pray with me...

As you may have read in my previous letters, I feel like God has called me to join staff here at YWAM Denver, possibly next year. I am going to be spending the next few days praying and fasting, seeking God’s wisdom and guidance for the logistics of that, including finances. I would be honoured if you could please join with me in praying, and lifting me up as I make these decisions. I feel like I do already know some of the details, but do not want to do this flippantly, and want to make sure of what God is saying, where He’s leading and what the process is from here.

as time flies by...

 An update written 30 November 2011 – Arvada, Colorado

So we’re on the home stretch now! In about 3 weeks, I will be home in sunny South Africa! Praise God! I am so looking forward to some summer, since I’ve now had two winters and am in desperate need of a tan. It’s going to be so good to actually be home for Christmas this year, since my last one at home was in 2008!

Good gracious… how to summarise everything that God has been doing in my heart? It’s incredible. So over the last two years, I’ve felt like God has been tilling the ground of my heart, breaking the hard parts a bit, chipping away at other parts… and these last few months have been a lot of refinement. To use another metaphor: it’s like He’s been doing home renovations and I haven’t been allowed to see what’s happening inside, but now He’s taken me into the garage and we’re going through some of the stuff He’s sorted through and wants to get rid of, and He picks it up, shows me, and then I have the choice of whether to chuck it or keep it.

Painted in November

It’s so fascinating, because last year I was blown away by how much more to God there was than I’d thought before, and thought I had Him figured out a bit more, but He keeps surprising me and blowing me away by the intricacies and vastness of who He is. It makes me so excited, because I realise how little I know, and how much more there must still be! Last year, I thought I had grown leaps and bounds, which was true, but looking back, it was nothing compared to what’s happened recently. This gives me such hope! The rest of my life will be filled with continually having my mind blown and expanded by the infinite Creator of the universe, who has redeemed and restored me. He makes all things new! And then those new things get old, and He makes them new again to a whole different level. I thought I’d experienced the depths of God, but then He took me even deeper, and deeper, and continues to amaze me… I am so incredibly grateful for how gentle He is in how He corrects, refines and restores me. He doesn’t go all at once or overwhelm me – He goes little bits at a time, then revisits those things and takes them even deeper still. He is so good!

One thing I often find myself doing is losing perspective. I take my eyes off of Him, and then get overwhelmed by what is around me and all the unknowns, and the things that need to happen or that I hope will happen. Then He captures my gaze again, and reminds me of who He is, what He’s done and His faithfulness to keep His promises. The beautiful thing about revelation is that it’s impossible to get prideful, because you realise how small you are, and how utterly huge and magnificent and WOAH God is!

God has given me some beautiful glimpses into what He has for me, and it honestly scares me a bit, because I don’t know if I can do it, but that’s the point! I can’t do it! I need Him! So often we only attempt things we know we can, but then we don’t have the opportunity to trust Him or grow. I want to be stretched and grow! And in order to do that, I need to attempt great things with and for God. I need to do things that I can’t do, by relying on His power. God has been challenging and re-defining my view of success. It’s one of the things that cause such great anxiety and fear, because we feel like we’ll fail or not do it well enough. This is because we make it all about us and how well we do it. Take evangelism for example: if our motivation is to save people, then we’ll never be satisfied, especially if we don’t ‘convert’ anyone. But it isn't us that saves people – God does. So how do we measure our success? God measures it by obedience. That takes so much pressure off of me! If I’m being obedience to what He asks of me, then I’m successful in His eyes. Jesus couldn’t and didn’t heal everyone or preach to everyone. He said that He only did what He say the Father doing, and said only what He heard the Father saying. He couldn’t do it all; else He would have burnt out – same story with us. Often we think we need to and have to do it all. God doesn’t need us – He chooses to include us because He loves us and wants to bless us with the amazing opportunity to share His love with others and build His Kingdom. Faithful people will be instructed with more – this is why obedience is so important. It is the essence of Biblical submission – coming up under to support and build up those in authority, and thereby having access to all that they have access to. It’s a beautiful thing that has sadly been so warped by the enemy.

Angie and Nathan with our Thanksgiving turkeys

That’s another thing God has been pointing out – how many things we avoid or write off as evil, simply because they have been warped for evil use, but if used for and through the power of the Holy Spirit, they are so beautiful and good! We are so scared of evil and legalism and sin, that we avoid it even more – like the Pharisees that built walls around the laws to prevent themselves from getting anywhere close to breaking the laws of God. In so doing, they missed the heart of the laws. If we focus on the sin, we are often consumed by it, but if we focus on the face of God, we are transformed into His image. You become what you behold and worship.

Enough preaching for now. Some things that you could be praying for: the last few weeks here – I really want to dig in and get all that I can out of this school. I don’t want to waste a day! Please also pray for my time back home, since it may be short due to coming back to join staff here at YWAM Denver (more information to come). Please pray for God to prepare the way before me for that, and against any spiritual attack that may come against this. Please also pray for the Dollar/Rand exchange rate – I want to see it drop to around R6-$1 (it’s currently around R8-$1). Please pray for the outreaches that are leaving off of this quarter at YWAM Denver – going to Haiti, Thailand, Brazil, Nicaragua and Honduras.

I am so extremely thankful for every one of you who take the time to read my letters and pray for me! It is such a huge blessing! I would love to pray for you too, if you have any specific requests. Please feel free to contact me on janinepalser@gmail.com if there is any way that I can be praying for you.

May God bless you so richly for your faithfulness and obedience to Him, and give you more opportunities to exercise your faith and grow with Him.

In faith, hope and love

Janine

a brief summary of this last month...

First snow of the season!

An update written 8 November 2011 – Arvada, Colorado

Oh my goodness! I can hardly believe that I am already half way through this school! SO much has happened in the last month, that I’ve delayed writing, because there’s so much, but then even more just keeps happening. So this may be quite long…

Right after my last update, we went to the Acts 1 Conference, where all the Colorado YWAM bases met together for 3 days to seek God. It was incredible. 6-10 hours of worship each day, with teaching and processing time in between. It was honestly a taste of heaven.

A little bit of background: so ever since my DTS, I’ve wanted to join staff here, and have felt like God has said that that is something He has for me. This school I am doing now is the prerequisite for joining staff here, and was part of the motivation for doing this school. While I was at home, I had the time to pray and think about what my motivations were for wanting to come back here, and through that time, God got rid of a lot of junk and emotionalism around staffing, but the desire remained. When I came back here, I still wanted to, and at the Acts 1 Conference, I asked God to please give me a fresh word about it, because I didn’t want to move forward in that decision without Him going with me.

One night during Acts 1, one of the leaders stood up and said that he had a really specific word, but wasn't sure if he should share it. Right then, I got that heart-beating-quickly God-feeling and God was like – ‘this is for you!’, and then the guy said "I feel like there are some people here who are considering joining staff at YWAM Denver that need to." And right as he said that, I burst into tears and started laughing, as I sometimes tend to do when God gives me crazy revelation. It was ridiculous! The week after that, someone got Psalm 45:10-15 for me. Verse 10 says: "Listen to me, O royal daughter; take to heart what I say. Forget your people and your family far away." When I got home in February, I read that verse and sort of claimed it, thinking that it might apply to me. Then later that week, someone got Genesis 12:1-3 for me. They didn't know what it said, just got the reference. Here's what verse 1 says: "The LORD had said to Abram, 'Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father's family, and go to the land that I will show you.'" At this, I nearly started crying! I relate to Abraham a lot, and have often felt like I would be doing what he did in just trusting God and following him, literally step by step. Having God give that verse to me in such a non-human-intervening way, was such a blessing and so releasing to know that it is ok for me to simply obey God step by step, trusting Him to lead me, and that the next step is leaving home and joining staff here at YWAM Denver. Honestly, that freaks me out a bit, but at the same time is so exciting and freeing! I will have to live off of support, trusting God. It’s an exciting adventure to be going on!

Painted Oct 23 2011

A lot of what God has brought up has had to do with truly seeking intimacy with Him with all of me. In Hebrews 12, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.” One thing God has been showing me is how important it is for us not to let anything hold us back at all – it’s not just sin, but other things that are permissible, but not beneficial. There are things that we hold onto that really aren’t that good for us, that in some ways hold us back from God in some ways.

Co-creating with my God

We have also been learning so much about how leadership shouldn’t just be chosen by people, but rather given and anointed by God. The term ‘servant-leader’ has become a cliché, but it’s so true, because the start and end of leadership is serving others. The idea that you are better than or above in some way is a warped view of leadership, since you are in that position to serve others, and to be an example of how to do so to each other. It’s so clear to see how the warping of God’s ways has infiltrated society, and also the church. It’s incredible what we believe as truth, where it is actually quite far from how God created it to be. Jesus didn’t teach anything He didn’t model first with His life. By our standards of success, He failed epically in His ministry. But God’s standards of success are very different. We often strive to succeed by our standards, and then burn out. Jesus said that He only did what He saw the Father doing. He could have done so much more, but He didn’t. How could He leave a town right when they were gathering? Because God told Him to. It was time to move on. His life was a modelled example of how we are to live – in constant fellowship with God, in tune with what He is doing and wanting to do, and doing that. Obedience to God is success in God’s eyes. When we define it as anything else, we put unrealistic expectations on ourselves, and burn out, freak out or fall apart. His burden is light – He wasn’t lying about that. It is a huge responsibility too and sometimes hard, only because of our resistance and the battle of our sinful nature against what the Spirit is prompting us to do.

Something else God has been speaking to me about is being His Bride. The Church is referred to as the Bride of Christ. This is such a beautiful image, because He says in Ephesians 4 that He has made her holy and righteous. We don’t have to strive for it. And the beauty of that, is that I don’t have to keep living in sin, because He is making me whole. Flip, it’s so good, because it’s like He’s been doing renovations inside the house of my life – bashing down and reconstructing aspects, and then also sorting through the things I have stored. And now He’s taking me through those things, one by one, pointing them out, and then we throw them out. It’s so good! It’s hard sometimes, but so worth it, because I know that He’s cleaning me out, and preparing me for what is to come.

He has been connecting so many different things over the last few weeks, it blows my mind! One thing after another… I have fresh revelation every day! It’s so refreshing! After quite a while of feeling like I couldn’t see what God is doing, now He’s letting me get glimpses here and there. This may be partly because of some treasured sin I had in my life. I didn’t really view it as sin, but it was holding me back from the fullness of what God has for me (I finally deleted all my illegal music and movies). I honestly feel so free! I didn’t realise how much I was missing out on, because of something that I’d been numbed to believe wasn’t really that bad. So now whenever God brings anything up, I embrace the brokenness, and allow Him to reach deep inside to clean out the junk. I really don’t want there to be anything between us.

One of those things was the mentality that I didn’t really deserve the abundant life God has for me – I knew it was there in theory, but didn’t really think I’d ever get to live it. This stemmed from a root of thinking that right when my life was getting great, that it would fall apart or something would be taken away from me. This came from the time when Claire Rouse (one of my close friends), died during my Matric year (Grade 12). It happened right around the time when I was finally starting to get on top of everything. Crazy. God also showed me how from that time, I shut off my emotions when I played piano, and focused on perfectionism, because the emotions were too overwhelming, and perfectionism was control. Ever since then, I have been unable to play piano, because I’m not perfect, and there is no emotion. This comes into any time I try to perform any music. There is an emotional disconnect. So God is walking me through that, and bringing healing slowly but surely. He is so gentle and so good!

Last Friday during worship, I just bawled my eyes out. I wasn’t really sure why, but it was so good. It was so refreshing to allow myself to just be broken in the presence of God, and to let Him hold me. I feel like so often we’re so scared of the extremes of emotions, that we avoid them altogether, instead of learning how to walk them out in a Godly manner. I was so willing to be broken, because I knew that the more my heart broke, the deeper His truth and healing could go.

So there’s a brief summary of what God is doing, as best as I can give right now. Thank you all so much for your prayers! Please keep praying for an openness and willingness for God to do all that He wants to. I don’t want to miss out on anything that God has for me! I want the fullness which Jesus died for me to have.

My prayer for you is that you would allow God to peal back the layers, pouring healing and truth into each part, deep into your heart and life. May His peace that is so incomprehensible guard your heart and your mind, and may you know through experience, His great love that we cannot wrap our mind around. Let Him love you, and take you deeper and higher with Him, that you may have the abundant life He has for you. It won’t always be easy, but I pray that you would press in and choose Him every time. He is so worth it! He longs for you so deeply – He wants to share His heart with you, if you would just let Him.

In faith, hope and love

Janine

My roommates - Kiny, Maddy, me, Gill and Laura

first two weeks back...

An update written 8 October 2011 – Arvada, Colorado

It was really sad to say goodbye (again), and a really long flight (33 hours), but God is so faithful and it is SO good to be back here again. It really does feel like home in many ways!

So there are 4 schools running this quarter at YWAM Denver: a Musicians DTS, Young People’s DTS, School of Social Justice (which I did last year) and School of Ministry Development (which I am doing now). There are over 100 students this quarter, so it’s pretty busy!

The first week was really full of getting to know people and settling in. Praise God, I have had absolutely no jet lag and have been sleeping pretty solidly from 11pm-7am every night! Previously, the first week has been hard as I only fell asleep around 3am and then had to get up early. God is so good! There are 30 students in my school, which is the sum of all my previous schools! Our director is Mark Davies – an amazing man of God who is a great leader and inspiration.

It has been amazing to see how all the students are diving straight in. Worship times have been so Spirit filled, with people relinquishing things, strongholds being broken and lives being changed – and it’s only week 2! During worship last Wednesday, they said they felt like God wanted to break strongholds that have been in people’s lives for a long time, so I thought about the fear and insecurities that have previously had a huge hold in my life. As I thought about it, I didn’t have that heart-beating feeling when you know you need to go forward – I just had a huge sense of peace. And then I realised that God was confirming to me that those things are over and done with in my life. Praise God! I knew I had been through a process over the last 2 years of breaking them down, but to know that they are gone is SO freeing!

Last Friday, we had our normal Kingdom Night, where we went into downtown Denver to love people and worship Jesus on the streets. At first, I just sat and sang along with the guy playing guitar, then stood up and watched for people who stopped to see what was going on. This one guy came over, and asked if the packets we had were to give out (they had toothpaste, water, etc in them), so I gave him one. He also noticed the Bibles we had there, and asked for one of those two, and pointed to a specific one he wanted, because he used to have one like it. It turned out he was homeless, and couldn’t get a job because his ID had been stolen, and was trying to get a new one, but they couldn’t find his birth certificate either. So I prayed for him, and he left. Shortly afterwards, a 22 year old woman (Toni), came up and was watching what was going on. I started up a conversation with her, and it turned out that in the last couple of months, a really close neighbour, her mom, uncle and cousin had all died. So she had a lot of pain, anger, questions and frustration at God and the world. I got to just listen to her, and also share how I dealt with my close friend Claire’s death two years ago, and my grandpa’s death four years ago. Earlier in the conversation, I offered to pray for her, and she declined. Later on, some other people were praying for someone else, and she said prayer actually sounded pretty good, ‘cause her family could use all the help they could get. She used to go to church etc with her mom, but now she’s mad at God for taking her away. She said she wouldn’t normally have stopped, but for some reason, tonight she did. After we prayed for her, she said she felt better. Please keep praying for her – that she will slow down and give God listening time to answer all the questions she’s asking Him, and that she would be open to experience the amazing love and comfort of our God.

Last Saturday, we watched a documentary by Exodus Cry called Nefarious, which is about human trafficking. Flip, hardcore! Almost every one was in tears, but there is also so much hope in Jesus! We had a time of praying for each other and interceding for this issue afterwards, which was so beautiful, because our tears bless God’s heart so much. It was glorious. Yes, there is great evil in this world, but our God is greater and His love is more powerful! Please take a few minutes to watch the trailer at http://nefariousdocumentary.com/. Awareness is one of the ways that we can stop this atrocity.

Right after that, some of us were sitting around in the lobby of the base with a guitar or two and singing, and more people joined, and it turned into a spontaneous, powerful time of worshipping our God together for who He is. He is so glorious! It was so beautiful, seeing the students gathering together, and freely worshiping our God. This kind of stuff normally happens around week 9, and it’s only week 2! So please be praying for more of God! He has something huge planned for this quarter and all these students. It’s so exciting, and I am so blessed to be able to be back here for this time!

This last week’s teaching was on discovering your strengths, and living and treating others from that perspective – building them up in what they are naturally good and teaching from that perspective, instead of trying to make them into someone they aren’t naturally.

The entire community is heading down to the Colorado Springs base to meet with other bases for what is called the Acts 1 Conference, where we meet together, pray and seek the Lord. I am so excited to see what God is going do and say. Please be praying that we will be united in heart, and that we would be expectant and open to let God be Himself.

In faith, hope and love,

Janine

how I ended up in Denver... again...

For those of you who don’t remember, YWAM (Youth With A Mission) is an international, inter-denominations, non-profit Christian missionary organisation. Their focus is to know God and make Him known, through training, mercy ministries and evangelism. They train and equip people to grown in relationship with God and to love and serve others.

YWAM Denver is in Colorado in the United States. What I love most about them is their focus on worship and leadership training. Last year, I was there for almost a year. I did my Discipleship Training School (DTS), which is the basic entrance program into YWAM. It is a 3 months lecture and training, with topics like the Father heart of God, relationships, spiritual warfare, evangelism, Holy Spirit, followed by a 2 month outreach where you put everything into practise. I went to Thailand, where we loved the unloved in a rural Burmese refugee village, in the slums of Bangkok and the bars of Phuket.

After that, I did a secondary school of Biblical Foundations (SBF), where I was equipped to study the Bible, through reading it chronologically, and studying church history, and other study tools. After that, I did a school of Social Justice (SSJ) which was focused on knowing and seeing God’s heart in and despite the justice issues all over the world. We looked at things like human trafficking, modern-day slavery, refugees, poverty, community development and Aids. Off of that school, I went on another 2 month outreach to Brazil where we worked with an orphanage and with local community ministries.

So last year was pretty busy, with 3 schools and 2 outreaches with YWAM so far. Through that time, God brought me out of the bondage of believing lies and fear of so many things, and brought me into truth, joy, freedom and life! I have seen God do incredible things in and through me, and my life will never be the same.

I came home in February this year, and the first few months were really hard, but as I settled down and got involved, I’ve seen so much of how I’ve grown and how God is preparing me. It was amazing to get involved in ministry at home - worship, KFC (kids program), Gap (youth program), HBC (winter kids holiday club), Mthatha (winter outreach/missions trip), Alpha course and a Beth Moore Bible study. I’ve also been tutoring and did some Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) training. I also dabbled in cooking, art and guitar. It was amazing to be able to do what I’d been doing overseas, at home, and to see God very much at work there too.

Also been able to help with everything after my mom’s operation – totally God!

I’ve been learning so much about faith and trusting God with everything, every day. It’s been amazing to look back and see how much I’ve grown in the last year and a half, and get excited about where God is leading me next!

So now I’m doing the School of Ministry Development here at YWAM Denver. (See http://www.ywamdenver.org/training/school-of-ministry-development/ for details). Throughout last year, whenever I was deciding what to do next, this school kept on coming up, but it was never quite right.

I have felt and many people have prophesied ‘the nations’ over me, so I’m pretty sure I’ll go all over the place throughout my life. I was thinking about this a lot in Brazil, and one time I was casually thinking ‘how the heck do I go to all the nations??’ and a simple phrase popped straight into my mind, right as I thought that: ‘A bridge to the nations’, which happens to be YWAM Denver’s slogan. I cracked up laughing. God has such a great sense of humour!

So I kind of knew I’d be doing this school sometime, or at least going back to Denver. The question was when. I came home in February, and nearly left in April to do this school, but God said wait. So I waited. And when I asked Him if I could go in September, He finally said yes! I am so glad I did! One of the things God said, was that if I couldn’t find and choose joy at home, I wouldn’t be able to in other places. If I couldn’t be satisfied with where I was, I would not be satisfied with where I was going. God taught me so much during me time at home – patients and trusting Him being quite a hot topic!

So it’s been a long time coming! I’ve wanted to do this school for a while, but never really felt ready to do it yet. Looking back, I totally wasn’t! I feel so much more ready for this school now, and so free to just go with what God is saying and where He’s leading me, without worrying.

One of the things I’ve noticed is that I love helping people and pouring out into their lives some of what has been poured into mine. I long to see a generation rise up that is passionately in love with their God and who will go out and change the world, and I want to be a part of equipping them to do so. I want to see revival come to this world again, and will do anything and everything I can for God to bring His Kingdom.

At Cape Town United one Friday night (a city wide youth gathering), the speaker spoke about how God is looking for people who are willing to say ‘yes’ to God, trusting that He has the ‘how’ figured out. That it my heart’s cry.

I know I’m going on some pretty sweet adventures with God, and I am so willing to go anywhere He leads. Regardless of any ‘cost’ to myself, cause He gave it all for me already. I want to see “His Kingdom come and will be done on the earth as it is in heaven”, through loving God passionately and loving others radically. All of this, so that the Lamb may receive the reward for His suffering. I don’t want my will, but God’s to be done – whatever that looks like, that He would have His way.

A few months ago, a group of young people gathered in Hawaii for what they called the school of the Circuit Riders. See this link for the promo video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdzPAhKQPgI. Every time I watch it, my heart starts beating with excitement – cause that is my heart! I don’t know what it will look like, but I’m so willing to trust God and find out! ‘I will go, send me!’

It is always such a blessing knowing I have family and friends praying for me and supporting me while I’m away. Pinelands Baptist is my family and community, and has a special place in my heart.

I booked my flights using frequent flyer miles, and the missions committee have set aside an amount to contribute towards the school costs. I have been working and tutoring to make money for this school too. A couple of weeks before I was due to leave, I was chatting to God about stuff, and told Him that I don’t want to try to say the right thing to try to manipulate Him to provide the money. I don’t need to do that, cause He’s a loving Father who is my provider, and I can trust Him. So I told Him, I need money. That’s it. I’m doing what I can. It’s in Your hands to do the rest. The next day, I find out that someone offered to pay the rest of my expenses. Yeah, I was in a mild state of shock, awe and delight! Without me even having to ask people directly, God prompted and provided.

The thing I need most at the moment, is prayer. It is SO incredibly powerful! Stuff changes and moves when we pray. I don’t understand fully how or why, but it does. So heck, I’ll pray! I won’t let the one or two times when things don’t happen how I expect deter me from praying and missing out on the millions of other times when God just shows up!

Here’s what you can be praying for:

The leadership of the school and base and the students – for an openness, willingness and courage to surrender, learn, struggle, grow and dream with God.

A continued outpouring of God’s love and Spirit.

Revival and awakening in the church and all the earth.

Please be praying for these things – not just here in Denver, but for all people, all over the world. 

Thank you all SO much for all your support, encouragement and interest in my life. God is doing some big things, and I am so excited to be involved in what He is doing internationally at the moment.

In faith, hope and love,

Janine

battle cry...

Regina Spektor's song 'The Call' has a very special place in my heart, and always seems to come up at times like this - when I'm moving (again) and saying 'goodbye'.

It started out as a feeling
Which then grew into a hope
Which then turned into a quiet thought
Which then turned into a quiet word
And then that word grew louder and louder
'Til it was a battle cry
I'll come back
When you call me
No need to say goodbye 

Just because everything's changing
Doesn't mean it's never
Been this way before
All you can do is try to know
Who your friends are
As you head off to the war
Pick a star on the dark horizon
And follow the light
You'll come back
When it's over
No need to say good bye 

Now we're back to the beginning
It's just a feeling and no one knows yet
But just because they can't feel it too
Doesn't mean that you have to forget
Let your memories grow stronger and stronger
'Til they're before your eyes
You'll come back
When they call you
No need to say good bye

I just listened to this song about 5 times, and the first verse really struck me. With me leaving, and stepping out into what God is calling me to, it took on a new meaning. It all did start out as a feeling, then it became a hope, then a thought, then a word, which grew louder and louder, and now it's my battle cry.

I don't know what will happen after this, but I will come back, 'cause this is home. I like that there is no need to say goodbye. It's a 'see you later', which is more hopeful and exciting.

Everything is changing, but it has happened before. All I do need to do is hold onto my friends, and Jesus (my star and hope on the dark horizon). And just 'cause not everyone understands my passion, doesn't mean I should ignore it, but rather embrace it and let it fuel me.

So here's to me heading off to war, following my Jesus - full of the passion and battle cry that have been building in my heart. I am a warrior princess, cloaked in authority and power through His anointing and Spirit.

a day away with God...

Our church, Pinelands Baptist, has been running an Alpha course on Wednesday evenings, which I have been privileged to help facilitate. It has been a great time for all of us to go deeper in our faith - even if that is in the beginning stages of questioning and discovering.

Yesterday, we went away as a group to Kleinmond for a 'Holy Spirit day away'. On some Alpha courses, this is a whole weekend away, but since many of our participants have families, this wasn't possible, so we did our own day-long version. So much prayer and preparation went into this weekend, and with such God-results!

The drive up was beautiful - mist covered the ground, and the sun peeped over the mountain, visible through the mist. God is so creative!

Craig co-lead the day, mixing the DVD teachings with his own, on who the Holy Spirit is, what He does and how to be filled with the Holy Spirit, followed by a time to put this all into practice. It was wonderful hearing people's questions, confusions, doubts and understanding all coming out and being challenged. We had some discussion time in smaller groups, which again was fascinating! Over lunch, I got to hear two ladies, both who started this course not knowing Jesus personally, saying how glad they are that they have done this course and how many of their questions have been answered. Praise God! During the practical time, we invited the Holy Spirit to come, and prayed for each other to receive a fresh filling of Him. It was so beautiful to watch as each person experienced God in their own unique ways, as God met them where they were at and loved them. There was tears, laughter, peace, joy, freedom, love, passion and healing being poured out all over that place!

God is doing such amazing things all over the world! Amazing is too small a word... It doesn't wrap up how crazy or huge He is!

On the way back, we took the coastal route, which reminded me again that Cape Town really is one of the most beautiful places in the world, and that it will always have a special place in my heart, no matter where in the world I am.

During that time, I had this weird feeling growing in my stomach - a nervous excitement is probably the closest I could come to describing it. I wanted it to go away, 'cause it was weird, but at the same time, I didn't want it too. I asked God what it was, and He said it's for the things to come - what He is about to do, that will far exceed anything we could ever hope or imagine!

through a cup of coffee...

Flip man, I just love helping and loving people! Tonight's sermon was on 'evangelism'. I don't like that term, cause it's too Christianesey. It's not some spiritual thing - it's just being a friend to others, and telling them about your best Friend who happens to also want to be their Friend too :) It's all about love.

They offered to pray for people after the service if you wanted, to do with the whole 'evangelism' and going out and telling others about our Jesus. So I was just chilling with God, but got that annoying feeling when God's like 'hey, that's you'. Silly me tried to reason out of going up, 'cause I've been prayed for before for this kinda thing, so I don't really need to again. Sure sign it's God when you start to reason yourself out of it. Haha. After this happening a lot, I've gotten used to recognising this, so I was like, really God? And He, in His wonderful humour, said 'Just get your butt up there and get prayed for.' So I did, and realised that it was about the obedience, and that if I say I will go for God, I need to start now. It was awesome - such peace and God saying 'See, not so bad? You silly, lovely girl'.

After church, we headed over to Spur (local burger restaurant), but found it closed, so went to Mc Donalds instead. We walked past two guys on the way in who greeted us, so I greeted them back, asked how they were and they commented on how cold it was. Small talk. We went inside, and I was like - what the heck, let's buy them coffee. So I did. Went outside to give it to them, and almost walked away at that, but stayed and talked to them.

It was such a blessing to see their immense gratitude for a cup of coffee. They asked my name, and told me 'God bless you', when I was the one trying to bless them. Nice one God! I asked their names, and what they do. Peter and Andile wash cars in the parking lot outside the shopping center, but because it was raining today, they hadn't made enough money to buy bread for their family. They were waiting there in the cold, hoping for someone to buy them bread, so they could finally go home to their families. How could I not buy them bread too? Man, were they grateful! Peter said that he was amazed by how kind I was - that there aren't many people who will stop and talk to them, and that I offered without them having to ask. He said He would pray for me before he goes to bed tonight and thank God for me. Flip man! How challenging! So I offered to pray for them, which they received so gladly.

Ended up finding out that Peter had been to Pinelands Baptist Church once before, but everyone had given him weird looks, like wondering why a beggar was there, and that it had hurt him. That made me so sad - and ashamed to represent that, but honoured to get to improve his opinion. He commented on how many Christians believe in their head, but not in their heart and with their lives - so true! He told me that doesn't go to church at the moment, but that he still read his Bible, and wanted to help other people in his situation to learn to rely on God like he does, maybe even preach in a church one day!

It was such a beautiful encounter - just meeting a simple need of hot coffee on a warm night, and listening to their story. It was no inconvenience to me really at all - just a little bit of my time. But there is no place I would rather be when Jesus returns, than loving and helping people. It was such a blessing to me, and I'm sure to Peter and Andile too. Praise God for His extravagant grace and love that is so infectious, and that will permeate culture, life and the entire earth!

about the essence of God...

So I've been thinking about that Holy Spirit thing a lot :) I quite like that part of the trinity. Not really sure whether to call 'it' a Him or a Her, cause the Hebrew form is feminine, but I tend to default to to masculine when it comes to God.

Anyways, when watching 'Furious Love' the other week (which I highly recommend, cause it blew my mind), one of the guys said something about 'Holy' being God's first name - the name for every day use, the one people call you by. Your surname is for formal things, but is also the part that belongs to you (the speaker put it much more elegantly, but that will suffice). We call Him 'Holy', because that is who He is.

I then got to thinking about the Spirit part... It seems kinda abstract, which it is, but then I remembered that we also use that term to describe the essence of something. 'There was such a spirit of love in that place' or 'they have a gentle spirit' - it describes the essence of a thing. So the Spirit of God is the essence of who God is: Holy Spirit.

God is holy. It's that word that is used to describe the other-ness of God. We can't really describe it with our little words and vocabulary, but it's what sums it all up, once all our words are gone. God is love, just, gentle, caring, comforting, powerful, mighty etc etc... and holy. In Revelation 4:8, those who are in His presence day and night continually cry out 'holy holy holy is the LORD God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come'. If you were in the presence of GOD... woah! I'm not even sure I'd find the words to say anything at all! But once that had passed, to try and express and praise who God is - that's when 'Holy' is the only word that you can repeat, because it sums up God's God-ness, His other-ness. His essence.

Then it hit me that we have this Holy Spirit living inside of us! Flip that sent me on a mini tailspin just thinking about the enormity of that! We - sinful, miniature, scummish, little humans - have the Spirit of the living God in us. The essence of who God is, rests upon us, dwells within us, fills and empowers us... FLIP!! Now if that doesn't shake something inside of you, I don't know what will. I am so ridiculously humbled, awed, blessed and relieved all at once. I have the essence of God - His holiness, His Holy Spirit - dwelling in me, helping, empowering, teaching, guiding, counselling, comforting me... So Jesus is God made visible - God with us, and the Holy Spirit is God in us. Yeah, I think that's pretty cool, to say the very least :)

I'm not sure how to end this post, since it's one of those stare-into-the-humungousness-of-God-and-realise-how-freaking-small-I-am-and-how-great-He-is moments. Honestly, the only thing I can think to do is try to express my gratitude to this immense, Holy God. He is making me into His likeness - making me like Him, and He has placed the essence of who He is in me, to help me to do the seemingly impossible - change.

a little bit of artsy...

I did art classes on a Tuesday afternoon all the way through junior school. I did art in grade 8 and 9 because I had to. I never thought I was much good, and I never really had much time to put in to trying many new things or styles. I was too much of a perfectionist and too scared to really try anything, because I was scared it wouldn't be good enough or as good as everyone else. So I never really did much with art.

Until this year... One afternoon, I was super emotional and frustrated, so I dug out some canvases, old paint and really old brushes, and painted. It wasn't bad for a first attempt on canvas, but nothing particularly amazing. It was a start.

First canvas paintings: 16 April 2011

27 May 2011

After that, I felt like I could actually try this whole art thing. What the heck, let's just give it a try. So I went and bought myself a little canvas, and painted a tree type thing, and did some other random things on pieces of cardboard I had around.

For the kids holiday club run at our church in Pinelands (PBC), the theme was Superheroes, so we decorated the walls with paintings of superheroes etc. I went along to help, and 4 hours later, I had painted this life-size Spider-man, much to my own surprise. I didn't think I'd actually be able to, but I did.

17 June 2011

For my birthday, I was given some proper paintbrushes, more paint and some canvases. Here's what I did with them:

21 July 2011

3 August 2011

6 August 2011

So I have very much surprised myself in what I can do when I just give it a try. I love the transition from abstract, to more impressionistic, to more realistic. It has been so much fun just sitting down, and painting, and seeing what turns out. It is a wonderful way to express myself, and create. After all, I am made in the image of the Creator God :)

matters of the heart...

One of the annoying things with this lifestyle of faith that I have chosen, is that it hurts. I knew it would. And I know that God is and always will be enough. But there are still moments when my heart aches. All I can do in those moments is run to my Dad, bury my face in His chest and know that He holds me and loves me.

In the last year and a half, I have moved almost 20 times. It's really hard having to be uprooted from where you are - the comfort and familiarity, the support system, friendships, love and the known. It's hard to come into a new place and learn to find and create those things again. It's hard to have to uproot from that again - often right after you've established some sense of 'home'.

As you can guess, the idea of 'home' has changed a lot for me. That saying 'home is where the heart is', has never been more meaningful. But what if a little bit of my heart is in each of those places, with all the people I love all over the world? Simply, my heart is in God, and God is everywhere, so my heart can then be everywhere too. Not sure if that makes sense to you, but it does to me. Instead of feeling my my heart is fracturing into a million pieces, it somehow expands into a stretchy bubble of God-love that can surpass distance so easily.

That makes it a little bit easier, but being a bit of a quality time person, not being able to really spend time with people kinda sucks. Everyone always says they'll keep in contact, but it just doesn't always happen. Life carries on. I have to realise that some friends are just for a season. Another thing I struggle with is that if I'm just going to uproot again, then what's the point in settling, investing and connecting? Surely if I don't, I'll save myself the pain of having to leave and say goodbye? Yes, but I'll also rob myself of the amazing friendships and memories that I could have had. As a friend of mine once put it, you need to learn to keep your heart where your feet are. To invest where you are, now. Yes, dream, hope and plan for the future, but it is so uncertain. The past is gone. Now is all you really have. So make the most of it.

With all that said, I can feel that uprooting process starting. It's 6 weeks until I'll be in Denver, starting the School  of Ministry Development (SOMD) with YWAM Denver. I am extremely excited, because this school has been on my heart since I did my DTS at the beginning of last year. But every time I was deciding about what to do next and SOMD came up, God always said 'not yet...'. During my time at home this year, I have had to really look at why I want to do this school, and weigh up all the options. It's been flip hard, but I now know that this is what is next for me.

Sure I still don't know what will happen afterwards, but God is ridiculously faithful, good and loving, and He is leading me towards a glorious destiny in Him :) I like to plan things and have my ducks in a row, so obviously, as part of me having to learn to trust Him, He is not letting me in on much more than the next step. This is a tad frustrating, but I know it's so good. After all, I'd probably freak out if I knew what it was that me and Him are going to do together!

Another thing about this whole uprooting thing, is that I'm pretty much alone in it. Yes I have and will meet amazing people wherever I go, but the only constant One will be God. Yes, I long for the day when I have a husband to go and do all this stuff with - someone to share this adventure with. It would make the uprooting process less painful, knowing one person would be with me still. As much as I look forward to that, I am also trusting God with all my heart, because He knows what He's doing there too. And I know that it will be SO worth the wait!

I have also been blessed to be able to worship with United Pursuit twice this last week, which was such a blessing having them here in Cape Town. One of their songs that forever gets me goes like this:

I lean not on my own understanding;
my life is in the Hands of the Maker of heaven
I give it all to You, God,
trusting that You'll make something beautiful out of me
I will climb this mountain with my hands wide open
There's nothing I hold onto

 One of my other favourites is written from God to me:

come away with Me
come away
it's never to late
it's never to late
it's not to late for you 

I have a plan for you
I have a plan
it's gonna be wild
it's gonna be great
it's gonna be full of Me 

so open up your heart and let Me in

How great is our God, that He is mindful of me! He knows my name, and loves me more than I could ever know

anticipation for what is to come...

I'm sure you've felt it - the sense that something is coming... We are at the brink of something huge... the point of no return.

A time is coming and is almost upon when finally there will be no half heartedness and people will stand up and be counted for what they believe. I will be one of them. I don't care what it costs, because He gave it all already. Any 'sacrifice' is nothing compared to what He has given. I do this all so that He may receive the reward for His suffering.

I will follow Him wherever He goes, wherever He leads I will follow. I will be obedient. I will go against what everyone else thinks should be and what is 'normal'. I don't want normal; I just want Jesus! I don't care what happens to me, because I know my Jesus, and He knows me. I will live recklessly abandoned for my God, because of who He is and who He has called me to be. I will embrace Him and truly live. Where, for how long and who with, I don't know, but I know that it will all be for His glory. Cause at the end of the day, this life is meaningless if it isn't with, for and about Him. He is everything.

There's a movement happening all over the planet - revival is coming. There is resistance, but like the refining fire that separates gold, only the real stuff will remain. I want to be a part of what is about to happen. I don't want to just hear about it and wish I could have seen it and been part of it. I don't want to come to the end of this life with regrets for not having risked more. Most people on their dying beds don't wish they'd risked less or lived safer - they wish they'd risked more and really lived.

I'm one of those crazy people who say that for me to live is all about God, and to die is even better because then I get to see Him face to face. This is my life, and I will live it for Him.

This video connected with me so powerfully and is my heart's cry. This is what is coming. This is the movement of people who will change the world. Will you be one of them?

God is an IT junkie too...

So I still haven't gotten around to writing about the other awesome week that I spent in Mthatha... I will soon, but I had to share what may seem small to some, but awesome to others about what God did this afternoon.

For my birthday last year, I had just arrived back in Denver to do my second school with YWAM - School of Biblical Foundations (SBF), so I got one present from home: a 750G external hard drive. It was beautiful. When I went to Brazil at the end of the year, I took it with me and man am I glad I did! We had some good movie watching sessions :) Anyway, but on that trip, it got dropped and made a ticking sound when you plugged it in (never a good sign) and needless to say, didn't work.

I took it home with me, and my dad took it in, saying that it didn't work. They said they couldn't fix it, and didn't have any 750G's in stock, so they gave me a 1 terabyte. Yes, now THAT was beautiful... Unfortunately, I lost all my files. Movies, school projects (most importantly all my programs I'd written - literally months, if not years of work), and photos from way back when and all through YWAM etc. Yeah, I was a little upset, but God has been taking me through a time of letting go of a lot of my physical belongings, so I wasn't distraught.

So when I plugged my 1T in today and it popped up with write errors saying that all the data was lost, I freaked out just a little bit. One minute, all the files were there, the next - nothing but empty folders. It wasn't that I'd lose all my movies or music - it was the photos. It really does suck trying to save them off of Facebook, and the quality isn't that great. So I unplugged my hard drive, and prayed over it... Plugged it in again, let it do it's scans etc, and BOOM - all my stuff was there and working perfectly! Yeah, I think God must be a bit of an IT junkie too... and He's awesome and He thinks I'm rad too :)

That may seem like the smallest thing, but it was just super amazing to have God come through. Maybe the hard drive would have been fine. Maybe I would have actually lost everything (again). All I know is that I asked God for help, and He came through, and it was awesome! He is so faithful and loving - He blows my mind daily!

about holiday club 2011...

Abigail, me and Grace

Alright, so let's start with holiday club... I helped run it from June 26 - July 1 at my church. It was a great time! I've helped run it in previous years, actually probably the last 4 or 5 years, but never to this extent before. The first couple of times, I was the admin girl who organised registration, did data capturing and took photos occasionally. I was the scared little teenager who was petrified of children. Strange, I know, but I had no idea how to relate to them, and they scared me! I'd run away from a situation where I'd need to interact with anyone more than 2 years younger than me. Maybe it's cause I'm the youngest of 3. My mom says that when I was little, she ran a Bible study at our house, and all the other young kids would come and play with all my toys, which apparently made me mad. Scarred child. Whatever the reason, I avoided children like the plague.

Last year, I stepped out a bit and volunteered to help out with the grade 6-7 age group. I lead the small group time and even told the story/lesson for the day! A big thing for me at that time, cause I was also petrified of speaking in front of people - like freak out, nauseous scared.

The awesome thing about this year, is that I was doing almost everything I could. I was leading worship (something else I would have rather died than do previously - I refused to sing or play piano in front of people, and the idea of leading scared me too), telling the story with confidence, teaching the memory verse, leading a small group, and leading the afternoon prayer meetings with the leaders. Yeah, big change! Reason: only Jesus.

One of the most amazing thing for me, was that I hardly even saw any of the other leaders because I was so engaged with the kids. It was easy for me to get down on their level and love them, have fun with them and be part of their lives. And I enjoyed it! Sometimes during the day, I would have a 'Woah, I'm actually doing this and loving it! Yay God!' It was awesome!

I wish I could have blogged each day, but I was so exhausted that I didn't get a chance, and I also ended up losing my voice/ finding my man voice during the week. Too much screaming and singing :) But it was SO worth it! And besides, my man voice is super sexy! The not so fun part was having to lead worship and have my voice break like a pre-teen boy. Luckily, I had two amazing singer/guitarists who backed me up amazingly!

I found it so interesting to see how different people reacted to the kids - many of the younger leaders who hadn't lead before were much more observers/baby sitter type mentality, whereas I found myself having fun with the kids in what they were doing, being their friend and not just watching them. It also fascinated me how kids need to be corrected and given an alternative in love, not just shouted at and told 'no'.

On the Monday evening, we showed the 'Jesus Freaks' movie to the leaders. Wow, it gets me every time. I got to share a bit of my experience at YWAM, and had many of them asking questions about it and getting pumped to serve Jesus.

We also had a prayer and worship time on Tuesday night for the leaders - a time of refreshment and refilling. We can only give out of what we have, so we need to be filled to overflowing to give and not run dry - else we're giving people our leftovers. We want to be giving them the good stuff and teaching them how to receive His love in abundance too! It was such a beautiful time in His presence. One thing I felt so strongly was that we can know that God loves us. That's easy. The hard part is actually letting Him love us. So often we think we're unworthy of His love. We know He loves us, but we don't let Him love us. And it's only once we let Him love us that we can really love others.

Me and some of the kids

It was adorable to have those few kids who'd keep you a seat and always want to come and sit on your lap, hold your hand and be on your team in the games. One of the most precious moments was when this one little boy was hugging me and sighed saying 'I love you'. One of the other girls told me I was her favourite leader. One funny moment was when the grade 4 girls in my small group said that I was 'like, a million years old!'. It was so awesome to see how much fun the kids were having, and hearing them say how they wished it would go on for longer, not just a week. It amazed me how much love these kids needed and wanted. You give them a little bit of love, and they just latch onto it, craving more. The beautiful thing is that God IS love, and we were there to love them with Him, so it was Him they were latching onto. My prayer is that they will continue to realise this, and continue to crave and seek Him all of their lives.

As one of the older leaders (most of them were in early high school), I got to not just be an example to the kids, but to the leaders as well. What an amazing privilege! Many of the girls who were in my small group last year (in grade 7 at the time) were now leaders this year (in grade 8). That blessed my heart so much! It was so amazing to watch all of them grow just in one week, and to see Jesus shining out of them.

On Thursday, we 'presented the Gospel' to the kids. I still don't really like that phrase, but I'm too tired right now to think of a more accurate one. Some of the kids were crying as Justine (a particularly awesome friend of mine), told them about what Jesus did for us when He died on the cross and what it means for us. I think about 30 kids said that they wanted to know more about Jesus and made a decision to follow Him, which is so amazing!

My small group of grade 4 girls were a bit frustrating. They had a problem with staying on topic, and kept diverting back to their pets. On Thursday though, I actually got them to talk seriously, and we got onto the topic of how the heck do you hear God?? So I taught them something we call 'listening prayer' where you ask God to give you a word, picture, or word of encouragement for the person in the middle. I also got to explain some other things like how the Bible was written etc, and about creation a bit, and other interesting conversations that I didn't expect to have until I had kids one day :)

So all in all, it was one amazing week! I got to love people, have fun, encourage others, teach, lead, be an example and worship Jesus - I think I'd like to do this forever! Oh wait, that's the point :) How exciting! It was so amazing to love these kids with His love, and make a lasting impact in their lives. They're at such a beautiful, vulnerable stage where they need so much love, and only God's love is enough. I'm praying that what the kids and leaders learnt during that week will stick with them all their lives and that His love will cover them and protect them from the lies of the enemy and this world.

The super grade 3-5 leaders

before 'Heroes' holiday club...

Alright, so these next two weeks are gonna be pretty hectic for me, but let's start with this week:
We're running a kids holiday Bible club (HBC) at church this week, running for all the grade 1-7 kids.. The theme is 'Heroes', so we're looking at how God is our ultimate Hero, and then also other heroes like Joshua and David, Jesus, and how we also get to be heroes with the armour of God. We are training up heroes in the faith - the next generation that will be one who seeks God's face. What a privilege!

So on the practical side, I'm leading the music worship times, I'm one of the leaders in the grade 3-5 section where I will be doing some of the story telling, memory verse teaching and leading a small group. Yeah, I'll be pretty busy! So please be praying for me with all of this.

It's such an honour to be able to partner with God in all He's wanting to and going to do in the lives of the kids of our community here in Pinelands. To be able to build into a kid's life is one of the most powerful things, because they are so malleable - most people who will come to know and love Jesus meet Him before they're 14.

We also have a fairly young group of leaders, with many grade 8 and 9 leaders, so I'm one of the older ones, and as a result, I'm not only going to be an example to and discipling the kids, but also to the other leaders, which is also such a great opportunity! Tomorrow night, we're going to watch the 'Jesus Freaks' movie with the leaders, so be praying and get excited for what God is going to do!

Each day starts at 8am, so I'm going to have to wake up before the sun for the first time in a while! But I really am SO excited for all God is going to do in and through us! After all, this is all for Him, and in His strength, power and anointing! My prayer for this week is that it wouldn't be remembered as 'fun', but as a time when we encountered God and our lives where irrevocably changed!

let Your glory come down...

These are the lyrics of a song by Jason Upton, that is my heart's cry for the church worldwide:

Father, listen to our earnest prayer
Jesus prayed it years ago
That the glory You had given Him
We would somehow come to know
So make us one according to Your plan
As in heaven it will be
Fill us with the truth and righteousness
You desire the world to see

Let Your glory and honor
Fall on our face
Holy Father
Rest in this place

The church is sick and need of God alone
And people we must seek His face
If we turn from all our unrighteousness
He’ll forgive our evil ways
So may the eyes of God be on us here
Lord, revive us by Your grace
Holy Spirit be forever near
Saturate us in this place

Let Your glory and honor
Fall on our face
Holy Father
Rest in this place

Let the fire fall
Let the wind blow
Let the glory come down

God please help us to have the right heart focus - that we wouldn't try to bring you stuff or do things for you out of  legalism, obligation or duty, but that it would flow out of deep passionate love for You. Correct our hearts so that we are longing for You, not just what You can do - that we would seek Your face, not just Your hand. Thank You that You do act, but that that wouldn't be our focus; that knowing You intimately would be our goal, and from that, everything else would flow. When we see nothing but Your face, every thing else falls into it's proper place.

Let us be dissatisfied and desperate so that we will seek You without ceasing and never give up hope! Capture our heats again and amaze us with who You are! Help us to recognize our hunger and thirst, which can only be satisfied by You, so that we will come to You alone to be filled.

Bring revival in every heart - awaken us, teach us to sing again! Rain down Your fire, wind and rain of the Spirit. More LORD!

late night ramblings...

So it's one of those nights where it's 1.12am, and I don't want to and/or can't go to sleep. My mind is in a weird place of wanting to think, but not really being able to. Strangely enough, it's these times when God often speaks in the weirdest and most wonderful ways. Maybe because my brain isn't functioning enough to over-think stuff (something I do a lot, unfortunately), or because it's quiet and I've slowed myself down enough to just be and not worry about anything.

The next thing on my agenda is sleep. So nothing stressful, no planning required. Sitting in my pj's, teeth brushed, heater on, sitting on my bed. The frogs are croaking outside and there's the gentle dripping on rain off the roof. Today was just one of those days where it rained a whole heck of a lot. It was cold-ish too. Denver re-defined my definition of 'cold', but for Cape Town, it was pretty cold. No central heating, so I stayed in bed with my heater on most the day.

The last couple of weeks have been hard-ish. Not particularly busy or demanding in the 'normal' way, but I've really had to choose a lot and make a lot of decisions. Now decision making hasn't been my strongest suit ever. I'm working on it though - deciding to get better at it (see, I'm making progress already!). Every day we make a million decisions. Many are subconscious or no-brainers really - like brushing your teeth or putting on shoes (well, for some...). Those decisions we make without a second thought really. In the average person's day, they make decisions about how to manage their time based off of how much they need to do etc. This is a whole lot easier when you're busy than deciding what to do with your time when you're not. Hear me out: when you're busy, stuff has to get done, so you can't mull it around in your head much - it just has to happen, and fast! When you're not busy, there is so much time to do all the stuff that doesn't really need to happen any time soon, that you end up not doing anything really. This is great for a time, but after a while, it gets a little frustrating! This is where indecisiveness is a B with a big itch!

So I haven't had a whole lot that I really NEED to get done, so I'm in the second category of prioritizing time when you have complete control over pretty much every second. Great! - yes and no. Freedom, yes, but with that comes great responsibility. 'Intentional' is the word that has been stamped across my life recently. I've really had to be intentional with my time. I get to decide to stay in bed all day and watch movies, or to read book after book, or go for a walk or a drive (yes, it is rather fun to finally be able to do that now!). The thing with this, is that I get to choose how much I get out of each day. Yeah, seems great, but good intentions don't get you very far unfortunately.

Where am I going with this? I have no idea really. It was just on my mind, so I typed it down. Probably as a reminder to me to get my act together again. I am responsible for my own growth. I need to feed myself. I'm not a baby anymore and don't need to be spoon-fed. Yeah that's easier, but I need to grow up. I need to go out and find my own food, prepare it, chew it and swallow it, or spit it out if it isn't good. In case you didn't get it, but I'm talking about spiritual food, not soup and macaroni. Yes, God changes our lives, but He wants to partner WITH us, not continuously nurse us. He meets us where we're at, but we're not meant to stay there.

This life on earth is in many ways a physical representation of life in the Spirit. Babies grow up; we're meant to spiritually too. We're meant to mature in our faith, to grow. We are responsible for our own health. God can heal us, but we do need to do our part too - it is a partnership after all. God will do what only God can do, but we need to do what only we can do. We need to choose it. Unfortunately -or fortunately- 'choosing it' isn't just a passive choice. It's active and requires a whole heck of a lot more than just going 'ok, I'm in'. We need to 'choose it' every moment of every day. We need to make the effort to get to know this remarkable God who made us and loves us so deeply.

This line in a song has been haunting me recently:

We have only heard the faintest whispers of how great You are

 How beautiful is that? And how incredible! Anything you think you know about God - no matter how grand, huge or unfathomable they are - God is always so much bigger. That's the thing with an infinite God! We will never fully understand Him until the day we see Him face to Face - and oh how I long for that day!

So that's a nibble of what's going on in my head. May God continue to call you deeper, and may you respond to His call to seek Him with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. You will find Him - He has hidden Himself for us to find! What a marvelous God! Please remove the scales from our eyes so that we can see more and more of who You are. Keep our longing desire for you burning so that we do not give up. Thank You that You give us the desire and the power to do what pleases You! Let my life bring glory and honour to You in everything.

believing who God says He is...

Ok, let's see what I can manage to make sense of out of what's whizzing around in my brain at the moment...

So I'm doing a Bible study by Beth Moore on 'Believing God'. One of the things she focuses on right away is that believing God isn't a once off thing: it's a 'present active participle' - its continuously believing. This is faith - to continuously believe. It's a lifestyle of believing because God is.

Throughout the study, we look at 5 areas of faith: believing God is who He says He is, that He can do what He says He can do, that I am who He says I am, that I can do all things through Christ, and that the Word is alive and active in me. Woah! Take a bit of time, and just think about what those simple statements really mean... How often do we say we believe in God, but do we actually believe God in all those areas - believe what He says? After all, He is truth - He doesn't know how to lie!

When I think about it this way, it's no surprise to me that the church is thought of as hypocritical and why there are so many sleeping 'Christians' out there - because we've made the mistake that we just need to believe God exists, and not believe Him in His entirety and all that He says at truth. It's a bit of a mind job!

So we're only in the second week of teaching, but 3 weeks into the study - we take 2 weeks to do one week of teaching. Yes, that's how intense it is. This week is focused on the first principle: believing God is who He says He is. As I've had that going around in my subconscious, I've realised how much everything is affected by this. What you believe about God is the most important thing about you, because it changes everything. Not who you say He is, but who you actually believe Him to be deep inside, because you'll show this by how you live. I think that if we actually saw God in His entirety and perfection, this world would be such a different place! Imagine your average church worship service - a couple of people singing with their hands raises, but many people standing still in God's presence. If we actually were in the throne room of God and saw Him.... I don't think we'd be standing! I have no idea what we'd be doing, but I highly doubt it would be that.

Another thing I've found interesting is fear: we are afraid when we have misplaced our faith. Fear counteracts faith. So often we're scared of what will happen with our future and of letting go of stuff and trusting God - if you really look at why, we basically don't trust God. We don't believe God can handle it. Why? Because we don't believe that God is who He says He is.

That's just one example, but almost any issue or doubt or anything comes down to this. We don't really believe that God is who He says He is. It's absurd, because God doesn't lie. So why wouldn't He be who He says He is? I think we have a complex of always needing to be right, so when there is a conflict in what we believe and what is, we think that what is must be wrong, instead of examining ourselves. We need to challenge our faith - to figure out why we believe what we believe. After all, faith unchallenged is hardly faith at all, because faith is meant to grow, and how can it grow unless it is challenged and correctly rooted?

How similar is your view of God (what you really believe deep inside that is shown by how you live, not just what you say you believe) to who He says that He is in His Word?

God clearly says who He is throughout Scripture and in what He does around us every day. Creation declares His majesty and greatness - if we don't praise Him, the rocks will cry out. If you manage to believe that He created this world - that He spoke all of this into being out of nothing - then anything else really isn't all that hard for Him to do either. Sometimes we make the mistake of thinking that He was created for us - to do our bidding, to bless us and to take care of our loved ones; but we were made by and for Him - to do His bidding, to bless Him and to take care of His loved ones.

Messing with your mind a bit? I know my mind is in a bit of turmoil, as I examine my beliefs, why I believe them, where that idea came from, and whether it is Biblical - whether God is actually like that, or if I have been trying to make my own god - an image of god that fits what I think he should be like. Basically an idol. How hectic is that?? So maybe worshiping a god that we create or manipulate into how we think he should be or act is actually worshiping an idol who isn't God at all. Woah!

Some of these thoughts are things I'm still grappling with, so take it to God and ask Him to explain the truth to you. He says so many times in His Word that He will do this:

"Ask me and I will tell you remarkable secrets you do not know about things to come." Jeremiah 33:3

"Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you." Matt 7:7

"If you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me" Jeremiah 29:13

Many of those verses deal with seeking and finding God, but God is Himself Truth (John 14:6 "I am the Way, the Truth and the Life").

My prayer is that you wouldn't be comfortable to just go with how things are, but that you'd challenge yourself and allow God to point out areas of unbelief in your life or where you have skewed perceptions of God. Take courage and allow God to align your view of who He is to the truth of who He says He is. God, please take the junk out of our eyes and hearts and minds, so that we can see You clearly. I want to see You as You are, with nothing of my own  ideas. I want to believe the Truth and to believe You to the fullest extent that I can. I believe, God, help my unbelief.

"I am the LORD and there is no other. I publicly proclaim bold promises. I do not whisper obscurities in some dark corner. I would not have told My people to seek Me if I could not be found. I, the LORD, speak only what is true and declare only what is right" (Isaiah 45:19)