as a daughter that You care deeply for, as a best friend that brings joy abounding...

If nothing else in my heart happens, I will find strength knowing that I am Yours, that my life was to bring You glory. That you are my heart's desire.

And yet how honest can I really be with that statement? Can I sing the words beautifully? Yes. But can I feel loved in a way that only Jesus is. It's who He is. Better, do I even know what that looks like, seek that, open even the smallest window for Jesus to pour so deeply?

Cause I can sing the words and let everyone around me know that it is my desire, but what if the man that I marry, all that I did was sing him songs? How annoying.

That I never really talked about the depth, but only sang what I thought would be most pleasing to hear.

Do I really make it the cry of my heart? To let my heart overflow. Or does it just sound good written out? Cause right now, it's just looking and sounding really good...

Am I a lover of His presence? Absolutely! Do I see fullness of joy, in the purest form? Absolutely.

But my love is not Yours first, it is of You, but not You.

I wanna sing to You Jesus, that YOU are my heart's desire. But I can't because I would be lying. To desire You more than anything would be a LIE to my heart. There are things in my life that replace You. Easily. There are few parts in my heart right now that can only be filled by You. Which in reality, to be fully honest, I think I forget too often that You are fullness. I let others do that for You, because I'm not even sure I would know what that would look like. I run to others to fill hurt, to fill voids, or even to fill joy. Or I enjoy just talking more about You, than really to You. I fall into that too often.

And this breaks me to say. It brings me to the deepest sorrow, belly of tears.

I wanna run so hard.

But I know that You must, and You desire to be that first. That my truest desire right now is to desire You. And this can be said and sung over and over but, I want to really know and truly seek what that means. My life reflects Your love, but my heart is a mess.

And I will fight You until deep cries out to deep. I'm not scared to be angry and confused at You, because to know this deeply is worth so much more than to live in pretend.

Christmas

This time of year is insanity. And sometimes I wonder how we have made it what it is.
We have all that we need throughout the year, mostly, right? Yet when it comes to a time where we remember Jesus, for this one day that is here to look to Jesus...what have we done?


Now, I LOVE Christmas. I love it because you get to make a list of "wants" and send it to the family, right? Then you get to stuff your face with sweets and a Thanksgiving meal all over. 
I love being able to come home and see my family and to love the moments and memories we have together. Where we decorate the tree, I get to put the manger scene together, and to make Christmas cookies that sometimes turn out brutal, like a one-legged gingerbread man. You know what I am talking about. And sometimes we take it to the next level and put blood there. Don't pretend you have never done it.


But the more that I have seen the world, the more in this season, I am in tears.
Tears that cry out for Jesus to come and bring heaven to earth. This time is the time that I am so overwhelmed with what we have become. So overwhelmed that most of us hate this time of year, because you don't have the money to buy the gifts, or the time to do all the shopping.


And yes, we see things on facebook, on the news, that remind us of our consumerism and we all "like" them and say "wow, conviction" BUT YET WE STILL IGNORE THAT IT IS ACTUALLY TRUE.
That we don't care enough to change. And yes, I am saying this to make some of us feel bad, because frankly- we should be completely ashamed of what we have made it. I know I rebuke it and say its just whatever, because it is speaking directly to the sin that I have ignored.

And don't get me wrong- I am so very guilty of it all with you. I am slowly coming out of the mindset that this should be anything of what we have made it. That if we took why this season IS, then maybe, just maybe, we could really sing...


Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel,
BORN IS THE KING OF ISRAEL


Oh come thou day-spring come and cheer
Our spirits by thine advent here
And drive away the shades of night
And pierce the clouds and bring us light!


Son of God
Love's pure light
Radiant beams from thy holy face
With the dawn of redeeming grace! 


These are beautiful words that are a praise to Jesus, in the simplicity of their hearts, they cried out saying, "Joy to the world, the Lord is come! Let every heart prepare Him room. The glories of His righteousness and WONDERS of His love."


It would be a whole culture change, a whole new way of thinking. 
And how do you make that change without coming off as judgmental? Because if we are honest, if I am honest- I look at families that I have seen do this well and I just think, "wow, way to make everyone else look bad...holier than thou." 
Or how do you tell your kids, when all their friends from school come back from break, bragging about what they got for Christmas, while your kid says- I celebrated Jesus.


And I feel like this is what stops us. We see the hurt and we feel the hurt, but we, I, am not bold enough  to make that change. Because I am selfish being that loves gifts. Most of us could agree with that statement. And we love to give gifts to our friends, our kids, because we see the joy it brings.


And you have seen the chaos of Black Friday. 
What if we fought for Jesus' name like that? That we fought for this season to be His. To be wonderfully in His presence?


I think we forget that life with Jesus really is far more, far beyond, more full of joy, than we even allow Him to show. Because we are so consumed. So very consumed.
Because not many of us have actually fully experienced the love of God, to where there is NOTHING else in this place that we crave more.


Even as I type this, I feel conviction in my heart, because the reality of it is that we are selfish. It's that feeling of knowing that we have made Jesus this man who just wants to rob us of the joy of this season, when in reality- HE is the reason that we have this joy. He is the joy that came! 


And I haven't gotten it all figured out, because I don't think that Jesus is angry that we love to bless people with gifts, and to show them that we love them, that we really do care for them- to show that in a form of a gift. But it makes me angry that we have made it JUST that. That it becomes something that we see as we deserve. 


Yet we neglect the needs of others throughout most of the year.
We can spend $450 billion dollars a year on Christmas, but we can't buy our homeless friend lunch, or we can't send money for villages to have clean water. I mean it goes on and on, but this time of year it especially hurts.


Something to think about as you wrap gifts.
Find somewhere to serve someone else this Christmas, and make it something you do regularly. I know my family has taught me this, and it makes getting that gift and singing that carol that much more meaningful. Because when I look back, who the stink even remembers what I got last Christmas. But I do remember giving the gingerbread a bloody leg with Emily.


Now that we know, we have an obligation. It's the reality that we live in. It sucks, it's not fair, but it's the reality we have made. But when we pray, "Jesus we want earth as it is in heaven," we have to start somewhere.


I pray that we can experience the love of Jesus in a way that it is what we crave, that we see that there is no better gift. Cheesy, maybe? But I fully believe He is better. 


Worship fully.

Love

Are we just living for the reward that we know is to come or are we seeking more of His presence now?!
Are we completely missing why He came? Are we blinded just like the Jews?


This past week while my dad has been here, we just had a lot of conversations about the "I wonder's."
Mostly it has sparked from him reading the book "Love Wins" by Rob Bell. Yeah, the one that all that fuss was about. He read it in less than 2 days, while I just picked it up this morning and read 3 pages. I had to stop and even process that. So I had some of the same conversations with my roommate, and we went in circles- through laughter and tears and anger and overwhelming joy. We just stopped and were completely in awe of Jesus. Completely in awe. It really is so intriguing to read, as I begin to wonder- is this whole book wrong? Or have I just believed things because I have been told, and never really sought them out for myself? Whatever my answer may end up being, which I may never have one- I love how much he challenges me to think and to really seek Jesus for His heart. It's amazing how different his perspective is.


Now don't take me for saying that I have a whole new opinion and I completely agree with the 7 pages I have read so far, but it has absolutely made me stop and think- if we know the character and nature of God, and we TRULY believe that God is good ALWAYS, that He is faithful ALWAYS, and that He is ALWAYS redeeming and pursuing- then all the theology and opinions we have accumulated in our many years of believing Jesus...could we be wrong? Or even not completely wrong, but have we maybe have missed who He is, why He came, and made Him who we want Him to be? Sounds like something we as the church have done for some time. Maybe that is why we quickly rebuke this whole new idea, because it doesn't seem fair does it? It doesn't seem fair that if we have given our whole life to serve and love Jesus, that everyone should reap the benefits in the end.


In the book it talks about just that thing. Take the story of the prodigal son, which I'm sure that most of you know. That when the older brother sees that his brother, who just took advantage of everything, comes home and the father throws him a party. Once again, can you imagine that bitter feeling, that deeply rooted anger? I can! And I begin ask God that same question...then what am I even doing here? Why am I in full time missions- giving my heart and soul to pour into people so that they know Your love. And then He follows by saying that, you have been with me all along and EVERYTHING that I have is yours.
Everything that I have is yours. Is yours to enjoy, to know that even though you sin and spit in my face daily- that all that I am is yours. Have I really been living that way? Or do I just continue to look around me to judge if Jesus really cares, or if He really is good?


Now how can we look at Jesus and say that He doesn't love? Because we have been with Him, in His presence all along. All along, we have chosen to fix our eyes on the people around us and say- how can they be living that way and not love Jesus, but still have it WAY better than me? We have become just that- the jealous and annoying brother.
Let us fix our eyes on Jesus.
Stop looking around... and seek Jesus, because He is with us all along, and all that He has is ours. We just choose to look around and say it's not fair.
Side Note: Wanna read a book all about just that? Our inheritance now? Read "Momentum" by Eric and Bill Johnson.


It raises the question of...because I know and TRULY believe that God is good, that He is the one God- then wouldn't our lives truly look so much different than others around us- not just like humanitarians that do good to people and take care of one another, but we just serve a God along with that? Or that we are living as any other religion where we believe that IF we do good, and live our lives well to serve and please Jesus, and love Him- then we will receive Him for always? To go to another better life? Cause that sounds similar to reincarnation to me. It makes me think- WHOA I am so glad that I am not God, and if we have dumbed it down to where we can be the god of our own world, and even if we don't realize it- then why have we made God completely explainable? Cause if we can explain God, then we are god?


Now, clearly I do not know the answers to many of these questions, but things that I have been chewing on and will continue to pray through. But this is the time when my child-like, blind faith, kicks in. I know that I serve a God that is love, that loves, and that is completely, far beyond, what I could ever come to a conclusion on. And that is why I love His mystery. He never bores me.


Take a few days, just to think. Let your mind go to those scary places, and wrestle with Jesus on the hard questions...IT'S OK!

Texas meets California once again

 Papa Spurg came to visit! The first time he has seen where I live, where I work, the community around me, and the unicyclists.
It's fun to have him here! We have kept ourselves quite busy. There is much more that we did, but here is a glimpse of the week...

Jesus has given us very beautiful 70 degree, sunny days! It has been wonderful. 

We went out to the pier the first day that he was here and watched surfers like these...

Then we attempted to play sand volleyball with some friends on staff, but got to the courts realizing that none of us knew where the volleyball was, so instead..

We explored the caves, and enjoyed a nice ocean view walk

Then me and dad did a little beach shopping to the local shops and let's just say- he is meant to be a model? Crazy eyes!

I have put a few pieces of my art in the local coffee shop, so we had enjoyed a cup of joe while looking at my pieces behind me.

Actually, dad ate a burger because he thinks that coffee tastes like "grease from the garage floor" (so little do his taste buds know...)

After our staff family dinner on Friday, we went out to SLO and watched their Christmas parade. It was a little less than average. Awkward pauses and spaces between each car. We did get to see some roller derby ladies, belly dancers, and a giant snowman with a girl inside it riding around on a bike. We went into my favorite coffee shop (Kreuzbergs) and watched the whole parade from a beautiful window seat.

And enjoyed walking around downtown, through a bubble gum alley with my roommates.

We also, we-meaning my dad, took on the task of building me a lofted bed/ desk!! My dad had never built either, but in less than a day he whipped out this bad boy! Isn't he incredible?!

And while he was making my bed, I went downstairs to the closet under the stairs and made my art getaway! It is incredible!!!! I sometimes just go down there and shut the door to sit and be still. Come hang out and paint!

For those of you who don't know- all the singles on staff combined homes this past week. So now we are all living in one place!! Quite fun! We came in and quickly whipped this place into holiday cheer.

These are the Christmas stockings for the house.

Oh how we love the holidays!

Another fun part of the house! The map wall in our kitchen. We are such missionaries.

 I'm sure that there will be more pictures to come after today when my friend Brandon teaches dad how to surf!!! Ain't NO way I am getting in- check the water temperature...

  Gonna miss you dad! It has been incredible to have you here! You have gotten to see where your little girl does life now. Maybe the whole family can come and hang out soon! :)
You have been an incredible example and dad to me and the family, and to see where and how it has shaped me now, I forgive you for all the times that I thought moving and changing everything was the worst thing ever. Everyone around me can see why I am the way that I am, and have such a value on family and community and seeing a whole culture LOVED and submerged in Jesus!
I love you so much, and you are the example I want to be. I look up to you more than you know.