Financial Support Request

Its funny how you can get cocky about being not-cocky. I think thats exactly what snuck up on me in the last couple months. About September I knew that God had asked me to take a bit of rest as my next chapter in life and boy was I okay with that! I also knew in the depths of my dream-chest that I was going to head back to Kona/YWAM eventually to work in the Science & Technology department to do some agriculture research, I just didn't know when.

So with this assurance, which was more like arrogance, I didn't do much about really pursuing God's will for me. What if I was wrong? What if God had something else in the meantime? Well, I didn't ever really ask.

I thank the Lord for His grace and His willingness to go out of the way to make sure we don't miss the things He really has for us because it turns out that my cockiness did not steer me away from His best. It just put me in a bit of a time crunch.

I am now sitting here with about 5-6 weeks max of a time frame to get applications and fundraisers and packing things and housing etc together to get back on what God would have told me months ago had I bothered to mind Him sooner rather than later.

It is now later and I am more hastily seeking financial support and dedicated prayer friends for the before, during and after. If that sounds like something you're interested in please let me know!!

Prayer options: text, email, Facebook message, Skype...you get the idea!
Financial options: mail a check, transfer to my Paypal account (charges a small fee) or deposit online directly to YWAM (web address coming later).

Get Some...of this Great God

I had a very sweet and important moment with Jesus the other day but was in a quite inconvenient place to record it: on my drive to work in Osceola, Arkansas. You should Google it, it's a bitty town just a tiny bit bigger than my hometown in California.

I have always wondered when Jesus' death would impact my heart this way. I have known in my head for a long time the logistics of salvation: Jesus, who was perfect, was the only, only, only option for reconciling a very broken person back into perfect, unbroken relationship with God, my creator and HEAVENLY Father. I/we are broken by self-serving and self-satisfying, reckless choices like not worshipping God.

Anyway, as far as the mind goes, I can be super amazed and blown away by the effect, the impact this has on the world, on my heart, and my afterlife in heaven...but I have been waiting for my heart to get it. To be transformed and melted by His Kind of Love. <-- a="" great="" song="" that="" title="" with=""> 

Now, why would I know that I need more of Jesus? How do I know that my heart isn't quite overwhelmed by the result of Jesus' death, i.e., GRACE, FORGIVENESS, ASSURANCE?

Well this is my confession:  because I am constantly striving to do as little sin as possible so that when I get to Heaven I have less to be ashamed about.

BOOM. Yea, I just said that. I was worried I wasn't going to be good enough to be acceptable or loveable in God's almighty big hug and His beautiful face and outstretched hand, inviting me to sit on His throne of mercy and say, "well done, good and faithful servant." (Matthew 25:23)

If your heart is troubled over your actions, if you are constantly or even infrequently considering wether or not what you're doing or have just done was sinful or not, worthy of God or not, or will boot you out of the promiseland, you need more love. If you think "Will this add too much to my sinfulness?" or "Oh, no, I was doing pretty good until that, I just messed up, ok, now I need forgiveness again"....hahah, well, you need Jesus to slam your heart and face with His compassion and mighty love. I've just caught my first glimpse.

What did it look like?

It was in reaction to a song lyric jumping out of my speakers on KLove Radio (this thing is broadcasted everywhere, just like God's voice is) and the song was sayin' something along the lines of God reaching out His hand to save us. I then thought on the scripture in Matthew about Peter walking on water, but then starting to sink when his faith ran up short. (see: Matthew 14). Here Jesus physically saved  Peter by quickly reaching out to pull him back up and stopped him from drowning. Then I wondered if that's what grace was like. Peter had enough faith to get out and start walking, but not enough to withstand the wind, the doubt. So by Jesus reaching out and grabbing Peter, Jesus was saying I AM ENOUGH. He finishes what we cannot. He is the insufficiency that would otherwise be impossible to amend before our judgement day.

The coolest and miraculous part of this revelation: I was early for work. Ok, that was not it, I was just joshin' ya. I was early for work and had time to do my devotional beforehand and guess what the scripture reference was on? Bam, Matthew 14, the exact story God put in my little brain 7 minutes earlier.

So this is the meat of this glory bomb that went off in my heart: I finally admitted to God in another drive to work out here what I admitted up above, that I was basically fearful of what would happen in heaven. In that same devotional book I read Hebrews 12:2 a couple days later which says that Jesus is the author and perfecter of our faith. Keeping our eyes on Jesus helps us steady our hearts and minds on this.  I remembered another song lyric (likely drilled in this cabeza because of Klove) that says something like this: that one of these days I'll have to stand in front of the Judgement Throne and stand for everything I've done, but what I'll do is trust in Jesus.

So God was knitting together this great little story for me and it all came to this. Jesus is enough for me in this life, but He is also enough for me when I get to Heaven and have to be accountable for all that I have said and done. Jesus is here on earth and yet sits in Heaven. He is on the mercy seat at the right hand of God. Jesus will stand in the gap of all my insufficiency at that moment more desperately and urgently and readily than even now as He does that for me on a minute-by-minute basis.

I have nothing to fear of my righteous and perfect God, for although I will face all my sins in Heaven, it is only to chuck them out of Heaven and receive a bill already paid for, for my sins and thus live eternally with God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, in peace and perfection.

That's how gooooooood our God is, folks. Get some.

What of the wrath and judgement of the Lord?

I was having a good time reading the Bible the other day and I was so delighted by that nice caring side of God. You know, where He takes something you love in scripture and connects it with the encouragement you need to hear? (See my previous post). As I was reading through Luke 1-3ish last Friday I was struck anew by something in the Gospel I have read through here and there many times.

What happens when we have a conviction of divine duty and we do not do it? I am asking because I really want your advice/counsel/Godly wisdom on this. I am broken-hearted over something I read and appreciated as a cutesy lesson from the Bible and separated from my real life. These kinds of realizations are like slamming on the brakes to a halt in the middle of an empty country backroad because you are running late and just noticed you left something at home—like your compassion, your boldness, your courage and the simple duty of zeal buried beneath the obligations of social conformity.

Luke 3:9-11 The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.” “What should we do then?” the crowd asked. 
 John answered, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.”

I always look for something new to stop me in my tracks when I am reading something so popular like a passage in Luke. This is the track-stopper: Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same. 
ANYONE, anyone who has two (or more, many many many more) should share with he/she who does not have many many many more.

This wasn't such an exclamation in my heart until the next morning. My mom had a work conference in San Diego and I being in a season of restfulness (or at least learning how to rest) went with her to serve as her driver and to continue resting in a preferably warmer place. As we were headed home Saturday morning, getting closer to the freeway on-ramp I saw a man with a sign, a homeless or extremely disadvantaged man. His slice of cardboard read this:

God bless. Please help. A LITTLE LOVE GOES A LONG WAY.

I read that sign and immediately thought his rare sign was a great photo-opp! And then I quickly remembered how I want to make sure I live my photography life 'people-first-photo-second.' And then I wondered what my mom might think if I asked to give him money/something even if in lieu of the the photograph. Then I squirmed in my seat as the light turned green and I realized I didn't get my photograph, I didn't help this man, his sign melted my heart with a conviction of the truth of how I am to live...I sat there in passivity instead of boldness. The fear of man and that awful truth that if enough time passed I would not longer feel so challenged. This inner-debate stole that opportunity from me. 

I could have easily asked my mom to make a U-ey and pull into a parking lot. She would have and I probably would have been able to 'get-away with it' without much convincing; I could have grabbed my camera, grabbed my wallet, offered to buy him a refreshment or sustenance and then dignified him by asking for his name, honor him by asking for his story, take a photo to go with his story. And then give him a hug—because all that lovin' would have indeed gone a long way.

I was about to post just the above as my entry but I just had a conversation with a dear friend of mine, Campbell. She and I got to talking and sharing thoughts and what not on how we are so wired for DOING things for God and not enough of BEING for God. How God wants our worship and our love and proclaims His (un)dying love for us free of MERIT. How it's hard for us to admit this, being such 'do-ers,' but that perhaps there are moments and convictions and realizations like these for just the sake of learning. For the sake of glorifying and petitioning God in prayer, for He is the almighty, not I.

I have these expectations of myself, you see. Expectations that are so stern they're more like obligations, and are very performance-driven. I am so quick to condemn myself for what I do and do not do. It can be quite toxic and brings me anxiety quite often. Campbell mentioned how we are so quick to be harsh on ourselves and how she often senses God say things to her like, 'I love you' when she is beating herself up (metaphorically) for not DOING something.

So here I am, reminded of God's free unconditional GRACE but perplexed and in somewhat of a rock+hard place. I read this scripture of a command that speaks on DOING. GIVE your shirt away if you have extras. But I read his sign, and went on my way. 

These things I am sure I will be judged for--God will ask when I get to heaven, why did you not stop? Would it have taken too much time? Too much effort? Too much humility?

But I do not doubt that God is so well pleased that I am learning so much right now. That I am taking the time to write about it (I learn so much deeply-er this way) and to discuss it because now, now my heart has processed this learning and I put my hope in Jesus to use me for the next time. To use me to DO His will when He asks. We shouldn't have to be asked by God to do the things that we know would honor him, would bring a smile to his divine self, but I don't think He would on the other hand condemn us for it. Wait on the Lord to do His will, do not fill in the blanks of a quiet day in order to earn your daily dose of righteousness. 

There is nothing we can do that would thwart God's will—but who am I to assume that God's will was for me to DO something for that man? What if I am reflecting on His very plan: to reveal to me the functionality of scripture, the practical that is to be lived out in my life? Because I am certainly more prepared just now, and a smidge closer to being like Christ.

I am sorry I did not do what I am more than capable of DOING for that man but I will not bind myself in the chains that Jesus died to break off.