Blessed.

In case you don’t already know, I will be going on a mission trip to Slovenia in May. I sent out the majority of my support letters a few weeks ago and I’ve been playing the waiting game ever since. Today I received my first two donations. Now, I’ve had to do plenty of support raising in years past so this wasn’t anything new. But what was new was the feeling of being utterly blessed.

I was so incredibly encouraged today when I realized that people were supporting me. Honestly, it had very little to do with the money (though I do greatly appreciate that!). I was much more encouraged by the realization that people are supporting me because they believe in what God is doing through me. They’re not just giving me their money to be nice. If that was the case, they would have stopped giving years ago. They support me because they love me and because they love God. They support me because they’ve seen the fruit of what God has done in my life and they want to be a part of it. They support me because they’re excited to see the gospel spread.

I am overwhelmed by how blessed I am. I am blessed to have these faithful supporters who believe in God’s plan for my life. I am blessed to have the opportunity to travel the world spreading the gospel. I am blessed to be at a school where I am constantly built up and encouraged.  I am blessed to have a family that loves me and supports me, even when they don’t understand why I want to do the things I do. I am blessed and I am very thankful. Thankful to God and thankful for the people around me.

So if you are reading this, thank you. You are a blessing to me! I pray that I could be a blessing to you as well.

Walls

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Emily. When she was young, something very bad happened, and Emily was terribly hurt. So she decided to build a wall around herself in order to block out the people who might hurt her in the future. But the wall was not yet very high or strong so people still got in and again she was hurt.
So Emily built another wall outside the first, but this one was higher and thicker. But again, people kept climbing over and breaking through and she was hurt. So she kept building more walls, thicker and higher. There was a door in the wall but Emily learned very early to keep it locked. No one was allowed inside her walls and she stopped going out. Eventually the walls had gotten so high and thick that she had an impenetrable fortress. She was safe in her walls and no one could hurt her.
But one day, she started thinking about what was outside the walls. It had been so long since she had ventured out that she couldn't remember. She couldn't even remember why she had built the walls in the first place. She thought about leaving her fortress to see what lie beyond but she was so terrified. She had, after all, built the walls for a reason.
She thought about leaving for months until finally, she felt desperate to know what was beyond the walls. But it had been so long since she had opened the door that she couldn't remember where she had put the keys. Her fortress that she had built for safety had literally become a prison. She had trapped herself inside her own walls.
She tried desperately to break down the walls or to climb over but they were too thick and too high. It was impossible for her to get out without the key. She searched for weeks to no avail. One day though, after searching and searching, she realized something of incredible significance. The keys were in her pocket. They always had been. Throughout all of her searching and desperation, she had held the keys to her freedom.
But now that she had the keys, she didn't know what to do. She wanted so badly to leave her walls and be free but now that this was actually a possibility, she was completely overwhelmed by fear. Could she handle the outside world? How was she supposed to act? She didn't remember. What would other people think? What if she got hurt again? Was it really worth it to take that risk?
She had so many fears and doubts and all of them were valid. But she realized that she was truly desperate. She couldn't handle being a prisoner anymore. She had to be free. It was worth the risk. So she put the key in and opened the door. And then, for the first time in years, she stepped outside of her walls.

Forgiveness

Last Friday, in my Power of the Cross class, we talked about forgiveness. At the end of the class, we had some time to talk to God and work through some of the stuff we talked about. As I was praying, God brought up an incident from over two years ago that I needed to forgive. So I'm going to get a little vulnerable and share that with you.
The incident he brought up was from my second trip to Sierra Leone. We were doing ministry at these barracks and while we were evangelizing, I got separated from my partner. Our whole team was still fairly close in the same area so even though I wasn't supposed to be alone, I didn't think much of it when two men started asking me questions about the drama we had just done. So I started talking to them and it was actually a really good conversation. They weren't ready to accept Christ or anything but they were engaging with what I was saying. Towards the end of our talk though, it started getting a little weird. They started asking me for my watch or my bandanna because they wanted something to remember me by. I said no. Then they asked me for my email or phone number. Again, I declined. By now I was starting to get uncomfortable so I tried to walk away but one man grabbed my hand and wouldn't let me go. I tried some more and he pulled me close and wrapped himself around me from behind and then kissed my cheek. When he did this, my team leader saw and ran over to rescue me. After this happened I felt terrible. I was angry and I felt violated and dirty. I wanted to just scrub my cheek over and over and pretend like it never happened. But it did happen and it affected me a lot.
Now, I had forgiven this man before and it's probably been months since I last thought about him. So it was really weird when this popped into my head after the forgiveness talk. It was even weirder because it was the first thing to pop into my head after the talk. So I prayed about it and I forgave him again and it was good.
The next day we had outreach. I'm in an outreach called Trinity Works where we go down to the University of Minnesota and evangelize. This week, I got partnered with one of my classmates Erica. So at this point in the story we had already had one AMAZING conversation with this man Prayvion (I have no clue how to spell that but it sounds like I wrote it...). He rededicated his life to Christ! But that's actually a different story so I don't want to talk much about it right now.
Anyways, after we had prayed for Prayvion and were walking back to the church, two men approached us and asked if we were from around here. We said no and found out that they weren't either. One of the guys was definitely flirting with Erica and he invited us to a bar so they could buy us drinks. Obviously we said no but we did agree to walk with them to the bar so that we could talk more. As we walked, they asked us what we were doing down at the U of M. Erica told them straight out that we were talking to people about Jesus. That shocked them! The one man said that he believed there was some sort of higher power but that it couldn't be Jesus or any of the other religions. He argued everything we said. The other man kept fairly quiet and let us talk even though he didn't agree.
Eventually we got to a stoplight where we stopped to talk for about 10 minutes. Erica started talking to the quieter man so the other one came to talk to me. We actually had a pretty decent conversation. He asked me why I believed in Jesus and when I answered he interrupted me and said that I only believed because I was taught to and Jesus was just an invented man that was supposed to bring control to society. I said, "No! I believe in Jesus because my life used to be crap but then Jesus entered it and he transformed me. Now, even though there are still crappy circumstances in my life, I am free and I am joyful and I have hope and life. And that transformation couldn't have happened if Jesus was just some made up control method." I was pretty fired up :) He didn't respond much to that though.
We kept talking for a few minutes and Erica and I needed to leave. We started to say good bye and this guy I had just been arguing with, who had been hitting on my friend the last 15 minutes, grabbed me and pulled me into a hug and then kissed me on my cheek even though I was pushing him off. Sound familiar? This was almost identical to what I had just forgiven the Sierra Leonian man for the day before. This wasn't just some weird coincidence, it was an attack.
So I pushed the guy off and Erica grabbed me and we walked away quickly. She asked if I was ok and I thought about it and I was. I realized that this creep didn't have to affect me. I didn't have to let him make me feel dirty or violated. What he did was gross and wrong but it didn't have to get under my skin. I was ok. I was able to forgive the man in Africa so now I could forgive this guy too. But I didn't have to wait 2 years to do it. Satan's attack didn't phase me, if anything it made me stronger and more confident.
On our way back to church, Erica and I prayed about what had just happened and then once she was sure I was alright, we started praising God for how he had moved that night. We praised him for Prayvion and for encouragement and for speaking through us. By the time we made the 10 minute walk back to the church, we were both so joyful. We couldn't stop laughing and smiling and it was just spilling out of us. Man, God is so good! He is so faithful and loving. He took this mess of a situation where I was attacked and turned it into something I could praise him for. How cool is that?! So anyways, it was a great night and I serve a great God.
Amen.

In the desert

Ok, it’s been over a year since I’ve posted anything. Sorry about that. I’ve tried to post several times but I just couldn’t put into words what was going on. And I’m kind of a perfectionist so it seemed better to not write anything at all than to write something that didn’t adequately express what I wanted to say. But in just a week I’m going to be heading off to Bethany College of Missions and starting a new season of my life and it seemed necessary that I write about this past season as a way to close it off. So I’m going to try to do that. Sorry if my thoughts get scattered or if this ends up really long. I’m still in processing mode.

Since I moved home after Kairos, a year ago, I’ve been in what I would call a desert season. A season of refinement and purification. Not gonna lie, it’s been hard and painful and I haven’t particularly liked it. But it’s been good.  I can see that God has been teaching me and changing me a lot through this desert but it’s hard to write about because He’s not done yet, so I still don’t completely understand it. I’ll try anyways though.

One big thing God has been teaching me is that he can be my only source of satisfaction. This was not a clean and pretty lesson to learn. It was hard and painful and messy. In Kairos, it was easy to look to those around me for encouragement or wisdom or even attention but when I moved home, I was alone so I couldn’t do that anymore. After seeking (and failing) to find satisfaction in many other things, I was finally forced to realize that God is truly the only one who can satisfy. God showed me a ton of truth this year specifically through Psalm 103:1-4

“Praise the Lord, my soul;
all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
 Praise the Lord, my soul,
and forget not all his benefits—
 who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases,
 who redeems your life from the pit
and crowns you with love and compassion,
who satisfies your desires with good things
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.”

God also used the line that says he “crowns you with love and compassion” to speak to me in huge ways. You see, God has been doing a lot of heart work on me this year. My heart was broken and divided but he has taken it and made it new. He repaired the brokenness and painted over the cracks so it was perfect. He took my worldly “crown” which was made of junk and replaced it with a beautiful, perfect heavenly one. He called me daughter and princess and held me until I was convinced that it was true. He crowned me with love and compassion and by doing that, I was renewed with joy and strength. Now, to be honest, sometimes I don’t feel like I have this new crown and I certainly don’t feel like a princess. But I am. And whenever I doubt, he pulls me back into his embrace and reminds me of the truth. I don’t know that I’m explaining this very well but it has been a huge revelation to me this year and it is amazing!

This post is already pretty long so I’m going to stop soon. But like I said before, in just one week (!!!) I will be headed to Bethany College of Missions to get my degree in Intercultural Studies. I am super excited for this opportunity, especially because I know this is where God wants me to be. Even so, I’m still kind of nervous.  If you would pray for me, that would be much appreciated J Hopefully I’ll be able to restart this blog and keep you better updated on my life. I promise I’ll try! For now though I just want to thank you for taking the time to read this.

God bless!

Emily

Well that was weird.

Last week we did our Kansas City Outreach and it was surprisingly incredible. We had 5 days of ministry and we did things like helping set up a garage sale for a youth center, having free prayer stands at the Plaza in Kansas City, hanging out with kids and cleaning at an Urban youth ministry, having a day of prayer at a local college, and spending a night cooking and socializing with a group of down syndrome teens. I really hadn't been looking forward to KC outreach because planning it was so stressful but seriously, God blew me away with how great it was.
The first night we went to Desoto Youth where we put on a program for about 30 teens and helped them set up for the garage sale. So we got there and Sarah (the student in charge of planning this outreach) comes walking around before we start asking if anyone wants to give a testimony. For some reason I kind of wanted to but I had no idea what I would say so I didn't think I actually would. She came back a few minutes later and told me that RJ was giving a lesson on living radically for Christ. Well that was weird because God's been teaching me a lot about that lately. So, hesitantly, I volunteered to speak with less than half an hour notice.
Now just so you realize how strange this is, let me tell you about the time back in December when we practiced public speaking in Kairos. We had to go up on stage and draw a random word out of a hat and then speak on it for a minute. I got up there and drew the word bellybuttons and after maybe 15 seconds, I left the stage shaking and crying having a panic attack in front of my entire class. Spontaneous public speaking isn't exactly my cup of tea.
So when I volunteered to speak with no time to plan every word I would say, that was WEIRD! In that 30 minutes I had, I tried to plan but when I rehearsed it in my head, I could only get throught the 2nd sentence before my mind would go blank. But I stayed strangely calm.
So we started the program with some worship and then RJ gave his message and then it was my turn. So I got up there and just started speaking. It was crazy because I think my words probably came out smoother and making more sense than they do in normal life. There was no shaking and no crying. It was just good.
I talked about how I always thought that living radically meant moving to Africa or something and how I was perfectly ok with that. And then I told them how I've always thought that the time until then was kind of a waste. But I explained that right now, God is calling me home, not to Africa. And in my eyes, home is just dark. I prayed for weeks that God would change his mind about sending me home but unfortunately, he didn't and so I finally just gave in and decided to go with it. There has been so much relief since I made that decision and now, God is showing me that I can still live radically, even at home. And that doesn't mean I need to be going out evangelizing everyday or anything like that but it just means that I can live my life completely dedicated to Christ and let people see it. And I don't need to isolate myself from the culture to do that. One thing that I plan to do is be a leader in my youth group. Realistically, I probably can't make what seems to be a big difference in my youth group or church but I can pour my life into a small group of girls and make a big difference in their lives. I can live my normal everyday life drenched in prayer and scripture and disciple a few girls in the process. It doesn't seem like much but it is living radically for Christ and that is what I have been called to do. And someday, I probably will move to Africa but in the meantime, God can still use me here.
So I just spoke about what God has been showing me lately and it was good. And I think that maybe it helped some of those kids because honestly, they're in middle or high school. Even if they are eventually called to be radical in Africa, they most likely do not have that option right now. So it was cool to be able to explain how they can be radical in a normal place.
So that was the beginning of our KC outreach and it was incredible. And after all I could say was, "Well, that was weird."
God is cool sometimes :)

In the midst of chaos

So we've been back from break for a little over a month now and we are busier than ever! We're reading our 4th book, we've memorized several verses, we're doing a thorough book study on 1 Peter AND in the midst of all this, the students are in charge of planning a 5 day Kansas City outreach that will be happening in just 2 weeks! And we only get busier from here. Yikes!
With everything going on (and that list only skims the surface), I've noticed that Kairos was taking a lot of hits and we weren't looking too good. We were tired and stressed and worried and we started slacking off on essential things like prayer and worship. We were all getting frustrated at each other and there were a lot of tears. It was not a good situation. For quite a while, I thought it was just me noticing these things and that I was making a big deal out of nothing but on Tuesday, it ended up coming up in my small group time. Every person in my small group had been feeling this same thing so we decided to do something about it. So we prayed.
We normally only have an hour for small groups but on Tuesday, my group ended up sitting in a car in the parking lot and praying for almost 2 1/2 hours. We prayed for each other and for Kairos and for our families and we read scripture and it was wonderful! It was like taking a breath of fresh air after being in the slums in Sierra Leone (trust me, the air there is anything but fresh!). It was so refreshing and great! Later in the week we ended up talking to some staff about our concerns and it turned out that they had been feeling this too and so on Friday, we had a time of prayer with the whole class and it was so cool. You could just feel an atmosphere change. The heaviness of the past month was just being lifted away and the fire within us was once again lit. We were brought together as a family once again and it was so sweet. We're all still incredibly stressed and busy and the chaos isn't about to let up but it's ok because God is good and he is faithful and when our focus is on him, everything's going to work out.

Perfectly happy.

Right before we left for Honduras, some of us got together to have a night of prayer at Tony's house. There was one point in the night where I was pacing the back part of the room we were in and I had the most ridiculous smile on my face. So I started thinking about how at that moment I was so incredibly happy but not only that, I was joyful. And I loved it! As I was thinking about this, Phoebe spoke up and told us to think about where we were 3 years ago. Wow, that hit me! See, 3 years ago I was in the worst couple of months in my life. That time was really the climax of my depression. I remember how I just felt isolated and how smiling felt so unnatural. The idea of ever being happy seemed completely hopeless. But just 3 years later, here I was; in a basement in Kansas with an enormous smile on my face surrounded by people that I've grown to love as my family. I never usually think about how much I've changed these past few years because it's seemed to happen so slowly but really, 3 years is not a long time! I get so frustrated whenever I struggle with stuff nowadays but when I really think about it, all of my current struggles are miniscule compared to what they used to be. And when you look at just those two snapshots of my life you realize that I am a completely different person!
I've been thinking about this a lot lately and I realized that for the first time in my life, I am perfectly content with where I am. Perfectly happy even! See, right now, I know that I am exactly where God wants me and it is such a good feeling. Yeah, I do still struggle with stuff sometimes but my struggles are small and I know that God is always faithful to get me past them. And although being joyful still feels kind of unnatural at times and I still have to work at it, I do experience joy quite often. Joy used to be a completely unknown concept to me.
Like I said, I've been thinking about this a lot lately so I just wanted to share this because it's proof that God is good and I am excited about it!