The Very Most

I am learning to pray.

I mean, I’ve always “known” how to pray, but I’m learning that praying is everything. I am learning how absolutely essential it is. I’m also learning that most times, all I really can do is pray. I have always told people, the CIT’s I worked with this summer, the kids I have counseled at summer camp over the years, and more recently, my team, that “prayer is the very most you can do.” Meaning that sometimes when all we can do is pray, and it feels like we are doing nothing of value, nothing that holds real weight or merit, we are actually doing the most. We are giving our best when we pray. I have always said this and I have always believed this, but since coming to Thailand God sure is stretching me in this.

Each week us Trekkers follow a fairly regular schedule. Two times a week us girls help at a preschool in Huay Yen. (actually we just painted the entire preschool this morning! It looks so good!.) These kids have become so precious to me. Many of them are often sick and Chris, our missionary, says that a few of them are HIV positive. About 80% of these kids hold the trade mark of an Animistic culture; strings around their wrists, that are so worn and old that they are literally thread bare, fraying off their little wrists, but they are not to be taken off. When they are put on, just moments after birth, the parents pray for a spirit to come protect their child, and believe that as long as these children are wearing the strings on their wrists, the spirits will favor them. Its these moments, when I am sitting in the preschool, holding these children and giving them some much needed physical affection, that I feel entirely and completely overwhelmed. I don’t speak their language so my only means of communicating to these kids that they are loved is to hold them and play with them. And to pray. As I hold these small and beautiful children I pray. I pray that God communicates to them how incredibly valuable they are. How loved they are by the Redeemer and Creator. I pray that these kids will rise up and be a generation who seeks God whole heartedly and abandons their animistic culture and background, being the first in thousands of years to break the chains of bondage and step out in faith, trusting in the living Savior. It’s in these moments that I realize I have the power to intercede. To stand in the gap, like Abraham did to save Lot, and to beg God to turn his face with favor on these kids and their people group. I can do that. God has given me that privilege and opportunity and has reminded me that sometimes, when I feel like holding a child for an hour twice a week just isn’t enough to fix the big problem, I am doing the very most that he has empowered me to do. Pray.

Once a week us ladies go to another village, Huay Ja. On these Wednesday nights our girls first walk through the village and pray with whoever needs it. Sometimes there are reasons to share another’s burdens; sometimes we partake in peoples joy with rejoicing. Last week we got there and a guy was having a birthday party J complete with Kanomes (sweet snack) and Soda. We sat in his bamboo hut with his young wife and young child and prayed with them and sang with them. Each week after we walk through the village and pray with people, we meet in the church that has been planted there and Yom, one of the ladies who works at the Centre, speaks in her native tongue to the people. Though we cannot understand Khmu, and neither can Chris to translate, there is something I enjoy about listening to Yom speak. Isn’t this why we are here? To transform communities who will continue to transform and nurture within themselves. To see the people who now know Jesus encourage their fellow people in their faith. Sometimes as I sit there, surrounded by women who have lived lives of hardship, who have had no one to advocate for them and have carried some burdens that I could not imagine having to carry, I again feel completely overwhelmed. “What good is this God?” is my question. These women need medical attention, they need work, they need food, and sometimes their basic needs aren’t even being met. What good is a church meeting going to be, I question.  And again, its in these moments that God reminds me that “the very most I can do, is pray.” That is what you can do Becca comes a steady, sure voice in my head. And so I pray. I ask God to be present to each women, in each day, and each circumstance, and you know what? They have joy. These women come together and we shed tears and we pray and we sing and we love… and then we have joy. We get to share in the supernatural joy that only comes from the one true Joy Giver and we leave with thankful and full hearts and again I realize that there is great power in prayer. That not one of my prayers goes unheard.

Every Friday night our team runs a “kids club” in another village, Wang-paa. This village doesn’t yet have a church and are quite animistic. On these nights we do a bible study, a craft, and have a kanome. I love Friday nights, its one of my favorite. Last Friday there was a young boy sitting a few kids ahead of me whose wrists were laden with threads ands strings. There were probably 8 on each wrist and then he also had a pendant around his neck, again, a way to invite the spirits. I was overcome for this kid. I cant even explain why entirely…. but I just sat there and choked back tears because this small boy seemed like he didn’t have a chance. I was so angry. At the culture, at the traditions, and at Satan, who has sunk his teeth into so many families in this part of the world, who has been given reign in so many of these kids’ life. But it was here ,within my deep hurt and anger that again I heard Gods steady prompting. Pray. So I prayed. For an hour and 15 minutes I sat in the back of the room and prayed for this little boy, for his parents, for his siblings, for his home, for everything. I cant honestly tell you anything epic happened, I didn’t see this boy the next day transformed, I didn’t see the strings fall from his wrist, but I trusted. In that moment I chose to trust that God knows what he is doing and my incredibly finite mind could never understand my infinite God. That God heard my prayers and somehow, some way, and sometime, he will answer them, and when he does, it will be perfect. Because God knows far better than I what timing is correct, what moment is best, and what each person needs.

At least once a day I remember how I got here. How God connected all the dots together for me to be in this country. I sometimes cannot believe the miracle that brought me here (see my earlier blog for details ;) ) Gods faithfulness is steady and sure. It can be counted on and I trust it entirely. I remember praying and trusting which leads me to look back and pray in thanksgiving. Sometimes, actually, most times it is actually pretty hard here. Some sights are hard to see, some times living with the team is hard, and sometimes certain jobs are hard. I love when these moments of difficulty collide with my thoughts on the miracle that brought me here because as I pray in thanksgiving for what God has done for me, I am filled with Joy! My gratitude is turned to praise, and in praising I am filled with a supernatural measure of Joy. Prayer is such a powerful tool and I am learning that each day. Sometimes I recognize the power of prayer in rejoicing because our team has experienced and seen God come through and answer in the very way we asked him to. Sometimes I recognize the power of prayer in silence, with tears, not understanding or comprehending what God is working and how, but still trusting that he is working. Sometimes it’s a walk by sight, and sometimes it’s a walk by faith. Always it’s a walk of trust. Trying to step in the footprints of my mighty God, lest I try to go out on my own and fail miserably.

I challenge you, whomever you might be, to pray. Remember that when the unimaginable is happening, whether in circumstances of great joy or deep sorrow, that “prayer is the very most you can do.” I would invite your prayer into each of these pictures I painted you today in this blog. Pray for the Khmu people here, who desperately need Jesus. Pray for the preschool in Huay Yen and for all of those precious children. Pray for the churches that have already been established in some of our villages. Pray for our team, that we would continue to be united under the banner of Jesus. Pray for the Changed Life Centre, that they would continue to be equipped with everything they need to work at change here in Khmu land.

The Two little girls who have had my heart since day one at the preschool. The one in plaid, Nim, The one in yellow is Pream. Precious kids (Note the strings on Pream)

One of the little girls at our Friday Night Kids club in Wang Paa (again, note the threads)

Praying with a woman and her sick child on Wednesday night during our Huay Ja ministry

This Passionate Purpose

With every bump that I hit on these rocky roads in the North, on the back of this song thaew I am driving in, I become more and more aware of the little bits of myself that are changing. Like I do more often, I ponder how much has changed for me in the last 3 years, I can hardly recognize the girl I was when I left my small town in September 2010. I thought I was headed off to an adventure back then… little did I know where God would take me! I could never have imagined being on this journey, in this place. So here I am, bouncing around on the back of this truck, going 80km and hour around the bends of the Mekong; I’m breathing in what has already become one of my favorite smells, the smell of the sun setting and Thailand quieting, everything is dusky and colored pink in light of  the descending sun. I have one leg tossed carelessly off the back of the pickup tailgate, Im leaning back into the bench in which I always reside in when we travel. The warm wind is blowing by me and I am looking across the river at Laos… I wonder, will I ever be able to go back to living like a typical North American? What does that even mean for me anymore? I am becoming more and more aware of what a minority we are in America. I have always thought myself much separate from “the rest of North America.” No , I thought to myself , I am not like so many egotistical, haughty North Americans who live in ignorant bliss… but the truth is, I am entirely North American. My entire life has been lived in ignorance of the suffering and pain of not only the people around me but also the people who are exactly like me who live across the world, the only difference being that we were born in different countries…

We arrived in Bangkok and we were picked up by Ricky Sanchez, a long term missionary working with MB mission who lives in Chonburi Thailand. His job with us was to “orientate us” to Thailand, to teach us about the culture, the do’s and don’t’s, and the religious back ground. It was such a whirlwind, from getting off the plane, to having no idea where to go or even who would be picking us up. We didn’t know where to meet Ricky, there was honestly not one person we could find that spoke a bit of English. We didn’t know what we would be doing that week or what we would be seeing, we didn’t know what a Bhat was (their currency) and we hadn’t yet learned to do quick conversions to figure out what cost what.  I remember that first step I took out of the airport and onto Thailand soil, it is so vivid for me because I literally felt like I stepped into a wall of humid, sticky, heat. There is no way to describe it; it is almost like moist air is being blown at you from the ground and from all sides. The week sped by, we did lots of things; We worked at the Abundant Life Home one day, it is an orphanage for kids who are HIV positive. We spent the day planting coconut trees. Won’t say much about that except I never want to dig another hole in Thailand soil again. It’s a mixture of rock hard clay, and dust. It was at the orphanage that I got to meet Bing-Bing, the little girl who first broke my heart for Thailand back when Ricky Sanchez visited CBC in September. Ricky told our class her story, and it was while listening to her story, with silent tears and a broken heart that I first felt God laid Thailand on my heart in a blanket of compassion and passion heavy and strong. Meeting her was unreal! Like God was confirming where he had called me. It was like God was also showing me the hope before he showed me the hurt… that came in the following days as Ricky orientated us to the brokenness of Thailand. He spoke about the bondage the Thai people live under. Both to Nirvana (Buddhism) and also to generations and generations of sexual brokenness. “To be Thai is to be Buddhist” , we hear this so often our here. Buddhism is a lifetime of pouring yourself out, of striving to rid yourself of self. It’s a lifetime of striving to pay a debt that you were born with yet never knowing if your workings have been enough, never knowing if your Kharma will be better to you in the next life. Thai people don’t even kills flies because they believe that all animals and bugs are their ancestors who never paid their full debt, thus came back as lesser beings. They live their entire lives like this. Striving for something yet never knowing if they have come to it, never knowing if there is hope. It breaks my heart. We went to this massive temple; I think it was the biggest one in all of Thailand. Hundreds and hundreds of people were there, they were bowing down to a statue that was about 16 inches tall; emerald Buddha. They have given their lives to this statue that cannot save them… a statue that cannot even talk to them or hear them. My mind can hardly grasp it and my heart can hardly take it.

…Later that night we walked about 5 blocks down from where we were staying to the biggest red light district in the world. I can hardly type this because I cannot physically see through the tears that are blinding my sight…Most of me wishes I could go back to being ignorant, I had not understood the saying “ignorance is bliss” until that second and that moment. We turned the corner on this street and I took about 3 steps before I hit a wall. There was nothing there but I literally felt like I hit a physical wall. The person walking behind me had to physically push me to take my next step because I could not actually lift my foot and move it forward. I felt like I was stepping into Satan’s kingdom… I guess I sort of was. The red light district in Bangkok is 2 and a half blocks long, it took us less that 3 minutes to walk through. It has a thriving market in the dead centre of it, and this one little part of the city houses over 10,000 prostitutes. In two blocks. 10,000. I don’t have words, and I don’t understand. I just pray, a lot. The people of Thailand have been SO blinded by Satan and his schemes. He has broken them, and tied them into such a sick and heavy bondage that they don’t remember what it is like to live in freedom, they never even knew what freedom was to begin with…There is hope though, God is showing us that he is still working. We hear stories and we are meeting woman and people who have been rescued from that very street. Bing Bing and others like her are meeting Jesus and are finding freedom. God is saving souls, one person at a time he is using people to break Satan’s chains from these people. We have been praying for God to show us his purpose in all this pain and suffering. I feel like God showed us this so we could be aware of the battle we are in. We are now up North working at the Changed Life Centre. God reminded me of what I would be doing in the next three months. He reminded me that I have a part to play in the battle, that here, in Khmu villages; we are fighting for souls, one person at a time. It’s even in the name of the Centre, “the Changed life Centre”. When it feels hopeless, like I don’t understand why that kind of pain exists, or when I just want to be angry at God for not knowing why he allows things like that to happen, or when I just plain cant understand why God does what he does, God reminds me that he brought me hear to focus in rather than to try to understand the big picture. To, one person at a time, bring comfort and hope and freedom. Since coming here to the North we have been working in local preschools, loving on the kids there. We have been visiting widows and loving on the local Khmu teenagers. I am trying to pour all that I am out for these women. They are the same as me. They have the same desires and hopes and dreams except that I was born in a country where I might be able to achieve some of these… most of them will never know that privilege. When I look into the big, brown, hopeful eyes of any of these beautiful Khmu and Thai children or when I gaze into the withered, sunken eyes, that hold an entire life of hardship and experience of these old women who have lived so much, I am keenly aware of my privilege. And sometimes…for brief moments, I hate it, because the only difference between them and I is our birthplaces, and I didn’t do a thing to earn or deserve what God has so richly blessed me with. God is giving me a heart for this place. It’s hard to have a heart for Thailand. I used to pray that God would break my heart for what breaks his…Now I beg that I would never experience the searing pain that he must feel for his children every day. I pray now instead each day for a measure of compassion and ability to see what needs to be seen and to hurt for what needs to be hurt for. Which brings me back to my very first point… Where do I go from here? I don’t know how I will move back into the culture of North America, all I know is this; That God has shown me some of his heart and I will not leave this place unchanged. There are pictures both beautiful and painful that have forever been branded on my mind and heart and God will not let me return to where I once was. I go forward changed. I move forward with new purpose and a sometimes, furious passion. My God is mighty to save and he has placed in me a new objective. We will see where he takes it, Ill do what he needs me to and Ill go where he calls me to. Whether that’s back to where I came from or forward to a new place, where God leads, I will follow because he has given me a passionate purpose. 

My Very Own Miracle!

Well folks it has been far to long, the amount that God has been teaching me is unreal and there is no conceivable way to write it all for you! Ima tell you about just a few of the things!

Im learning so much about myself. Im coming to an awareness of things that, with refinement, could be really good, but I am also being shown some things that I don’t necessarily like. God is still teaching me a lot about pride, He is teaching me to be patient and he is teaching me to leave my presumptions at the door and love people without conditions. It’s difficult, it has actually been kind of tough to learn some of these unpleasantries about myself, that’s where my lovely pride comes into play… it sure doesn’t like being corrected. I’m finding myself in a constant struggle with my human nature, I can relate to Paul in Romans 7 when he is talking about being a slave to his sinful nature. Vs 15 “for I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but the very thing I hate.” Paul is taking about the law, and how it was once life but then/now it has become death. I am in that same struggle. I love my lord , thus I want my life to reflect that in every single area. I want to live a life above rebuke or reproach so I want to follow every rule. I want to live by the law. The problem with living by the law though, is that it can quickly turn your faith into something legalistic, what I want is a genuine faith, I’m not looking for a legalistic faith. Oh but God is so faithful in showing me how to do this, there has not been a moment where I have doubted his gentle guidance. I am truly and entirely overwhelmed. My God is so sufficient and so powerful and even when I am wavering or idolatrous he holds me. He carries me to the banquet table of his grace, mercy, power, and provision and he sets before me a feast! I’d like to share with you an excerpt from my journal last week, this is what I wrote word for word.

“God, this sucks. I am so worried. What if the money doesn’t come in? Lord I am weak and I don’t know how to trust you in this”

            “And when the oceans rage Becca, those waves WILL NOT touch you. My love never fails. Becca, my love.will.not.fail.you”

“but love doesn’t produce finances, it cant buy a plane ticket”

            “my love never fails”

“Is this a promise? Jesus, I don’t know what to do with this!”

           

            “ I make all things work together for good. Through ALL the ages my love has not failed people, it has been constant, why do you expect it to be any different for you? Child, my love is constant and it will not fail you. I promise.”

“Lord have your way”

You may recognize these as song lyrics, which they are, but God spoke them loud and clear to me last Wednesday, 4 days before our departure. That last little line of submission was half hearted. I felt so strongly that God was promising me that he would provide for me, that his love would in fact produce the rest of the finances for TREK (3500.00) but I couldn’t let it go. I couldn’t wipe the remnants of doubt from my fickle heart. Since the beginning I have believed that God would provide for my financial needs. I knew he would, yet I still doubted. Especially this last week, with just a few days to go and a large sum of money still needed I really began to doubt. I went into the next day carrying some of this doubt, the day that us as a team were being commissioned. Thursday evening we arrived at the chapel excited to be charged and ecstatic to move into the next phase of our TREK journey; assignment. I cannot explain the overwhelming feeling of love and care that I experienced as I greeted so many of my close friends, family, and supporters!  I was so overjoyed that they were there, supporting me and standing behind me. The body of Christ is a beautiful thing. As some of them came in Erin handed me a bag, the bag was full of money. I don’t even know who I just know that a group of my incredible friends had come together and given what they could. Erin explained to me as she handed it to me that though it wouldn’t be enough to cover the rest of the funds, God was going to multiply it like he did the bread and the fish on that hill so long ago. She told me how the group had prayed over the money before they brought it and that God had given a revelation of this. Wow. Sufficient much? God is unreal… I cannot fathom it. I went into the rest of the commissioning service feeling at peace, feeling excited, resting in Gods might and joy. I mingled with a lot of people after the service… when I looked down and checked my phone some hours later; I was informed that an anonymous donor had covered the rest of my trip. Can I get an amen? ;) people, GOD IS SO FAITHFUL!! He is such a provider; It was like he was just shaking his head at me in this patient sort of way… “oh yea of little faith Becca, have I not always been your sustainer , have I not always given you your manna and quail? So it shall be for today again. Take and enjoy what I have given you” My very own miracle. I serve a mighty God, I am all too aware of that as I sit on an airplane, this very second bound for Bangkok, Thailand. WOW. I am entirely overcome with gratitude to my heavenly Father and all the people that followed the gentle nudges in their hearts to support me! There is 8750.00 dollars in an account in my name because enough people supported me enough and believed that God was working in my life enough to support me this way! THAT’S CRAZY! I am humbled and speechless. Thank you friends, thank you family. I could not express the depth of my gratitude if I tried. So instead I just keep freaking out, because this is happening!! God brought me here! He isn’t going to abandon me and he is going to keep teaching me things! I get to keep growing in relationship with him!!!! Do you guys understand what a gift this is? I know I have taken it for granted much more than I would ever dare to even admit but God is working, he is working in me and he is working in you! My dear friend Amanda wrote me a card a few weeks ago, she reminded me in the card of how crazy it was/is that I am on this adventure with God. She reminded me that life is happening. My life has begun, I know it has been happening for a while now but sometimes it just hits me harder and I realize just how big of a deal it is. I AM ON AN ADVENTURE WITH GOD!!! My life is an adventure with God, and it is and is going to be continually filled with abundance! It will be more than I could ever have asked or imagined (Ephesians 4) and even when the oceans rage and the storms come and my world shakes, I will always be sure. I will always have my foundation, I will always have my Lord. 

These Adventures with God

Well, the last time I blabbed I was about to do my silent retreat so I suppose I will update you on what God has been doing since then :) 

I went into my silent retreat (SR) without knowing what to expect. I feel like last november (2011) God really did some big work in my life. There was a lot of transformation that happened for me then. So though I am not being arrogant in thinking I have nothing left to work on , I do believe that those really "BIG" things God had already helped me move past didnt need to be dealt with. I felt like I went into the SR without holding onto anything or being heavily burdened by anything. When people asked me how the retreat went, I tell them it was like "weeding my heart garden". Now as ridiculous as that sounds I felt like that is what happened. I was just hanging out with God. We were getting to know each other better. I was becoming more familiar with his voice as I quieted myself to hear him speak. As we hung out he would bring things up for me, nothing huge, just little things that I had not moved past yet. Perhaps someone I had not totally forgiven or perhaps people that I love that I was not trusting him to take care of. As God brought things up, we would work through them and then we would keep hanging out. It was almost like a filtration time, no, a purification time. Like God was purifying my relationship with him, getting rid of even the most minuet things that were diluting our relationship. It was such a refreshing time. To be honest the first 18 hours I slept pretty much solid. I was so exhausted and I felt like God was just saying "first take a rest, then we will work together". I also came to peace with some things on the retreat. I was really scared about where I would go (Berlin vs Thailand) and who the leaders of our teams would be. I was really struggling with giving that all to God. Eventually I felt like he gave me this phrase, "I am a missionary". At first I didnt understand but then he promoted my spirit with some questions. "Where are you right now? Are you serving them? When you go home for the holidays, do you love me and witness to me then? In Berlin, will you follow me there? And yes, in Thailand, will you love me and serve in my name there?" to all these questions I battled and struggled and thought, yes, yes I (if nothing else) strive to do this wherever I go. So God gave me that phrase for myself. I. am. a. missionary. In Abbotsford, I would be one in Berlin, and I would be one in Thailand. When it came to the leadership I was even more stressed.. God just kept telling me "Becca, you are going to learn to follow, are you ready to follow?" and though it wasnt easy at first I eventually came to terms with it, I was even excited. I thought, even if I am on a team with a leader I struggle with and we end up in Berlin, I will still have joy, I will still have my God. might seem petty, but it was hard for me to give it up and reach this point. WELL as you all know, 2 days later the teams were announced. They wrote our names on a flip chart and covered them , gathered us all together, then once we were all there they uncovered the chart and we moved directly into worship. It was shocking. I was so stunned, not only had God put all 8 of us on one team together, he was sending us all to Thailand and he put me as the leader! I was all , "what God?!" I did not know what to think, but then the thought came back to me "Becca, are you ready to follow?" and I realized that when I got that phrase on the SR Jesus was asking me if I was ready to follow him. Its pretty nuts and I still feel unequipped but I know that God is going to do some big things and that in my inadequacy he will work and that nothing I could ever say or do would have any merit without him anyways. crazy. 

The next big event that happened was this wonderful little (BIG) event called Amazing Trek. Now if you know the show amazing race then you know what this looks like sort of the only difference is, the leaders and interns designed amazing trek to pretty much break you in every way possible. yeah. fun lol. The race started off with a posting the day before. The note said that the race was going to happen and it would be beginning any time between 4 and 7am, yes am. It would go till 3 pm. We would not know when they were coming thus we would have to be ready and down there at 4am, if we wanted to eat breakfast then 330. Marley and I had this great idea to be hard core and sleep on the couches so that we could just sleep in our cloths and then here the interns when they walked in, we didnt think about the fact that the other 6 wouldnt be there with us and that they would  be down at 330. needless to say we hardly slept. When the interns finally arrived at 5am our adrenaline kicked in, and the race started off with a bang. Our team of 4 made about a 5 min lead right off the bat. This was the ONLY lead we had the entire day. This first challenge we were given a gps and and some corrdinants. We had to run about 6 km to get to these corrdinants then find a bandana . It was raining. what a suprise lol. We found our first bandana no problem then we continued to our second corrdinants for our second bandana. We could not find this thing anywhere. It was raining and dark, we were cold and literally searching on our hands and knees in a chunk of forest. For TWO AND A HALF hours we searched! we were so frustrated. finally our leaders told us to move on. We later found out that the bandana had gone missing and we searched for so long for nothing. When we finally got back to the Mark Centre at 9 after finishing that challenge and going for our second one we were greeted by a "missionary breakfast" this might have been the hardest challenge for me the entire day. We had to eat some of the worst things I have ever seen or smelt in my life. that is not an exaggeration. Some things included balut- a cooked half developed baby duck still in its egg. A "fruit" that looked like chicken, smelled like rotting flesh, and tasted like it smelled. Salted, pickled papaya - one little piece and all your taste buds would close and you would gag at the strong salt/rotting taste. There was much more but those were just a few. We did many more challenges throughout the day, walking I think probably over 70km throughout that day in the rain. One of another difficult challenges was when we were given a license plate of a vehicle and told it was anywhere in the mall parking lot and we had to find it. It could have been anywhere and we had to check every vehicle. We searched the parking lots and the car parks all twice and we still didnt find it. After another 2.5 hours of searching we finally called a leader and they gave us a hint. When we finally found the car we realized there had been a mix up and they had accidentally given us the wrong licence plate number. We were searching the WHOLE time with the wrong number. We were pissed lol. So far that day we had accidentally been given the short end of the stick twice in pretty big ways. Anyways I just wanted to give you all an idea of what this day looked like. It was physically, emotionally, and spiritually exhausting. 

Everything in this race was designed to go against us there was a point to it though and I think it is a point that our team learned. One was that the race was supposed to bring out the worst in us, we had to learn to be patient with each other, be encouraging, wait for each other, hold each other together as a team and lead as a group. Another was that in an extreme way our leaders were trying to prep us for the mission field. Really making us aware that sometimes we have to relinquish our rights for something to be fair, relinquish our rights to being able to explain ourselves or to make sense of certain situations. We had to let go of our individual needs and take up those of the team. We would have to relinquish our schedules and our "plans." Though this was unreal in its ability to break each one of us down to our lowest our team really did have fun with it, as in we would just go into a fit of laughter any time we were overly exhausted or so angry we wanted to cry BUT, we were stretched, there is no doubt about that and I suppose that lesson is invaluable. At one point I Marley and I were in hysterics of some sort and I looked over at her and said "yeah I would totally do amazing race" about 5 min later were were doing another challenge and we both came to the conclusion that if anyone ever forced us to be in the amazing race we would probably bowl them down. Then the joke became, "yeah, I could totally do this again-- said no one ever!!" which is really the truth lol. 

needless to say things have been crazy. I am learning about team. God is showing me how important quality time with him is. God is also teaching me about spiritual gifts. Its actually pretty cool to be growing in some of the giftings God has placed me in :) I dont know why but I used to think that I wouldnt get or didnt have a spiritual gift. I didnt know that God gave everyone gifts and it was just a matter of learning them. Well, God sure is teaching me. The more familiar I come to his voice the more I realize he is speaking to me all day long. Throughout every moment. Something cool God has been teaching me to do is to be bold in words he gives me for other people. As I pray for people God has been giving me words or pictures for them sometimes. The more I am attuned to Christ's spirit I am realizing that God has given me some ability to be able to bless people in this!! there is no greater joy then relaying the words God gives a person to them!!!

God is so good and I am so aware of that in this place!! thank you for your support and your prayers. I would ask for continued prayer especially in finances still. To be perfectly honest I still need at least 7000 dollars of support and I only have about 4 weeks for this to come in. I know God is going to provide, I know he is has called me here and so I know he wont leave me hanging. I have not been stressed about this but I am asking, in boldness, for your support as you feel led, even in sharing my mission and goal with people you may come into contact with.  I am also asking for prayer in this newfound leadership role. Just that I would be able to lead this team of 8 with confidence in the Lord, always having a listening ear to whatever God is relaying to me. 

I love you all and I am so grateful that people like you love me enough to even come here to this site and read my rantings and my experiences. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart. I love you all!! GOD BLESS!! 

Gods reminder

Well if there is anything I am sure of its that God is good! More than good! It is just so good to be here with no agenda but to grow and learn. What a blessing my Father brought me too :) 

Well I am aware that last time I blogged I didnt give much information as to what my schedule and life so far in Trek has actually looked like, so I'll give ya a snap shot now! A typical day is breakfast at 730 and then life journaling at 8. For life journaling we were put into groups and directed to pick some scripture and work through it. This has been such a rich time for me every morning to meet with my two lovely group girls and sit by the fire and discuss how Gods word is speaking to us and how we can apply it to our lives. We are working through the book of Galatians. We spend 15 min reading and picking a verse from our section that really stood out to us, then we compare it with different translations. We then spend 15 min journaling and looking first at factual observations then life applications. After that we spend 30 min discussing and praying over the scriptures and the rest of our day. We then usually have 2 more sessions before lunch. This week is all about "hearing Gods voice" and about the different ways and places that God communicates to us. Its been such a new and beautiful topic for me. I am astounded at how much God speaks and how often before I have missed it. Through the help of the Spirit I am learning to hear and obey what God tells me. Then we have lunch, for an hour after lunch every day we have a scripture memorization time. I am trying to memorize the whole book of Ephesians by the end of Trek. So far its been so good! The idea of writing Gods precious words to us on my heart is so appealing to me and I get so excited about it, that we even have the freedom to do this! Its so good! The rest of the afternoon we usually have another session then some free time. After dinner we will sometimes have group time, sometimes free time, sometimes reading time, and sometimes a planned activity. Each week we each have a different chore as well so chores are thrown in there sometime too :) By the end of it all we are kept pretty busy with just the right balance between it all and sufficient free time. 

Today was a little difficult for me, I felt like I was wrestling with God today about some things and it was kind of exhausting to be honest ha. I woke up refreshed for the first time since coming to the Mark Centre (I have had some trouble sleeping) but from there I just felt unrest all through my devotions, right through till the about 2 when we had a lovely and incredibly wise woman named Sandy came speak to us. Now being me (who wears my emotions on my sleeve) All day I had been a bit teary eyed and maybe a little withdrawn. I was in this attitude , of grumpy/upset unrest-fulness sitting on my phone in the common room. I heard someone come in but I didnt bother to look up or introduce myself as I normally would have with new speakers/session leaders. I just kept scrolling through my facebook news feed on my phone. I looked up for a sec and noticed this lady (Sandy) was trying to post a paper up on the paper board, she couldnt get it posted so I stood up to help. As I did so she looked at me, and you have to know, I'd never spoken to or met this woman before, she said "you're Becca right?"  and I said "yes? have we met?" and she simply said "no, but this morning God gave me a word for you so I wrote it out on this paper, you can read it and tell me if it fits. If it doesnt then leave it, if it fits then God wants you to hear it" and handed me a letter with my name on top. I was dumbfounded. I had just come in from a walk and was asking God while I was walking to help me sort through my frustrations. I was bringing my struggles to him and I felt like we were almost wrestling in our interaction. I wasnt submitting to his will. Anyways I took the letter and read it and I was hit with both a deep conviction and freedom. Part of the letter spoke to something I have struggled with a whole lot lately, my pride. Gods reminder to me was that everything should be done out of who he is, and not out of my needs. It was such a powerful and real moment for me. That God spoke directly to me on something that I was struggling with so much, through this woman who I had never seen or met before in my life. 

Our God cares so much and is so active and real. The Holy Spirit is waiting with such anticipation for us to let him reign in our lives, and when we do, he delights in astounding us with his presence and with his tangibility. I hope and encourage every one of you, whoever that might be, to give reign to the Holy Spirit in your life today. You will not regret it. There is something incredibly powerful in letting God run your life completely. 

Blessings! 
~ Me (Becca!)

PS: If you are praying for me here are some specifics that I would be delighted to have prayer for

- I am memorizing scripture right now, just that I would have the mind to retain and really grasp what I am memorizing. 
- I still have a significant amount of support financially to raise in a fairly small time frame. Just that I would continue to trust in Gods provision and guidance in that. 
-I am entering into 48 hours of silence on the 17th (tomorrow). Just that I would be really attentive to understand what God is communicating to me. 
- and lastly that I wouldnt be to homesick. You all know I love my family and being away from them is at times extremely difficult. Just that I would allow God to fill that space in my heart and that I would have the capacity to love from a distance. 

Thank you!!!! 

Abundantly more!

Well, here I am. 

ha I wrote that line and sat staring at it for about 10 minutes because I honestly for once am speechless, I do not know where to begin. I guess Ill start with my first day of TREK, last Sunday. 

Erin helped me move in. We moved into the Mark Centre which is a retreat centre based on the Gospel of Mark, a truly beautiful book. Each room here at the retreat centre is named after an event or moment in the book of Mark. My room name is "Expectancy" and it is based on the story of a woman who pushed through the crowd just so she could touch the robe of Jesus, having faith that if she could just touch the robe of Christ she would be healed. This woman had faith and an expectancy in Jesus. Its a very cool story and I am excited to be living in a room with this type of meaning because thats exactly how I am coming into trek, Im expecting God to blow my mind, I am expecting him to be hear living and active because thats what I have experienced thus far in my life, a God who shows up. Bill used to say "expect a miracle" so its just really cool for me to be in this room :) All that to say, the very first day I showed up, Erin helped me move in then she left and I went downstairs to the common room to hangout with my fellow "trekies" there was actually no one there yet but one of the 3 interns (3 wonderful people who help run this program) We were just sitting and talking, not even about anything special or anything but I just had this shiver down my back and I got goose bumps and I just felt God tell me that this was exactly where he has called me to be. I have never been more sure of where my heavenly Father has brought me and it feels so good to be able to, though I fail often, walk in the will of my Lord, it is bringing me to a place of abundance.

A lot has happened this week, we have been to a lot of sessions, we have heard from a lot of people and God has been working a lot. Through everything I have just been completely overwhelmed with how good and how faithful our God is. I cant describe it because there are literally no words to express how abundant our beautiful Lord has been to me!! Its overwhelming in the most wonderful way imaginable! This week every person on trek shared a part of their story. I got to share a bit about the way God has been working in my life too. When each person was done we were quiet for a bit of time just waiting to see if God would put something on anyones heart for the person who had just shared. After I shared one of the lovely girls thats here too gave me a verse which coincidentally  (or not so coincidentally) was one that I felt God put on my heart already this summer. Its Ephesians 3:14-21 and it says this:

"When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong.And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or imagine.Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever! Amen."

These verses have just come to such fulfilment begining this summer and then since then. I feel like finally God is living in my heart and though I fail all the time I am trying to give him free reign in my life. I feel like my roots are finally in the right source and are finally grounded. I feel like, though it is just one grain of an entire beach of sand, I have finally begun to understand the love of my Father!! and because of all of this I am experiencing such fullness in my life!! Whether plans fall through or work. Whether things go my way or not. Through disappointment, joy, heart ache, confusion, and more, through it all I feel like I have "abundantly more than I could ever have asked or imagined" My God is so big and he has conquered so much for me, all I can do is lay my life at the foot of the cross and ask and pray that he would use me in whatever ways he needs. In whatever ways it might look like I want to beat to the heart of Jesus and as I strive to do this I experience abundatly more than I could have ever hoped for! We serve an amazing God! 

All I am

Here we go. In approximately 3 days I will be moving into the Mark’s Centre and beginning my 6 month journey of TREK. I wish I could say that this only brings me excitement and anticipation but to be perfectly honest, in this moment right now, it mostly scares me. Some days I wish I never left home because the fact that I left now means that my heart is divided between two beautiful places that I love almost equally, and every time that I come home to Lethbridge I feel this way. Being away from my family is the most difficult thing for me, I used to think it would get easier over time but mostly my heart just grows fonder thus the distance just gets harder. This sounds pessimistic but I am actually so excited too. I legit cant wait, I am so excited to be open to whatever God wants from me this next while especially, I know he is going to teach me more than I could ever imagine and despite how difficult it might be I know that God is going to blow my mind and when I come out of this, I will have infinitely more than I could have asked or imagined going in. But right now in this moment its just kinda hard to grasp. I wont see my beautiful little nieces or nephew for at least 6 months., maybe more. One of my best friends is having a baby in March and I wont be here. I dunno I guess its just hard to sacrifice some things. Yet even now as I think this is hard… its really not. I would give up anything if God asked me to, I really would, because nothing in my life is worth anything unless my God grants it. All I wanna do is follow my Lord, and he brought me here!! To this beautiful place and gave me this beautiful opportunity! And I am SO excited to see how he will move. It overwhelms me, the way that God has already provided, in the way that he has given me a new measure of trust in areas where I would have struggled to give up so much more before , even in the new people he has brought into my life. My God never ceases to amaze me. So as I sit here, in my old room in my parents house, in the last bit of home I will have for a very long time, I wait in anticipation, loosening my hold on my God has asked me to give to him for now, and trusting that no matter what happens, no matter what I feel like Im giving up that is irreplaceable, no matter how my heart hurts, this is his will, and nothing would be more painful to me than not following Gods call on my life. That is something that I cannot and will not compromise because I already know that I cannot function without the guidance of my loving and beautiful Savior. Its 2013! This year holds so much and I expect nothing short of miracles in my life this year because  my God is good and amazing and I KNOW he has got this under control. So I’m giving all I am, everything I hope and dream. Everything that scares me or hurts me. All the crap and all the good and I pray that God would use me, or break me, or do whatever he wishes in my life for his glory. All I am is all I have and I want to give all I have for my Lord.  Come at me 2013!!