I am His beloved.

Today, I hope to leave for Kenya and the things I had concerns with, I have no more.  Prayer answered: God took away some fears I had about traveling.  Now, my concern is just simply for my heart.  My heart has been in a little rut the past couple of weeks and has felt like it was at its max in the past few days.  The anticipation for the trip has been much and unfortunately, I took it out on a person I love the most.  Like I said in my previous blog, I believe there have been things thrown in front of me trying to prevent me from going, but each time I feel God there saying “Stand up and stay strong.  Lean on Me; have faith.”

On my last day at Camp Summit, I walked out of the building, able to rejoice in what God was doing even though I had no idea what was to come and still is to come!  I got in my car, turned on the radio, and just sat in the midst of Him for as I drove.  I felt like I had been standing on the ledge since January 27^th and now, I had just jumped off.  I was now completely in God’s hands with no security of a job or a paycheck, but full security in Christ.  I began to laugh out loud.  It was a great feeling of comfort and peace and excitement. 

I know God has something great because the enemy is trying to be very involved with things in my life.  The joy that God has put in my heart, the enemy is trying to take away, and I do ask for prayer about this.  I am so excited to see what God is doing in the lives of the kids at Naomi’s Village.  I am praying that I get the opportunity not to just love on them, but to share the greatest Love of all with them and with others around.  My focus about this trip has been to love the kids and to learn something about God along the way.  But wow – it is so much more than that.  It is to love the kids like Jesus loved me – so that they might know Him, love Him, and spend ETERNITY with Him.  It is not just to learn something about God.  I yearn to really know Jesus more.  I don’t want to continue on this journey of being on the end of receiving great blessings, but I want to give my heart and soul to serving and living my life for Him because He is worthy of that.  He is worthy of me being labeled as “unemployed” for this portion of my life; He is worthy for me to lose my life because I know that I will gain it in Him.  (Matthew 16:25)  He is worthy; He is worthy; He is worthy of so much more than I give Him in my everyday life, and yet He still delights in me and loves me in the midst of my selfishness, pride, and all the other yucky stuff.  I am His beloved and He sings over me in delight. (Zephaniah 3:17).  I am so grateful.

To end more on a silly note because I am not the best at always being serious:

The past couple of days, I prayed to be upgraded on the plane. Well, since I my flight got cancelled yesterday, two great things happened: 1. I was able to worship once more with the body of believers from The Village Church and 2. I was upgraded because there was no more room on economy!!!  I was real excited (and makes me super excited just typing about it right now). I’ve never flown anything besides economy, so I think I might stay awake all the way to London to soak it up a bit. Haha

God is so good, even in silly prayers we pray as a joke.  He is good with the people that I have been blessed to know.  Words cannot express how much love I have for people and my prayer is that I begin to show that a whole lot more than what I have been.  (1 John 3:18: Dear Children, let us not love with words or tongue, but with action and in truth.)

Thank you and I look forward to writing again from Kenya.

And So it Begins

Last September, God allowed me to travel to Kenya with an amazing group of people from The Village Church.  It was those two weeks that a dream I've had for 6 or 7 years finally came true.  Through this trip, God got a hold of me.  When getting back to the states, there was not one day that went by that I didn't think about what life was like outside of the US.  It is a world that many Americans will never experience and never fully understand.  It is crazy to think that more of the world lives like people in Kenya then people in the US.  I am grateful for the "things" of the United States, but also grateful for the "nothings" of a third world country.  I have seen, but not experienced, what it is like to have nothing and still be whole-heartedly be in love with God.  This is something that I long for more now than ever.

As I got back, I began to pray and ask myself "Am I really doing all I can for the glory of God?"  I didn't know how to answer, but felt like there was something out there - something to pursue hard after - not knowing what that was.  Later, I developed two pictures in my mind: 1. God and me staring at each other face to face and looking square in the eyes of one another  and 2. This teeny tiny Lindsey standing in the  almighty, powerful, huge palms of God.   I also began to talk with Julie Mendonsa about the thought of coming there summer of 2011, not really feeling God was leading me in a certain direction, but just felt we should be praying.  As the new year rolled around, I felt like God told me to work on three things: 1. Becoming a woman of prayer 2. Being a servant for Him and 3. Increasing my faith in Him.

As time went on, I went back and forth with the idea of having to quit my job as Assistant Camp Director at a camp for children and adults with special needs (my passion).  There were days when I felt like God said yes and there were days when I felt like He said no.  I fasted, prayed face flat on the floor.  One day, I sat in my living room with several things going on around me and I saw a short clip of my trip that September and felt an immediate overwhelming sense of peace.  That's when I knew what I had to do next.

I put my notice in about a week and a half to two weeks later - scared as all get out, by scared I mean, the thought of not having a job upon return and scared of losing the campers.  I have never felt more like this wasn't a choice of "What was better - Kenya or camp?", but "Who is better than both Kenya and camp?"  One person said "You've just gotten over one of the hardest mountains and there will be more that you will have to climb before your time comes to leave."  I will be honest in saying, I thought the resignation conversation was going to be the hardest part, but it wasn't.  Since the conversation, my grandfather has had three surgeries: 1. Triple bypass 2. infection that was pretty severe because of his coughing ripping up his sternum and 3. Repair surgery of his sternum, which should actually say "the removing" of his sternum.  While in Florida for his surgery, found out my step-mother, who had breast cancer was sent home because she was doing so well.  What the doctors did not know at the time was that her breast cancer had turned into brain cancer and had to have emergency surgery the day we were flying back from Florida.  As I watched my father, a man who wasn't really there for his children, love this woman as she was hurting - I knew that this was completely about his heart with the Lord.  Shortly after things somewhat hit a plateau something else would come up - another one being, having to deal with some false religion in my family and how satan can hide so easily, even for Christians to get confused as to what God is saying.  This is very vague, but was a pretty hurtful situation.

As I have watched life unfold over the past two and a half months, I have never felt more like Satan was trying to gain control of something in my life.  I've had to completely make myself stop thinking about what these people were feeling and look directly at what God was doing through this time in me.  It was increasing my faith, getting me to pray like I never really had before, and forcing me to stare directly into God's eyes and trust.  These situations have so many little details, some instances where there was no explanation other than the real presence of the Lord, which I had never felt.

All this to say, this blog is for what life will look like within the next 3 months as I prepare to go to Kenya for a couple of months, and what happens while I am there.  I am very ready to go see what God has, because I know it is soo good and soo sweet because Satan is trying hard to keep me from it.

Thank you and I look forward to God's plan unfolding.

Much Love,

Lindsey