Faithful One

God has been constantly reminding me of His faithfulness. Something tells me that's what He's trying to teach me right now... hehe. So many things have been happening in my life lately that just completely point to the Lord's faithfulness. The biggest thing is just that lately I've been feeling really really isolated and alone. I'm constantly reminded of just how alone I am in this far away land... but at the same time I am constantly reminded of His presence here. I've been super busy with work and have been out of town a couple weekends, and I just kind of feel like my friendships here haven't been what they were. I feel like I'm in a constant battle to keep myself in with the DBU crowd here... it certainly makes a difference when you're the only one working somewhere else. I've learned that things will never be what they were, and I need to let go. It must be part of this wierd phenomenon called growing up eh? The past couple months have been ones filled with being broken and restored. Constant molding. BUT, can I just tell you? I am sooo grateful for the things I'm being taught here. I'm learning that it's ok to be by myself. It's ok to FULLY rely on my savior. It's ok to focus on taking care of me. It's ok to be in the background of friendships instead of up front. It's ok to be broken. I'm learning that there is no shame to not having it all together, and I can in fact rejoice in that!

Also, being issolated here has made me aware of how painfully single I am :) I'm prayerfully and patiently waiting for my Beloved... and I know that God is going to be faithful in taking care of me on that level. Two very real examples of this, are two of my dearest friends Chelsea, and Gracie. These two ladies have been a HUGE example for me in the realm of patience. I have spent many a conversations with them on what it means to wait for His timing. I am so grateful for their examples of what it means to be a woman after God's heart. THANK YOU to both of you, and congratulations on your engagements last week!!!!

The beautiful Chelsea and her FIANCE! So excited for you love! Getting married March 6th! Yay!

And precious Gracie. Getting married January 23rd!

Aren't both of these women just glowing so beautifully knowing that they're about to marry the ones that they have waited so patiently for their whole lives for??? And how exciting is it to think about that God created that person JUST for you, knowing exactly what you would need?? GOD IS FAITHFUL!

I'll write again soon :) 26 days til I'm home for Christmas! yay!

Song for today:
Hillsong: "Desert Song" (Listen to it HERE)

This is my prayer in the desert
When all that's within me feels dry
This is my prayer in my hunger and need
My God is the God who provides

This is my prayer in the fire
In weakness or trial or pain
There is a faith proved
Of more worth than gold
So refine me Lord through the flame

I will bring praise
I will bring praise
No weapon formed against me shall remain
I will rejoice
I will declare
God is my victory and He is here

This is my prayer in the battle
When triumph is still on its way
I am a conqueror and co-heir with Christ
So firm on His promise I'll stand

All of my life
In every season
You are still God
I have a reason to sing
I have a reason to worship

This is my prayer in the harvest
When favor and providence flow
I know I'm filled to be emptied again
The seed I've received I will sow

Photo dump

So I have a lot of pictures I haven't posted yet from the past couple of weeks. Enjoy :)

Anthony turned 23 November 5 and Kathy threw him a surprise birthday party. I was really awesome. Mostly because we finally got to watch SNL's "Surprise Party" skit... we've been missing it... we can't watch it online here because we're in Korea, so Kathy bought it for him on itunes. If you haven't seen the surprise party skit, PLEASE watch it by clicking here. Be prepared to laugh harder than you have in a while.

Here's the birthday boy himself with his bestie Pak In.

Annie decided to come too. She sent a package full of party supplies, complete with pictures of herself on sticks. It was awesome.

We like to call this the language corner. Jake and Alyssia rarely speak in English. No one ever really knows what they're saying...

Narae, Roori, and myself. Love these girls :)

Something was clearly funy... I don't know what? But it was the most glorious cake.

Again, something about a presesnt he was opening was really funny. I think it would be the couple shirts someone gave Anthony for him and Kathy. Really awkward slash really amusing for all.

AWESOME gloves. If you want any of these for Christmas, just let me know.

I definitely had to try these out.

Anthony and all his church friends.

The DBU group.

The special crowd.

Pak In, Anthony, and Pak In's girlfriend, Halla.
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The next group of pictures is from the Jubilee women's retreat I went on a couple of weeks ago.

The Jubilee women's ministry logo. I'm the second person on the bottom of the right leg of the M.

The whole group. Can you find me?? haha. I'm the 3rd from the right on the front row.

Two girls from my small group, Dabin and Heidi.
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These pictures are from the mini birthday celebration we had for Krista at the Indian food place. YUMMY!

Amy, Eden, Krista, Me and Caroline... Erin was taking the picture

Krista blowing out her mini cake

The whole group of present and previous CCA kindergarten English Teachers.

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A couple of weeks ago, my friend Daniel and I figured out that we both attended small group Bible studies... his made up of Baylor people and mine made of DBU people, so we decided we should all meet each other. So, my group ventured out to Seoul (BangBae) to meet Daniel's group. It was a fantastic night! We're hoping to all meet again soon before Christmas.

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And lastly, I went to eat Indian food again... like 2 days later. I LOVE it so much. I crave it all the time, so thankfully my friends indulged my craving, and we all went out to have it.

Stephanie, Anthony, Pak In, Pak In's friend, Jake, and Cameron. We had our own room... I'm pretty much a celebrity at this place. They always give us free stuff now, and I'm pretty sure it's because I come here way too much.

I feel like I shouldn't been interrupting whatever they have going on in this picture...

The whole gang. Oh, minus Cameron...

The end. I hope everyone is doing well. I'll be home in 33 days. Not that I'm counting. I'll be in Daegu for the next 3 days for an ESL certification, so don't try to call me or anything. Miss everyone so much!

Memorable quotes from this week:
My student, Min Joon, looked up at me, pointed to my hair, and said, "Teacher, wig?"

Oh, and today, we were reading the book Giraffes Can't Dance and one of my students said, "Teacher, you are elephant." Thinking this was another fat joke, I said, "JinHee, why is teacher elephant?" she simply said, "the elephant is gray. Your shirt is gray." I was sooo shocked. hahaha. No fat jokes this week? This is too good to be true.

What do I want for Christmas?

Mom, can Amy and I get some matching gowns like these again for Christmas this year?

I can't wait to be home for Christmas.

Ezra...

So today in our daily QT at work, we were reading out of Ezra 1. I don't know about you... but I could've never told you what can be read in the book of Ezra. In my mind I consider it a "lost book" if you will. It's one of those books that I always skip over. I've recently realized that I stick to my favorite books of the Bible and RARELY go beyond them. I've been quite pleased with the QT book we've been going through at CCA because I find that it goes through all those "lost books" of the Bible, and I'm reading and learning so much that I never knew was even in the Bible. I am constantly thinking to myself, "that's in the Bible?? I had NO idea!" It's really made me aware of how little I know the God I call my Everything. I feel pretty vulnerable with this confession, but I've just been really challenged by that. Sorry for the tangent, that's not the point of this story. Back to Ezra 1.

Take some time to read Ezra 1 if you have a minute, it's only 11 verses. Basically, it's just about God's restoration of the Temple of Jerusalem, and really just the restoration of God's people after immense times of suffering and trials. 2 big things I got out of this:

1st, verse two says: ² "This is what Cyrus king of Persia says:" 'The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and he has appointed me to build a temple for him at Jerusalem in Judah." It just really made me think about how much we need to pray for world leaders like Cyrus. He was completely in tune with the Lord, and did exactly as the Lord asked him to. How amazing would it be to have leaders like this in today's messy world?
2nd, this whole story was just so encouraging, as it paints such a beautiful picture of God's faithfulness to restoring what is damaged and broken. In His PERFECT timing, He restores His chosen people and the Temple of Jerusalem. I was just so encouraged that even though my life has it's messy and broken parts, God is going to be faithful to restore all that was lost. It makes me look at times of trail with a smile, knowing that God is going to show up in bigger and better ways than I could've ever thought in the end. Patience Ashley. Patience.

I'm definitely not a Bible scholar, but this is just one average girl's take on this snipet of God's word... I hope you can be encouraged to wait patiently for the restoration :)

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On a COMPLETELY different note, I had quite an adventure/ordeal at a Korean hospital today that I feel like you should know about....

So basically God gave me rocks in the place of the muscles that should be in my shoulders and neck. I've always dealt with back/shoulder pain, but it's gotten a lot worse in the past year. Then, last week I started having really bad pain in pulses down my arms and into my hands every now and then, usually at night. This really freaked me out, and basically I thought I was dying. I'm seriously turning into a hypochondriac, and it's kind of ridiculous. Anyway. I was telling Caroline about it today, and she said she had gone to a physical therapist here last semester and that she wanted to go for neck pain anyway, so she would take me today. We got to the doctor around 4:30, and after quite a dilemma over the spelling of my name in Korean, I finally was able to have the consultation with a doctor. After telling him my symptoms through my bestie and translator, Caroline, he got very serious. He basically said my symptoms were very serious because of the pulsating pain through my arms. He explained that he was 99% sure that I had a herniated disc in my back that was causing the problem. At this point I was really freaked out because I was pretty sure that's not something I wanted to have wrong with me. I was sent in for about a million xrays and a CT scan to diagnose the problem. As worried as I was, I was actually THOUROUGHLY amused by this whole process. Caroline obviously couldn't go in with me to the testing rooms, so it was just me and the Korean girl who probably lost rock, paper, scissors (how all important decisions are made in Korea) for who had to be stuck treating the foriegner. It was hilarous, because I couldn't understand how I was supposed to position my body for these tests, so she basically was forced to move me around like a rag doll into the positions she needed me to be in. So funny. Poor girl.

After all that, there was some waiting, and then the results. Good news is there was no herniated disc as far as he could tell, bad news is my spine is pretty crooked. However, he was confident that after a few weeks of PT and visits with a chiropractor, it could be corrected quite a bit. I was pretty excited that it wasn't as serious as he thought in the beginning, I'm just praying that all this will give me some relief of all this pain... I'm only 22! I'm way too young to be having so many back/neck problems :(

Finally, Caroline and I headed upstairs to the PT area. This part was pretty much awesomely relaxing. First, we were placed on these massage beds that massage your whole body. Amazing. Next we get connected to these suction cup like things on our hurting areas, and it sends electric shocks into your muscles. Then we are transferred to another room onto these heated beds. So cozy and relaxing. While you're on the heated beds, you're connected to another type of electric pulse machine... I'm not really sure what the difference is. Finally, I saw the Physical Therapist/Chiropractor. That was not so much fun. While he was massaging my neck/shoulders/back I wanted to SCREAM! It hurt SO bad. Then I was twisted and turned and popped in all different directions. This was also super amusing with the language barrier. I feel so bad for the stress I cause these doctors by forcing them to use their VERY limited English....

So yeah. That was my EXTREMELY lengthy evening in the hospital. A simple idea of a shoulder massage turned into quite the ordeal. I'm glad though to be hopefully getting some relief soon. I have to see the PT every other day for the next 2 weeks. That means a lot of time commitment, but I guess I don't have a choice...

Sorry this turned into a novel, I just thought I should give a quick update. Miss you all.

Lyrics for today... SO GOOD. You can listen to it by clicking HERE
"Everything" by Tim Hughes
God in my living
There in my breathing
God in my waking
God in my sleeping

God in my resting
There in my working
God in my thinking
God in my speaking

Be my everything
Be my everything
Be my everything
Be my everything

God in my hoping
There in my dreaming
God in my watching
God in my waiting

God in my laughing
There in my weeping
God in my hurting
God in my healing

Christ in me
Christ in me
Christ in me the hope of glory
You are everything

HAPPY PEPERO DAY!

What is Pepero Day you might ask?

According to www.popseoul.com/terminology,
Pepero Day: (빼빼로 데이) An informal holiday on November 11 (11.11) where peppero chocolate sticks are given out as presents.

Also, here's a snippet about it from an article I read:

11/11. If you’re a Westerner, it was Armistice Day, the end of World War I.
If you’re a Korean farmer, it was Farmers Day, but don’t expect too many Koreans to know that. In a coup that undoubtedly has fattened the bank accounts of some clever marketing executives at Lotte Confectionary Co., most Koreans would say that Nov. 11 is “Pepero Day.”
Pepero is a snack that looks like a straw dipped in chocolate. Under the chocolate is a thin cylindrical biscuit, in fact, and it is not even originally Korean ― Japanese have known the snack as Pocky since 1965.
But Pepero Day now rivals Valentine’s Day in Korea, especially for the younger set.
The day has also become an occasion for young lovers to exchange gifts of the stuff, including oversize versions that Lotte so kindly provides. In some elementary schools, students exchange the sticks with classmates at 11:11 a.m. on Nov. 11.
Pepero Day supposedly started in 1994 at a girls’ middle school in Busan, where students exchanged the sticks in hopes of becoming tall and slender.

Sorry you can't enjoy the oh so yummy pepero's today! I'll bring some back at Christmas :)

Counting Down To Christmas

So this post is basically just because I want these pictures to be in my final book that I make out of this blog when I finish my journey here in Korea. I've already put these pictures on facebook, so if you've already seen them just move right along... there's not much else interesting here :) Just skip to the end and listen to my song recommendations at the end!

Last week when I had the days off for the swine flu, Daniel, RooRi, and I went to the N. Seoul Tower. It was pretty neat. Basically it's famous for couples coming there to put locks along the fences that surround the tower. It's CRAZY how many locks there are... thousands and thousands and thousands. You'll see for yourself in the pictures to follow. I think it's supposed to symbolize something like locking your love in forever... or something overly sentimental like that. Who knows.

I'm sure these guys love their job.

SOOOOO many locks. We all felt REALLY single at this moment, so Daniel was expressing that feeling :)

Locks everywhere...One of them said something like this: "Married Oct. 1998, Married again July 2004." Wow. So sentimental. Haha.

The North Seoul Tower in all it's glory. It was hilarious because it had a comparison chart on the highest towers all over the world and it came in last.

The view from the top... SO many buildings...

Bench fail.

The most awkward bench of life. Seriously.

Me with all the locks!

There was a teddy bear museum. Seriously there is one of these everywhere I feel like. Koreans really love their teddys apparently.

The view from the bathroom sink! It was so amazing!

Me and RooRi with the beautiful fall colors!

Daniel loved his life.

Yay for leaf throwing! One of my favs!

Walking along the Cheong Gye Choen River (Or at least it's called something like that)

We're pretty presh.

RooRi, Me, and Daniel. LOVE this one!

Yay for a fun day in Seoul on a lucky day off from school WOOHOO!

Hope everyone has a fantastic week! Miss you all dearly and ABSOLUTELY CANNOT WAIT to come home for Christmas!

Oh and here are some of my favorite songs right now. Just click on the words and it will take you to a link so you can hear them :)

Tim Hughes: Everything

Hillsong: You'll Come

Starfield: Cry In My Heart (FAV!!!)