In Awe of What God is Doing in My Life

I've been in this place of awe before. Of looking at what God has done and going, "WOW!" It's not uncommon for me to tell God, "You absolutely amaze me!" But never so much as lately. And never so much in my own life. For those that know me best, you know the things i have been praying for and wanting for awhile. You know what are big things to me. You know what USED to be big things are sometimes replaced as time goes on.
When i first graduated nursing school, my plan was get hired in a hospital and work 12s and get married to an engineer or something else to give me a "comfortable" life. HAHAHAHA! God told me, though i didnt know it at the time, "I have better plans than that." Instead of being hired in a hospital, i was hired for a position at a residential pediatric facility. The 12 hour night shifts, 5 days a week, up to 17 days in a row kept me from hearing His voice...until one day i started cutting back with work and increasing my hours with friends, and eventually, God.
With less hours and more time at home i decided to start working on learning how to be a wife from the best example i had closest to me. My Mom. I told her i wanted to help her make dinner, cook, clean, everything. But that didnt last, and many times when she told me she was making something and would teach me, i would be "busy."
Fast forward about 3 years, and now i am making meals, cleaning, and helping take care of my 5 nieces and nephews. I'm working in homecare, but still working for the Lord. I'm plugging into people at church and work and attempting to show Christ and His love everywhere i go. God has become the most important part of my life, and with focusing on Him, He helps my will conform to His. To learn what it means to live in the role i am called into. To learn to be the best young adult woman living for Him i can. But also to prepare to be a wife and mother, when He says so. This is the first time i am actually paying attention to what this means, and can i just tell you, it is FUN!

I have learned, that truly,

 "For the Lord God is a sun and shield;
    the Lord bestows favor and honor.
No good thing does he withhold
    from those who walk uprightly" (Psalm 84:11)

and 

If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! (Matthew 7:11)

and

Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart. (Psalm 37:4)


I did not KNOW what good gifts He could give and what my heart was truly desiring until i met Him and let Him lead me. He shows me that He knows my heart even better than I do. Though i made my plans, i had not known that being a pediatric homecare nurse is so satisfying and perfect for me, at least at where i am in life now. He knew that all those others that i would chase were wrong and that He had so much better if i would just run to HIM. Now that i have, I have security and safety in my LORD GOD, who is my Sun and my Shield, Rock and Redeemer, Husband and King.

Everything failed without Him. Everything that was just good, not great, and just ok, not right, for me failed. He protected me from so much heartache, and now i have nothing to do but praise and worship Him. Because He is GOOD. And i am seeing that no good thing will He withhold when i am walking in His path.

Dear God, let me always continue in Your path. To walk in righteousness and not let my feet go to the right or to the left. When i start to wander, God i pray that You 'bind my wandering heart to Thee!' Thank You for all of the wonderful gifts You have given, are giving, and will give. I love You. In Jesus' name, Amen!"

We walk away, God doesn't

So I kept hearing that God will never abandon me, never leave me, never stop loving me. i believed it, to a point. but deep down, i
just didn't know if it was true. I accepted it as truth, but didn't really believe it. Kind of like, "exercise is a good thing." I knew in my head it was true, but my heart couldn't quite "get it." Then I cried out to God to show me, to show my heart what this means. And, true to Who He Is, He show me He did.

It is never God who turns His back on us. Jesus took that punishment on the cross. But that doesn't mean we don't turn our backs on God.

Ok, so you knew that already? Congrats. You are ahead of me in this. When I realised this, and really BELIEVED it deep in my heart I found such comfort....and shame. All those times when I felt far from God, I was walking away. Maybe I wasn't blatently sinning, but in a way, I was turning my back on the only One who will ever be able to love me fully. Wow. This hit me like a ton of bricks. Nothing like the realization that I'm walking away from my True Love and that He will never leave me....now I just pray I never walk away again.

The gap between the real me and ideal me

I'm not yet who I want to be,
But I am who I am, now, this is me
I want to grow, and grow I do,
But much too slowly I fear it's true.
I know what needs to change
And I know the change means pain
But I also know pain is not harm
And through the change I'm in Your arms.
I desperately want to be who You desire
To live for You, Your ways are higher.
But then You remind I am who I am now
And You are using me, someway, somehow.
You remind me that there are many seasons
That I will go through, for many reasons
And even when I feel so useless, You find ways
To use me and will continue, each one of my days.

dear God, i thank You for showing me the consequences of following or not following You. i pray that You help me to obey You. let the consequences of past actions motivate me to do differently. make my heart's motive to bring glory to Your name. let me see how wonderful this could be following Your way! every moment i try to turn away i pray you bring me right back to Your way, Your path. i long to obey You out of love and with a pure heart! i can see already how You have blessed me with so many blessings! i pray i do not mess this one up. help me to see Your plan and not be distracted by my own desires. i know Your plan is the best one, so i  want to yield to it, to You, to best. i want to be the woman who brings You honor and praise, who's very life brings You glory. let me store up my treasures in Heaven, because i know that Your kingdom is the one that matters! teach me how to store up treasures that do not get destroyed like those on earth. teach me to trust and obey. grant me faith and action, to believe You have the beat and to take it when You give it, and to give back that which is not for me! give me wisdom and discernment to be able to see clearly and a pure heart to walk in a way that glorifies my God.

Another Kenya story :)

I find that very often with God our plans don’t go quiet how we expect. If you would have asked me five years ago, I would say if I go overseas it is somewhere with Spanish. If you asked me three years ago, it would be the same answer with an added, and I’m really not going to Africa.  By the end of last year, I was set on Kenya. How quickly God can change my heart just awes me. I am so glad He did!

I went to Kenya for a month with Chariots For Hope on the internship program to the AIC Children’s Home in Mbooni and Kitui this summer. I expected the assessments, the health tracking form, and the sponsor letters and pictures. I even expected to do four Bible lessons and lead devotions. God proved that He had more for me to do. Not only did I do those things and completely fall in love with the people, I also grew in my own walk with Christ!

God continued to prove His faithfulness to me, and that He could do things through me that I never would have imagined. Every step along the way that I had fears, God relieved the fear by putting people in my life to feel comfortable with and grow with, whether it was the couple days with other interns or whole month with the staff and children at the home. I ended up leading devotions every night that I was in Mbooni. One night we gave an alter call, and 29 children gave their lives to the LORD! I was amazed.  Praise the Lord! Another night, we issued a devotions quiz, an examination of what they remembered from all the nights I taught. One child earned at 38/35 because he was able to gain extra credit with memory verses. The Sunday I returned from Kitui I preached in the AIC Mbooni church in the English service. Every step along the way God showed up. I couldn’t have done it without Him.

Kenya--God's faithfulness and growing my trust in HIm

            When God first put orphans on my heart, I began to understand what a “burden” was. This heightened awareness and heart for people I have never met was so intense I would find myself crying for no apparent reason, other than that God was connecting me to those He was preparing me to serve. I received a text message from my young adults pastor informing me of an opportunity to serve as an intern in an orphanage in Kenya and immediately knew it was for me. Throughout the process, applying, interviewing, preparing to leave after getting the acceptance, I knew I was going. Before I applied, I knew God had chosen me for this internship. He had placed it on my heart before I knew it existed! “But,” I thought, “even if I don’t get chosen, I know I WILL go, sometime, somehow. God will make a way.”

            This theme of God’s faithfulness and learning to trust Him continued throughout the internship. I had many doubts rise up before leaving for Kenya, but each time they would appear, God would bring something to me to remind me that He is faithful and I can trust He will me with me. The one evening I was driving home from work and a blue truck had the license plate “Kenyan.” I almost had to pull over! God is so good to give us just what we need to build our faith and trust in Him!

            In Kenya, so many things happened that deepened my trust in God. From leading devotions every night to traveling in different areas and preaching a Sunday sermon to allowing myself to not hold back with the kids, I kept seeing how He has provided for His children. This was my first time in Kenya, in Africa. It was my first time staying alone in a country I didn’t know. I was scared, but because of last minute changes the first two nights I had another intern stay with me. God used that time to acclimate me to Mbooni and when she left, I felt God’s faithfulness in allowing me to have that time to adjust.

            Now that I have returned to America, God has shown continued faithfulness by allowing me to enjoy some time “adjusting to reality.” I met up with so many missionary friends, and even people I just met! It encouraged me to continue to trust God and bask in His faithfulness. I am so excited to return to “my” Home in November with Kenya’s Kids!

You say you like me, and I like you too.
But wait it out is what we gotta do.
Take our time to get to see where this is going
Instead of jumping in and start this growing
It makes good sense to have a solid foundation
And to God's will we want "us" to have consecration.
But when you don't want to tell people I'm yours
I start to doubt, to wonder, starting mind wars
Do you really like me or is it just a cover-up?
Do you want to be with me or think this could be love?
If you already see we will not be
Let me know if you've given up on me.
But if you think we could be forever,
Then why take so long to put us together?
I'm not saying its wrong to wait
Just wondering why we are still at the gate
The gun has gone off and we have not yet started to run
Together we just stand and look at the gun.
Are we too scared to find the truth about us?
Because if it's good,that takes a lot of trust.
But if it is bad, there goes some hope, a dream.
But standing here I feel like I need to scream