Sunrise from the veranda
Ok, let me begin
this blog post with a general update so that all of you are caught up with
what’s been happening! This month, my team’s ministry is located in the small
city of Mbarara, Uganda. First off, Uganda is an absolutely gorgeous country,
full of lush green fields, mountains, fruit plantations, and breathtaking
sunrises and sunsets. It’s also more westernized than Kenya, and thankfully,
the westernization appears to have been a good thing, showing up in the form of
education, organization, and cleanliness. Our ministry contact here is Pastor
Solomon and my team is staying with him and his wife Lilli and their baby
daughter, Sufficient Grace. Their home is a modest rental, decent by Ugandan
standards. Although there is no electricity or running water, I’ve actually
enjoyed it a great deal. It gives me time away from my electronics. Plus, the
light from the kerosene lanterns is more cozy. I’ve adjusted well to the
African outhouse and love the bucket showers. People of the USA, we should try
this! It conserves water and is a great way to enjoy nature! (i.e. the showers
consist of a stick structure with tarps and corrugated metal nailed up for the
sides and door; the sun on your shoulders and the cool water on your hot skin
feels wondrously refreshing!)
Our ministry here
is more varied than it was in Busia. Here, we hold crusades every Thursday,
Friday, and Saturday night. We’ve also worked at a rehab center (essentially a
boarding school for youth with disabilities) and a tech school. I’ve decided
soccer is going to be a part of my ministry and I’ve enthusiastically taken up
the sport and play it as much as possible with any of the youth and kids who
are around. I’m not very good, but I’ve gotten a lot better over the past week
and a half. It’s actually been great being on an all-women’s team because I’m
not concerned with trying to impress guys and can just be myself and really
focus on doing God’s work. I’ve been ministering a lot more to the kids here,
and I’m finally learning that part of my calling (and learning) is to minister
to the women on my team. I’ve learned a lot and I’m definitely still learning.
So how do I know
what is of God and what isn’t? Well, I’m still learning that. It’s a long,
arduous process but God’s been teaching and showing me a lot. I’ve loved my
early morning quiet times. Rising a little before seven, I take my Bible and
sketch pad and sit on the veranda and watch the sun rise while I commune with
God. Ugandan kids scamper past, waving and grinning as they pass on their way
to school. It’s in these times of peace and tranquility that I’ve learned to
not just talk TO God, but to talk WITH God and to listen to His voice and see
through His eyes. This time is from God and filled with God; it is OF GOD. Just
this morning, He gave me a really cool vision that I think He wants me to share
with all of you!
I was standing in a
room with a small window at the far end of it. The whole room was freshly
painted stark white, clean and beautiful. Although I was standing in the room,
I knew I was also somehow the room. I couldn’t see Jesus, but I know He was
there. Joy filled me and when heavenly music began playing softly, I raised my
arms and began dancing. As the music grew in crescendo, so did my joy and
dancing. And as I danced about the room, colors and patterns and designs and
all manner of beauty began to appear on the walls, on the ceiling, on the
floor. The room that had been so plain was now a gallery of art, God’s
handiwork on display for the world to see, for His glory! Then Jesus was there,
laughing and dancing with me as I twirled around. The walls of the room slowly
disappeared and I was swept up with Jesus and we were dancing among the stars,
high in the heavens. It was glorious! After, God explained it to me. Each of us
is like that white room. When we are saved, Jesus comes in and cleanses us from
our dark, dirty sin, making us white and pure and beautiful. Then, as we grow
in Christ and allow Him to work in us, He fills us with His beauty and His
life. He creates in us a masterpiece! YOU ARE HIS MASTERPIECE. When we allow
Him to work in us and change us and give us His love and joy, He is able to
grace us with His beauty. By getting to know us or just by being around us,
others can come into us, our room, and see Him and His glory through us. And
when we are perfected and have lived our time here on earth, He takes us up
with Him to dance forever in heaven in praise of Him. How glorious is that!
Never forget that you are precious. God has
created you with great care and made you exactly how He wants you. It hurts Him
when you’re unhappy with how He’s created you. It’s something that I’m still
working on coming to terms with. There are so many things that I see about
myself that I don’t like – physically, emotionally, and spiritually. I want to
be thinner, be prettier, have better skin; I want to be less angry,
aggravating, flirty, and more patient and loving; I want to be more like God
instead of struggling daily. But God told me one day, “My daughter, My precious
child… I have made you beautiful, glorious among women. Why do you continue to
seek the affirmation of others? For I have made you lovely. Rest in that. It
hurts Me when you are unhappy with how I have fashioned you, for you are
perfection to Me and I took great care when I made you.� Don’t you see?! We are His workmanship. Think
of something that you have done which you take great pride in. Now what if that
thing turned to you and began complaining about what it didn’t like about
itself, told you that you should have made it differently in a certain way? It
would hurt. So don’t do that to God. God accepts you how you are, so you should
as well. HOWEVER! God also loves you too much to leave you as you are; He sees
how awesome you could be and wants you to become that, to step into and reach
that potential He has blessed you with. So seek after Him, seek to be more like
Him, and He will show you how to live a life that is of Him.
