"Therefore go and make disciples of ALL nations... and I will be with you ALWAYS!" Matthew 28:19

And the Lord asked me, "whom shall I send? and who will go for me?" and with everything in me I replied, "Here I am, Lord! I will go! Send me!!" me and God's conversation after I read Isaiah 6:8.

Monday, June 21, 2010

the week...

Well, it’s time to write another blog. Sorry I haven’t written this last week. The internet was down… such a bummer. I will never take wifi for granted in the US again. I miss being able to get on whenever I wanted and not having to wait a week before I write again.
So many things are happening and sadly I can’t share a lot of them online. Please be praying for me. I am frustrated with a few things and it’s definitely not just me. I really have to rely on the Lord for HIS strength, His love, mercy, and grace. I am perfectly safe… don’t worry. Just be praying the Lord would shower down on me and that He would give me His heart for the people here.
Also, please pray that we would get our plane tickets. We were told we had them and now for some reason we don’t. Alex and I really need and want to leave here on August 7th so please be praying the Lord would open up 2 tickets on each plane and we get them. We believe for them! We are claiming it all the time. One more area God is teaching us to trust Him…
This week has been incredible with our speaker Jackie Pullinger. I can’t wait to come home and share her teachings with everyone. She rocked our world. She just teaches straight out of the Word. She is BOLD and VERY authoritative. She taught us about spiritual gifts and how to break curses off our life. Curses that were placed on our life that I had no idea everyone has. That was neat. She taught us about how our identity is in the LORD and not in a man/or woman. She taught us about how our protection is in the LORD not in man. She taught us about surrender.
We have some amazing speakers this summer! We are so extremely BLESSED! So far, Heidi, Rolland, Will Hart, Jackie Pullinger, a missionary from Ukraine and England, and Stacy Campbell! So many more amazing ones are to come!
One of the students got to go to the jail Friday and he prayed for 2 men who were deaf in one ear and now they are HEALED!!! They can hear out of BOTH of their ears!!! Praise the LORD!!! Yippee!!! I love hearing and seeing miraculous healing miracles.
I am going on outreach this weekend to a village 5-7 hours away. I am hoping this village has never heard the gospel so that we can be the first ones to share it! I am believing and declaring that we will see God do MIRACULOUS miracles. I declare we WILL see blind eyes SEE, deaf ears OPEN, and dead men/babies/women to be RAISED. I believe for it. I claim it. It was prophesied over me that I’d pray for the dead and they would be raised. And it turns out that 2 more people in my group have had that prophesied over them too. So, let’s go!!! C’mon JESUS!!! Please stand with us! Satan has thrown enough crap my way this week that I am just believing that God is about to do something AMAZING! I am praying and believing for so much breakthrough!
The Lord is doing so much in my life. He is just calling me to lay down so much. And He promised there would be JOY in the laying down and there truly is. He is my portion. His plans are prosperous for me. He is more than enough. So, why not just be a laid down lover of Him? Why not let Him lead me? Why not let Him be the leader every moment of my life? Why not? It’s so simple.. Jesus asked me the other day if I would dance with Him wherever He wanted to lead me. Then Heidi spoke on that. Haha how amazing!
“For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Ephesians 2:10
Through a friend Jesus wrote me this love letter…
“Daughter, Just let me lead. Let me show you all the steps to this dance. Just watch my feet and go where I go, step where I step. There are new moves that I want to show you that you have never done before. Trust me. Take my hand. Step out and trust me. I’m a good dancer. You are my partner. My child, do not be afraid! Keep your eyes on me and you will never take the wrong step. My love will carry you. Let my love sweep you away, let my love sweep you off your feet. One rhythm, one movement. We are one. Let this reality of our oneness penetrate deep inside your heart. Let this reality be always on your mind. I in you and you in me. My love. My desire. You have truly ravished my heart. Let y light shine through you. Nations will be drawn to this light. Be my light. My light, my goodness draws all men. Shine brightly so that all can see. I don’t want to any left out. Radiate me so that the lost and broken know that they are loved. Show them who I am. Be love. Be yourself covered by all that I am. Wear my presence like a cloak. Freedom looks good on you my beloved.”
Heidi prayed over me… “He will empower you as a lover. He is going to empower you for the dance. Shaka. The shoes that you need to dance the dance. He is going to give you the anointing you need, the passion you need.”
That’s all I could hear… the rest didn’t get recorded. But it was all about dancing for Him. It was pretty amazing. I was blown away. She has never seen me dance nor does she know I am one!
Tuesday 10 other people and I got to sit down with Rolland and just talk. He wanted to get to know us and we could ask him whatever we wanted. Then he asked us something that really made me think. He is full of wisdom. He said, “What would you die for?” You can only die once so what would it be for. He also said, “before you go on the mission field you need to get to the point where you can say, ‘this is what I’m giving my life for…’”. “You have to be willing to give your life for it. When you leave, there should be no turning back.” –Rolland said.
Jesus is truly the lover of my soul. “I am my beloveds and He is MINE!!” Song of Solomon 2:16. I am so overwhelmed by His love for me. I am so completely in love with Him. I can’t even express how amazing He is. He is truly romancing me!
Saturday I just laid out on the beach… ahhhmazing! Heidi told us to take the day off Saturday and just do nothing. After spending 3 hours with the Lord in the morning I went to hang out at the beach for awhile! I have quite a few funny tan lines… oh I don’t know what I’m going to do when I get home! Then we just hung out the rest of the day. 6 of us piled onto Alex’s bed(and our beds are TINY hahaha) Saturday night and watched Ice Age 3. It was so much fun!
Sunday and Thursday are my shower days! I thoroughly look forward to those! Love being clean! Some of these sweet students here have just been telling me that I am a beautiful missionary… even though I am so nasty. How sweet!
Alex, Catherine, and I met these new visitors(we get new ones every 2-3 weeks). They are all big tough guys. I say that because they couldn’t believe that we were here for 3 months. They couldn’t believe that we were girls who sleep in tents in a remote village without being scared, take showers twice a week, etc. etc. They were amazed at how “tough” we were. It cracked us up! Living in Africa does make you tough. I just never thought 3 tough big guys would be so proud of us. It was encouraging.
This morning at church was so special. Heidi’s daughter is here so she translated the service into English. Heidi spoke on John 4- the woman at the well. If you aren’t familiar with the story, the woman has had five husbands and was then living with someone who wasn’t her husband. Heidi went into detail about some of the reasons that the husbands might have kept leaving this woman in the bible. Then Heidi asked the African women to raise their hand if any of their husbands had left them. Probably 95 % raised their hand. My heart broke. In this culture it is very common for the husbands to leave their wives. They will leave them if the women can’t have kids, didn’t have a boy, or they’ll find a younger, better-looking wife, etc. etc. My heart was crushed. The pain these women endure on a regular basis. There is NO one to take care of them. They have tons of children and yet no one to love on them, help them, or care for them. Heidi asked us women to go pray for them. (THIS IS MY FAVORITE PART!!!) We get to love on and pray for these women every Sunday and Monday and it’s one of the joys of my week. I crammed in beside these two women with one baby in my lap and I just prayed for these women. I LOVE praying for them. Then, they prayed for me…. Really? Oh my Jesus. Well, after I prayed for one woman she went up and told Heidi she wanted to be SAVED!!!!! She gave her life over to JESUS today!! PRAISE THE LORD!!!
We also got a new little baby last week so he is getting extra care and love from me! He is so precious!
We washed our clothes again today.
Talked to my little brother and parents today(Sunday). Oh how I miss them! I cried the whole time I was on the phone with them. I have almost been gone a month…. I just miss them so much. I miss seeing them every day. I miss their hugs. I miss being able to sit down with my mom and talk to her for HOURS about every little thing. I so miss her. Today(Sunday) is Father’s Day and it hurts my heart that I can’t be with my dad to celebrate it. Oh how I wish I could just give him a big hug! It was so good to hear my little brother’s voice and him make me laugh. I miss that boy SO much!!!
God is so good. He fills me up when I am weak and broken. He holds my heart. He loves on me! I am so thankful that I serve a sweet, sweet Savior! May all of you have a blessed week! Will update you next Monday, hopefully!
“I thank my God every time I think of you.” Philippians 1:3

3 comments:

  1. And I thank my God every time I think of you, too!!!!The Lord just brought another verse to my mind for you. One of your favorites: Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go."
    You are loved beyond measure. I am so proud of you.

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  2. Also forgot to tell you that Nana and Aunt Leslie have been trying to post a comment but can't. They wanted you to know. Love you!!

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  3. wow again em, how wonderful an experience. you are loved and are being prayed for thats for sure. Philippians 2:13 It is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. you are so blessed,
    love you aunt fran

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