Well, here we are everyone. Its the last week of the race and I am currently on a 22 hour bus ride down to Cape Town. There has been a lot going on these past couple days, but in a totally different way than usual. Usually we are out on ministry preaching the gospel but the last few days we have been in meetings about how to adapt at home. I loved the classes, they taught a lot of good stuff.
I am so excited about being home and seeing everyone that I have missed. Also, i know that I want to meet with people and encourage them in totally different ways. Probably ways that they have never been encouraged in. I am going to do a little bit of that right now actually. If there were two things that I would want you to know, out of everything I would want you to know that Jesus loves you more than you can ever even imagine. He would come down and die and everything all over again just for you if he had to. Also, that you can do all things through Christ!! I literally mean ALL things! There is not a single thing that you can’t do in this world if you are practicing it in Jesus’s will. People thought that raising the money for this trip, God provided. I didn’t think that I could last 9 months being away from home being on a Christian missions trip, God strengthened me. I didn’t think I had the faith that I needed to practice his word, God gave me what I needed. I didn’t think God healed people anymore, God definitely does!! If you have ever thought,” God doesn’t do all the crazy things He used to in the Old Testament and in Jesus’s time.” If you have thought that or are thinking that, then I have been exactly where you are. I used to think that all the hearings and weird stuff that is happening around us was just people faking it. I can tell you now, with out a doubt in my mind at all, that God still does all those amazing things! If you guys know at all, you will know that I won’t lie to you. I have seen hearings, god moving in the communities, God speaking to me, God telling people to do things and when they do them amazing things happen. He is more active than ever. There are tons and tons of missionaries all around the world doing all the things that I have done and way way more. I can only imagine what miracles God is doing all around the globe that we don’t even know about.
I want to encourage everyone tossup out in their faith. Do something for God that you haven’t ever done before. Take that leap of faith that you have been to scared to take. Talk to someone about your faith in a way that you have never done before. Ask someone deep questions and actually care about the answer they give. Go on a journey for the Lord and ask Him to show you someone who you can pray for. There are endless ways that I can tell you to go out and try new things in your faith to improve it. If you aren’t improving yourself then what are you doing?
One major thing that I learned on this trip is that you lack nothing. You have every single thing that you need to go out and reach different people. All this fear that you have of,”I dont know what to say” or “Ill look weird” are all little petty fears. You saying that you don’t have the right words to help someone is another way of saying that God isn’t big enough to give you the words to say. I tell you, God has given you every single spiritual give that you need for any task. The trick is that He isn’t going to give those gifts to you if you aren’t in a place where you need them.
Think of spiritual gifts as a chain saw. God is your father and you are a little kid. You want to be able to use this chain saw that you see your father using. Your dad isn’t gong to just give the chain saw to a little kid who doesn’t have any experience or practice with it. That would do more harm than good. Instead he is going to train you how to you it first. Also, (heres the big part) your dad isn’t going to give you the chainsaw in the house. If you really want to use it then you are going to have to go out side into the woods where there are trees to cut instead of couches and chairs. When you are in the place where He wants you to be and know how to use it then and only then is He going to trust you to use it. Every time that you use it, the better you will get with it and the more you will know how to do.
That really hit me when I thought about it like that. I was waiting around in my house watching movies and going to work and never thinking about God but yet I wanted Him to show me what my gifts are. It took me going out and learning more about my self and Him and being in the places where He wanted me to be for Him to give me those gifts. I really had to want to see them and use them.
Step out of your comfort zone, your little happy bubble. Try new things and go search for the Lord. I know that even in the smallest things that you do for Him, I know that He sees it and you will be rewarded. I have stepped out and prayed for hearings and have had nothing happen, but I know that God saw my faith and saw my efforts. I know that He is a generous and loving God and that every effort will be accounted for.
Now that I’m done challenging you all, I would like to say thank you. Thank you all for supporting me and encouraging me. I don’t know if you all know how much you mean to me. I have read all of your emails and comments and that really helps in the hard times. Thank you for stepping out in the ways that you did and supported me to be able to do all this. Thanks you for believing in me, even more than I did my self. this trip has forever changed my life in more ways than I even know. With out this trip I would have wandered very far from the Lord and might not have found my way back. So, from the deepest part of my heart, I would like to say Thank You. I love you all and am praying for you guys all the time.
I hope that I have done my job and have been able to touch your hearts in some way and have gotten everyone into action for the Lord. There is so much to be done yet in this world. That is why I have another announcement to make. I would like to tell all of you about the next step for me that I feel like the Lord wants me to do.
Sorry for this being late. I never had the chance to post it while in Cape Town.
