.:♥:. What God has been doing the past year .:♥:.

As promised here is the speech from Sunday *Note the picture below was NOT taken by me :) *

So tonight I am here to talk to you a little about what God has been doing in my life this past year. To begin I am a former student from Banting Secondary School. During my 4 1/2 years a lot happened during my last year and a half that tested my faith in many ways. Sometime in March of 2009, I learned that a classmate of mine had just been diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor. I had known this girl since kindergarten, and had been friends through elementary school, we still talked to each other during high school, but we weren't that close. I only visited her once during illness, and that was in May, the very day she was transferred to Parkwood hospital. Seeing her lying in the bed looking so frail and sick really scared me. A month passed and on June 14th I prayed to God that night, but instead of just praying I wrote it in my prayer journal. I prayed that God would end her suffering according to his will whether it meant a miraculous healing, or calling her into heaven. The next morning at school during first period, it was announced that she had passed away in the early hours of the morning. I had never thought that the first funeral I went to would be that of a classmate. During that week at school, a bunch of her friends congregated in the vocal music room to sit, comfort each other, and just cry. Two days after her death, we decided we wanted a change of atmosphere, so we marched of the music room, two people grabbing their guitars, and we lined the walls of the hallway and spent the day singing. I will never forget the feeling of that day were we all sang together, God worked through the tragedy to bring all of us together to celebrate the life of a departed friend. That was probably one of the hardest times I've been through, but God was there through it all. I graduated Banting in November 2009 and am now working full time at kidscape- an indoor playground for kids. God literally provided this job right when I needed it most. After two years of unsuccessful job searching I finally decided to turn things over to God. I was hired at kidscape a week before my final exams were finished. Being a christian isn't always easy, and there are times when I feel separated from God, but it's through these times that you have to keep going, run the race, live the faith, and trust that God will always provide for all your needs. A bible verse that has been a great comfort to me is Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in the Lord with all you heart and lean not on your own understanding but in all ways acknowledge him and he will direct your paths. I now leave you with the lyrics to one of my favourite songs, "Be strong in the Lord and never give up hope, you're gonna do great things, God's got his hands on you so don't live life in fear, forgive and forget but don't forget why you're here." Thank you.