a long week update

i kind of don't know where to start right now. i feel like so much has happened this past week. some heavy things have been laid upon my heart from the Lord.

we had a creative/praise & worship time. it was wonderful. i'm not much of a painter but this was good. if you want to see them, go look on facebook. i'm a little lazy on posting them right now on here.

Birmingham Prayer Furnace was this past weekend. this was my first time to actually go alone. it was at my church (which i love when it's there). it was weird for me being there but then it was really good for me to be there alone. i can't really describe the feeling.
night watch was great!
midnight-2am set was focused on nations and i dedicated a page in my journal for all different nations that i thought of. i wrote them down & put prayers on the sides of the page.
then the 2-4am set was all about the people who live in the "margins" of society. homeless people, prostitutes, & those who live in poverty were the main subjects focused on in prayer. we mainly prayed for prostitutes. the Lord gave me others to focus on to pray, mainly the foster kids. i feel like they are the ones who are forgotten about the most in our society. so i just prayed for them and the girls who will most likely end up in prostitution and for the generational curse of prostitution to break. it was really awesome for the Lord to give this to me.

i was reading Amos 5 again earlier this week. three times it says to SEEK the Lord and LIVE. then i just start praying and i see God as man crying out to us saying, "SEEK ME AND LIVE! SEEK ME ASHLEY, SO YOU CAN LIVE." show me how to fully seek You Lord. i hate that this can be so hard to do. my heart is heavy with these words. SEEK HIM. wow.

i saw harry potter opening night. we had to get to the theater two hours early! so we sat in the theater an hour and a half before the movie started. it was fun though... being with mal, kimber, kendall, & kristen. i have missed tuscaloosa and my friends. what's even better is that i didn't get any nightmares from the movie. i prayed i wouldn't.

kate left for her family vaca in cali yesterday. i miss her so much already. but we got to text tonight which i loved.

the Lord is moving in my friends' lives. i love it! especially since it's my group of friends from high school.
i'm trying to learn how to desire what the Lord desire's and not my own desires. it's hard! i'm learing though!

i'm off to arkansas for the weekend with eric, kendall, and todd. this should be fun!

"i've been praying... i'm on hold right now." -elliott

love it. i should start saying this when people ask me what i'm doing next.

wow, so the Lord protected christy and i tonight as i was driving her home. we were leaving tip-top after a great night with us two, marc, and katelyn. we had a night of honesty. stuff that we had gone through and what we thought about everything. it was great because we are uniting as a small group and wanting to seek after God. so we pretty much broke down walls between us. we ended up at tip-top since everywhere we go we get 'kicked out' since nothing stays open late.

so christy and i leave. the way we went to her house was nothing new to either of us except for that we passed two recycle bin trash cans laying on the road (which i almost hit one of them) with trash on the road. so we backed up and christy got out to put the trash back in the bins and put them where they belong. but as she was doing this, we both got these horrible feelings and we thanked God for protecting us and we both knew that demons put those bins there in the road. we did something right tonight. the four of us are uniting, especially us three girls. after i dropped her off i still felt them in the car so i rebuked them in the name of Jesus and they dissapeared. i love that our God is bigger than them. HE helped me get home tonight, he protected me, i have no fear because of Him.

THANK YOU DADDY FOR BEING THERE FOR ME!

cabinets

today has been somewhat productive. i guess.

some of you may know that three days before i left for China last summer my mom had a small grease fire in our kitchen. so, over a year later we finally painted it. which means i paint it. i actually wanted too since i am kind of in a painting mood. so here are the before and after pictures of the cabinets:

before:

after:



now off to the bank to deposit my check from dog sitting/walking last week.
hopefully Christy, Katelyn, and i will be able to have our Revelation Bible Study tonight.

see you later!

Elohim

God is moving so much in my life and in the lives around me.

i learned two new names that mean God: Elohim (Almighty God) & El Elyon (God Most High). katelyn & christy taught the 4th & 5th grade sunday school class last week. i sat in and listened. the series for the summer is learning the names of God. how cool is that?!? i have never heard these two names and since i have learned them i have been hearing Elohim (L-o-heem) being said aloud. it was said at the Ramp this past weekend. i love hearing it.

i went to the Ramp this past weekend with katelyn. it was just, amazing. i haven't been in a place where teens are so on fire and seeking after God's heart in a long time. all we did was worship, mainly. we interceded for countries, our cities, & our nation. i can't describe how great it was. i'm so glad that we got to go. both of us needed to go and the Lord let us be there.

i got set free from some bondage that i didn't even know i had until i read this:
"The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!" -Matthew 6:22-23.
these two verses represent purity to me. we have to be careful on what we watch & what we hear. so i choose not to scary things or stuff that i know is wrong for me. i have gotten made fun of so much for not watching things that everyone else watches. i didn't even know that my heart was still hurting from those moments until i read this and the Lord completely took that pain away. i strive for purity even though i have failed. i won't give up.

that is only one thing the Lord has done in my life this past week. i'm learning so much. i'm trying to be patient with what He wants to do with my life. it wouldn't be that big of a deal if people didn't ask me weekly what i am going to do with my life. my family is pushing for me to get a job with my degree so i will be "secured." but i don't want to be secured or tied down to the world. so the Lord has my life; He can do what He wishes with it. You should read The Barbarian Way by Erwin Raphael McManus. the Ramp made me think about that book the entire time i was there. it was nuts!!

i have more i could say but i will spare you. love you all!

For your Maker is your husband—
the LORD Almighty is his name—
the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer;
he is called the God of all the earth.
-Isaiah 54:5

why am i not there?

why am i not in China?? i know why and i'm not questioning why the Lord wants me here back at home. parts of me are learning why i'm here and other parts are still yearning to be back in China, especially my heart. i see things here all the time that reminds me of China. i was at walmart and they have green tea gum! i loved this certain green tea gum in China. ahhh!!!

i just read the journal post i wrote a year ago today. we were in hong kong doing evangalism work with YFC. after the usually routine of ministering to the senior citizens and to the people at the mall, we went to a mosque to minister outside of it. it was intense as we were all "yarping" on the way there. but as we got there we saw turtle doves flying in circles above us on the corner. it was a sign from the Lord to us! we pressed on that night and at least one person "joined the family!" we loved it!

i really miss China and i can't wait to go back. when will that be? only God knows. i plan on going to Africa before i go back to China.

my heart aches for the Chinese people.