HAPPY NEW YEAR 2007!

Wow, this turned out to be blue... Oh well, just imagine that it's red

Alittle delayed MERRY CHRISTMAS to you all! As you can see my blog is turned into normal again. I (actually Shane:) will be putting a link to the page he made for me when he popped the big question.


So I guess many of you have already heard the good news...

Me and Shane got officially engaged the 6th of December 2006!

I'm so blessed and lucky and the happiest girl in the whole world to have gotten the privilege to spend the rest of my life with the one man that I love with all of my heart!
Wow, that was a long sentence!

Thank you so much for this, Shane! Not only are you my fiance, but you are also my bestfriend. You have always blessed and encouraged me in so many ways. I love you.

Breathing the Breath, Matt Redman

We have nothing to give
That didn't first come from Your hands
We have nothing to offer You
Which You did not provide
Every good, perfect gift comes from
Your kind and gracious heart
And all we do is give back to You
What always has been Yours

Lord, we're breathing the breath
That You gave us to breath
To worship You, to worship You
And we're singing these songs
With the very same breath
To worship You, to worship You

Who has given to You
That it should be paid back to him?
Who has given to You
As if You needed anything?
From You, and to You, and through You
Come all things, O Lord
And all we do is give back to You
What always has been Yours

Yours

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM!

I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!

Kjære Ma!
Takk for din omsorg og kjærlighet
Takk for din tålmodighet
Takk for dine kjærlige ord og oppmuntringer
Takk for alt som du har lært meg
Takk for alle de ganger du har tatt vare på meg når jeg har vært syk
Takk for alltid ha satt mat på bordet
Takk for alle de gaver som du har gitt meg
Takk for alle de gode stunder vi har hatt sammen
Takk for alle de ganger du har ryddet rommet mitt for meg
Takk mamma!
Jeg er så uendelig glad i deg og jeg setter utrolig stor pris på deg.

Ha en fantastisk og velsignet dag!

Stor klem fra din datter

A Christmas without snow?

I've always celebrated Christmas at home with my family. Let me tell you how a Christmas day would be in my family.
In the morning...
I wake up (and i can wake up whenever i want:) to the smell of my mom's cooking preparations for Christmas dinner in the evening. Oh boy, i can tell you that woman can cook!
Then my sister and i watch all the usual programs that they show on tv (we are still in our pyjamas). Cinderella is one of the movies i've come to love. It's not the kind of movie you would expect to watch tho. It's made in the Czech Republic in 1973. And it's pretty funny too, cuz it's dubbed into norwegian, and it's only one guy talking for all the characters (You can still hear them speak in the background!). It's such a sweet movie.
After that we have RISENGRYNSGRØT (some sort of a norwegian type of porridge). It is SO good. You cook the sweet rice for about an hour, and then add butter, sugar and cinnamon on top of it. Yam!
The fun part is that we put one sinlge almond in the porridge, who ever gets it gets a present:-)

In the afternoon we dress up and go to church.

Evening...
O, how i love the smell of mom's food! (I usually help her prepare the food early in the morning) The sweet smell of her famous home-made potatosalad, spare-ribs, pinnekjøtt (salted and dried rib of mutton; only eaten during christmas), christmas sausages, mashed swede (oh la la, my favourite!), vegetables cooked for a long time in the meat sauce (mm!), and then of course the gravy.

Oh my goodness! Look at that delicious piece of thing!!

Then when dinner is all done, it's time to read the story of when Christ was born. I love this part, and i never get tired of reading it.

Finally it's time to open the presents. This is also one of my favourite parts. I love to see all the faces as they open their presents.
After the presents are opened and played with, it's time for dessert...

I'm not even gonna go there, the list is too long. But one thing you should know, it's goooood...

The night is still young, but we are all so ridiculously full, that we're all nackered. So we just hang out and talk and look some more on our presents.
If we're lucky it's snowing outside.

Nothing is like a Christmas Eve when it suddenly starts to snow.

Later that night...
I cuddle into my blanket thinking: Man, i love Christmas...

My International Family

I just had the privilege to spend 2 wonderful months with my Shane and then 2 wonderful weeks with my friends, Berit and Gunnar from Norway. But all three of them has now left, and I miss them so much.




I'm so glad though, that I still have my friends here in CR. Both old friends, and new friendships that's been developed during my
time here. God has really blessed me with amazing people, and I'm thankful for each person that He has put in my life. For my friends here in Thailand, for my friends back in Norway, and for all of my friends from the rest of the world.


So I just want to say to all of you guys (wherever in the world you are) whether we know each other well, or not that well...

I AM SO BLESSED TO HAVE YOU AND I'M GRATEFUL FOR YOU!!!

Dear God

May You bless them and protect them
May You Lord smile upon them and be gracious to them
May You show them your favor and give them your peace.

Num 6:24-26

And help me Father, to be a blessing to them as they are to me, and to love them with the love that comes from you. Amen.

Love, your sister in Christ.

First day of training

It's almost like being back on DTS. Except for that there is far less students this time, oh and all the students are now staff:-) Per today there are 8 staff members, and i did my DTS with all of them except for one. Two of them were my staff.

I'm really excited to be trained by Paul and other people who's gonna come and teach. We'll be looking into what a leader is, what is required from a leader and more.
Best of all i'm excited to see how God is going to train me up into being a servant and humble leader.

We read from Ephesians 6:12 today in class where it says that we don't fight against flesh and blood, but against the unseen and forcess of darkness. That was really good, and i realized that there's still alot more i need to learn (i'll never stop learning:)

I pray that as my traning has just started that the Holy Spirit will continue to guide me and teach me. As long as i have Him in my life, life is as good as it can get. It may seem scary to work as a staff, but i know that this is what God has called me to do, so i will do it, and He will enable me and give me all i need to follow His plan. God is certainly good.

GRATULERER MED DAGEN, KINJA!

Today it's my sister's 17th birthday!! She's such an amazing girl and i love her so much! She's also the only sister i have, and i am so blessed to have her.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SIS!!

Kjære Kinja,
Hei min lille solstråle:-)
GRATULERER SÅ MASSE MED DAGEN, SURRAN! Jeg håper du får en fantastisk fin dag, fyllt med glede og kjærlighet. Jeg skulle ønske jeg kunne være der på dagen din... Men du skal vite at her i Thailand er gleden stor over at du endelig fyller 17 år! Jeg er så glad for å ha vært en del av livet ditt i så mange år allerede. Jeg håper og ber om at året ditt som 17 skal bli et godt år, hvor mye spennende vil skje og du vil kunne se tilbake på som en god del av livet ditt.


UTROLIG SUPERDUPERMEGAGLAD I DEG, KINJUS!
STOR KLEM FRA DIN SØSTER:-)

Home, sweet home!

I've finally arrived in Chiang Rai this morning! Me and Shane had a wonderful, but long trip. We left Perth on Monday morning, and we got to spend a whole day together in Brunei, celebrating our 5 MONTHS ANNIVERSARY! :-)

We arrived at the new airport in BKK at night the same day, and from there we took a taxi to pi Tuu. We stayed at her place for a couple of days and then catched the bus to CR.

Everything is going good, and i'm staying at Grayce's house right now. I'll probably move as soon as i can to the base. They've actually made bamboo huts for the staff to live in, so that will be interesting. Hopefully it will be awesome!

Staff training starts on Monday, so things are probably going to be busy from then on. Tomorrow we're gonna go to Jason and Sarah Ann's for dinner, celebrating Grayce's and Jade's birthdays.

Ok, i should hit the bed, it's already too late. Good night
Love, Kim

It's always better when we're together...

I am finally in Perth, WA! I've already been here for 6 days, but been too busy to update... We've just been a few days out in the country visiting Shane's relatives. It was really nice to see the farmland and just miles of miles of beautiful nature. AND... i saw a kangaroo!

Anyways, i'm back in the city and i'm having a blast! I've only had positive impressions of this place and the people so far. The schedule seems to be pretty full, there's heaps to do, many places to go and many people to meet. But i'm enjoying every minute of it.

Just a little update on my trip coming here. My two days in BKK was really good. I stayed at pi Tuu's place (Shane's brother's girlfriend) and we had a great hang-out time together. Most of you have probably hear of the coup in BKK last week. I didn't really notice much while i was there and i got safely on to my next flight. Praise God! When i arrived Brunei it turned out that my plane to AUS was having "technical problems" so i had to spend the night at a hotel there.
Then finally... the plane was ready to take off and i got to see my wonderful Shane!

I thank God that he brought me safely to perth and that i get the chance to be here and get to know Shane's family and friends. God is good!

Love&Blessings, Kim

To Pi Saow

This is my amazing friend and sister P'Pae or P'Saow (means bigsister in thai) as I prefer to call her. I LOVE HER SO MUCH! And I can't wait to see her again!







































(These photos were taken at graduation, 24th of June 2006)

She was my room mate for 5 and a half months while we did our DTS together. Man, I miss those days. She really meant alot to me during my staying in Thailand and we would do alot of stuff together, like she would teach me thai, translate for me, take me out to the city on her cool motorbike, bride my hair and be silly with me... She was also very good at keeping our room clean:-) And she is a really good cook and an amazing goalkeeper! She is such an awesome lady! I'm so blessed to know her and I am so thankful that God let me meet her.

I miss you and I love you so very much!

-Kim

Ps. Thank you so much Shane for publishing those photos on your flickr!

Ps2. Have you guys noticed that I've already punished TWO blogs in less than a day?? I'm proud of myself :-)

I'm leaving on a jetplane...

Then it's finally set! My planetickets are booked!! ThankYOU honey, for all your help! And thankYOU GOD for providing and having the control over everything!

Here are some IMPORTANT DATES:

• 17/9 12:55 I'm leaving Norway
• 18/9 13:55 Arrival in BKK
• 20/9 07:50 Departure from BKK to AUS
• 20/9 18:40 Arrival in Perth, AUS
• 16/10 03:10 Me and Shane are leaving AUS
• 16/10 21:40 Arrival in BKK
• 18/10 Katie Allen's Birthday!!
• 21/10 Grayce Hollingsworth's Birthday!!
• 22/10 Staff training starts

So now you know! Love you and God bless your socks off! (in the words of Katie). Have a fabulous day!

So... whats new?

The last time i blogged i was writing about following your heart, and just about not being sure of what to do after DTS. Well, guess what, God has put a desire in my heart to staff DTS in Chiang Rai for the next couple of years, so thats exactly what i'm gonna do! I'm SO excited and i can't wait to go back and see all of my friends there again! I'm probably going to stay with my amazing friends Graycie and Eunice during my training period, which will be 2 months before school starts. Its going to be SWEET!!
I will be leaving "home sweet home" sometime in October, and be back sometime next summer. My bestfriend Berit is going to get married then, and i got the privilege of being her maid of honour! So i kinda have to be back before then hehe:) I have known her since we punished kindergarden and we have been bestfriends since ages ago! She and her fiancee is actually gonna visit me while i'm in Thailand and i'm really looking forward to it!


My time back here in Norway has been really good. I was abit worried about how it would go with my relationship with God when i got home. Would he continue to speak like He did at DTS? I didn't even have to worry. God's promises NEVER changes, and He has been so faithful to me. What an amazing promise Jesus has given us in John 15:5 "Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing". I love having my quite times with Him and He has always encouraged me when i needed to be encouraged, either through His word, through friends and family, or even through giving me peace in the midst of troubles. I have learned how important it is to nurture my relationship with God, cuz i see that fruit are being produced in my life. God has helped me dealing with so many things that i couldn't deal with before, He has helped me to look at things from his view and to love people like He loves them. He gave me the boldness to pray for my moms hurting feet and my dads knee, and they both got better! For the first time in my life i got to pray out loud for my parents! God is good!!

Another thing that has happened lately is that God blessed me with an AMAZING boyfriend! God directed our paths and brought us both to Chiang Rai to do a DTS there. His name is Shane Matthew Beckingham AKA Mr. Sweet McGregor AKA Mr. Sud Yat ("kjært barn har mange navn" hehe! For all you english speakers, i'm sorry but i don't know how to translate that, you probably have the same proverb in english tho), and he's from Perth, Australia. He is really an
awesome guy, and i am incredibly blessed to have him in my life. Its funny how it all came to pass. Things didn't start to happen until at the very end of DTS, though we were on different outreach teams that didn't hinder us to get to know each other even more. Mobile phone is a funny little thing... But we both felt it was a blessing from God that he placed us in different teams. After outreach we only had a week to spend together, but that one week was really good! I got to see his family and also his friend Ryan, who all came for our grad.


Basically things are going great, and i feel like i'm on the path that God wants me to be in. I can't wait to see what He has for me during the next years to come. For all of you around the world praying for me, from the bottom of my heart THANK YOU!

Love, Kim/Kimster/Kimie/Kimberly/Kimbo (just A FEW nicknames i got during DTS haha! I LOVE IT!)

God bless you guys.

Follow Your Heart

I can't believe we've already been in Pattaya for 1 month! Only one more week and we'll be back in Chiang Rai. How did time pass by that fast? And then one more week after that i'll be back in Norway! Can't wait to see everyone again!

I'm having the most AWESOME time here and God has been teaching me quite a few things...
In the beginning of this outreach I had a hard time finding out what to do after DTS and just how to know for sure what God wanted me to do. I don't think I was worried... more like frustrated cuz I didn't know how God would give me a straight answer. I really want to follow His plan for me and I was kinda worried (ok, maybe I was worried, but just NIT NOI!(= a little bit)) that I would go outside of His plan.
But here's the thing... I(and you!) DON'T NEED TO WORRY! God knows that my hearts desire is to follow Him in everything I do. Therefore following my heart is a GOOD thing! But of course I will still seek Him in prayer. Dan Bowman says "if our hearts are for God, then its virtually impossible to miss his will for our lives"(my good dts friend Grayce encouraged me with this). Another quote from him "the only way to miss Gods plan for us is when we know what it is, but then choose to turn away from it".
I still don't know what to do after DTS, but I know for sure that God will lead me! And if I do fall outside His plan, He is faithful to draw me back in again:)

Have a blessed day!

Mango and sticky rice!!

PUNISH THIS!

Only 7 weeks left of DTS!

I can't believe how time here went by so fast! This week is our last week of lecture and next weekend we're leaving for our last major outreach. After 5 weeks outreach we have 1 week left for debrief and then it's over... It's SO sad! I'm going to miss everyone here so much. On the other side it's also good to finally be able to go home and see my family and friends again. It's going to be a little weird to go back to my real life after so many months with training in another country. But I'm excited to see how God is going to work and change the way I used to live before. The future is glorious:)

Some information about our outreach:
My team (Central-team) is going to Pattaya (near Bangkok) to work and help at the Tamar center. It's a place that help girls to move on after a life as prostitutes. We're also going to minister to people while in Pattaya so we've already set up some skits and are preparing our testimonies. I really believe that great things are going to happen and that God will receive glory for it all:) (We're still open for whatever God wants us to do, so we haven't decided to only stay in Pattaya for the hole 5 weeks).

Could you please pray for:

• the hearts of the people we're going to minister to would be open and prepared for the message
• boldness so that we can share the Gospel clearly and with no fear
• the Holy Spirit's guidance to give us wisdom for who to minister/pray/talk to
• the people who is going to do a visa-run during outreach that everything will go smoothly
• unity in the team
• safe trip to Pattaya

Thank you for all your prayers. God bless

-Kim

Back from outreach #2 in Chiang Mai

Hi folks, finally back home! Outreach was awesome and there was so much happening in my team that it would take all night to write it all down. But I will at least share what I've learned during these 2 weeks. As some of you already know this outreach was very different to the first one. This time we had no plans at all, we didn't know where we were staying or what we were going to do. We had to lay it all in God's hands and trust that He would lead and provide for us each day. I can tell u it was really challenging.
But as always, God surprised me. I experienced that He talked to us in different ways and He showed us where to stay and what to do each day. He didn't let us down even once! Our God is truly an amazing God!
I have to confess that I was a bit worried before leaving to Chiang Mai, but I've learned now to trust God. I know that if you really depend on God and trust Him with all your heart, He will do what He always wants to do; that is to speak to you and guide you. He would give u the most adventurous journey you could ever imagine, and most of all u would get to know Him in such a deeper level.

All in all these last 2 weeks has helped me to trust God more, to be more depentend upon Him and to listen to His voice.
I also loved my team and even though we had both thai and "farang" (non-thai) we were able to communicate (sometimes in the weirdest ways!) and we got to know eachother even more. We'll still be in the same team on our last major outreach. Only then we're going to Bangkok. I'm SO excited!
If u want to know more about what happened on this last outreach write me a mail and send it to: bjoerkkim@yahoo.com.au I'm happy to tell u:)

Walk in God's light.

Update

Sorry for being so lazy with updating my blog... I'll try to be better;)
It's been 2 weeks since my first outreach, which btw was AWESOME! I loved my team and the place that we were living at. The first week we lived up in the mountain in an Akha village, and in the 2nd week we lived by the Akha Youth Development Center. I really miss the children there, they were so cute:)
God taught me alot when I was out in the field, like just how much we could bless the people there by just working and being servants. To see all the happy faces even though they didn't have a lot of stuff and lived a very simpel life, really showed me that I don't need all this material stuff to be happy. Halleluja;)

This week we've been talking about Sin & Repentance, which was a bit scary. Specially yesterday when we went into group and shared everything about our life. But it was SO good to let it all out, even though I was crying all the time when I was talking. I don't have ANY secrets anymore, and I feel so relieved. I know that I'm not who I used to be anymore and that God has made me into a new person. Now I can walk in Him and His freedom! Thank you, Lord!

Have a great day filled with God's blessings:) Love u all!

Jeg lever fremdeles!

Etter mange advarsler fra mor om at jeg kom til aa bli kidnappet o.l viss jeg reiste, saa vil jeg bare si dette: I'm still alive, guys!

Det har gaatt 2 uker, men det foeles saa mye lenger enn det. Og jeg digger det! Har det helt konge her i borte, og jeg angrer ikke ett sekund paa at jeg reiste! Om 2 uker skal jeg paa outreach. Da reiser jeg+6 andre til en duud ved navn Luka, og der skal vi jobbe blant fjell-stammene med bl.a konstruksjon, ris- og temarker, male osv. Gleder meg! Paul (lederen vaar, som btw er awesome) har planlagt denne dts'en litt annerledes enn andre dts'er. Vi har 1 mnd med undervisning, saa 2 uker outreach, saa 1 mnd undervisning, saa 2 uker outreach. Forstaar tegninga? Den siste maaneden skal vi paa outreach i 1 mnd.

Jeg er utrolig takknemlig og velsigna over aa faa vaere her. Jeg tror virkelig at Gud har store ting i vente for meg. Og jeg vet at det som jeg er med paa her kommer til aa forandre meg totalt. Jeg bare gleder meg til aa se hvordan Gud forandrer meg til den personen han vil jeg skal vaere i denne tid.
Gud er god!

Endelig i Chiang Rai!

Hei!
Bare en liten oppdatering... Naa er jeg kommet vel fram til Chiang Rai. Senteret hvor jeg bor er kjempefint og stort. Bor sammen med 4 andre jenter. To fra Thailand og to fra USA. Studentene her er kjempekoselige. Ellers er det litt uvant aa maatte snakke engelsk og litt thai til enhver tid, men det kommer seg.
Maa bare faa sagt at det er kjempefint her borte. Vi bor paa fjellet og det er masse traer rundt om kring. Har en stor hage utenfor huset, med vollyball-nett og diverse.

Maa dessverre stikke, skal ha sport kl 14 og det er snart, saa jeg faar gjoere meg klar. Haaper dere kan fortsette aa be for meg.
Skal proeve aa faa ned noen blogger i loepet av tida mi her, spoers om jeg faar tid. Er mye aa gjoere paa her ser dere.
Hadet!