Journal Entry
October 1, 2018
As I sat in the class today I felt deflated… I just attempted teaching the first graders on the words “Tall, Short, and Long”. Tall and short were pretty easy to teach but I could not for the life of me teach the word “Long” I do not know why that was hard for me but it was definitely discouraging. As the class came to an end the teacher asked me, “ Have you gone to college or just high school?” I told her I had just graduated high school. Then she said “oh okay, make sense you not taught before then?” I told her I was still learning and then this made me feel even more insecure about what I was doing while teaching and if I was making a difference or not. As Satan started feeding me lies, I felt God come over me. I then realized if I felt like I wasn’t doing anything I needed to start doing something about it. So I asked God to show me his purpose for bringing me here and putting me in this class room. I began walking around the room talking to the kids about what they like to do and things like that when all of a sudden someone grabbed my hand. It was a tall older girl who was probably 5 to 6 years older than the other kids in that class. She did not know English and had just moved to the school 2 days before I got there. She proceeded to grab my other hand and dragged me over to her desk. She pulled out a book and started asking me questions about the names of the images in the book. I talked to her about animals, fruits, colors, and plants. She asked me about a flower in the book. It was a rose. She had never seen one before and she thought it was beautiful. She then started drawing the rose. As she began to draw I started to see such a beauty in her I had never seen before. I know this was from the Lord.
I began to see God’s love for her and see the beauty that Christ sees in her. I started to feel such an overwhelming amount of love for this girl I had just met and could barely even communicate with. I started to cry in the class (NOT LIKE ME). I was crying because I had realized that God was teaching me/showing me that even though we may not know how to speak with God, understand God, know how much God loves us, or we may not even know of him, this does NOT change his love for us. I realized today that God is the one that puts love in our hearts. Real authentic never ending love only comes from the father. That’s one of the many reasons why we have to seek God out is so that we can love our brothers and sisters like Christ does (learning this one! Living with 45 other girls definitely helps you learn/grow).
“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.”
1 John 4: 7-8
God is love and I am slowly starting to learn what the word love really means. For a long time I had defined “love” like the world does. But for the first time ever I am seeking what the father defines love as. I am seeking out what God’s love looks like in my life. That means how I feel, hear, see, and how I live out Gods love in my life. I was blessed to have such a loving family/friends but for a long time I relied on them to show me Christ’s love. This had me seeking the love of the world rather than my God’s. This left me feeling empty, not worthy, broken, angry, and insecure. All these things I was feeling are not what God called me to be. When I finally realized where I was and what my life looked like, not just the surface but the contents of my heart I didn’t even recognize myself, I was ashamed with the person I had become. God saved me from the life I had started to form back home. And he knew the things I was doing and the person I had become was not me. He knew my purpose and my value when I didn’t know it. I am learning how to trust my God with my heart rather than the world with it. Because of this I am left more fulfilled and more valued than I ever have been. So I wake up each day knowing it will be hard but I would rather be on the other side of the world living each day for Christ and pursuing him than be back in the sadness and brokenness I was in when I left. I want to come back different. I already feel a change in my heart and my attitude. I am also starting to learn that I am valued, loved, chosen, and heard by my God. And I pray God keeps showing me his kingdom and who he is calling me to be and how he sees me.
My father is good! And the fact he can take me out of the life I was living in, is just a testament of his unfailing, everlasting, authentic love for me! So I encourage you that if you have something you are ashamed of give it to the lord. He loves you just as much as he loves me and he will heal/ restore you! He will bring you back to who he made and called you to be. GOD IS SO GOOD! And his love is never ending!
“I will be a father to you, and you shall be my daughters, says the Lord Almighty.”
2 Corinthians 6:18 NKJV
“Put on your new nature, and be renewed as you are learning to know your creator and become like him.”
Colossians 3:10 NLT
