this area around the church. However,
this past Wednesday we went into Bender and met some other very encouraging
high school students.
I love meeting new people! I really
enjoy trying to speak the language and meeting Christians from around the
world. It is very encouraging. God is working all around the world! On Wednesday we went to a small group Bible
Study and met 5 young adults. We were
able to share our life stories with them and two of them shared their stories
with us!
and learn from each other. Even though
each story was different, there were many commonalities! As one girl shared her life story, I began to
reflect on my story and how I can learn from her experiences.
She shared that because she is a Christian, family members hate her! WHAT? She has also lost friends because of her faith. I have been living in fear my whole life
caring only about other peoples’ acceptance of me. I don’t think I have ever thought that people
might actually hate me because of my faith and certainly not my own close
family members.
Hearing her story made me so thankful for God’s protection over my
life. God knew that she could handle
peoples’ rejection and grow closer to Him because of it. He protected her and was with her during the
persecution and rejection. God knows
what I can handle and when I can handle it. He has my life in His hands.
I am overwhelmed when I think about the love that God has for all these
people that I meet around the world. Today at church we sang the song ‘Hosanna’ and these lyrics are my
prayer:
Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like you have loved me
Break my heart for what breaks yours
Everything I am for your Kingdom’s cause
God’s heart breaks for all of these people around the world. I want to love all these people just as
Christ does. Can you even fathom how
much God loves us???? I can’t. But I want to love as He loves. I want to meet people and see them as He sees
them.
That is why I have enjoyed Transnistria so much! God is working here in these people to reach
this country and to encourage us. We
have been honest about our stories with people we have met and people
appreciate and learn from honesty to grow their relationships with Christ.
