Travel Jitters

Tomorrow I leave.


It is the weirdest thought. Especially since I was planning on leaving in late June. Yet even as I have been praying and seeking God and asking if this is right, I have such peace.

Over the last few months, God has been scraping at my identity- at the person I thought I was destined to <always> be. And it has been… amazingly difficult and so rewarding in the enduring of the process. Granted, I am not done yet as my goal is to continue changing from glory to glory.
My goal is to always be compassionate, kind, and loving. To always be empathetic, content, and learning. To always reflect Christ to those I meet.

This morning as I was journaling about leaving, I was recalling back to the day I left. It seems like so long ago and yet only last week, and as I was thinking back I remember praying for contentedness.

Today, my prayer is the same.

I have had so many good times and good laughs and good cries here that it is hard not to think of the contentedness that came with partnering with the living God. And, as I sit here and think about it, I really have no reason to fear I have not learned contentedness. Silly me. (Not that I have not enjoyed my first hot showers in months and coffee in the mornings. ;) )


Over half of my year has been spent in Uganda, with taking a DTS team in January and February and then coming back in early August. Where I did not like it before, I fell in love with it during.
It was hard. It was destructive at times. It was humiliating at others. But it was so beyond worth it.
It was worth the people making fun of me and embarrassing me. It was worth the slaps and punches and hits at the beginning. It was worth the Luganda lessons I hated. ( I think it is a hard language.) It was worth the late nights and early mornings, and charts upon charts upon charts. It was worth the tears over not being able to see big picture or misunderstanding the point of a book. It was worth the tears and laughs over the marriage proposals. It was worth the friendships that I made and invested in knowing I may never see their faces again. It was so beyond worth the pain, tears, and uncomfortableness. It was so beyond worth it. Because I still have Jesus.

It is such a foundational truth- I have Jesus.

The thing that scares me the most (let us get vulnerable here) is going back to a familiar place after having changed so much. I literally know nothing about who I am now. Okay, not literally nothing, but it feels like it sometimes. Sometimes, someone will ask me what I want and I will literally have no idea. Having no idea scares me- a lot. How can I not know myself and be okay with it? I do not feel very intra-tuned. What is going on inside of me? What are my wants and desires? Who is this person that sees herself as pure and blameless and full of life? I do not want to lose her and I am terrified I will because when I go back to my base the people there know me as one person and not this godly woman I have become… and I know I should not fear. Honest, I know. And this is again where I remind myself I still have Jesus.

So yeah, I have that peace beyond understanding. Yeah, my emotions are not in tune with what is going on in reality. (I keep telling myself that I did not really just say goodbye to so many lovely, amazing people.) I have Jesus. Even if I am going back before the end of a school.

I did not fail. I did not run away. No. I succeed. I partnered with God and in Him there is no failure. I ran to my Savior, not away.


I have Jesus.

Pure And Blameless

You ever feel like no matter how hard you try, you are constantly losing? No, not is not the question I am wanting to ask- do you ever feel like where you are starting is so far away from the starting line? As I explained it to my roommate this morning- you are told your test is over the one mile, but you have to start half a mile from there and still get tested over the one. Oh, did I mention the other runners are only running one mile?
    That is how I have felt for years.
    No matter how hard I try, I am still striving to only get to the starter’s block. I looked at myself as impure and unlovely and one that could not be part of the bride of Christ because I was a stain in the church. Man. I was so wrong.
    All of this came about with 1 Timothy. (It is a really good book. Takes fifteen minutes to read through the whole thing.) A theme I traced was living a godly and blameless life. At the beginning of the book, my soul felt sad. I could feel myself sinking into a bout of depression and I was scared that I would not be able to get out of the slump. Anyway, so I was sad. I remember thinking: if only one day I could be good enough to begin this journey to godly and blameless. If one day, I too could be considered unstained. See, I have just been so convinced that there is NO WAY I am not pure/ blameless/ unstained/ lovely.
    Yet, that is not how God sees me. Engaging with God and Holy Spirit as I went through 1 Timothy, broke that mindset. Somewhere in the book I began to see and understand that God is not saying “almost”; "you are almost to the starting line! Almost, keep going.” But all along He has seen me as His pure and blameless bride.
    There was one night, Jack and I were talking and he said this to me. Almost the exact same thing. That he sees me as pure and blameless- the same way Christ does. And I remember thinking there is no way that they really see me this way because if they knew of my sins, if they knew my scars they could not look at me like this.
    Today, God has been showing me that I am not starting half a mile behind the rest, striving to catch up, but rather it is through Him and His goodness and mercy that He has redeemed and renewed me. And that- HE- puts me at the starting line with all the others. HE is the reason I can then train myself in godliness (as Paul charges Timothy). I am not sure if I made my point clearly— picture Christ on the cross. His face swollen and bloody. His wrists caked with blood and the block under his feet stained with the blood that cleanses you and me. In one hand, He holds justice and sovereignty and in the other He holds mercy and free will. His feet will soon triumph over death. His death and resurrection will drastically change the world.
    When I chose Jesus as my Lord and Saviour and made Him my King, God then put the blood of Christ over me and I was marked with Hid fingerprint. He claimed me and washed me and bathed me until I was white as snow.
But for years, I have not understood this bathing. I have been acting like there is something I have to do in order to be pure and white before Him. Yesterday, He showed me that this is incorrect- at my confession He washed me and put me at the starting line. It was my view that said I was miles behind everyone else and would never be able to catch up.
    Maybe that makes sense. Maybe not.
    But it was mind-blowing to me.

Seeing God for the First Time

  
Okay... This is a few weeks late..



    Week Eight has concluded with finishing 1 Thessalonians and if I am honest, I have hit a brick wall of exhaustion. The school has been so good and I am so grateful for this opportunity. God has been stripping out false thoughts and foundations, and together we have been laying new ones. It has been such a hurting, healing, and renewing process. No wonder after eight weeks I am tried. I have a solid ‘A’ in the course and I can say, with great conviction, that I have worked hard for it.
    I finished up Romans last night… In lecture, we had a discussion about God’s sovereignty and man’s free will. It was really good. The tension between the two is such a beautiful thing and, truly, I cannot see how anyone would not want to know God for who He truly, beautifully is.
    Colossians has been one of my hardest books. Why? Simple: the supremacy of Christ. Christ is the ultimate authority. Throughout the entire work of the book, I felt like the Lord was asking me if HE was enough for me. Sadly, I had to respond back with a ‘no’.
    Let me explain myself here: Over the course of my life, I have sought for approval. I have wanted the approval of my parents, my employers/ bosses, my mentors, my friends/ co- workers, and yes, of course God. The problem has come in with me desiring the approval of man of the approval of my God. Something thinks I should do this- okay, there I go, or that I should not do this- okay, I will not. Yet sometimes, I have the conviction of Holy Spirit to do the opposite. Like now.
    When I first began to pray about doing Bible school, I knew God said to do the first term and after that, the other terms were a bonus. I was determined to have the other two terms with my first term, but the money never came in, so I have been having to take time away from homework to pray and seek God on what I am to do. Actually, it was more along the lines of telling God what He needs to be doing for me to be happy. Okay, honestly, Uganda is not my context. There is just so much about the culture that I just cannot wrap my mind around, but in my first location (Arua), I was praying for contentedness- the kind that Paul writes about in Philippians. Here in Jinja, I have actually found it. Yeah, it is lonely sometimes. Yeah, I wish town did not take forever to get to (like 30 mins). Sure, I am having a hard time remembering certain English phrases mean something else here. And yes, I am tired of cold showers that leave me with goose bumps and the desire for a cup of cocoa. But even with all of that, I am content. I have my Jesus. I am growing and changing and I literally do not recognize the person I have become. God promised this school would be a time of transformation and He is still fulfilling that promise. I will go to the ends of the world to follow Him. BUT, at this point, I am not at the point where I seek His approval first.
    I flew to Uganda, East Africa on a one- way ticket. I have been fundraising for the money to continue on in the school then return home, but after many appeals I still do not have the funds. Each time I have gone to God in prayer on who to ask, I have a blank page in the end. Do not get me wrong, I KNOW God is faithful, but I also know He only promised term one. After struggling for the last week, I have made my decision, with the conviction of the Holy Spirit inside me, to pursue going home after term one. Many tears have gone into the process because this is not what I want.
    I want to stay. I want to delve deep into the Old Testament and come up praising God for who He is. But God has been showing me that I am fully equipped with the tools to do just that. AND that I can bring other people along with me on the journey to see God as He truly is- always sovereign, always faithful, always in control, always just and always merciful. I have seen so much of God in these last 14 weeks of my trip to Uganda that I cannot even remember why I had a problem seeing Him any other way than how He is.
    He is so beautiful.
    So glorious.
        Grace and peace.