Have you ever been in a place of perfect peace?

That's where God has kept me these past two weeks...it's so interesting, because my whole walk with Him has consisted of me learning to trust Him more and more. And right when I think I've learned the lesson, something else comes up that I have to trust Him with--such as my family in Haiti who I worried over so much last year.

But now...now is a time of trust. God is so good! I trust He knows what He is doing in Haiti and He is still saving people from rubble (like those two little kids and the 24 year old man, the kids were buried for eight days and the man for eleven). It's just crazy! Much has brought pain in Haiti in the last few weeks...but Jesus is at work in this nation. So good! I keep praying that He would be brought glory through this time--and I feel as though He told me that Haiti would have NEW BIRTH in the future--and I'm so excited to be a part of that, whatever it may be.

I definitely know I'm headed for Haiti in the future...my life is tied up with theirs in a way I cannot put into words. I was talking with my friend Susan and she said that sometimes supernatural connections occur like that--and I totally believe that. God has tied me to that country (I have tried to let it go and offered it to God to take away...but they are always on my heart. I love them and I believe it comes from God) and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Oh God, your unfailing love...

Praying on Friday night with my friend Bre and a high school friend named Sierra, I read this Psalm, which had been so important for me in the days before my team went to haiti. I'm going to type it up here. May it bring you hope, whatever you may be facing in your life.

"Sing joyfully to the Lord, you righteous;

it is fitting for the upright to praise him.

Praise the Lord with the harp;

make music to him on the ten-stringed lyre.

Sing to him a new song; play skillfully, and shout for joy!

"For the word of the Lord is right and true;

he is faithful in all he does.

The Lord loves righteousness and justice;

the earth is full of his unfailing love.

"By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,

their starry host by the breathe of his mouth.

He gathers the waters of the sea into jars;

he puts the deep into storehouses.

Let all the earth fear the Lord;

let all the people of the world revere him.

For he spoke and it came to be;

he commanded and it stood firm.

"The Lord foils the plans of the nations;

he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.

But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever,

the purposes of his heart through all generations.

"Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,

the people he chose for his inheritance.

From heaven the Lord looks down and sees all humankind;

from his dwelling place he watches all who live on earth--

he who forms the hearts of all;

who considers everything they do.

"No king is saved by the size of his army;

no warrior escapes by his great strength.

A horse is a vain hope of deliverance;

despite all it's great strength it cannot save.

But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him,

on those who hope in his unfailing love,

to deliver them from death and keep them alive in famine.

"We wait in hope for the Lord;

he is our help and our shield.

In him our hearts rejoice,

for we trust in his holy name.

May your unfailing love be with us, Lord,

even as we put our hope in you."

May Haiti be that blessed nation that belongs to Jesus. He is rescuing His people, all who call out to Him. Pray that all the money which is being directed that way goes into programs which help the majority of the people and not into corrupt politicians pockets. May our God reign in that nation, and may Haiti be a nation that loves the Lord. He will be their help and their shield.

My Family in Haiti

School's running full tilt and I'm planning to pray every night at nine 'o' clock in our prayer chapel on my university's campus. One friend has joined me so far and I hope for more. You can begin to feel terribly alone...

Haiti, everything that goes on in Haiti, always hits me hard. I looked at the pictures the Los Angeles Times has up on its webpage and...it's crazy. It's so real, but I just don't get it...lots of people are going to die and it's just numbers, but these were people, beautiful people.

The family I have there lived in the mountains above Port au Prince, near the Dominican Republic border (the most beautiful spot in the world that you have to go over crazy roads to get to, squashed into a car...I love it!! except for the legs going numb part) They should be okay, but I'm sure they make frequent trips into Port au Prince...they could have been there when the quake hit. In any case, I wonder what they're thinking and feeling, what they know so far about what happened in the city below them.

I just don't know.

I think that's what almost killed me this time last year was the not knowing. I had hideous pictures going through my mind of...it was grisly. God gave me a picture of hope though and I choose to focus on that, on children with bright smiles and healthy faces in beautifully colored clothes. The orphanage...

Someday, I'll live in Haiti. A literacy program will be up and running for them and there will be an orphanage called "In His Name" (whatever that looks like in Creole). It may be far off, but I'm working towards God's dream. I have His hope and I have His son living in me. It's beautiful and I can't wait, but I don't mind waiting on the Lord in this time. His ways are perfect and so is His timing. I know that full well. In the meantime, I pray and learn and He prepares my heart. What a glorious God!

Hey...

I'm tired. School started again and Haiti is currently in a state of chaos...crying wears you out, especially when you do it all day. :)

But it's good...thinking of myself (as always, I'm a selfish human being) and God restored me to a much better place spiritually as it came to our relationship the day before this tragedy...if I hadn't had that right relationship, everything in place, with Him I'm not sure how I would have reacted. Thank God for restoring His children to Himself and giving of Himself to us, even when we're unfaithful with what we've been given.

The book which helped a lot in that restorative process was Rob Bell's book "Drops Like Stars". Read it, if you can. You don't even have to buy it, you could read it in approximately two hours in a bookstore if you have the time. It's beautiful, it makes you think and it was very timely for me.

I love how God does that work in our lives, moves just when we need Him.

I have faith in a good God...even when it sometimes does seem as though the world is ending.

Keep praying for Haiti. Relief is coming, but they need miracles to get that aid form the airport into the city. They need people willing to dig other people out of the rubble. They need peace and love, God's presence. The whole city has been leveled basically by this earthquake, including all government offices. Nothing is functioning.

They need a lot of help. They need miracles. Pray for miracles.

He's good. Good will come even through this. Look for the beauty.

I love Haiti

How do you scream when you have no voice left
How do you sing when the song is only in your head
How do you cry when you feel no one will hear
How do you love in a world full of fear

This life
It gets so desperate
We're crying out for you
There's no else to hold onto
This life
It's so fragile
If you leave us Lord we'll die

But you came
And you brought us
New Life
Something we had never thought of
New Life
So let the rain come
Let it pour over me
I'm gonna be fine
Because Jesus is with me

And rains may come
And storms abound
They flood the earth
But I'm always found

Still alive (Seeking you)
Still alive (Seeking you)
Still alive (Seeking you)
May I be always found
Seeking you

Haiti was hit by an earthquake today. Please pray for them. I'm in shock...going to go to the prayer room at my school...I need Jesus. May good come...

Calling to a Generation

Think on this: "And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. Whoever says, 'I know him' but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may be sure that we are in him: whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked." 1 John 2:3-6

Wow...will you just allow yourself to think on this for five minutes? That's what I'm going to do, just pause and stare at these words for five minutes...and write what I'm thinking--will you do the same?

Comments: okay, first off, what does it really mean to be a Christian? Because if we're figuring out who is a Christian and who is not and we use this verse...we cut a lot of people who attended church out of the picture...
Makes you think: am even I truly a Christian? Do I walk as He walks? Do I know His words well enough, are they deep enough in me, that I follow them throughout my life and find that His love is being perfected in me? For the most part...okay, completely!! I do not measure up! I can think of times when God's words (Scripture) are so a part of me because I'm studying that they are always going through my brain and when I take action I am aware of doing things differently than most because it is right (such as lending a friend a camera worth $1000 for the summer because I am aware that everything I have has been given to me as a gift of God and therefore should be shared freely and not hoarded..and a lot of other times, when I've done or been able to do things I never would have, except that God was moving in my life). Can I honestly say I miss that? I mean, this is the first time in days that I've opened my Bible. I hate that. But so many things grab for our attention, especially in this digital age. I mean, you can spend all day on the internet, so easily...and then that day is gone. Let me analyze what I did today, to my shame and heartbreak: watched an old 1950's sitcom on youtube.com, went on facebook three times, read a couple chapters in a book (after waking up around 9:30 am), made tea, moved a bathtub, walked about 2.5 miles with my siblings and got the mail, read a whole Reader's Digest...you get it, right?

It's not that I was wasting time or that any of those things are evil. I interacted with family, had a good day...but no time for God. No time for me to be alone for five minutes and reflect and let thoughts drop in my head (I'm not even reflecting now, I'm still yammering) The point is, I think we far too easily get caught up in what's going on in our petty, mostly meaningless lives and miss out on the work that God is doing. There are people who wake up everyday to God and say, "I'm yours, use me as you want to. I'm here to serve." I feel as though I am calling to a generation, "RECLAIM YOUR LIVES!" We are such slaves to technology...I know there are people who never leave their computer. Please, live! Make relationships, ones where you really speak with people and let them know what is going on in your heart, relationships where you can look each other in the face and learn to understand one another and be there for one another in the rough times. I feel that's what our generation needs more than anything, that face to face interaction, learning to relate to one another again. Because as long as we're all safe behind our computer screens, we can pretend other people don't exist. We can treat others like dirt and forget love and...do you see where we are going? It's a wide, long dusty path...Come off of it, find the rivers of life and be one with Jesus, abiding in Him. I am preaching to myself here, I feel addicted to being able to stay on the internet all day, I need a change in my own life, a time when I just pause and focus on some of Jesus' words...

Take the time with me, will you? We can't change the world, I know...only the Jesus living in us can do that. Ask Him to be a major part of your life. I'm asking Him...and I know He answers.

I called
You answered
And I'll keep going where You send me
Cause I
Want to be where You are

My whole life I place in Your hands
God of mercy
Humbled I fall down
In Your Presence
At Your throne

In my life
Be lifted high
In my world
Be lifted high
In my love
Be lifted high

-song lyrics slightly altered by me

Dance with Him. Dance for Him. Sing His praise. He's worthy, He's worthy. Remember the cross and cling to the One who thought YOU valuable enough to die for.

I want to learn to walk as He did. Will you join me?

Let Your love become us, Lord.

Our Long Walk

Hope stirs...

It's been a long winter break...they usually are, but this one is especially. My feet were chilled continuously last night, I kept waking up to frozen toes.

Then morning comes (and I sleep in) while the sun rises and beauty abounds (Question: is it still beautiful somewhere even if no one ever sees it? hehe) I woke up and decided to climb a mountain, one I'd been on before a little earlier this break...but I never got to the end of the trail. Today I was going to walk on that path until it ended.

I read "The Long Walk" by Stephen King last night. 100 boys had to march at a certain pace until they all "bought their ticket" (i.e. violated the rules in some way--being too slow, falling down from exhaustion--and were sot by the soldiers traveling alongside them). The only boy sparred was the winner...and by the end, it didn't matter that he'd won. Apparently, this walk was the national pastime of the country and people had bets on who would be the winner. The winner also got whatever he wanted for the rest of his life...that's mainly what drew the boys in...
Brutal book.

Anyway, reading this and reading about "the Crowd"...this crazed entity that was watching these boys march to their death and loving it...I was aware of the stark contrast between the reality of the boys on that long walk and how the way Christians live. See, we're all on a walk in our lives, we're all dying as we go along (as one boy said to the main character "we've been dying all along") it's just that the walk in the book was much more simplified and put into a smaller frame of time...but we are all on this walk, dying as we go. Some die quickly, maybe before life has even started for them and it seems unfair...others are still in the race, but they've been so mowed down by all the difficulties that have come their way that they are no longer truly living or responsive to life around them, they're just still moving forward, who knows why?...others have a long walk, filled with all that life should be filled with, but then it all ends badly...

These boys had terror as the reality of their walk...friends shot down mercilessly...I think many people live this reality. Life just keeps getting worse, until you just have to go numb to all the pain and stop feeling disappointed or you'll explode (several of the boys in the book explode in this way--attacking the soldiers who escorted them, or, in some cases, pleading with the soldiers for mercy). We've resigned ourselves in order to survive. We believe the world is a dark and terrible place where senseless things happen and...what more is there to say?

When this worldview is contrasted with the Christian worldview...we Christians simply look naive!! It seems as though Christians wander through life with their head in the clouds, smiles plastered on our faces as we offer shallow bandages ("it'll be alright, sweetie, God's in control" and "it may look terrible, but God has a purpose for this too!") to those who are experiencing the ravages of war (life can be war, right?) We seem clueless...

...and maybe some of us are...maybe we're stupid and we don't realize what's going on in the world, the enormity of children dying all around because they are unable to have food in their bellies...curse us, if you will. Many of us are clueless. I was.

But then there are nights like tonight when you see beauty in the sky (hence the picture in this blog) and you realize that despite death and destruction all around, life has its moments of joy.

But back to the Christians...

I went on my own long walk today, up the mountain. I kept thinking on that book...I tried to walk fast, like they had to, without stopping...up mountains and along roads where people were driving by like every day...and I finished what I started. I found the end of that trail and even made it home.

You know why we Christians see it differently--it's because our walk is different. The "Crowd" surrounding us is not malicious...it's a crowd of those who have already made it through this race and are now cheering us on. "Fight the good fight!" "Keep going, you can make it!" Christians know that this life is not easy, but we know many have already made it and we can make it too. We have someone fighting on our behalf, someone who knows us more intimately than any other ever could and who has already gone before us. He knows how our lives can be used in the best way possible and we follow Him, even though the path may lead through despair and heartbreak and us having to give more of ourselves than we ever thought possible. We remember that He asked us to pick up our cross and follow Him and so we do it gladly...because He did it first for us.

Maybe that's why we can keep going and even have a smile on our face as we go. We even have songs of praise on our lips, because we know how very much our God loves us (His Son proved this on the cross) and we are thankful.

So we look stupid and some make fun of us...but we are still walking and praising our God as we go. He is in control of what goes on in our lives...we have placed our trust in Him and He is good.
He will lead us home in the end.

O, Christians are a strange lot. Live through us, Jesus!

Remembrance

" 'But why do you call Me "Lord, Lord," and do not do the things which I say? Whoever comes to me, and hears my sayings and and does them, I will show you whom he is like: 'He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house, and could not shake it, for it was founded on the rock. But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation, against which the storm beat vehemently; and immeadiately it fell. And the ruin of that house was great.' " Luke 6:46-49

It's funny how my life is converging around this verse right now...after I wrote the last blog I went out onto our deck with my dad's Bible and opened to these words (well, I opened to Song of Solomon first...). Do you remember the song you sang in Sunday school about this? "the foolish man built his house upon the sand/ the foolish man built his house upon the sand...the wise man built his house upon the rock...the floods came up and the rains came down/ but the house on the rock stood firm" I do...but I don't recall them ever telling me they were talking about the sayings of Jesus and how if we follow them with our lives, we will have a firm foundation! Ohhh!!! I get it!

This is so important for this time in my life too...in all our lives. We live in a post-modern world, where people pick and choose what they want to believe and we find places of worship that will serve us the general gist of what we already believe--whether we're Muslims, fundamentalist Christians, Catholics, Baha'i...we find a place where other people congregate who believe the same things we do. Even atheists do this! But here Jesus is shown as a man who is not concerned with where you worship Him--this is not about that. Rather, have you heard what He said? Are you following what He said? Now it has nothing to do with your church and what they believe...this is about you. Have you laid a firm foundation for yourself?

I know I haven't...this world continually suprises me and knocks me flat. I am so tossed by trying to figure out how to live, why to believe anything...it all gets so dense and complicated and I don't have answers...no wonder I have buried myslef in enetertainment...I don't know how to deal! But here Jesus offers a solution--a place to rest my weary head. He says, "Follow my teachings, do what I say and your foundation cannot be shaken." He is firm footing...

And another thing addressed here: do something!!!! A sermon I listened to recently said the same thing (but it was talking about the story which involves a master who went on a trip and put his servants in charge of different amounts of money). The story ends with the master coming home and the servants show him what they've done with the money. The first two increased what the master gave to them, but the last...buried the money in the ground. He was the one who was rebuked...because he had done nothing with what he had been given!!! It's a stroy for us--what have we done with what we have been entrusted with? The worst thing of all is to do nothing...

It's about potential...we all have some measure of good we can bring to the world. It's been placed within us. Christ created us to do good works, bringing glory to our Father in heaven. But so often, we hoard. We're so afraid: what if I fail? What if I do the wrong thing? What if no one notices? But we must give an account...so we cannot just let the beautiful gifts slip through our fingers. God created beautiful people when he created me and you. We were meant to love without reservation, to give as much as we can to others, to bring joy...Maybe we've lost that as time has gone on and we have lived in this world and seen it's tortures and faced questions without answers...but let that go. Find freedom. Find again who you were created to be. If you have become bitter or negative or so filled with a weariness that you feel you can't move forward...take it to Jesus. Seriously cry out and He will hear. He is no magician...but He is connected to our Father...and He is good. He will hear from heaven and come to your aid...maybe in ways you don't expect and maybe it will take more time than you think it should, but He will come. Trust me. I trust Him.

I forgot what I was going to write about...hmmm...today I watched my very first Bollywood film! That was fun...I didn't spend any good time reading my Bible though...I keep neglecting that. Oh why! It's the most important time of my day--remembering who I am in Christ, reading His promises and receiving His love--and I neglect it! I'm only hurting myself--and the relationship I have with God...

Makes everything dreary too, not having that time. I just have wasted my days of vacation. To show: I visited relatives, ate sugar, read half a dozen books and did a little laundry. Undone: studying Hebrew (hello!! what are you doing, Robin?), having good conversations, visiting friends, running.

Oh my...oh wait! I did one other thing!

I made a blog :)

lots of blogs

Wow...well I just spent a lot of time looking through blogs...never realized how many there are!!! lol...if mine gets read, it'll be God's doing :) I'm going to go do something productive with my life now...

the beginning

Hmm...a place for thoughts...that's what I wanted...and not just to keep them for myself, but to share. That's how I want to live life--not trying to hoard it all as close as possible like I see so many people doing--but living free. Lending things to those who need it, being a true friend and giving all I can to see that others are safe and able to follow their dreams...

I guess most would call me an idealist, but I've also been knocked down more than I now...not physically, but seeing people dear to me in situations and not knowing how to move...what can I do? They are so far from me and yet I ache for them at times. No one should starve...but some do. It is the reality of our world, but I can't stand it.

And you know, some days, you just want to stop feeling, stop caring...it would be easier. It is a pain--heart pain--to care deeply and it can take a lot out of you.

Maybe that's where this blog comes from...I know--so many people blog--so maybe I don't do this to be read, but rather to help myself see through this time to a future. I am a Christian, one who has read much of the Bible. I know and love Jesus--usually much less than I should--and I know what He promised. So that's where I am--here in the waiting...waiting to see His promises coem through, because soemtimes, that's all there is. Hope. I need hope...faith...and love. May they be evident in my life...and in this blog.

Jesus, live through me. Please.