From One State to Another, and Then Another...

Last week was spent in Alabama. We had a team from Carlisle, Pa come down and build a house from the ground up for Miss Karen, whose home was destroyed by the March 2nd tornadoes. It was a challenging week for sure and full of growth. But seeing Miss Karen's excitement light up her face and her smile grow bigger with every passing day was worth it all. I'm praying that we had an impact on her life and that she will see Jesus because of it.
Plus, I was able to get up on a roof, which is always fun!! :)

Earlier this week I was in New Orleans with teams from Maryland and North Carolina. And the nice North Carolina guys let me help them put in a ceiling. They even took pictures for me! :)

Right now I'm in Missouri visiting the husband-to-be and his family, talking about wedding things and picking out classes for when I attend Southwest Baptist University in the fall! Also, Mark Lewis and Katie Hooks made the trip to SBU to train a team of college students who are soon leaving for Japan on a mission trip! I was able to take some pictures of the training session and also them as a team. Please pray for them! 

Katie, Mark and the Japan team

I have 2 more weeks of school left. There is light at the end of this tunnel. I'm so pumped for summer and lots of volunteers and hard work! School is the only thing standing in my way :) Please pray that I finish out this semester strongly!

Also, please continue to pray for my support to come in. Unfortunately, it has not been as regular as it should be, and I am getting about half of what I should be receiving I would love to get a new camera before this summer is over so that I can do my job better, but at this point I will be using my support for just food and housing.

As always thank you for your prayers. They mean so very much to me and they keep me going! I'm praising God for the people that read this and continue to support me financially and with prayer!

Love,

Chelsea

ENGAGED

I'm sure most of you have heard the news by now :)
Needless to say, I had an excellent Easter weekend in Pennsylvania with my family and Dustin!
On Thursday morning, Dustin and I went for a hike. During it, he asked if we could sit down and read some Scripture and listen to music. When we sat down by a pond, he told me he bought me something and pulled out a very pretty journal and said that he would like me to use it when we get engaged, to write my thoughts down, etc. (As if he wasn't going to propose in about 5 minutes) Of course, I thought this was very sweet and gave him lots of compliments about the idea.

After that he read to me 2 Chronicles 34:31-32:

"The king stood by his pillar and renewed the covenant in the presence of the Lord -- to follow the Lord and keep his commands, statutes and decrees with all his heart and all his soul, and to obey the words of the covenant written in this book. Then he had everyone in Jerusalem and Benjamin pledge themselves to it; the people of Jerusalem did this in accordance with the covenant of God, the God of their ancestors."

Dustin told me that he wanted these verses to apply to his life, then mine and then our family's. Then he played the song "Lead Me" by Sanctus Real. After that, he told me that he also wrote me a letter. He read out loud to me how he felt about me and the past 8 and a half months of pursuing me and how he wants to cherish me, protects me and love me in the future. At the end of his letter, he explained that he talked to my parents that morning and they gave him their full blessing to marry me. And with that, he asked me to be his wife!

As you can probably tell from the picture, I was very shocked and excited and I said YES :) :)

When we got home he had a dozen roses waiting for me along with a framed picture of the two of us.

I'm so excited to begin this new adventure with my amazing fiance! God has truly lavished his love and grace and blessings upon me and I will always be praising him for that!

Thank you for your prayers and support, as always. But please include Dustin and I in your prayers as well, that we will continue to abide by HIS statutes and rest on HIS promises! 

Picture Happy

Things I am thankful for:

1. I'm so thankful for this house that Jen and I had in Covington. And also thankful for the family that allowed us to stay there for 5 months!












2. I'm thankful for this house in Mandeville. Praise God for orchestrating events so that Miss Sharon was able to let us live here and take care of her house while she is gone! We will be here for 6 weeks, until May 1st.

3. RIP the Lewis's Buick. It had a good run. I happened to be driving the car when it caught on fire (for the whole story, make sure you get my newsletter. Email me at chelsea.buffington@efca.org if you don't get it), so I'm praising God that I am alive and well and writing this blog right now!

4. So thankful for the college kids that are willing to give up their spring break to come down here and serve in New Orleans! Please pray that God will raise up interns for this summer!

5. I'm praising God for New Orleans and the fact that He has called me here in this season of my life. Plus, what a gorgeous place!

6. I'm thankful for yummy, home-cooked Cajun food that you can't get anywhere else!









Thank you for your prayers and support. I'll be sending out my newsletter this week, too!
Love,
Chelsea :)

I'm Back!! (in Bama)

I need to take a lesson from the devotions that the teams have every week. I should just go into my days without any expectations!
On Thursday, I found out that Jen and I would be making the 6 trip to Alabama on Saturday to pick up a truck and bring it back to New Orleans. The very next day (Friday) several tornadoes hit Madison County in Alabama again (the last time being April 27th, 2011. To read about this, see my blog post: Hope in Bama). Tornadoes are an amazing thing. They don't discriminate, but one side of a street could be completely wiped out, while the other side has not even been touched.
So Jen and I made the uneventful drive to Alabama yesterday, despite choosing a huge diesel truck with no cruise control (definitely a mistake). Today we attended the service at Hope Church, our partner here in Madison County. But, of course, we can't go a day without an adventure. I was skyping my family, when Jen called and told me that one of our trucks broke down (leaking brake fluid). Ironically, it was the truck that Jen and I originally came up to Alabama to get.
THANK YOU JESUS, for not letting us drive that truck back down to Louisiana!!!
For those of you that are wondering, the damage is extensive. Families who have just gathered up there lives from the last tornadoes had them ripped apart again. PLEASE pray for these people!
I'm headed back down to Louisiana tomorrow with Jen. Please pray that we will have another uneventful drive :)
Thank you for continuing to pray for me as I work in ministry. I can't do it without my team of people committed to pray for me! Praise God for this opportunity I was able to seize with TouchGlobal :)

I Love it When God's Like, "No worries, I got your back."

The past two weeks have been awesome visiting Dustin and also John Brown University. I was able to meet with their team leaders and also the girl who will be our next intern. It's funny how quickly time flies...I find it hard to believe that I was on a flight to New Orleans to be an intern 9 months ago. But enough about that! Let me tell you the latest story of how God's been working in my life.
Two blog posts ago, I mentioned that Jen and I will be able to stay in our house until March 15th. This is awesome and a huge answer to prayer. The problem was that we would be homeless after that until May 1st, when our summer home opens up.
Well, I found out that - through some connections at my church here in Covington - one very gracious woman has opened up her home to Jen and I for the month and half that we don't have a home. The house is in Mandeville, a block from the lake, and a reasonable distance from our office in Covington.
So once again, God's sovereign way of showing his power and love amazes me. While visiting Dustin, we were able to listen to a message by Louie Giglio where he goes through the Doxology in Romans 11:33-36. This passage came to mind again as I typed this blog:

"Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!

'For who has known the mind of the Lord,

or who has been his counselor?'

'Or who has given a gift to him

that he might be repaid?'

For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen."

AMEN!!

Love,

Chelsea

Mardi Gras

My favorite city in the world is so deeply rooted in history, something that I absolutely love about it.

One of the many traditions there is the Mardi Gras celebration. This is what today's blog is about. I'm on a mission to bring to light the redeeming qualities of Mardi Gras (which, by the way is in 4 days. Happy Mardi Gras!). I'll be honest, when reading about Mardi Gras I felt that this blog was a bit like a research paper, but don't be deceived! I promise it is interesting (and fairly short) :)

The celebration of Mardi Gras goes way back, originally being a pagan ritual that was incorporated into Christian Rome. It was sort of used as a last "hurrah" before the penitential season of Lent. Although its roots aren't solely French, Mardi Gras (French for "Fat Tuesday") was brought to the New Orleans area by French explorers. And no one does it like New Orleans now, that's for sure!

Mardi Gras didn't get it's bad reputation until the 19th century when masked paraders demonstrated violent behavior during the celebration. Because of this, the press demanded that Mardi Gras celebrations should be stopped. Fortunately, a group of men known as Comus made Mardi Gras a beautiful celebration, proving to the public that it could safe and enjoyable for all people. "Krewes", which are kind of like secret societies, were formed. These krewes get to plan their parades, choosing themes, costumes, floats, etc. 

In recent years, the general public knows Mardi Gras as an excuse to go to New Orleans and do inexcusable things. The media highlights this behavior making it seem like New Orleans is one big, dirty place during the Mardi Gras season. I want my readers to know that this is NOT the case. It happens, yes, in certain places in the French Quarter. I also want my readers to know that the people that are doing these things are out of town, foolish tourists. Northerners, mostly. NOT the people of New Orleans that I work with on a regular basis.

Every person from New Orleans that I've talked to has told me the same thing: Mardi Gras is a time of celebration. A holiday when the family can go outside, grill, pass football and share time with their neighbors. Especially after a thing like Hurricane Katrina, wouldn't you like to see your city dressed up and brought together? New Orleans natives rarely go to the few crazy parades. Most of the parades are kid and family friendly. Kids will sit on shoulders and reach up to floats as the people on them hand out beads and stuffed animals. I know! I've been to one :)

Me, Bethany and Jen at our first Mardi Gras parade!

Hopefully this post gave you a little more insight to the city I'm ministering to. It is a pretty awesome place :)

Thank you for your prayers and support as always and I hope your week is going well!

Love,

Chelsea

3 Things I'm Thankful For

Some of you who received my last newsletter know that the past month or so has been a little difficult for me. The theme of January, for me, was Romans 5:3 "We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance." It felt like I running into problem after problem, trial after trial. I walked into a different wall every time I turned around; it definitely started to hurt after a while.

But today I am praising God for 3 three things specifically:

1. Jen and I found out that the house we are living in won't sell until March 15th now. Which means another month we weren't expecting of living in a home!

2. I was approved to drive ministry vehicles even though I'm (slightly) under 21. So if I need a car or something to get me from Point A to Point B (or C or D or E. I'm always going somewhere!), I have that option. Thank you, Jesus!!

3. The grace God gives us in the moment that we need it. Whether it's myself needing grace or that I need to give grace to others, Christ always supplies that.

"Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." Hebrews 4:16

What an awesome promise! Thank you for your dedication in praying for me and supporting me. I'm praying that you will also approach the throne of grace with confidence!

Love,

Chelsea :)