Today someone told me something about myself that made me very ashamed. I know that I am not perfect and many times I operate in my flesh but when someone else calls you out on it, it doesn't feel so good.

My Father taught me how important my reputation and character is, he taught me by the example he set. My Dad is very respected and liked by many in his community and profession. The people that know him know the things he stands for and the things he will not tolerate. I have always admired my father's character and the reputation he built. Something I've strived towards but feel I often come up short.

Growing up, very early on I made many mistakes, not small mistakes. I disappointed my family, many close to me and eventually myself. Even though I have learned greatly from my mistakes, poor choices and disobedience, I continue to screw up. In most things I have made the mistake, learned my lesson, repented, accepted forgiveness and thankfully been wise enough not to make that same mistake twice. Unfortunately that hasn't been true for every mistake or poor choice. Sometimes even, I make the poor choice consciously! (I just paused, tightly closed my eyes, swallowed hard and took a deep breath...that's not easy to admit.) How stupid I am sometimes! My character and reputation suffer but above all that, I call myself a follower of Jesus Christ - His name, character and reputation suffer. It's like this lady a few weeks ago, a car ahead of me with a Jesus fish magnet on her car - she flipped off and used graphic words as to what she wanted to do with her foot to the man driving the car that just cut her off. Nice huh?

I hate that there are days that I consciously choose to walk in my flesh. No matter what happens outside of my body, no matter who says something hurtful, how stressful my day was or whatever the situation may be, I am in control and responsible for my attitude and the choices I make that reflect who I am and who Jesus Christ is.

Romans 7:15-19 "I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing." Verse 24-25 "What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God - through Jesus Christ our Lord!"

I'm just not as good as I want to be. I am inadequate in my own power to possess a positive attitude in a tough situation or make a wise choice I can be proud of in a time of peer pressure or temptation. Thankfully, Jesus spilled His blood to cover me! Every stupid, selfish, ignorant and shameful thing I do, His blood was spilled for me. 

Psalm 25:4-7 "Show me your ways, O 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, O Lord, your great mercy and love, for they are far from old. Remember not the sins of my youth and my rebellious ways; according to your love remember me, for you are good, O Lord. "

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be a child in slavery, an orphan left to die alone, a poverty stricken father who's lost his job and cannot provide for his family or a daughter sold into the sex trade? The people of the Filipino islands never have to wonder, for most, it's their life.

AIM has a base in the Philippines where they have been building relationships and ministering to the Filipino people and sending ministry teams there each summer to show the love of Jesus and bring healing, hope and a new way of life to the people.

This coming July I will have the opportunity to co-lead a high school age trip to Cebu, Philippines. This will be my first time leading a mission trip out of the United States. I am more than excited to be used by God in this way, to have the opportunity to disciple a group of young people as they minister for God's Kingdom. 

Please pray for the hearts of the young people who are being called to participate on this mission trip. May each of them hear the voice of the Lord and be obedient to His call for them to experience Him and minister to the lost and broken, an experience that will change them forever.

Also please pray for the Lord to provide a co-leader(s) to be a part of the leadership team with me for this trip. Being my first leading experience I pray the Lord provides leaders who I can look up to and learn from.

1 Samuel 2:8 "He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap;
he seats them with princes and has them inherit a throne of honor. "For the
foundations of the earth are the LORD'S; upon them he has set the world."

It's been almost a solid month since I announced my embarking on the journey of the World Race. This month has been one filled with many ups and downs. I struggle even right now writing this blog to express to you where my heart is. Of course I assumed that with the submission of my will to the Lord to participate and prepare for the Race that the enemy would attempt to fight against me succeeding stronger than usual. There are moments when I find myself trying not to think about anything, not the planning, the purchasing, the finances or even my heart's condition spiritually. I am so ashamed to admit this fault yet understand that the only way to push through this daily funk is for me to be on my knees even when I don't feel like it and to have you covering me in prayer. How can you cover me in prayer for the things I'm struggling with if I don't open this book and expose my faults, struggles or shortcomings? 

Last weekend I was sifting through some boxes of stuff from years ago (why I brought them to Georgia and didn't leave them in MI, I don't know) anyway, I found a verse I wrote on an index card. I used to write verses on index cards and tack them all over the house in the places people's eyes might be frequently. My Mother sometimes was driven a little crazy by this I'm sure! The thing about this index card, my child like handwriting and all that makes it noteworthy is the verse on it and the fact that I believe the Lord brought it to my eye at the right moment when it spoke the most. Philippians 2:13 "God is at work within you, helping you want to obey Him, and then helping you do what He wants." This verse causes me to wonder about God and His greatness. How many times over the course of twenty years has He protected me and scooped me away from some situations with really bad potential. How many times has He guided my steps even when I wasn't asking Him to. Many times I find myself having a difficult time wrapping my mind around the gravity of His love for me.

All of this to say, I have been struggling with feelings of failure and a lack of motivation. However the thing that never ceases to amaze me is that He still loves me and He's still walking beside me, providing, protecting and guided even when I'm not actively pursuing Him.

So what about you? What about those times when you acted without a care in the world and He was there, protecting, loving and guiding you? I think He's a God that loves His children - no conditions, He just does.  

When you feel the enemy attacking you remember this - Psalms 138:7  I am surrounded by trouble, but you protect me against my angry enemies.  With your powerful arm you keep me safe.

When you feel weak or inadequate recall this, it might instill confidence in you as it does me - II Corinthians 12:9  But he replied, "My kindness is all you need.  My power is strongest when you are weak,"  So if Christ keeps giving me his power, I will gladly brag about how weak I am.

I can barely contain my excitement with this news.....I AM GOING ON THE WORLD RACE!!! I have been praying on and off about doing the Race since June of last year but my flesh put up a strong fight until about three weeks ago. I was expecting this big bomb to go off or major fireworks but all that took place was me, a Kleenex box, and my Bible on my bedroom floor in tears. I think I've just had enough, enough of this mediocre life. I went to church as I have been for the past several months very faithfully but not because it's the "right thing to do" or because I work for a missions organization but because I ACTUALLY wanted to. In that church service three weeks ago I felt the Holy Spirit move like I never have before. That moving in my spirit was what lead me to my knees crying to God on my bedroom floor that afternoon. I wish I could explain to you in detail what changed or what sort of tangible thing brought me to that place but I can't. All I can say is that there's something more out there, something greater than me, my plans and my dreams. I KNOW that I wasn't created to please myself or to bring glory to my name or do things that satisfy my selfish desires; it's just not about me. I don't care who thinks I'm crazy, I don't care who thinks it's too much or I'm going "overboard", I'm just sick of my life being about me and those who think such things, I'll be praying for you. Although it may sound like after that day things have been easy or I've set my mind to a task and I should have no problems following through, actually I have to choose EVERYDAY, sometimes many times a day to have a positive attitude, to bite my tongue when my flesh wants to rise up or to do something I know won't bring honor or glory to the name of Jesus who shed His blood on a cross for me. I think sometimes we hear that and we aren't affected by those words or what that means, we've become desensitized to Christ who became man and did such a thing to save our rotten selves who continue to seek personal pleasure that is not glorifying to His Kingdom. We are blessed to receive grace and mercy, I know I'm reminded everyday that without grace and mercy I'd have gone to hell a long time ago. Thank you Jesus for your love! :)

This is an e-mail I received today from an AIM staff member....READ THIS and ACT FOR THE GLORY OF CHRIST! 

 

Many positive lessons came out of my ComLife experience the beginning of 2009 and I grew with Christ in several ways after also, but I'm only going to share a few that stick out. The first one is regarding resolving conflict. Not necessarily a fun one but I love that I have a better grasp on how to understand people and why certain people with certain personalities do things or act in ways they do. I feel equipped to know how to maturely handle resolving conflict in a variety of situations with a variety of people, not saying that I always get it right but I try. :) Along with the understanding of people, I feel I have learned the importance of quickly resolving conflict with a person. The longer the wait and the deeper the space grows between an uncomfortable or heated situation the stronger things like hate, anger, an unwillingness to forgive and revenge creep into the situation.

Patience, something I've talked a lot about and I am by no means saying that I have mastered this virtue but I have learned something new about its meaning. I thought that being patient was sitting and waiting for the Lord to show up and do something in my life, through some lessons and stern chats with Him I realized that patience IS about waiting on His perfect timing and His perfect plan BUT I'm not supposed to just be content and comfortable in my daily life. I should be serving Him better, trusting Him more, pursuing Him deeper and striving to further His kingdom while I wait for the other great desires of my heart to take form. I love it! :) When I finally got this revelation I was like, "Yes! I get it! I will serve you while I'm waiting!" a simple thing you might think but when I REALLY understood what He was saying and asking of me, it lifted this heavy "waiting burden" and now the deep unknown hole doesn't seem scary because I'm not focused on that so heavily anymore, I'm just trusting my Creator. :)

So like I said, I have learned many awesome things this past year and I feel like I grew up a lot, being on my own and managing all the things that come with being an adult. I am looking forward to taking on this new year, breathing in every moment and savoring each sweet and undeserving blessing that the Lord gives. I pray that this blog and the things I write about inspire you to evaluate your relationship with your Creator and that my experiences or the things I am learning will challenge you to go deeper and find more purpose, more meaning and reach for that purpose driven life.

Matthew 6:33 But seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

All my love and prayers!

 

 

Do you ever have this feeling that just when you think you know where your life might be going for a little while, it changes...? Well, I must be special or something, yea something alright. I just wrote a nice blog about heading off to India in a few months and now I must tell you, I will not be going. First off let me start by saying how much I've felt your prayers heavy over the past few weeks...I've really needed them. I will not be going to India with the Novas Project because after much thought, prayer, and careful decision making, AIM has decided to not proceed with this program. The Lord just does things we don't understand sometimes...that doesn't mean we're not disappointed or frustrated; we just have to trust and obey. (That is a fantastic hymn!) :-)