This is the power of Christ in Me...

In Christ alone my hope is found,
He is my light, my strength, my song;
this Cornerstone, this solid Ground,
firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace,
when fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My Comforter, my All in All,
here in the love of Christ I stand.

This blog is long overdue, my apologies. I had no idea after the last post two weeks into Malaysia what the next two months of my life would hold. 

As is obvious from the passing of time, the seasons have changed and I find myself in my typical perch in Starbucks in Minnesota which is currently under a foot and a half of snow. 

Kathryn, Alyssa, Sophie, Janie and Sarah on graduation night.

So much of my heart is still very much attempting to transition back into American culture. As I posted the picture above I had to bite back tears as I look at those five beautiful women who I was honored enough to call "my girls" for a season. They are now on their own unique journeys all over the world having finished well. Girls, you make me so incredibly proud. I am blessed beyond belief to have been able to witness you on this journey. To have laughed, cried, fought, wrestled, prayed with for and about you. Keep running! Keep running babies! Your hearts that are so tender and obediant will change the world for Christ if you continue to allow Him to mold you into the women He has destined you to be.

The men who changed my life, my perspective, and my story.

In Christ alone! who took on flesh
Fulness of God in helpless babe!
This gift of love and righteousness
Scorned by the ones he came to save:
Till on that cross as Jesus died,
The wrath of God was satisfied -
For every sin on Him was laid;
Here in the death of Christ I live.

After graduating the students Tack, Steve, Loren and I processed through this last seven months within a week of staff debrief. Trying to anticipate what closing this season would be, preparing for the next, looking back, making changes, looking forward. I am forever changed because of these three men. Their patience, their wisdom, their integrity and their love. I've learned so much about who I am, who men are, how I function within those realities because God crossed my path with theirs. So many people ask me what I learned in the last season, the first, biggest and most important lesson I learned was that God is faithful. One of the first ways I learned that was through these being the men that God picked for me to walk this road with. 

There in the ground His body lay

Light of the world by darkness slain:

Then bursting forth in glorious Day

Up from the grave he rose again!

And as He stands in victory

Sin's curse has lost its grip on me,

For I am His and He is mine -

Bought with the precious blood of Christ.

And so the question that everyone asks now is, "What's next?"  And now I can begin to answer that question. I will not immediately be posting this blog to my facebook because out of respect there are still people that I need to speak to face to face or ear to phone or finger to text before this becomes "facebook official."  

I am going back! That was always the plan, when I agreed to staff this Snowboard school I knew that YWAM was asking for a two school commitment from me. And while I was preparing to leave in May I would've said I would pry find a way out of that commitment within a few days of being back in Oxford and in that role I knew that I would be back for a second school. God's call had gripped my heart and refused to let go. While the last seven months have held lots of incredible challenges it was very clear to me from the first few days: I had found my place, my purpose and my joy. Living a life of leadership and discipleship within YWAM is where I was supposed to be. God's continued faithfulness at every turn and the support of countless people all over world confirmed this for me on almost a daily basis. I've never had an experience like the last seven months, have not grown like this, have not loved people like this, have not fought like this, have not seen God's face like this. 

So on my own I started making plans for the next year; I would come home after a few weeks of traveling the South Island with Sophie and spend time with family over the holidays. I was looking forward to getting to know my new niece Faith and catching up with Isabelle. I was eagerly anticipating long, processing conversations with Jenny and spending girls weekends in Chicago with Bits. Christmas with my Grandparents, heading to the International House of Prayer for New Years, everything was falling into it's place as I prepared with a full heart to end one season and begin another. In January I was making plans to move to Colorado to work within snowboarding and live with friends before heading back to New Zealand in May to staff the next Snowboard Discipleship Training school in 2013. 

During staff debrief my leadership within YWAM while processing the last school with me asked me to prayfully consider coming back to Oxford earlier than planned in a more full time role. There are a lot of reasons why I would go back so soon:  to continue and deepen the growth in my own heart, personality, and leadership that God began during the school, to create a support system within that place, to carve out my place, my home, to train under leadership there, to pour into that place in a different role, to support the March AW80 school, to strengthen my utter dependence on Christ. To be working as a full time missionary yes, but also to be strengthening the mighty work that Christ is working in my life. 

Making this decision has not been easy. There has been a lot of prayer, a lot of tears, a lot of long conversations with those whose lives will be directly effected by my choice to go, with people who have a logistics brain on how to make this happen, there have been sleepless nights, unanswered questions, fights with God, laughs, recalled memories, confirmations, support and now an immense sense of peace as I have made the decision, I am going back. 

As far as literally what will this look like in my life, many details still need to be ironed out. I need to apply quickly for a year long New Zealand VISA and start fundraising immediately. I don't know exact details yet, but the loose plan is that I will be leaving Minnesota the last week in January taking a longer route and landing in New Zealand the first week in February. While there I will be working on our base and helping to support our other base and school staff. I will rejoin my Basic Leadership School in March. As Spring comes I will help with the administrative side of starting the Snowboard school up again and then transition back to Snowboard staff in May. 

And so once again, and much, much quicker than I anticipated I am starting to fund-raise and seek supporters. There is an entirely different outlook on it this time, I am still fresh in the aftermath of God's provision. There were so many times I should've gone broke, so many times something should not have worked out, so many times that physical reality said, "This just isn't going to work," and every SINGLE time my God made a way. Every SINGLE time! I'm standing when I should not be, my dear Little Duck uses her left arm, my little brother can walk, I went, I did, I saw when I should not have. I have seen miracle after miracle after miracle. I stand in awe...

Once again, I need your help. I need another miracle. In a little over six weeks I need to be on a plane to New Zealand with a year long VISA. While I'm home for these weeks I have picked up as many part time jobs as I can. I am back at Elm Creek helping to supervise our Snowsports Academy as well as subbing in the Food Service Department with my Mom. Kidstop also brought me back on as a sub while I'm home and lots of friends have been gracious in inviting me to babysit and help with their kids as everyone heads to Christmas parties and finishing up last minute shopping.

As this times commitment is much longer I will need monthly supporters. People or families willing to commit to supporting me every month. My staff fees while in NZ are $100/week. This means if I have four families support me a $100/month my staff fees are completely taken care of! I have a friend who has been working with YWAM full time for three years now and she has multiple supporters of $10/month and she is a testimony of how powerful any gift can be! She has been supported for three years on gifts such as those! I am so grateful for every single gift and piece of support. I am currently working with the YWAM base in Tyler, Texas who will be handling my monthly supporters so that I can set up an account with them and supporters can elect to have automatic withdrawals from their checking account and YWAM will issue them tax deductible receipts. As soon as this is set to go with them I will post those directions and details. Right now, the prayer and need is for one time gifts and support to help purchase my plane ticket and VISA. I will be around church and the community to speak to people personally and my DONATE button connected to my Paypal is still active. I very humbly and confidently ask you to prayfully consider supporting this move of Christ in my life. 

No guilt in life, no fear in death,

This is the power of Christ in me;

From life's first cry to final breath.

Jesus commands my destiny.

No power of hell, no scheme of man,

Can ever pluck me from His hand;

Till He returns or calls me home,

Here in the power of Christ I'll stand.

This has been one of the most powerful years of my life. A few months ago if you asked me, "Have you sacrificed for Christ?" and I would've told you yes, I have. And in many ways I did. But I sit on the edge of what feels like a huge precipice in my life. I am keenly aware that Christ is asking me to lay everything on the line for Him right now. I am being asked to be nothing, have nothing, want nothing but the cross of Jesus. This is in all honesty, incredibly scary place to be. This is not what I had planned. But I look at the lyrics of this song (which has been playing on repeat for the last two hours) "No power of hell, no scheme of man; can ever pluck me from His hand; Till he returns or calls me home, here in the power of Christ I'll stand." Christ has laid down EVERYTHING so that I may know what it's like to be loved by a perfect being. Christ has given up all so that I may know truth, grace, peace, love and beauty. Christ has died so that I may live. I have never been so confidant in my utter smallness. I have never been so humbled by the power of my Lover. I have never been filled with such peace after making such a huge decision. Yes, this year will be filled with struggles, confusion and at times heart ache- we're human. This will be an immense challenge, but I've never been more sure that I'm on the right side. I'm on the winning team. NOTHING can pluck me from His hand! I am held in the palm of Christ and in His power I will STAND! 

You are beyond what I understand

There is so much to report at the beginning of our second week of full on ministry here in Eastern Asia. I'll start with a really scary story about how incredibly faithful my God is:

Chinese Moon Cakes. We've eaten a LOT of these this past week!

Last Thursday after ministry our crew packed up and headed (through a half mile walk in pouring rain) to catch a ferry to the mainland where we would be staying with a new contact and doing ministry for a week. By the middle of the trip in Bekit we were traveling for hours almost everyday in two vans. The boys would ride in one van with Isaac and us girls would travel in a van with Joshua. (Isaac and Joshua are new believers that are being discipled and trained in ministry by "Auntie Janet" our contact in Bekit.) I carried us girls' passports and Tack would carry the boys' because there were lowland checks at most of the major cities and if we were to get pulled over at any point we needed to be able to show id and valid visas. Sunday was our third day in a row of ministry from sun up to well past sundown. We'd been deep in the jungle Friday and Saturday. Sunday we'd served at a local church, rushed over to serve at a old folks home and then headed back to the island to be a part of a Chinese revival service that went well past midnight. After that late service our caravan stopped for a late dinner. At dinner I was walking up and down the road with Sophie processesing what had gone on at the service. In this heat I decided to buy a second round of drinks and went to the van to get my wallet. The insides of my stomach have never dropped to my feet as fast as they did that night. The passports and my cash were gone! I didn't know what to do but stand holding my mostly empty purse for a few moments. Not only my passport but the other three passports that I was responsible for. I  looked everywhere in the van hoping, biting back tears and praying that they had fallen out in the safety of Joshua's van. I replayed every moment of the day and the contents of my purse, kicking myself for the times I let it out of my sight for even a second. I become almost convinced that I had left the passports on my mattress when we had left that morning and so we headed back to Auntie's house to see and hope that I was right; I had never put them in my purse that morning. Our whole van prayed as we drove back and I rushed in when we got home to discover my gut instinct was right; I had put them in my purse and they were indeed missing. At this point it was almost 2 am and no way we could contact anyone at any of the ministries we'd been a part of. The only choice I had was to attempt sleep for a few hours. We'd contact the ministries in the morning and if there was no luck the girls and I would catch a bus to the Embassy in KL to start the process of getting new ones. When I went to dig out my phone to set an alarm for the morning my heart dropped a second time. My phone was also missing. This was almost as disheartening for me. My phone has all the photos I have taken since we've been here, it has photos of my nieces, memories from DTS,  recordings of our speakers and worship times. Things that unlike a passport in the end cannot be replaced. I tried sleeping and holding unto hope. Some believed that if two things were missing out of my purse it seemed more likely that my purse had tipped and the contents fallen out while others believed that 4 American passports and a nice cell phone missing seemed much more like robbery. I had a really hard time sleeping, I wanted so badly to break down and cry and scream and throw things and run around in fear. I knew in a moment it was my fault and my responsibility that four American girls were now in a third world country without federal identification. But I knew my team was looking to me for a reaction. I knew that how I handled this situation would set the precedent for our time in BM. It would set an example of how leaders work in stress and in fear. I didn't handle it perfectly, I know that. But I managed to force myself to fall asleep for an hour, I managed to cry quietly and pull myself up the next day. Yes, it sucked. Yes, it was my fault but it was not the worst thing that could happen and I know that now. The next morning the church from the morning and the old folks home called us back to say they'd checked with no luck. The evening church (which was an hour and a half drive back unto the island) called to say they would find a pastor and let us in to check. So we sent the guys unto the HIV clinic and us girls went with Joshua and Auntie Janet back to the island. Once there (as outreach would have it) we found out the Pastor was actually on his way back to the mainland to drop someone off at the airport. We'd wait an hour before we'd be able to get back into the church. We were having juice and char que teo when Joshua got a phone call. He set his phone down and I was ready to hear, "Ok we can go check." When he said, "Let's go! They have your phone and passport!" And took off running. I bolted behind him telling myself to take it with a grain of salt, maybe it's lost in translation. His Chinese to my English...But he was right. We ran to the church, the girls yelling and screaming behind me and a man on a motor bike handed me my phone, all 4 of our passports and every single bit of my cash! I think in many ways, I still have not fully understood just how faithful God is in that incident. I don't know that I ever will. All I know is since I left the US almost seven months ago my God has been BEYOND FAITHFUL to me at every single step of the way!

The girls at "Auntie" Janet's house at our first night in BM.

Working at an Orphanage for Indian Children. 

This was only the second time I'd worked with an orphanage before and easily one of my highlights  from our trip to BM. We had planned a little program with a few songs and the boys were acting through the story of David and Goliath but that only got us through about 3/4 of our time there. Andy was our superstar of the night. He got in front of all the kids and started telling the story of Noah and the Ark, calling the kids forward to act out the different animals. He captivated all of them and left all his big sisters and brothers speechless! He was amazing! This was also a good night for me because really soon after getting there a little Indian girl found her perch on my hip. Before long her head started nodding and I knew the inevitable was coming; for the first time since May I got to rock a baby to sleep in my arms! What a peaceful comfort for us both. On the flight to Singapore Soph and I watched this movie called, "Beasts of the Wild South," about this little girl whose pretty abused and one of her quotes in the movie is, "I can count the number of times I've been lifted on two fingers." And as I was rocking this little girl Soph came up and said that line to me and it hit me, I wonder how many times this little one has been rocked to sleep. I wonder as one of my many in a place like this how many times she's been, "lifted" into someone's arms and whispered to as she falls asleep. Sometimes in this environment I get upset with myself or put on undue pressure that I'm shy and have a hard time walking up to strangers and preaching to them. I'm a teacher, a coach, a shoulder, a confidant but an evangelist? That night as I whispered prayers over that sweet baby girl, I was sure of the woman God has made me into. I may not ever lead someone to Christ in the sewers but I will hold a lot of sleeping babies. And that moves the heart of my Father.

Lunch at the School for Disabled Children. 

Our team at the first jungle village we visited. 

Later in the week our team took part in some pioneering frontier missions. As much as I've always known this was God's call on my life, there were parts of me that never, ever thought this would be me. We drove for hours on end through dirt and jungle to reach people who were living in basically garbage bag houses. We didn't have long with any of them, some of them had no written language let alone a Bible. We brought songs, hugs, smiles, candy sometimes, clothing, food. Today while processing through some of this as a team I asked everyone to share an image or something they saw that will never leave them; some of these photos are the ones that will never leave me.

Organic farming where most of these men make their living. 

As girls some of our ministry opurtunities need to be a little creative because of gender roles and rules here. The men in the first village loved running around and grabbing the stray puppies for us to hold. (Although I DO NOT condone holding stray animals most days ;) 

Janie and her incredibly gentle heart towards animals.

It's one thing to see it on tv or listen to people who've been there, it's totally different to be here in reality. People actually live like this...

I don't know whose cuter, the puppies or the kids ;)

Jer and his super tender heart for the Lord. This man will change generations.

Worship at the village we were in at night of Indonesian migrants.

Sophers leading worship.

Andy giving a testimony that had us all on the verge of tears. His honesty and vulnerability in being abandon and his hope in Jesus was something these villagers could relate to and understand.

Church in the jungle!

Jeff preaching!!

Alyssa and the one child in the village. 

Alyssa praying over the woman. Thank you Jesus for your Spirit that can cross language barriers.

Riding in the jeeps up the tin mines.

Super dusty.

Our family photo at the top of the tin mines.

I think everyone on our team was super effected by the last village we went to. Here there was no written language, no missionary, no ministry presence  The work here will be long and take a lot of people dedicated to this cause. Here girls have one of two babies by the age of thirteen. Men have ten wives each (this is why there are so many women and children and not many men and also why all the children tend to look alike). We brought food, candy and clothing. Hugs, cuddles, high fives, attempted to teach phrases in Malay and English. These are more images that will stick with me forever.

Waiting in line for candy, cookies and clothes.

That smile melts my heart every time I look at this photo.

Sophie attempting to gain the trust of these young ones. By the time her and I got into the van a few hours later there were three girls yelling to us, "Goodbye I love you. Goodbye I love you."

She is someone's Isabelle. 

I think my Mom has seen this image in her head since I was born.

This little man stole my heart!

Jeromy got to help baptize one of the fathers and one of his wives.

Little lizards EVERYWHERE!!!  

Dinner at midnight! Joshua's dear children Matthew and Evon who joined with us in ministry most days. We were so blessed to be able to share cuddles with these ones and encouraged by their little hearts.

Family style supper.

Soph, Janie, Andy and Tore lead worship Sunday morning.

Back to our side of the Island.

I was hoping my niece would be proud of these photos. Feeding monkey's on our day off. Joshua and family came to the Island to take us out for a day at the beach we stopped here to see the monkey's first.

Brendan and Tore both got stung by jelly fish! (No no one had to pee on them, vinegar works just as well.)

Alyssa's birthday celebration on the beach.

The beautiful locals only beach where we all got FRIED! (And aloe is 30RM a bottle!)

Curly hair makes the best beach hair! Me and "Junior"

And so here you find us, relaxing at home after a night out doing street evangelism with an amazing ministry here. Alyssa got to go back to some of the worst places for prostitution here, and Sophie got to meet with the same person she spoke with last week, Andy and Janie got to pray for a man with a serious arm wound for healing, Jeff got to be encouraged by Peter. The work here is not easy, we work hard, we play hard, and we love hard. God continues to be faithful. Words very quickly become meaningless in this life. I realized that as I tried to journal some of this. There are times and places where nothing can be said in light of how amazing and faithful HE is. How He chooses to use us, his children out his great love for us. 

My Mom wrote on my facebook recently that I must stay in awe of His wonder in order to witness the depths of His kingdom. I think she's right; I stand in awe of His kingdom. I stand in awe of His greatness and faithfulness.