Obedience

I've had to make some vital decisions about my future the last few days... About what my next step will be and what God's will is in the matter.

So naturally I've been thinking about obedience.

I had several different options presented to me, and each of them were good. Each of them fit into God's will for us as Christians. Each of them were a good choice.

But that left me with the question: Lord, which is the one you would have me do?

The hard part of it, was that one of these choices was one I wanted to do a bit more than the other two. But I knew that I wanted to do God's will above my own.

I have learned in my short life, that listening to what dad tells us is so important, because he has plans for our lives that are more amazing than what we can dream up for ourselves. (NOTICE: I didn't say the SAFEST place is in the will of God, but the BEST. Look at John the baptist, he was in the will of God and he was martyred. Look at peter, same thing happened to him. But, their lives were lived the way the father had planned for them to be lived)

As I opened up to those close to me about my decision, alot of people wanted to remind me that it's ok that I was laying down something I wanted, because God would bless me for that.

I feel like as Christians we often think that if we obey God, he will reward us with something "better" or simply just reward us for our obedience.

I understand completely where this comes from, we know that our father in heaven loves us.
But something was going on inside of me today that I really want to share with you.

I do not obey God because I know that I will be blessed for doing so. Or that if I give something to him he will give it back... I obey my father because I love him.

Sometimes when we obey God, he shuts the mouths of the lions. But, sometimes... obedience means we face the darkest night of our lives, and wake in eternity. We obey because we love him, not to get something in return. We give all we have to him without our hands outstretched in waiting for him to give it all back in greater measure.


I don't know where it is coming from, but somewhere in my heart I feel something churning, flaming and consuming me. A call to give him all of me, all of my desires, all of my dreams, without holding on to the thought that he will "bless" me in return. I obey for the sake of obedience.


There was a man that came through here a few months ago, and we sat and had coffee and talked about God and his will to heal the sick. I believe it is God's will that all are healed, I know that people's experiences beg to differ... But, that's a whole other topic that I won't get into.

But this man was a paramedic, and he got a call one day to an elderly woman's home. When he entered he found a woman that was clearly dying. She had gauze on her chest, and as he started assessing her, discovered the story behind what was going on. This woman was dying of cancer, and it was the worst thing he'd ever seen. When he lifted the gauze he could see where it had surfaced, he went into detail of the gruesome thing before him, and asked the woman why in the world she didn't get this taken care of. She answered him saying that God was going to heal her. The guy I was talking to clearly thought I was as insane as the woman dying of cancer on her living room floor, waiting for God to show up.
He said, "why would someone be so foolish?"

I am probably going to get so much flack for what I'm about to say, but I hope you catch the heart behind this...

I sat in my chair holding my cup of coffee, and I looked at this man and said to him, "why not? This world is full of people without hope, without passion, without a sense of something bigger than them. I would rather be like that woman, and die with my beliefs, passion, and uncompromising trust and faith than abandon them in fear"


Needless to say, we didn't really ever come to an agreement. But something in me changed that day... Something barbaric rose up in me. Passion took place of logic, faith took place of fear, purpose took place of comfort.  I realized that no matter how my life turns out, I want to be marked by passion, faith, obedience, and reckless abandon to my father in heaven.

That woman died with something that those who live often never have. Though it looks like foolishness to this world.


God has asked me to do alot of things in my life that often did not make sense to those around me. I have given up many desires to follow him in obedience. I have seen some fruit from that, and some of it I still wait to see.

I think Jesus really meant it when he said if we want to be his disciple, we must deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow. I think he meant it when he said that if we want to gain our life we must lose it.


But, I also believe he is loving. And I think that he asks us those things because he IS loving. Something starts to happen to you when this thing is awakened. You realize that those things you desired or wanted don't compare to the purpose you feel, to the passion and love that is awakened for the Lord. I think humans are at their best when they give, not receive.  And love is the most beautiful when there is sacrifice, (look at Jesus).


And so I walk forward in peace, knowing that I am obeying my father. And that even if I am made a fool for it, even when those around me think I have been abandoned by him, or forgotten by him, even if on this earth I never have the thing my heart desires most.... That I am walking in a deeper form of love than ever before, a love that doesn't seek it's own.

I think what he really came to save us from was meaninglessness. 

Beauty out of the ashes

Can you see it? The beauty that is pouring out of this broken brick home?

Nobody has lived in this house in Hong Kong in over fifty years. It sits with trash piled around the base, and crumbled brick.

Yet life has found its way to grow from that heap of mess to create something that captivated me and drew my attention far more than the houses around it that were in perfect order.


I think that is why God chooses to use the weak and the broken to accomplish great things in the kingdom. It takes our eyes off of the house, and we focus more on the life that is bursting out from inside, which is like him coming out of a person who the world sees as unfit.

God uses the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, he uses the people that surprise us. He likes  the glory, and when we aren't able to do it in our own strength, he gets all the glory, which he deserves.


Thank you for using me daddy!

Revealing the way

Many young girls have come through this base in the time I've been here. And each time their mothers have come to me and thanked me for investing into them and being a role model. 

Mia is one of those little girls. 

We built a house together along with her team. A simple act of kindness toward her earned her affections for the rest of the week. She walked around the work site calling me "Boss" and making all the other kids listen to me and get things done. 

In a world where young girls and boys are being show by media what it is to be a man or a woman, it 

is more crucial than ever that we as Christians are good role models and take time to invest into the younger ones around us. To show them they are important, to talk to them about God and his love for them. To walk the way that Christ walked and show them their value as a child of God. 

Love looks like something. It isn't just words we speak, it is in actions we take. Most children in this world today have terrible family situations, and as they get older they will find another way to fill the void they have been left with. We are called to protect them, to nurture them, and to show them that God has a plan for their lives.

Thank you for partnering with me so that I can walk like Christ in the lives of these children. 

Vapor

I took this photo in Harbin, China. Old gentleman like this man here would take water and paint Chinese characters on the ground with a small stick and a rag wrapped around the top.


I remember wondering why in the world they would take all that time to write out such beautiful characters that would evaporate within five minutes. I couldn't understand why anyone would waste such precious time doing something so temporary.


The more time has passed by, the more I look back to that and understand the reason why.
Everything in this life is so temporary, everything evaporates so quickly, but we are children of God, and were created like him, and he does the same thing all the time! Creates beautiful things that so quickly fade away.

I have been so moved by sunsets here in Mexico while overlooking the ocean... Colors like I have never seen as the sun dips behind the ocean line, lighting up the sky with reds, oranges, purples, and yellows that take the breath out of you. And yet it only lasts for a few short minutes, and if you aren't watching it and taking time to stop and enjoy it, you will miss it.


I think about so many things in this life that are so temporary. I think about the lives of the my three friends that have gone home to be with the Father. None of which reached their 27th birthday....
But, I wouldn't dream of saying that their lives weren't worth it.

I think about the friendships that I have made in the years I have traveled. People that I have connected with so deeply, and have had to part with. But, I wouldn't dream of saying those relationships weren't worth it.

There are so many things in this life that come and go. So many things that sometimes we think the energy isn't worth putting in for what we will get out of it.
But as I look at this man drawing these characters, I remember the way that it made me feel when I walked past him on the street. How each stroke he made was perfect and how he took the time to make each one perfectly concise.


This work of art dried up in five minutes, but for those five minutes that man stopped people in their tracks to admire something out of the ordinary. To let themselves feel the spirit inside of them come alive for just a few moments to the beauty of life.

I think we were made to spark, explode, and flame out, leaving people breathless.


I pray that my life is like these characters drawn on the cold cement in that small town of China. I pray that as I move with his spirit and follow him wherever he asks me to go, that I become a beautiful piece of art for my saviour. I pray that it takes God's breath away as I spill my life out in offering to make something beautiful for him.

It is who we are.

This is Louie. He belongs to a missionary family here from New Zealand. On this wonderful night I had the amazing opportunity to babysit them and let their mom and dad go out for much needed alone time. This may not seem like the kind of story you would expect on here, but that's exactly why I'm writing about it. As Christians we have one commandment. Love God and love others. Do to others as we would want them to do to us.

Ministry is not just about those on the streets, but those in our very own family, our own brothers and sisters in Christ. We are called to love.


On this night, I got to love three precious boys and make amazing memories they won't soon forget. Bondfires, smores, climbing trees, treasure hunts, jumprope... And I got to serve my brother and sister in Christ.



Love is all that matters, and as we grow in our relationship with Father God we should begin to become love to everyone around us.


God is love.

Home of Hope

 Anjelica was one of the funniest little girls I have ever met. I was able to build her house along with a group of youth from Washington. She helped us build, she played with us, and she made us laugh.
I still can't forget the look on her face as we took her family through the grocery store and spent hundreds and hundres of dollars on food for them. Whatever she wanted to put in the basket, she could.
I love being part of the kingdom and showing daddy's love for us to others.

Coral

This is Coral

We spent the day walking around the gardens in Chengdu, talking about God and his love for us.
She was one of the sweetest spirits I'd ever met. It was such a blessing to spend six months with her every day and seeing her grow in her relatioship with God.

Rosarito slum

These are two of fourteen children that I was able to give haircuts and hygeine products to. 

They live in one of the poorest ares here where I live. I was shocked to see that their houses consisted of a couple of boards slapped together and old rags draped across for a door. On this day they experienced the love of our father in heaven through me and my friend Dolores. 

Precious, aren't they?

A new thing

I want to try something new for you guys. I have all these pictures and so many stories that I have not been able to tell you guys about the amazing things that God has done as I've been a missionary.
The lives that have been radically changed and touched by our father.

So I am going to put a picture a day up, and tell you the story behind it.

I hope you enjoy it!


#1

It was negative fifty degrees outside on a Sunday night in Harbin, China. These Chinese students huddled in the living room to hear about a man called Jesus for the first time in their lives.
I was young and inexperienced as a missionary. But the gospel's power proved true in spite of me.
One by one they heard that their father in heaven loves them and wanted to know them.
One by one they were changed forever.

Radical obedience brings radical fruit.

Identity

God has been speaking up a storm to me today, perhaps cause I took all day to listen. It's rare in our lives when we have an entire day, without interruption, to just talk to God and get things straight.

I had a lot of questions for him today, and I went on and on and on at him, when he finally gently spoke to my heart something so full of truth and revelation.

My questions at him were full of "Am I doing this right" "should I do this" "how can I be more, do more, produce more" "Am I giving enough" "am I walking toward the right things"

And his gentle answer to me was simply, "You are still trying to earn my love and acceptance."

This was so hard for me to hear, cause I have gone over this topic so many times, and thought that I killed every last bit of my ulterior motive for ministry, healing the sick and preaching the gospel.

I thought that I had truly understood who I am as a daughter, and my acceptance regardless of my performance.

But there it was, plain as day. I was trying to get closer to him by producing what Jesus produced, instead of producing what Jesus produced because I AM close to him.  Do you see?

I have definitely come such a long way in this area, and I can say that the majority of what drives me is passion that comes from my own personal breakthrough with Father God. (Which is what is always should be!)  but, I could see where my father was telling me that I still need my mindset and heart changed in that area.

I often have felt that if I am not in the poorest of the poorest places, or with the worst of sinners telling them about God, or in the most dangerous places, that I am not doing all that I can do in the kingdom.

Dad showed me how this is just not true. We are the Kingdom, and wherever we go, there our father wants to bust out of us and touch the people around us. No matter who they are!! Fellow missionaries, family members, friends, co-workers.... They are all just as much in need of a touch from our father! And you just happen to be his hands and feet!

I watch alot of these Todd White videos, where he goes out on the streets all day long and heals people. That kind of stuff really pumps me up... I'm built for that kind of thing. Intensity...

Watching those videos is good for me cause it shows me how much more there is in the kingdom, but at the same time I start to compare myself and what I'm doing with these people... And start to tell myself that I'm not DOING enough.

So as I am walking around talking to God this afternoon, I start talking to him about how much more I wish I was doing for him. And I felt like he asked me "why?"

And I had to really think what it was that made me feel this way. So I walked and I thought... And I realized that deep inside of me I feel there is an expectation of me to produce.

 From God and from people.

AND THAT is the problem. When you do what you do out of a feeling of obligation, or a need to perform, you are not doing it out of LOVE.

Everything you do, you do out of a feeling of needing to do more. Produce, produce, produce! And then passion is lost.

So as I was understanding what my father was telling me, and realigning my heart to his... He did something fantastic.

He began to show me all the people that I have spoken with and brought the kingdom to in the last couple months. Not as a result of a mindset to produce, but out of the multiplication of my heart's passion for my father. I began to realize how many people that have come through this base that I have been able to share the truth of the kingdom, and the fathers love for them, and really just open their eyes to a deeper relationship with God. Some of them he reminded me that actually told me how much I had touched them, and some of them he showed me that I didn't even know I might have touched.

And all of it a result of my relationship with him. Stemming from a passion I can't keep quiet about what he has taught me and is teaching and revealing to me.

And suddenly I realized that the kingdom is in me and gets out onto other people whether I'm aware of it or not! I am the daughter of the creator of the universe, and his truth lives in me, so WHEREVER I walk and WHATEVER I am doing, he's getting out onto those around me. It cannot be helped!

When we realize who we are, a beloved son or daughter of God, and we realize that we are already accepted by him and he is already pleased with us because of Jesus Christ. That is doesn't have to be earned at all (or we would cancel the very nature of Grace) we can see that we do not have to strive any longer. Our daddy loves us! We are to simply come to him and nurture that relationship. No matter how much ministry you do, no matter how many people you evangelise, no matter how many miracles you perform... None of it helps you get closer to you father in heaven. There is only one way to get closer to him... Spending time with him! In conversation, in the word, in worship.... It is the foundations of our walk. Everything we do outside of that simply stems from that relationship, because as we get to know our father more, we begin to become more like him. When we are like him, the things we do we do because it is who we are. We become love.

It cannot be faked. If we are not spending time getting to know our father in prayer/conversation, reading his word, worship, etc... Even the things like Miracles in his name, evangelism, and works can become just another way that we perform or try to earn his love or worse! The love of those we minister to.

All those things are so beautiful, the gospel, works of righteousness, and the promise we have to heal the sick and raise the dead in Jesus name... But, they can NEVER replace the relationship and intimacy we should have with our father.

The scripture says in Mathew 7:22

Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? And in thy name have cast our devils? And in thy name done many wonderful works? And I will say to them, I never knew you. Depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

I never knew you...

I just encourage you, the power to change the world, the power to change our lives is in a relationship with God.

It sounds so cliche because we have heard it so many times in our lives, I feel that it has lost it's impact. SO I will rephrase it a little:

The power to change your life, and the lives of every person in this world lies in the time that you spend alone with God talking to him, listening for his response, reading his word, and praising him.  And it needs to be done DAILY... for more than a couple minutes.

If you want to get to know your Boyfriend/Girlfriend or spouse, you don't spend once a week talking to them for an hour, or reading an email from them once or twice a week... Relationship is daily and takes time. The more time I spend doing those things, the more I have actually grown in my ability to hear and to FEEL God. My reward for seeking him has been great, and I wouldnt' trade it.

The more time we put into that intimacy with God and not neglect it, the more the kingdom is unleashed in our lives and able to touch those around us.

This is not to boast about myself, but to boast in JESUS when I say this, but I have seen so much fruit of this deepening in my relationship with God in this last six months.

I have gone to the prison here and the streets, and simply touched people to begin to pray for them (never having met them and without preaching at them at all) and they have wept and experienced the holy spirit for the first time. I have seen the girls in the prison completely changed by the holy spirit showing up.

None of it was because I said something that gave them some great revelation. I didn't say a thing! But, I have spent time in the presence of my father, and when I touch them, that presence flows out.

Jesus himself spent tons of time alone with God in that secret place. It was in that place that he soaked up from God and from that place he poured into us.

I encourage us all to stop making excuses for not spending at least an hour in God's presence daily, and begin to see what God can do as we draw near to him. As we truly know him and he begins to change us and make us look more like him.

This is for all of us. 

Regret

I have written about this before... But each day that goes by,  I understand it on a deeper level.

I was talking to a friend about regret yesterday. I think we all know that feeling well. There are things we wish we would have done differently in our lives... Things we wish we could take back, or things we wish we would have done.

I learned this lesson the hard way a long time ago, when I pulled my lifeless friend out of the Ocean in Mexico, and realized that he would not be coming back. And then 11 months after that, lost two more friends in a shooting, one of which I had a nasty fight with that I had never made right.

Every day is a gift, every day is new chance to say the things we should say, do the things we should do, be the person we want to be. And the thing alot of us don't get, is that we really only have this day to do it.

One day we will wake up, and it will be our last day. Our last day to tell those around us how much we care. The last day to do the things we know we should or we want to do. The last day to make things right that are wrong. The last day to be the person we want to be.

This life really is a race. Some of us will be in this race longer than others, but we will ALL come to the end of it at some point, and have to deal with how we ran it.


I realized something yesterday, that each day is not just a day to try to live without regret, but also a beautiful gift to rectify regrets we already have. We DON'T have to settle with past regrets, we MIGHT just have time to make past mistakes right.


I encourage you today... Just go for it.

 Make things right.

IF you still can change something you regret, DO IT.

BE the person you want to be.


Today is all we ever have.