It's about time for the 101...

Creating your own 1001 Day Project

The Mission:Complete 101 preset tasks in a period of 1001 days.

The Criteria:Tasks must be specific (ie. no ambiguity in the wording) with a result that is either measurable or clearly defined. Tasks must also be realistic and stretching (ie. represent some amount of work on my part).

Why 1001 Days? Many people have created lists in the past - frequently simple goals such as new year's resolutions. The key to beating procrastination is to set a deadline that is realistic. 1001 Days (about 2.75 years) is a better period of time than a year, because it allows you several seasons to complete the tasks, which is better for organizing and timing some tasks such as overseas trips or outdoor activities.

Drum roll please...

1. Get a six-pack.
2. Read a book per week for 4 consecutive weeks
3. Get a tattoo
4. Fast from sweets for 6 months
5. Run a half-marathon (13.1 miles)
6. Play in the rain
7. Get dreads
8. Go back to the Mathare slums in Kenya
9. Take a road trip
10. Tour California
11. Go on a cruise
12. Back pack through Europe
13. Live downtown in a city
14. Find dark chocolate peanut butter m&ms.
15. Learn to play the guitar
16. GRADUATE
17. Take a cooking class

18. Learn sign language
19. Make a DVD of my trip to Kenya
20. Visit Colorado
21. Take a horse and buggy ride
22. Ice skate in central park
23. Walk bare foot in the snow
24. Stand in two countries at once
25. Train myself to drink black coffee
26. Write a song
27. Not buy clothes for a year
28. Ride the trolley downtown
29. Participate in a slip and slide
30. Make my own peanut butter (all natural)
31. Master chapatti making
32. Pay for the person’s food behind me in the drive-thru
33. Work at a 24/7 diner (night shift)
34. Write send letters to my Kenyan friends
35. Have a reunion with my dinner group from the summer
36. Go to the Ramos wedding (James and Sara)
37. Watch my sister get married
38. Taste every kind of chocolate ever made
39. Get a massage (a real one)
40. Volunteer at a soup kitchen with my dad
41. Pull off a surprise
42. Go sky diving
43. Learn to Skateboard
44. Fly to Kansas
45. Put on a talent show
46. Send a card to everyone on my team this summer
47. Start a cook book collection
48. Paint a wall-size mural
49. Be one of the first customers in line at a grand-opening of Chic-fil-A
50. Finish my reconciliation process with a letter
51. Download Skype
52. Make pizza on the grill
53. Start a blog
54. Have a dance party
55. Get a piggly wiggly t-shirt
56. Spray paint a shirt
57. Eat like a vegan for a week (only)
58. Finish an entire journal
59. Make a ginger bread house
60. Switch from milk chocolate to dark chocolate
61. Take hip hop dance classes
62. Change the oil in my car
63. Try soy ice cream
64. Develop my pictures in a dark room
65. Visit Tim and Alicia
66. Visit Portland, Oregon
67. Swim with the dolphins
68. Host a Kenyan-themed party
69. Work for an airline
70. Learn all the dialogue for Nacho Libre
71. Go to the movies by myself
72. Spend an entire day in solitude
73. Tease Bethany’s hair
74. Read Pause: The Message Remix
75. Wear the same outfit for a whole week (except for undies)
76. Get a waffle house coffee mug
77. Visit Alquippa, PA
78. Sleep in the nude
79. Buy a bong (hookah)
80. Start building supporters and making connections for Juja Java
81. See one of Lindsay Jones’s shows
82. Try every flavor of Baskin Robbins ice cream
83. See the “E” go up on the Ziegler wall
84.Visit Yoni’s family in Ethiopia
85. Listen to Mark Nelson on the pod cast (every lesson from the first Sunday of Crossings to the present)
86. Wear a funky costume and go roller skating
87. Spend the night with my grandma
88. Go visit my step-mom’s family in West Virginia
89. Sleep under the stars on a trampoline
90. Go to a Hillsong and Coldplay concert
91. Buy a coffee grinder
92. Pick coffee beans from the plant
93. Get a dog (black lab or golden retriever)
94. Set and Stick to a budget
95. Welcome Jennipha to the states :)
96. Write my mom a letter
97. Visit Josh and Julie (post-graduation/marriage)
98. Ride a Harley (by myself)
99. Ride a jet ski
100. Bake a 6-layer cake
101. Buy and fix up old furniture

*The ones in red are the ones I have already done and can cross off my list.

Shouting the Gospel with my life

I'm am continually praising God for the way He is moving in my life. I have been completely emotional lately. The more I learn about God, the more contagious He becomes to me. As I lose myself in Him, I fall deeper in love. He reveals Himself to me- who He is, what He has done and is doing- and I can not help but be overwhelmed. He is indescribable.

This morning, I am missing Mathare like crazy. Thoughts of this summer keep replaying in my mind, and my heart longs to be back there. I felt it started with the theme of brokenness last year. God had to break me first, in order for me to relate to his brokenness. He broke my heart, I believe, for what broke His, and is still doing so.

This year, that theme continues to expand, with a new emphasis on the vision of His Kingdom. I look around and picture what God created the world to be, and see the perversion of what it has become. I get frustrated and discouraged. My heart aches for His Kingdom. And I cry out for forgiveness to my God. What a mess we have made of this world!

A couple of weekends ago, I was visiting some sistas of mine in the ATL. Jesus radiates in them. We all desire to be the hands and feet of Christ. We yearn for something more...something outside of ourselves; bigger and better than anything we could have ever imagined. We are passionately pursuing Christ. And when I am with them, I stop, thank my Father, and smile. My heart is filled with this consuming peace: thoughts of spending an eternity praising God in community. It's in these moments that I realize this is what it's all about. It's in these moments I catch a little glipse of heaven.

And while I am at times saddened, I stand strong behind the vision: The vision of dancing God's revolution; saying "yes" to His request; being swept off my feet in this divine romance. I am captured by His love; I am astonished by this aggressive forgiveness we call grace. I am captivated.

I have been reading further in Romans, and have fallen in love with this book. Romans 6:10-11 says, "From now on, think of it this way: sin speaks a dead language that means nothing to you; God speaks your mother tongue, and you hang on every word. You are dead to sin and alive to God." And I have been hanging on every word, every whipser from God.

Romans 7:4- "When Christ died he took that entire rule-dominated way of life down with him and left it in the tomb, leaving you free to "marry" a resurrection life and bear "offspring" of faith for God."

Romans 8:1-2- "With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ's being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificiently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death."

After reading these passages, I was overwelmed by the thought of salvation. Do we really get it? If we truly understood our salvation, what Jesus saves us from, that "fated lifetime of brutal tyranny", would we not proclaim the life we have in His name? Would we not live as undignified, passionate people?

With that said, every moment of every day is another chance to walk in His footsteps, to get my hands dirty, to shout out the Gospel with my life.