Well we’ve been in Dublin, Ireland, nearly a week and the Lord is moving. LOL!!!! (there is quite a bit of holy laughter going on here).
The Lord has been revealing to me (us) how He pursues those He loves. Y’all the Lord is moving!!! (I’ve been hanging out with too many amazing southerners lately… sorry)
Our connection to the hostel and contact here was miscommunicated/out of service, leading us to take a people mover to a campground outside of Dublin for a few days until Snoop-dogg left town (long story…) Our leader felt lead to pray for the driver, so we prayed. He said, and I quote “oooh, I just got the tinglies all over!! I ain’t never felt like that before” (GO JESUS!)
After a few days of respite, we found another hostel, made it back into Dublin, and in contact with our ministry host and all was well.
We land in the hostel (a mighty fine one I must say), spend some time with our ministry contact and head back to the hostel. We meet daily for what we call feedback/team time, and soon enough this English chap walks in to our little meeting in the hammock room. Some of the girls had met him earlier, but we ALL felt like the Lord had anointed this man.
“I’m an atheist” he said as he just started hammering us with questions of ‘Why do you believe in God? You can’t see Him.” After an hour or so, 2 other men came in. One, a comedian with such an amazing spirit about him (and hilarious). The second, a leather maker (tanner?) from the countryside of Ireland who voiced that he has experienced things of the Lord but hasn’t followed Him consistently.
So here we have 3 men in our room, joining our “meeting” (bless Megan’s heart for being flexible) talking of things of Jesus. SO AMAZING!!!!!
The first man I told you about insisting on joining us for our ministry the next day. So he (Kelan) became our photographer and doorman and clothes try-er-on-er as we sorted through donations, made food, served food, and talked to the homeless/poor that came to receive food.
He then insisted on joining us again the next day at our next ministry site, cleaning and moving stuff at another building. Meanwhile we were having conversations here and there about who the God is and what He has done for us, how He sees Kelan.
From that first night we met him, throughout those 2 ministry days you could see his heart soften and become hungry for Him, then almost just as quickly he’s running off swearing and yelling at the person next to us or throwing out classic inappropriate English comments (I never understood more the teaching “you can win the battle for behavior but lose the battle for the soul” as Kelan’s behavior was far from ‘appropriate’ most of the time)
We felt led to have worship for our ‘meeting ‘ that evening (last night) and of course, in walks Kelan. After getting past some distractions, he opens the bible to Psalm 31 and begins to read verse 13, then the rest of Psalm 31, then Psalm 32, then to 33. ‘I don’t know what’s happening to me’ ‘I’ve never felt like this before’ He reads on. ‘it’s like its written for me.’ We spent the next 2 hours just letting him experience the Lord for the first time, praying with him, praising with him, laughing, crying, and just rejoicing with the angels and the Lord as Kelan prayed to receive Christ.
The Lord sent us crazy 8 Americans on a wild goose chase to this random hostel so we could be the aroma of Christ to this young man and he could experience true freedom that only comes from God. If that’s all we do/see this next 11 months, this whole trip will have been worth it.
Thank you prayers/supports for being a part of this man’s salvation. Continue to pray for growth/support/accountability for him. He is actually on his way to America for a couple years. We are attempting to find him connections there.
Meanwhile, we were able to purchase a bible not only for Kelan, but for one of the other men (the leather-worker) and pray over him. Remember the comedian? Well, we found out he had decided to start reading the bible for more comedy ‘sketches.’ We caught one of his shows last night and let me tell you… the Lord has been knocking on his door. Pray for another opportunity to see/talk to him early next week when he’ll be back in town.
Yes, the Lord is GOOD!! He is worth of ALL glory!!!
Kelan and I
A day of R&R
getting a little distracted from sorting clothing donations…
