Countdown to Spain ~ 12 days!

When you decide to take a trip, it is always seems to be a loooooong time until you leave.  Then you blink.  Then it is 12 days away.  You have tons to do to prepare for being gone for 3 weeks, lots to prepare for your trip, packing, and the list goes on....




On August 4th, I will be heading to Orlando, FL for a couple of days of training, then on the 6th we take off.  We will arrive in Malaga, Spain on the 7th, where we will have more training for a few more days.  We will take a train to Cordoba and spend 11 nights there, then we will take a train to Madrid August 21st.  The rest of the team is leaving on the 22nd, and I am leaving on the 25th.


This is a missions trip through Wycliffe Associates (WA).  Our job is to work "in support of missionary families working in sensitive countries throughout the region.  As the parents meet for strategic planning, spiritual refreshment, and mutual encouragement we have the opportunity to minister spiritual refreshment and encouragement to their kids." (That's the official description)  


This all came about after "the powers that be" and I decided it is a good idea for me to see what WA (and Wycliffe) do outside the states.  It is time for me to get on the field and see some things with my own eyes.  I started a mental list of all of the places I wanted to go and the "people groups" I wanted to work with and minister to.  It took about 2 seconds because I had thought about where I wanted to go about a billion times.  Spain was not on the short list, it actually wasn't on the long list either. :~)  About 20 minutes after the meeting where we all decided I needed to go somewhere, I was having a conversation with a fellow WA.  We were talking about the places I had traveled on missions trips, and while I loved those places and people, my real burden was with a different people group.  One I won't put on the blog (but is starts with a K).  Right about that time, the guy in charge of some of the ministry trips WA takes walked by and said, "if you are interested in (that people group), I have a trip for you."  I had never met this man and barley knew what he did for WA...it was just one of those God things.  In a little over a week the decision was made - I was headed for Spain in August.  Yay!

Thoughts on 1 Kings 17:2-9

1Ki 17:2-9  And the word of the LORD came unto him, saying,  (3)  Get thee hence, and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the brook Cherith, that is before Jordan.  (4)  And it shall be, that thou shalt drink of the brook; and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there.  (5)  So he went and did according unto the word of the LORD: for he went and dwelt by the brook Cherith, that is before Jordan.  (6)  And the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening; and he drank of the brook.  (7)  And it came to pass after a while, that the brook dried up, because there had been no rain in the land.  (8)  And the word of the LORD came unto him, saying,  (9)  Arise, get thee to Zarephath, which belongeth to Zidon, and dwell there: behold, I have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee.

2 - 3 ~ The word of the Lord told Elijah what to do.  God's word can give us direction. 
4 - 6 ~ God assures Elijah that he will be taken care of.  God provides a brook for drink and the ravens to deliver food.
7 ~ The brook dried up, and Elijah watched it dry up...and he was still there.
8 ~ Then word of the Lord came to him again...
9 ~ God told him to move.


It is noteworthy that Elijah stayed where he was until the Lord told him to move.  God had proven his provision through the brook.....and it dried up!  It is easy to watch things in our lives dry up right in front of us and then question God about why He would let that happen, or wonder if we heard Him right the first time.  We start trying to "make" things happen, stress out, come up with contingency plan after contingency plan, lose sleep, and talk about it until we are sick of hearing ourselves talk about it.


It is best to make sure it is the word of the Lord moving us in the first place; so when things dry up we know we are standing where the Lord put us, and also making sure we are continuing to listen for it just in case He wants to move us.  Per His Promises those are the only two options: provide for us or move us to the provision.
  

The Book You Are Writing

"You ought to live holy and godly lives." 2 Peter 3:11

The only way to have a stainless and beautiful year at its close--is to keep the days, as they pass, all pure and sweet, with the loveliness of holy, useful living.

It is thus, in little days--that our years come to us. We have but the one small fragment to fill and beautify at a time.

The year is a book, and for each day--one fair white page is opened before us.

And we are artists, whose duty it is to put something beautiful on the page.

Or we are poets, and are to write some lovely thought, some radiant sentence, on each leaf as it lies open before us.

"That we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness." 1 Timothy 2:2


(From Grace Gems)

March 2010 Update and Prayer Requests

Wow! Can we say busy? This “volunteer season” (Oct 09—March 10) has seen a lot of changes; new volunteers, and the highest number of volunteers in several years. We have had well over 200 volunteers, plus several groups. In January we had a church group from Geneva, NE for a week (some stayed 2 weeks). Just this week we had over 20 Duncanville High School Students on the campus completing their community service hours, and next weekend we have a group from the Chinese Church of Arlington coming to volunteer. They asked me to speak at their missions conference a few weeks ago and decided to set up a time to volunteer and get their congregation exposed to Bible translation at the same time.

While things are starting to wind down with volunteers a little bit, I will be staying busy for a few months longer. April 7-9 I will go to Orlando, FL for a few days of meetings with Wycliffe Associates. April 10-24 I will be going through an intensive training course with Wycliffe USA (in Orlando), and then vacation April 25-May 2 (in Orlando & Jax– yea!) I will come back to Dallas for a week or two, and then head out again for 2-3 weeks on a Partnership Development trip (raising support and prayer partners). Part of that time I will be in Kansas City, so if you would like to get together while I am there call or email me and we can set up a time!

This is the “campus” I work on. It is called the International

Linguistic Center (ILC).

There are about 700 people that work here year-around. The sole purpose of every

organization on this campus is to support Bible translation in over 70 countries. The linguists are trained here, the finance

offices are here, HR/personnel offices are here, typesetting,

editing, publishing, counseling, IT, apartments for retired

missionaries, and much more...

Praise and Prayer:

1. Praise—I STILL love what I am doing with WA, and it continues to grow & stretch me.

2. Praise—I really like Dallas and I think I have finally found a church to be a part of.

3. Prayer—Raising financial and prayer support.

4. Prayer—For my training and meetings in Orlando, FL next month.(and a week of vacation! )

5. Prayer—That the Lord would continue to open doors to partner with other cultures (like the Chinese Church, WA’s growing Hispanic and African volunteer population).

Information on how you can support financially ~

By Mail: Make check or money order out to Wycliffe Associates and put my name & fund code M08730 in the notes field. Mail to Wycliffe Associates; P.O. Box 620143, Orlando, Florida, 32862

Online: www.wycliffeassociates.org\links\donatenow. Under “program” select “other,” fill in my name & M08730.

Day's Like Today are What My Job at Wycliffe Are About!

We had a group of about 70 youth (7th – 12th grade) here from North Carolina. In the morning we schedule presentations, in the afternoon we did good, old fashioned, get your hands dirty work. We had a great time!

One presentation was a Monolingual Demonstration. If you are like me….you thought, “huh, what’s that?” A monolingual demonstration in the “land of Wycliffe” is a demon-stration showing how a linguist first communicates with the people with whom he is going to translate a Bible for. He does not know their language and usually they don’t know the linguist language either. For the demonstration, they get someone the linguist does not know and English is not their first language. They only speak in their “mother tongue” through the demonstration. They are also not given any instruction on what the linguist is trying to accomplish, and are not brought into the room until after the linguist does the introduction to the group. Neither of them speaks English for the first 30 minutes. The linguist holds up dif-ferent common objects and hopes that the person knows to tell him what the objects are. The linguist will write down what the person is saying by sound in a “phonic international alphabet.” (It is not the usually ABCs that we have here in the US.) Usually after about 30 min the linguist can start putting simple sentences together. It was amazing to see a demonstration showing how the translation process gets started.

The second presentation was amazing! I know I won’t be able to justify it with my words…
Don Johnson (the missionary…not the actor) and his wife Helen presented a powerpoint spanning 53 years. It started January 8, 1956 when Nate Saint, Jim Elliot, Peter Fleming, Ed McCully and Roger Youderian were killed in Ecuador by the Waodani tribe. Don, along with 6 other missionaries went in by foot to find out what had happened to the men. I imagine most of you have either heard the story, or seen the movie or documentary. Don and Helen went back on sev-eral occasions to work with Rachel Saint, Elizabeth Elliot, the translators, and others that were there to serve. They had the privilege to preach, minister to the people, dedicate the first book of the Bible translated into their language, and for the 50 year anniversary church service, January 8, 2006 on “Palm Beach” where the men were killed. It is one thing to watch a movie or documentary….it is quite different to hear someone talk about it that was there, who took the pictures and when through it all with the families…. I think when most of us say, “Here am I Lord, send me,” we tend to look at the more adventurous side of things. Rarely do we think we will have to sacrifice as much as these people did.

Nate Saint, Jim Elliot, Peter Fleming, Ed McCully and Roger Youderian – Called to be martyred
Elizabeth Elliot (and 4 other women) – Called to serve the Lord as a widow.

Rachel Saint – Called by the Lord to witness to, live among, and serve those that killed her brother.

The last presentation was by Wycliffe and Wycliffe Associates. They ended the presentation with a demonstration that showed them why organizations like Wycliffe Associates existed. They had one kid get up in front, and he represented a Bible Translator. Then started asking the kids what that translator would need to do his job. A roof over his head. Who will build it? A computer. Who will fix it? Paperwork and money. Who will manage it or be bookkeeper? What happens when he gets sick? By the end of the demonstration half of the kids were standing up front holding a sign rep-resenting a job needed on the field for one (yes ONE) translator. If each kid would have handed their paper to the translator and sat down….the translator would be overwhelmed with paperWORK. When would he translate? It used to take 40 years to translate one New Testament. Now it takes 10-15….and recently they had one completed in 5 years.

“Then he said unto them, Go your way, eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared: for this day is holy unto our Lord: neither be ye sorry; for the joy of the LORD is your strength.” ~Nehemiah 8:10

Prayer Requests:
1. Wycliffe Associates, as well as the International Linguistics Center (the campus I work on) are starting a HUGE transition. Please pray that I can continue to learn my job and keep up with the transitions….and not get too frustrated with all of the change on top of change. :~)
2. That I would continue to get acclimated to Dallas as my new home…..so far I really like it….even the heat.
3. Financial Support
4. Finding a local church….still looking.
5. There is a lot of warfare going on right now, pretty much everywhere. Dallas, my family and my mind…

THANK YOU FOR PRAYING!!!
Every Verse. Every Task. Every Tongue.

Missions, my hearts desire.

I am going to Africa... I have said that to myself 100 times a day for the last few days, but just doesn't seem to be sinking in. It is like this distant "thing" that completely overwhelms me.

I remember the day in June of '97 when I decided that missions was where I belonged. Before that day I was actually anti-missions. It was great for other people, but I wanted no part of it...period. Then one day - flip - my heart just changed and there was nothing I wanted more.

I went to Peru a few times, thinking that was were God was leading me, but that was not the right place or the right time. Just in case God changed His mind, I went to the 4 year Bible Institute (SSM) and graduated in 2005. I wanted to be prepared, "just in case." By the time I graduated, I felt as though I has less direction than when I started....not in a bad way, just not sure where God was taking me and why.

So here I am 3 years after SSM and 7 years after Peru, pricing plan tickets to Africa for a 2 1/2 month visit. I don't know what to expect, why Africa? Why Kafulafuta? What I am going to do there? Will I go back long term? (yikes!) Those are all questions I have been asked and all questions I can't really answer. I just know that God has opened doors that I am to go through...He has made it so obvious that this is what He wants, I couldn't ignore it if I tried. Every prayer answered....quickly. I prayed for verses of confirmation and they came...quickly. I prayed for the approval of my pastor/church, and got it....quickly. The financing came....quickly. I prayed that if this is not God's BEST plan for my life, that it not happen. I don't want good or better, or for God to give me over to my desires, that are not His desires. I want what He wants.

The Word is Alive!

When God moves, He moves... This week has been a crazy whirlwind, and I am not even sure where to start. This has been one of the most stretching years of my life, lost jobs, friends moving, people dying, spiritual warfare like never before. All I have been able to think is, "what are you doing Lord?? Everything has gone CRAZY!!" I don't have any other choice but to keep moving forward....I mean, I guess I could "quit." The thing is...even if I did quit, my God would not. So what do you do? I mean really! What do you do?

The only thing I can think of, is to hold tight to the one who created me, stop asking "why?" open the Word and read about His love for me. How "all things work together for the good of those that love Him (Rom 8:28), He is my Light, Salvation, and the Strength of my life (Ps 27:1), He will not fail thee, nor forsake thee (I Chron 28:20), He has given me rest on every side (I Chron 22:18), He is with me whithersoever I go (Josh 1:9), He is my Hope and the health of my countenance (Ps 42:11), He leads me in a plain path because of mine enemies (Ps 27:11), He set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings (Ps 40:2), He has put a new song in my mouth (Ps 40:3), His lovingkindness and truth continually preserve me (Ps 40:11), and He is good; for his mercy endureth for ever (Jer 33:11)."

Those are just a fraction of the verses God has showed me this year to be my comfort, support, and let me know that there is a purpose for all things and all seasons. The trials made life difficult, but God's word became alive because I had to depend on them to get to the next day (without losing my sanity :~).

This week has been a little bit different than all of the other weeks this year. I am starting to see part of God's plan for my life open up....not just His plan, because every day is a part of His plan, but I am talking about HIS PLAN as in the things I have prayed for and hoped for, the burden of my heart. It has been a week of watching God move and just being in awe watching so many things come together, and come together FAST. It is awesome and scary and overwhelming and humbling...

I am at that point where fear and faith collide...I can walk through the door He has opened, trusting that He is my creator and protector and that THIS is His plan for this time in my life, or I can be afraid, over-think, over-analyze, and let fear have its way and stay home.