Let me catch you up on the last few days here, friends.
My last week at home was so very sweet. My friends and family threw me a surprise birthday/going away party; and lavished me with prayers, good tidings, and traveling gifts.
I have been surrounded by so many supportive and Jesus loving people and I cannot even count my blessings, as we say, because frankly there are far too many.
Thank you all, family and friends that are really also family, for showing me all of the love. I am extremely grateful that my God has given you people to me!
January thirteenth, I flew to Atlanta to stay in a hotel for three days with my mission people, to continue to train, grow, and worship our King before we launched [like astronauts]
I am not sure what day it is now, The sixteenth or seventeenth maybe? I am in the air and my watch still tells Georgia time and I like being in the in-between.
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So.
I had an epiphany while in the laundry room of our hotel one night.
I was sitting with a fellow World-Racer, sipping on soda and munching on healthy crackers, that tasted very naturally like dirt.
As we waited for our load to dry, we contemplated Jesus in our lives. It was an exciting night, full of buzzing promise and good heart jitters for the upcoming month ahead.
While talking, God put into our perspectives the beautiful orchestrated things He had done to get us to this point. There is no disputing it, and there were certainly no coincidences,
It took me a year and a half to get to this place in my life, I had searched high and low for a good Christian organization to work with overseas and each step led me closer to Adventures in Missions.
My last endeavor, to go with a church to Kenya and intern there, had fallen through, yet God used the pastor to tell me of this organization called AIM that focused on discipleship, Missions, and community.
Before, when nothing seemed to be working out, I thought that my research was inadequate, that I had not been trying hard enough and I felt guilt for that. Looking back I see every single moment was used by God. He did alllllllll the work for me, it was His intention all along and He did let me find it as I half-blindly stumbled towards His path.
Patience and many months later, here we are.
The last few months have been filled with AMAZING people reaching out to me, pouring forth with prayers AND donations. Oh the JOY these beautiful people have for God. They shined bright telling me they would love to go along on this mission as well. Let me tell you, so many people are joining me. It is quite the motley crew God has banded together 🙂 prayer warriors and financial fund-ers!
So I haven’t gotten to the epiphany this led to.
GOD, WITH MUCH DETAIL, PLACED EACH PERSON AND CIRCUMSTANCE to bring us to this very place. Here we were about to embark on a seemingly crazy endeavor of traveling eleven months to eleven countries and serve and preach and share and learn.
What HONOR and REASSURANCE and COURAGE that brings me to stand tall in following His lead because there is not one doubt left in my mind that God’s purpose WAS AND IS to bring us together as He has—-with supporters back home and these on the field—- to His purpose. He holds our hand in His as He teaches us how to love like Him and bring glory to His kingdom.
THE KING OF THE UNIVERSE IS SENDING HIS SONS AND DAUGHTERS ON THIS IMPORTANT MISSION. Frankly I feel like a princess sent by Her Father. Because we are sons and daughters of the only true King and He sends us on Missions all of the time. Aren’t you in awe! I am dumbfounded!
This is a very long blog and I sort have promised myself I would not do that to you people. 🙂 but I did.
One last thing I will leave you with, and yes I slightly annoy myself because I have told this story about three trillion times in just the last three days. A trillion times a day is never a good amount of times to tell the same story…
I just finished reading the Hiding Place.
Corrie Ten Boom and her family helped hide Jews from nazis, by God’s miracles; and were later put in prison and concentration camps for having done a good work. Also by God’s hand, amazing things happened through each of those circumstances.
After having moved from prison and from another “camp,” Corrie and her sister Betsie were moved to one where their room reeked as women were piled upon one another sleeping in squished “bunk beds”
But this room was infested with fleas
So the sisters were,as you can imagine, very discouraged. Yet Betsie told Corrie, “we need to pray a prayer of thanks for our circumstances, Corrie”
They thanked Him for the women they could minister to and share God’s love with, they thanked Him for allowing them to smuggle medicine and a bible to share.
Then Betsie thanked Him for the fleas…
Corrie argued and Betsie said “the Bible says to thank Him in all circumstances, not just pleasant ones! So God, thank you for the fleas.”
Months later they discovered the reason why guards hardly came into their room to cause trouble, why they were able to hold nightly prayer and worship sessions undisturbed with the ever-growing number of Jesus seeking ladies, IT WAS BECAUSE THEIR ROOM WAS INFESTED WITH FLEAS!
I’m tearing up, darn it, I can’t get through a page without crying in that book and I can’t get through a conversation either.
God is the greatest conductor in the beautiful symphony of our lives.
He sent me through a process that led me to Adventures in Missions, He sent us all through experiences that brought us to particular places in our journeys, and He used the horrible fleas in Corrie and Betsie‘ room to ensure they were guard-free during their bible study time.
So yes,
Thank You God for the fleas.
Miss them!!
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