-Just another day in Paradise.

Often when I am discouraged or feeling overwhelmed I go for a walk, sometimes I pray, other times I am just silent and breathe in the air and look. Silence, can wake up the noisy soul more then scores of sermons.  I look at the towering mountains and fields ready for planting; I see deep green grass blanketing the earth and wildflowers playfully moving with the wind. I look up at the turquoise sky tinged with the majestic crimson of the sun. God’s creation busting forth in a love song and seeming to shout tenderly “He is good, He is loving, He is real!” I encourage you today to take a walk and enjoy Gods presence. 

   

Bible Study Begins!

 Preparing the lesson beforehand.

Talking about the Sovereignty of God through Creation

 

 Since April Kim and I have been praying intentionally and planning carefully for a weekly Chronological Bible Study.

Two weeks ago, with fear and great anticipation, while constantly reminding ourselves that the study is not ours, but God’s alone, we began what will be a 35 week journey through the Bible.

Our hope is to build a firm foundation through the Bible, which will highlight God’s character, giving a clear understanding of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection.  We believe that God’s Word is powerful and will not return void.  We pray that God will use this study to transform Didinga lives for His glory.

Please join us in praying for God’s will to be carried out through this small fellowship:

• Translator - There are 3 different languages currently represented in the group – Didinga, Juba Arabic and English.  Mirium, a faithful old mama, is an Arabic only speaker.  This could present a communication problem in the future, as Kim and I do not speak Arabic.  So far, God has provided capable translators.  Please continue to pray for this provision.
• Hungry Hearts – Currently there are seven people coming to the study.  Please pray that they would be faithful in attendance, committed to learning and sharing freely both their burdens and joys and that their hearts would desire God and His Word above all else.
• Communication – Pray that Kim and I would present the Gospel in a clear and culturally relevant manner.  Pray that we would have wisdom and not be blinded by our own culture and that we would never compromise God’s Truth for own or other’s artificial comfort, but rather cling to Truth in love.
• Give Thanks – We thank God for this opportunity to share His Word with the Didinga people.  We have been greatly encouraged these past two weeks in our ministry through this study. 

God is faithful!  God is so very good!

The Sacrifice of Delight.

The Sacrifice of Delight-

I write to you my friends indeed, I hope to show you the great need, for Christ to be first

in us all, for faithful men to answer the call, to go wherever He may show, that the beloved of God might Jesus know.

I can not say that this will be painless; sometime you may feel rather aimless. You’ll hurt so deep you’ll sit in quietness, the reward is simply being refined in God’s likeness.

It will require all you posses, you find sometimes you won’t meet the required zest and when you’ve given all you are, you’ll find yourself broken, wrenched and marred. All alone and still afraid, you may fear you’ll lose your faith.

 Do not fear! It is just this child of God, be happy, be blessed. His glory is always best seen, after we lose everything.

You will find that prayer is your only hope; you lean on it with every stroke. You won’t come to God’s word for its doctrinal essence; you’ll come because you need his presence. You’ll see His peace is not a shaky up and down; it’s an anchor in a sea unsound.

 Jesus was not lying when he said a sacrifice it would be, He was not joking when he said, “Take up your cross and follow me.”  If you are thinking that purity, faith and love is a cost too great to bear, remember the cost of chasing the world is also hanging there. I’d make you see if I could; the world can bring you nothing good.

Do not lose heart, He comes to save, you his child, the one to whom all He gave.

His love is better than any other love; He will offer Himself which is more than enough.

Oh, he is good, His life divine! I rather have his, than squander mine.

Aaah my heart is full tonight, as I think of this sacrifice of delight.

Adventures in thought- A Beautiful Life.

Some girls romanticized love and marriage their whole lives; I romanized missions and Africa. I love the stories of people like Jim Elliot, who gave his life and death for the gospel or Amy Carmichael a single women who left all behind giving up everything so that she could serve with her whole heart or the Moravian believers Leonard Dober and David Nitschmann, who volunteered to go as missionaries to work amongst the slaves in the West Indies, actually selling themselves into slavery, with their famous scream “Is not the lamb who was slain worthy to receive the reward of His suffering?” These men and women did not seek to be idols they sought to be examples. I love these stories because they are brave, sold out, completely focused on God’s glory. 
The reality is, living daily like that is hard. Giving “all” is a lot, in fact, it seems to always become more and more, I’ll be honest, I’m not there yet. The more I know, the more I know I don’t know and more I see what God can do through a devoted heart the more I want to have a fully devoted heart. What made these people great was not them, it was what they believed about God, it was God’s Spirit in them. It wasn’t that they were perfect but they looked to Him who was. What we believe about God will shape are every day...Pray that I would believe God and that I would trust and follow Him. I pray the same for you. 
                                                                                                          True Christianity is a choice to believe, a choice to be all in, a choice to follow no matter what the cost, no matter what the repercussions, no matter how small or large the sacrifice may seem, no matter many times we fail, repent, come back and follow. We are only on this earth for a while, this is not our home, this is not our inheritance, this is an opportunity… an opportunity to see God's glory, an opportunity to suffer, an opportunity to be part of something glorious, rise up, choose to believe, choose to obey, choose to follow…For our King and His glory. 

A Cry for Help...A Cry for Prayer.

Now, that’s just sick!

A lot of you have expressed some concern about me being sick a lot. I want you to know I believe God has used me “Getting sick a lot” to teach me a lot about him. I also want you to all know that I am doing well now. It comes and goes and it’s part of life here. I am actually thankful that God has allowed me to be sick…It has taught be to be thankful for being healthy also it is a small price to pay to be where I believe God wants me to me. I pay it gladly…Pray though, that I would be effective in ministry and that I would honor God in what I think, feel, say and how I act and Pray that the Didinga people would come to believe in Jesus Christ that they would hunger and thirst and seek after God.

Sunday School.

Sunday school has been a blast, If I could do anything in the world forever, it might just be teaching Sunday School. We have been going through the Bible and just finished Noah. My co-teacher is Merafu who translates as well as teaches himself. Merafu has been probably one of the biggest blessings to me in Didinga. He has been a direct answer to prayer for a translator, and a good friend. Pray for Merafu that he would know and love God and rise up to be a Didinga leader who is faithful and who has a heart devoted to God.

Bible study      Merafu and I get together once a week and go over the Sunday school lesson. This has become like a small Bible study, we pray together then I’ll read the Bible in English and he will translate in Didinga.  Then we’ll talk about the story and our favorite parts. Every week God is opening new things in His word to me and well as learning about the Didinga culture. Merafu also loves these times and is so excited to go through the Bible chronologically, every week he comes with questions (hard ones too!) he has talked to me about expanding the group and starting a Bible study, Unbeknownst to him that is exactly what God had been placing on my heart as well as Kim's and we ask you to pray with us as we take steps to do just that.

-A bit of reflection

School- The thought of teaching was intimidating to me…I have never thrived academically but my worries were quickly put to rest when I realized I didn’t need to teach calculus, and I actually love teaching. I love my students and seeing them was the highlight of each day. I feel like this first semester was more learning then anything, learning to communicate in a different language, learning names, leaning tactics of teaching, learning how to handle a classroom of differing ages of kids. It was a fun and I loved it.  I am excited for next term.

7 days Journey

 I am here in the middle of a big city sitting alone in a small guest house the past few days have been full of reflection. What I am wanting to do in this next seven days is to take you along with me in this reflection of the past 7 months in Africa. I am praying that God would open my eyes in the next week and prepare me for going back to Nagishot. I am praying that this will encourage you, give you a better idea of how to pray for me and update you on what I see God doing in Nagishot. I warn you, I am going to be boldly honest, my blog shall be my journal, it could get ugly but I trust you and more importantly I think this is what God wants me to do, so here we go.