Miracles Build Faith

Miracles Happen.

And I think they are a little more logistically close or even plain than you might think. Still magical though. You see miracles are impossible to one person but carried out through someone else ordinary. 

I gave away ALL of my money in faith that God asked me to--whether He really did is not 100% verifiable, but most of what God speaks to us can be questioned in our minds. I was then set on grounds that would call for a extreme and new level of faith in the shape of TRUST. 

A couple days ago God pointed out (spoke) how self-reliant I am and that it goes beyond feminist independence or middle-child proximal separation. I have yet to learn of the experience that triggered it or just the underlying reason I became this way. But I also have a good idea that God might have planted that seed to keep me from becoming too much like the ones He was trying to set me apart from. 

Prior to dedicating all of my money to God and whichever purposes He prompted--$3000 for a student's fees, $10 for a fundraiser raffle, $100 to a sports organization and some miscellaneous I am still looking to give away--I was planning on a couple of things that were affordable. Primarily, I wanted to buy three copies of this revolutionary Bible formatted like a play or movie script, Sourceview Bible (www.sourceviewbible.com). They each have different purposes but they were to be gifts to friends back home and I needed them by May 17th, 2012 before 9:30am. 

God was bringing me to a place where I would have to ask for the things I want and need. It is such a childlike place to be and that is hard for me. I would have to make known to my friends around me that I did not have money, that "I don't have a budget for that" and that I would even have to just ask "Can I have this?" 

I did not want to drop all my practical desires like the copies of the Bible or buying my sister a lei for her college graduation that actually came from Hawaii! I know that God is practical, radical, faithful, and that He hears and sees me. So of course, these were not outlandish requests. But, God really likes outlandish requests, too. 

I asked our school founder during an assignment of taking photos for branding and advertising of these Bibles and cried. Of course I cried. I had to tell her I had no way of providing for myself the things I wanted but that I did not believe I should stop wanting them. She said she would pass down my story and request to the developer of the Bible (who of course, is on campus--that's how YWAM works, we are neighbors to those producing revolutionary and world-changing products/ways/norms...). 

Yesterday afternoon, May 16th, I asked her if she had passed along my request and she had not; David Hamilton the developer had only been on base for two days before flying to another country for a couple months (something else that happens to YWAMers--up and leave randomly and frequently for spurts of time to anywhere in the world). 

She then said, "We need a miracle then, don't we?" Indeed we did. She said to be praying about it and hope that perhaps someone drops the amount of money I needed for the Bibles. I continued my on way through the night doing what I had going on in my day but keeping half my attention on where the Bibles or money could come from, how God might work through this person, this opportunity, etc. My brain had taken over my posture of worship and praise and had completely ruled out the space for trust. 

I had become so focused on how God would work and the place or way He would answer my prayer. My friend Deb prayed that night before I went to bed that as I was choosing to trust in Jesus that I would….I do not understand how I can miss the fact that even though I was trying to devise God's miracle that I was still actually trusting Him. The choice alone was trust; she saw that in me. Do not get me wrong, I await that kind of trust that does not have my hands and mind trying to understand something that has not yet come to pass. 

So I wake up, already packed and ready to leave campus. I had a one-on-one meeting with a team leader to just talk about the week so I told her about all these things. She encouraged me to just give it back to God, to stop striving and planning--man this has become such a theme!

I had an hour of intercessory prayer to participate in and I thought for a fleeting moment that I would opt out to go lay before the Lord, but then I realized I would be continuing my own control via engagement and planning and pleading and would likely not actually let it out of my hands. 

So I used the 15 minutes of earliness to lay it down before the Lord and I cannot even tell you what I prayed--funny how that works, hey. I was still sitting down, in the front of the prayer room with most of my photogenX school behind preparing their hearts also. And I was reading Psalm 31 (I had tried to remember the verse Proverbs 31 but got the P's mixed up by God's grace) and was just praying into that. 

Then, it happened. I had let it all go, I was empty of the control. It was no longer involved in my destiny. Someone came up from behind me and with a quick hand on my back placed $80 into my hands and Bible on my lap and walked away. 

What a precious moment to let go of my hopes and therein receive a gift so perfectly planned and sacrificially given. One of my roommates said it best, 'We are living in a Fortress of Ridiculousness' as we all are without jobs and all have these challenging fees to pay for outreach, housing, food, flights, tuition, camera equipment, etc. Yet generosity here is higher than I have ever seen in any given community. Just like the woman that gave Jesus all the money she had even though she had no other way of providing herself livelihood. 

Initially I was thinking that it was not even about the Bibles--it was about the miracle and trust and love. Especially being that I did not finish giving away all my money. As it sinks in that I do in fact have three very large, red, overweight Bibles in my carry-on I am more and more delighted in the fact that these material things will be forwarded and the story will bless the recipients. 

Ballerina, not just Photographer

Monday Night, Ministry Night, PhotogenX DTS, YWAM Kona UofN.

This is now Tues morning before intercession--

I had been feeling like there was more blocking me from truly having Jesus as my Lord and I'm believing there is probably quite a bit that needs clearing out. The worship leader had the staff offer prayer for things, or even if you didn't know what you wanted prayer over. I found Lou, she's staff on the Sports DTS. She's beautiful and bold, a strong-looking woman and very Spirit-filled. 

I told her how I had felt like there was something junky in my heart I still hadn't let go of but I didn't know what it was. She prayed/ministered against STRIVING, control over what I'm learning, rather what I'm missing out on. The likelihood of me being able to go through my whole experiences (via my notes/journal) being…well zero. Its DTS-overwhelming meteor shower of teachings and knowledge. God let land in my spirit what I need to take away. 

She started praying and God gave her the word RESENTMENT and asked if it resonated with me. Nope. But then again I was not resonating with much of anything the past week and a half or so. She had me pray on not STRIVING, not being in control of my studies (BRITTANY, THIS IS NOT UCD!! NEW STYLE OF LEARNING!!!)

Then I was to pray over resentment and ask God what it might/could mean for me. And if my Holy Spirit didn't bring up anything, then you ditch it. That's how it works. You always have a choice to receive the things people with the best intentions think they're hearing from the Lord. 

Well, when they say God knows your heart, they weren't kidding!

I realized I did have resentment for someone in my life but was at the same time aware of the reality that I had no good reason for it. You see there is a difference between what we receive and perceive people to be in our lives and the reality of what and who and how they are, in reality. Jesus how you know me! You were there in it all too. 

I also learned that I had a HUGE milestone worth of resentment for a transition in my life. It was the time that I dropped a passion of mine for a seemingly legitimate replacement. I was a ballerina and I wanted to start playing sports in high school. It would be more fun, I would get to bond with my best friends that were actually from my home town and participate in the community of Firebaugh, instead of outside it. It was also getting harder to commute to Fresno for dance--the more advanced you get the more classes you take, the more rehearsals for performances there are etc, and driving a round trip of 2 hours for 1 hour of dance multiple times a week just didn't seem worth it when I could replace it with a local greatness of volleyball and basketball. But Jesus revealed to me last night the primary reason I had for making the leap. I did not want it to be true, nor expect it, but I'm realizing when you go into a time of prayer and ask the Holy Spirit to show you what you cannot see, you'd better be ready for truly a revelation of something you had hidden from yourself. 

I dearly loved my 5 years of athletics. I loved it! I learned so much about myself and spent countless hours working up the best sweat of my youth in a gym full of my friends. (Well, I sweated a lot in ballet class too, but in a gym is just such a different thrill!). 

God has been bringing me images of ballet, me dancing ballet, me getting excited about it and the truest desire to be able to dance in worship with such elegance as I just know He would be delighted in. I just can't attain this with salsa or swing--elegance is not so important here.

I initially was perplexed (still am I suppose) and told God, I can't do this. I can't be that again. If y'all knew me in high school and still now, you know I have had lots of issues with my feet, I wear ugly and ergonomic shoes instead of cute trendy ones, and just have given up on being able to use them with intensity and frequency.  

Here comes more resentment. 

I made the switch from ballet to sport for the wrong reason. I was looking for intimacy in friendships and really thought that I would gain love by coming into their passion for sports. Don't get me wrong, I am an athlete and compete with the best of them. But I could have done that with keeping my identity of ballerina. But with these past couple days of realizing God made me a ballerina, in prayer last night I acknowledged my resentment in Jesus for not keeping me in that, on that path. For letting me get wooed by fitting in and connecting to others through sports. I need to pray into it more because I don't quite understand what I was using sports for. 

So, lots of forgiveness later, I'm pausing to keep rational but I do believe God wants to restore my identity in being a ballerina, I just don't know how that will look. I can give ya a good guess and hope that Jesus walks me through learning how to worship Him through dance. 

I didn't come to DTS/PhotogenX/YWAM/Hawaii to (re)become a ballerina. I came here to become a photographer. I'm still grappling with this surprise. But I blame it fully on myself: I asked for revelation, for Jesus to bring to surface the thing that was blocking me from accessing my whole heart. And, welp, He is faithful--He did!  

HOLY Spirit boom! Baptism

Hellllloooo There,

Here is my first attempt at summarizing and processing the most dramatic week of my spiritual life. Ever.

This week was super emotional. Now that seems normal, life is pretty emotional, I am definitely an emo kiddo, and everyone experiences emotion. All the time. BUT YOU HAVE NO IDEA. Let me try to explain some of the things going on as I cannot possibly relay a true and accurate description of the feeler end of things.

--Ok, I'm nice and updated on the home-front and had a cool chat about the Jeep community as church and the institution of religion and how it misses the whole point of Jesus' radical love...so awesome broskies. Glad you chime in on my meeting of the minds--

Ok, back to my new crazy reality.

Lets sum things up:

The Holy Spirit is the THIRD PERSON of the Holy Trinity, and He is soooooo real. You can feel His presence, recognize his personhood (though not a fleshy frame like Jesus had), be overcome with physical sensations and actually burst out laughing, like bust-a-gut-or-two laughter. Uncontrollable and sweat-provoking, work-out-esque laughter!

Monday we learned of Amy Sollar's reader's-digest-version of her life story and how she came to bear her identity as a prophetess (female prophet, get it?). No joking matter here, she is divinely gifted. Want to know why? Because of her love for Jesus, because of her relationship with God, and because this is how God Himself operates. Its a new normal for me and I'm sure this is making you wonder what kind of adventure I'm on here at YWAM.

I was baptized in the Holy Spirit which is a fancy way of saying the Holy Spirit made Himself oh so clearly present in my being. Sounds crazy, I know. Most of this is going to get you OUTTA YO MIND. When Amy is around, things get heated; literally, some people feel a warming sensation over parts or the entire body. Crazy. But God reveals His Spirit in us to give us a window into His glory. Romans 8:16 says something like this: the Holy Spirit together with ours declares to God that we are His children, and if children we are heirs, co-heirs with Christ. DO YOU HEAR THIS? The Holy Spirit is with us from birth, in every person believing or not. But its in times like these that God has His perfect timing to reveal to us His power and release just a little bit bigger piece of Heavenly truth in our walks with Him.

WHAT WAS IT LIKE FOR ME: the Baptism in the Spirit part
In complete and utter eagerness and will I was so stoked for this to happen. I wanted to become paralyzed and invaded by the Holy Spirit. I mean, go big or go home, yah? By faith and truth I just wanted the biggest and BEST God had for me. I began to cry. This happens a lot here. I cannot tell you I remember the prayers but I know what happened. I began to feel light and had slightly become drawn into a bendy/crouchy position, just slightly. As a staffer, Holly, held her hand lightly on my forehead I began to tip backwards and other staff helped me land softly. This is normal. We call it 'hitting the deck' or 'getting laid out' by the Holy Spirit, 'losing it'...lots of fun wordage we have here. I began to laugh--though my will was involved I didn't really know why, nothing funny actually happened--and I just noticed my abs were contracting from the laughing and I was laying on the floor. I was on the floor laughing and I was seriously tripping out because GOD LAUGHS. AND HE LAUGHS LIKE THAT! Makes me wonder if He laughs at me that hard. Sure He does. It began to subside and the presence was gone. Not gone from my life, from my heart, from my baptism, but just not invading my physicality.

Oftentimes being baptized in the Holy Spirit also reveals or brings out your own individual prayer language, i.e. tongues. But if we say prayer language y'all might not pull up this idear of tongues being something bizarre and possessed, perhaps that foreign imagery you've heard as lunacy or an ancient thing, or something you're completely dismayed or doubtful of. But it happens. Now, staying on the go-big-or-go-home level, I asked God early this week if my tongues could sound like scat, like scatting. If you don't know what that is, look up a jazzy song where the singer begins to make beats with his voice: bad-dum bee, bee, beet beep, oh whoa whoa wow oh yeaaayuuhhh...hopefully you just already know what that means. Hey, if God created this earth and everything in it, He is the ultimate designer and provider, He can surely give me that. AND HE DID. So cool!

But this took some more prayer, and some help. Yes, I said help. It was humbling to recognize that I needed the strength and confidence from another to HELP me; I was grateful. Two staffers, Jillian and Andrew, came to pray for the release of my prayer language. I of course was crying--I'm telling you, new standards of normalcy here. I held my hands, palms up, to Andrew so he could place his fingers in their depressions. I suppose this is just a comfortable way for him to connect. Girls are usually more touchy (appropriately so), but I mean theres no magical alteration to the receipt of the GLORY of God by that gesture is all I mean. Jillian had prayed for me and Andrew continued to pray for me and I was overcome once again by the Spirit's laughter. Now I later learned that it isn't always joy that is being experienced in the Spirit's laughter but that sometimes it is the expression of deliverance. Im thinking that this one was deliverance. While I was laughing my abs were soooo sore and tired by now and I was starting to want to collapse forwards/downwards like you would fall to the ground laughing with your best friend over Cherry Pepsi and then continue to pee your pants. Not that that ever happened. Or that people pee their pants when the Holy Spirit comes. It could happen, but I'm not saying that either have. So, no, I did no pee my pants. That was a joke. Anyway.

The help came like this: I was trying not to break the connection from Andrew, just wanting to make sure I was still in an attitude of receiving his help. He asked if I had it and honestly, I was crying, laughing, collapsing from sore tummy muscles and giving a voice to my voice box seemed challenging at best. He said to me, 'I know you have it, let me hear it. Let me hear it, I see it.' This man of God was literally doing the Father's will. It was overwhelming to need that help and to have it in the same moment. So I used his confidence and began to speak. It was strange indeed but it was coming out and....it sounded like scatting!! Praise God from whom all blessings come!

Since then, I have been practicing and learning so much. You see the whole point of a prayer language is that it is A) the perfect prayer, a prayer that I can not use for my own good and for my own desires but because I do not understand what I'm saying, its just God's words through me going right back to His ears. 2) it can't be intercepted by anything spiritually not of God's holiness. hence its a perfect prayer. It beams like Scotty straight to Him.  D) it strengthens my spirit inside. I receive and am blessed by this intimacy with God and though its invisible and I have no understanding of it all, thats what it does.


OK, QUESTION TIME!!! I'M SURE there are tons of things in this entry that you're unfamiliar with or just have no idea how to digest it or don't believe or can't fathom....I want to share! and answer! and help! Or at least reduce the alarm inside. BUT also, if you totally know whats going on, I still love to chat with ya so we can get all excited and jazzed about it. That would rad. Hopefully I repeat this throughout my entires and my correspondence with y'all. If i don't, just take it as a given.

Love! lots of it!
Britt

Daily Life as a Discipleship Student

Just FYI (for y'alls information hahaha) I thought I share what my weekly schedule is like. Our weekly itinerary changes shape frequently, so más o menos:

Monday
8am: Corporate (campus-wide) Worship at Ohana Court. Live band, hundreds of people of all ages and colors and languages (english and korean lyrics).
9am: (or as close to it as we finish with Ohana Ct) Class. This week was taught by Daddy von Hamp i.e. the dad of (one of) my staff leader Jillian for my outreach to GREECE!! The theme of the week was The Father's Heart. What a big and beautiful thing it is that the God of the WORLD wants to be the best daddy I could ever want.
15 minute break: usually a nap on our sofa cushions, run to my room for water, chapstick or the like, or a delicious snack or cup of coffee.
More class: usually involves lots of tears, things are just so clear and important and moving and healing; it comes with the territory. I cried daily the first couple weeks from the incredible whelming of God and His plans and purposes and His character. I'll get to more of that later.
12 noon: LUNCH. A random assortment of things you'd imagine at any cafeteria providing meals for upwards of 300 people.
1:15pm : Media Class with none other than our school founder of PhotogenX Susanne Childers. This week was a refresher on the basics of ISO, aperture, and shutter speed that we had already been taught by our fearless and hilarious staffer José. Its great to get retaught on such vital basics from another angle.
3:00 pm  Everyday this means its Work Duty time! I work in the maintenance and building project group: woodshop construction, junkyard recycling, furniture moving, oil-drum-unloading kind of things. It must be a genetic attraction, I am such a greasemonkey like brother and daddy.
5:00pm Dinner. Again, think feeding the masses: salad and rolls, rice, beans, stir frys, pastas, pork loin once!
6:30pm -8/830pm Ministry Night. This is a time to worship and bring your heart to Jesus' presence. Its always high energy and when I don't have a lot of that I can go up to the balcony and sit on the tiered floor and still see all the action. I still pray and sing and listen to the Lord, i just get to do it sitting down muahaha.

So thats just Monday!! I'm realizing if I outline each day, hardly anyone is actually going to keep reading. Thus, I will tell you what fluctuates throughout the week:

Tues and Thursday: Intercession prayer.  For 1 hour in the morning we pray against injustice and we call on the authority and truth and dreams of God's heart to spiritually fight against things the enemy thinks he can get away with: For protection and efficacy in celebrity Christian athletes like Tim Tebow and Jeremy Lin; for the Aids/HIV epidemic in Africa, India and China; Orphans of Africa and for changes in adoption logistics; things of global proportions basically.

Thursday Night: Ohana Court. Ohana Court is a location on campus, but we use it as a proper noun for our Thursday night, open-to-the-public church service. Its awesome. International guest speakers, usually from other Christian organizations like More Than Sport (morethansport.com) and Campus Crusade for Christ and other YWAM bases etc come to tell us what God is doing in other nations and in other groups. LEGIT.

Wednesday(night): there's volleyball games!! woot!

Friday: We take the morning or at least a portion of it to highlight things of the week's discipleship/lecture portion.

Then, I'm usually ready to sleep my body into restfulness early in the evening. But instead I write blogs like this and chat with great friends and try to upload photos without success for the 6th time this week.

Just a taste of my schedule and intense discipleship!!

<3 B

Some Photos For Your Pleasure!

So, I'm not quite sure how I'm going to go about this, sharing my photos. I'm working on opening a flickr, but Im a little tired of the bajillion social media options and don't like signing up for them all. So here's a teaser. 

Photo Assignment: "Where are you going?"

I decided to show where I'm NOT going: not back to a way of life with limits; 

limits set by other people, the world's standard of 'normal, conventional ways. 

They don't real make you happy, do they? (I have no way to edit photos yet

on my new computer, sorry for the darkness!)

First idea for above photo assignment, something to the effect that

I want to go to the places and people that the average Joe finds

unattractive or unappealing: the unloved and untouchable. 

EPIC landscapes in Hawaii: fyi, there are 11 of the 12 climates found 

in the world on Big Island. Idk what to call this, but its like the terrain next

to i5, next to the ocean. Cool combo. Oh, and these are fellow 

PhotogenX-ers, walking back from the Green Sands Beach.

Perhaps my coolest photo yet: no editing, but nearly perfect 

ISO (light sensitivity/control) to get the sky in good color/contrast

while still being able to see the foreground. Sweet!

Questions & Answers!

So I want to make sure my blog isn't completely self-serving. So if you email/facebook/text your questions and I'll answer them!!


Angelina Marie LaBotte what do you see when you look out your window?

Sorry for the glare---its literally through my window!! Theres a bit more ocean you can see with the naked eye, hard to squeeze it all in one shot. 

Angelina Marie LaBotte tell me, is the air as delicious as everyone says?
No. I don't know if I've heard that before..maybe on a different island/different city. Where I am at (Kailua-Kona) is down-slope of a active volcano--plenty far away I promise! But theres this thing called vog (like smog, fog..) and its hazy and overcast at least half the time. Which makes the sunshine that much sweeter!


Jennifer Salas most jaw dropping moment. GO!
Theres tooooo many!!!


The first week--we had orientation in the 24 hour prayer room....I was sitting down bc my feet were hurting (mehhh) and I was just in awe of being completely surrounded by about 100+ people all praising the Lord in Heaven! so hard...people were swaying, stomping lightly, arms up high, heart abandoned...and I was overcome by tears so fast I swear they were jumping out of my face: "If we can worship with this much love HERE, on EARTH, what the heck is it gonna be like in HEAVEN??!!" WHAT GREAT LOVE. PURE LOVE is what I felt. 


During our "Pure Heart" weekend retreat April 28/29: In the midst of all the junk we face in this life, disappointments, incomplete relationships with mothers and fathers, betrayal, abuse--on any level and in any area of our personal lives like relationships, work, studied, friendships, entertainment....all these things, I had one of the biggest revelations by the Presense of the HOLY SPIRIT. He took me back to a few of the countless nights spent looking for all the right things in all the wrong places: boys/relationships. He told me there in that prayer time, "I never meant for you to find Me in a boy." (See me blog "Jesus Never Meant For That"


There are soo many others!


Tim Honeycutt What has your experience been with the Holy Spirit through this time?
OUT-OF-THIS-WORLD. Ok readers, prepare yourself. I say this because there will be a mixture in y'alls ability to related, understand, accept, freak out etc...I WAS BAPTIZED IN THE HOLY SPIRIT. 
I'm working on a blog to post that outlines it all, so keep an eye out for that soon. 
Everyone experiences the presence of the Holy Spirit differently; DO NOT COMPARE YOUR LIFE TO MINE (unless you can already relate, thats chill). 
I have physically felt in my body His presence: 
First experience, I was starting to feel lighter and didn't notice it too much until a staffer whose fingertips were on my forehead were too much a force for me to stand and I was caught by other staff and layer on the floor.
Then I was overcome by laughter, that was probably the most enjoyable (who wouldn't want to bust out in the Lord's laughter--He laughs really hard, like ab-work out hard)
Later that same day I got up to praise God and just intercede in prayer and enjoy the incredible works of God happening right before my eyes. I was praying and friends came over to call out my prayer language, something you get sometime after your baptism in the Holy Spirit. I wanted more, thats for sure: more laughing, more physical acknowledgement of His presence...anything!! So I'm standing up trying not to bend into the power of the Holy Spirit--I was starting to crouch down bc my abs were tired from laughing! But I didn't want to lose touch with the hands that were praying for me...So i'm laughing and crying (i'm emotional) and trying to use my voice all at the same time. I'm so joyful and just can't operate under so many tantalizing elements. Andrew, a staffer, calls out to me, "I know you have it, I want to hear it, let me hear it." So I muster up something and begin to speak in tongues! 


Ok, I know these things are essentially rare in Christian culture today, so if anyone is skeptical, leery, judgmental...all these things I accept--I understand. 7 days ago I would have been all of the above. I'd love to chat further to answer your questions the best I can or even just to tell ya more about it!!


Sandy Blakely Duke What are you learning about yourself?
Oh man, this question is soo open-ended: I could mention 100's of things!
The most encompassing is this: everything I am, everything I'm not was all by God's design. (Darlene Cunningham's phrase, co-founder of YWAM). I have memories along my life from as early as second grade that God is calling back to my attention that remind me I've been who I am all my life. Every piece of that has been on purpose, for God's ultimate and worthy plans for His Kingdom and even my pleasure. It may have been something to be estranged by, which I definitely experienced a lot of--never recognizing much of my quirks in anyone else and wondering if I was normal. If you ever ask yourself, "Am I normal, is this right/ok?" The answer is Yes. God is going to do works through you that only you can do, because of the DNA He gave you. 
It's not instant and constant confidence I have in this, there are still insecurities and forgetfulness that lack the above revelation, but its there and I'm working to press into it and live by it soon.