Thank YOU, Lord

I just want to say thank You to our Lord Jesus for all the wonderful rain He has sent us here in South Africa. On my family's farm (here in the Eastern Cape) and the surrounding area it was getting close to becoming dangerously dry, but the Lord has answered my prayers with rain. Thank You ♥

I Googled Bible verses of the day and these are what I found (I had originally meant to only post one verse, but I liked them all so much) :

1 John 4:7  Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

1 Kings 18:37  Hear me LORD hear me, that these people may know that You are the Lord God and that You have turned their hearts back to You again.

Philippians 2:3  Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.

Psalm 25:4-6  Show me your ways, LORD, teach me your paths. Guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long. Remember, LORD, your great mercy and love, for they are from of old.

2 Corinthians 12:9   "And He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.' Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me."  

The websites from which I got the verses of the day are the following:

http://www.lehrmangroup.com/verse/ 
http://www.verseoftheday.com/
http://www.whatchristianswanttoknow.com/bible-verses-about-love-25-awesome-scripture-quotes/
http://www.biblestudytools.com/philippians/2-3.html


I hope you have a great day and weekend and next week and whenever else you want it to be great. Love Emma xx
God loves you.

Greeting all my God-loving friends!

Lately I have been feeling quite negative about the fact that I am don't have a boyfriend. Many of my friends do have boyfriends or love interests and valentines day is approaching, so that doesn't help me any. Then I was on a South African magazine's website and their readers write little blog entrees that you can read directly from the website. One of them was about loving yourself and being single. I immediately clicked the link and after reading the entry, I realized that the writer is right: I don't need a man.
I would like to encourage everyone who's single. You don't need a guy to be happy. Yes, I know it's hard, but it can be done with God on our side. Just pray to Him that you will find happiness within Him and within yourself. It takes time, I know, but doesn't everything in life take time? God will give us our Mr Right when the time is exactly that: right. ♥

 Love forever, Emma


GOD LOVES YOU!

Something to think about for today :)
Love. Emma

Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." (NIV)

Back to school..

Green dresses, white socks, crowded hallways and hostel food are what await me. As you may have deducted, school starts on Wednesday. Woo hoo *rolling eyes*

 We're going stationary shopping two days before school starts and going to the hostel one day before. Before we do any of that, though, we have to visit the family (let it be noted that this specific branch of my family decided that they were going to China for Christmas. Oh no, they don't have any family there). It was their turn to do Christmas lunch for my grandma, but noooo, China is way more exciting. Anyway, enough of my complaining.


Just this morning I was going through my old magazines and came across an article about positive thinking. Now I can be quite the negative thinker when in the right (or rather wrong) mood, so I thought I might as well give it a shot. I am now going to try my verrry best to think positive thoughts and I will let you know if it makes any difference.


In a weird way, I'm actually excited for school. I'm excited for new subjects, old friends and hockey. Most of all, I'm excited for Alpha (a little Christian group) and VSCV (UCSA). So yeah, I'm quite excited.




PS. Sorry I've been away for such a long time, we were away from home. I had a very blessed Christmas and new years, I hope you did too.

Let Jesus fill your lives!
Love Emma

Ho ho ho!

Ho ho ho! 

As it's almost Christmas time and as this may be my last post until then, I would like to wish you all a very merry Christmas!
I know from personal experience that it's extremely easy to forget what Christmas is really about. There are just so many things to distract you, presents, Christmas dinner, friends and family, to name a few. My family isn't the most religious and as hard as I am trying to change that, it's not happening quickly. I know that until last year Christ wasn't on the top of priority list come Christmas. And that is because it's the way I was brought up: Christmas is for family, presents and food. I now know that that's wrong. Contrary to popular tradition, Christmas is the time when we should be commemorating and celebrating the birth of our Saviour. It's hard to do that, though, when the people around you don't. I'm trying though, and I pray that you will too.

I was poking around on a blog I read, when I came upon this blog: the Journey . I clicked the link and started reading. I hope you will like Katie's message as much I as do.

 This is all I can think of to say at the moment, so I bid you farewell. Enjoy your Christmas and New Years, and don't do anything Jesus wouldn't do! 
xxx Emma

I'm back, back again :)

I know. I know. I've been gone a really long time, and I'm truly sorry! I was away from home since.. when was it? 24 November, I think? Well, whatever the date was, it was a long time ago. I hope you all have been well and are filling your lives with God.

Now, let me tell you more about my two weeks away from home. First, it was the last week of school (and exams) and was pretty fun. Exams were difficult, and we're getting our rapports on Friday. I'm not quite sure what to expect. Quite frankly, I'm scared. Maths, maths, maths.

I then went to friend's house at Sundays River Mouth, and it was extremely fun! I, ahem, actually had my first kiss that weekend. Uhm, yeah, so I'm not going to go into those details...

After that I went to my other friend's house in Bluewater Bay. Oh! It was fun! We were on the beach most of the three days I was there, and we played touch-rugby on the beach, I met some new people and almost got swept out! Ha ha, I guess not really, but it felt like it! We were swimming in the sea (my friend, my crush, his friend, and I) and the current was really strong (there were lifeguards), but we still swam. We went it quite deep, about there where the waves start. It's deep. It's far. It's scary. I prayed so hard, and all the glory to God because he enabled us to be able to swim to shore. I guess it isn't back big of a deal, but I'm not the world's best swimmer, so it was pretty scary for me.

After that I was in PE with my family for a bit (we have a flat there), and now I'm back home! :) When we were in PE, my sister and I both got new cellphones, which we payed for ourselves. Yes, our parents unfortunately do not buy us cellphones. It's really sad. I got a Blackberry and Lauren a Samsung Galaxy Gio. :)

I was on the Internet the other day, and I found this, which I love. It's so perfect :) 
 











I hope you have an amazing day, week, year, whatever. May you read your Bible fiercely and with passion. May you be a missionary to God in your everyday life. May you have one hundred percent faith in my, your, OUR SAVIOUR. <3 
I will try to do the same.
Love, Emma 

Tests, tests and more tests

Hello there!

Yes, it's that time of the year again: exam time. We started exams this past Monday with English and Afrikaans together. Because I'm grade 9, we write departmental exams, so they're really unpredictable and you have no idea what to learn. The teachers tell us to learn everything we've done. EVERYTHING. 
We wrote maths today and it was so incredibly difficult that I started crying when I got outside. Not crying badly, but a few stray tears escaped. But, I shall not say anything more about such depressing subjects, simply because they are depressing.

My dad bought us a new TV today, and although I know he bought it with good reason and we are specially re-doing our TV-room (how it used to look, with built-in wall fixtures [or whatever you call them], couldn't accommodate a plasma). Now we have one, and it's great and pretty and huge, but I can't seen to shake the feeling that he shouldn't have done it. Maybe it's because I don't like change or maybe it's because we're spending A LOT of money now (Re-doing our one bathroom, TV room, new TV, new surround-sound, new DVD player, Christmas, holiday and even more things) that I'm just scared about our finances or maybe it's something else completely! My dad says that we did well this year (with the farming and olives), but I can't help but worry a little. I'm praying about it, though, so I'm sure it'll work out just fine.

To be brutally honest, I don't know how I feel about the boy anymore. I'm SUPER confused and my feelings change almost daily, so I have no idea what to think, feel or say. I sat with him (alone) for about 45 minutes before exams on Wednesday, and we talked and I helped him learn his Afrikaans (he doesn't learn much - but I do). I know, it's quite weird because he's older than me, but it was setwork and he was learning someone else's summary of the book they did, so I just help him to remember it. Since then I've only talked to him once and it was very brief and just after I'd finished exercising, so I looked all red and blotchy and hideous. So I don't know what to think. I don't think I like him anymore, yet I still want him. It's weird. I'm weird. Oh, well. :) But I think he thinks of us as just friends, so that SUCKS. But right now, I think I'm going to leave it in God's more than capable hands, so whatever happens, it must be His will.

Talking about Him, I've been feeling really far away from Him lately and I don't like it at all! I pray (maybe not enough, but I'm trying), I read my Bible and I trust Him to help me through everything, especially exams. I don't know what more to do. He gives me beautiful verses when I ask for them or need them, but it feels like something is missing. I prayed that I want to come closer to Him, and I worshiped earlier tonight, and I feel a little closer, but not quite where I used to be. I feel empty, almost. It's horrible, and I don't know how this happened. I guess that maybe it's because there hasn't been a praise and worship or Alpha (it's a Christian group that meets before school every Thursday, except in exam times) and I need these things to keep me alive in my faith and trust, but I don't want to rely on these outer things, because one day they'll be gone. Please pray for me, and I will for you if you want me too. Just comment. And if you have an inspiring verse or something, please feel free to comment as well. We're in this together, aren't we? :)

Anyway, I hope God fills you up with Him, the Holy Spirit and Jesus
Love Emma