I died.

This week I have felt the heavy burden and frustration of massive confusion, as Hebrews says: the sin that so easily entangles us, I felt like I was caught in a net of strands and strands of misled thoughts.  So much confusion.  God is not confused, He is very clear and simple.  He is specific.  

The enemy, on the other hand, is like a chatty Chelsea.  The enemy or yourself will start to think about too many things that veer away from the simple truth.  

For me that was fear of going on outreach for two months.  Fear of the heat, fear of going into villages and possibly having to hug or wash dirty people with lice, fear of giant red ants and all sorts of spiders and bugs biting me, fear of unclean water, fear of slipping and falling in poop, fear of food that I don't want to eat, fear after fear after fear that built up anxiety in me.  Fear that even led me to think that perhaps this was not what God wanted.  God doesn't want me to be anxious!  God doesn't want me to be angry!  So surely this means I shouldn't go.  And I got so confused.  So confused.

Confusion usually leads to defeat or apathy.  Those ends are not what God desires.  God gave us our lives to live!  Not to be or feel defeated, He put life in us, to produce joy, peace, love, and unity with our churches.  We are called to just give Him everything, and not let anything....anything get in the way of what He asks of us.  He wants your money? Give it all.  He wants you to let go of your boyfriend, do it.  He wants you to fast?  Just obey.  He wants you to donate your favorite shoes, bag or dress?  Give it away after you pray and ask God who to give it to.  He wants you to quit your job and go be a missionary in morocco?  Pack your bags!  

It is not that God needs or wants any of these things from us.  What He asks of us is only for our good.  

Things are what get in our way as we walk toward God.  So God sees a blockade and He knows if you remove that then you can come closer to Him.  It is difficult because things are what make us feel worthy.  Our identity is usually based on our things, our physical appearance can define us, maybe God wants that from you.  Our jobs can define us, our money, a pair of shoes can feel so "ours".  You know when something is what defines you when you actually grab that thing and stand before God in readiness to give it all to Him, and you are quaking with tremors and just fear all over.

  I'm not talking about thinking about it, thoughts are weak and oftentimes justifying as our good intentions.  No.  I'm talking about when you, if you ever have the grace from God to get to that point of getting ready to give up what defines you to Him, find yourself standing there with that thing, and you fully understand that it is a choice.  That the choice will mean you will suffer not just physically or emotionally, but the suffering is mostly mental.  Your mind will war against you, you will start to feel angry or maybe impatient, but what you feel is not a product that appears due to the loss of your sacrifice.  

This was revelational for me.

What surfaces after such an act of obedience is something that was always in there.  

What you find come out or begin to come out as you give God the most precious thing to you is actually something that was always hiding behind that blockade in your heart.  

Things like anger, rage, cursing, scowling, worry, panic, anxiety, stress, lust, impure thought, jealousy, envy, greed....

God knew it, and He wanted you, all of you, so when you prayed He asked for that from you.  If you're like me you may have thought, "why do you want my precious thing?  I love this!  I don't love it more than I love You....I don't think.  But why?  And if I give this to You can I trust that You will give me something better or will I just be short of that all my life?"

I looked at it as a sacrifice on my part, rather than Gods mercy and love wanting me to be closer to Him.  In Him is fullness.

We hardly ever know why God asks us of such things, we just think He wants to take from us what we love most because He is a jealous God or because, if you don't know Gods nature and character that well, you think He just wants to see us suffer; that it's one of His mysterious characteristics that we are just supposed to accept.  

But the God I serve is not like that at all.  God speaks to me and reveals His plans to me when I ask Him and do my part in seeking counsel from others who I know also walk closely with God.  For are we not one part of one body?  So when I think I have to struggle with something confusing on my own, I am like an injured eye trying to detach myself from the socket in order to get better.  I want to be perfect so that I can come back to the body and everyone will be happy.  But can an eye get better or even survive without being attached to the socket and the body?  Haha, the reasoning is all messed up!  We are not meant to live individually.  We have personal relationships with Christ, but we live and thrive and get healing when we are unified and attached to the body, where Christ is the Head.  So talk to people.  Not because they are perfect but because they are the body that you are attached to.  You need them in order to get healing and strength.  Christ is the Head, and He is perfect.  The body can be broken and messed up, but so long as it remains unified under Christ, it will be in the only place where it has any opportunity at all to become better.  Apart from the body you will not last long.

But just to clarify an important point regarding the sin or sins that hide behind those things that we find so difficult to give up, be aware that they were always there.  

For example, I found that when I had to give up my comforts (coming to Cambodia) I found myself complaining or feeling irritated at people, and I blamed the heat or the dirtiness and mosquito bites.  That made sense to me, I am complaining because these things are difficult.  But if I truly knew God was with me and that He was all I needed as I walked with Him then nothing should have bothered me.  But when I removed the blockade of comfort, I saw that God was not all I wanted.  I saw comfort sitting there on the throne of my heart, and when I threw it down, there behind it lay the ugly sins of anger and greed.  Like mold, it was festering behind comfort.  But God is merciful and so good, He brought to light those things that were keeping me from Him, things that I know I don't want!  I don't want anger in my life!  I don't want to be greedy!  But when I didn't see those things, I just saw comfort, and comfort didn't look like sin, it didn't look evil, it looked good, actually. 

 But it is not that comfort is evil, God blesses us with comfort lots of times.  The comfort of a nice bed, the comfort of a loving friend, the comfort of good food or clean water or maybe a first class seat on your flight :).

It is when comfort sits on the throne of my heart, the throne that belongs only to God, then it means it is hiding something.  And that's when sin is not so noticeable.  But that's why we need to ask God : "what is it that is holding me back from You?"  And we may not understand fully why He asks us to give Him something that appears to be good and not sinful, like comfort, but when we trust in His perfect will, in His goodness, His fierce desire and love for us to be close to Him, when we trust in Him like that, it's usually not very long before we see the sin that was festering behind what appeared to us as ok.   

Don't be scared of the sin that surfaces.  

Be thankful that it was brought into the light in order that It could be dealt with so that you could remove it and go forward. 

That is what healing is.  

Obeying God.  

Letting light shine in the dark places of your heart.

---

One of my favorite verses in the bible is Colossians 3:3 that says:

"For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God."  

I think about that and I recall that Jesus died too.  He died on a cross to reconcile man to God again because sin separated us from Him.  He died and took all that sin down with him into the grave, then rose from the dead.  

He made a way for us to be united with God if we repented and believed in Him.  Instead of having to sacrifice an animal every time we sinned, all we have to do now is repent and believe that Jesus has cleansed us from all sin.  

He died and then rose from death back to life.  

So I died.  My sin died.  My life is now hidden with Christ in God.  I wait for His return, which is my hope, my choice.  I choose God.  

Colossians 3:4

"When Christ, who is your life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory."

I died, but death will not hold me down as it could not hold Jesus down.

I wait for Christ, to appear with Him in glory.  That is why I live for Him, in Him, and by faith do all things through Him who is the One that will raise me up with Himself.  So for a little while it may appear that I am losing, but what is it to me these things that I know will eventually lose their luster?  Comforts.  Clothes.  Money.  Beauty.  Even the world knows that these things will eventually die out.  

But in Christ there is eternal glory. 

 I would rather wait a little while for that then live a life without hope for more than just now til death.  

So yea, I died. :) 

My life is not mine, but I walk with Gods word saturating my mind.  I keep my eyes on Him.  I set my mind and my heart on Him.  I put to death whatever belongs to my earthly nature.  I die to gain Christ.  To live a life worthy of The Lord.

Here's a silly doodle I wrote on my arm as a reminder of my choice. (Because I still forget everyday).  

Stay close to God by wrestling in praying, reading His Word, and obeying whatever He asks of you because He knows what is keeping you from Him.  

And I will rise, as Christ was raised to life.

J.

I've only just begun ...

(I've been not posting a few of my entries because for a while I felt like my posts started to become something I took as my own rather than Gods grace in speaking to me.  I was taking so much from my own little blog, and that felt strangely uneasy.  Most of the entries this past week were me complaining some more about how much I have hated it here, which is not even true, but the more I thought I was suffering the more I suffered...if that makes sense.  It should.) 

It's about intimacy.

It is intimacy.

Be intimate with God.

I must know who He is for myself.

Get alone with Him, get into your bible, pray, speak to Him in your thoughts.

Think very hard about who He is to you, over and over and over until you get something that makes sense to you.  That brings about fresh intimacy.  It can't just be something you heard or was told, it has to be something you know for yourself, because God speaks to us about who He is.  The mystery of God is Jesus.  If you know Jesus you will know God.  The fullness of the Diety are in Christ Jesus. 

If I don't know who God is to me, to me as Jamie, if Jamie and God only know each other through other people then I will not know Him when I see Him face to face.  

Because when all the thoughts, the deep nagging curiosities and questions that always arise at some point or another, when they begin I must have my own first hand account of who God is.  He must be to me as any other person I know, like my mom or my friends in Nashville.  He must be so alive to me.  I must be able to ask Him my questions.  I must be able to hear Him speak to me.  I must be able to rest in His arms that are as real as the arms of my mother when I see her pick me up from the airport (at least the sense of how real that is).  I must know when He is pleased and when He is displeased.  I must know when He is deeply moved with compassion for someone.  I must know when He desires to discipline me and when He desires to give me gifts.  I must have a bond with Him, bonding time; intimacy.  I must be close to Him, because apart from Him all else withers in time, but He is the Rock that stands forever.

He is who I want to see.

He is who I want to know, personally.

He is who I will set my eyes on.

I don't want more spiritual facades.  No more tears or brief moments of "maybe that was God".  

No.

I want a firm faith that comes through intimacy of knowing God personally.  I'll be searching, digging, and waiting.

My hope rests in eternity with Jesus.  That is my reason for all this work and effort and time and persistence. The benefit must outweigh the cost. I will go until I find Him more clearly.  At least clearly enough to say that I will give up everything to follow Him.

Reading the entire book of Colossians at 5:30am, 1pm, and 8pm everyday for the next 2 months.  

Let's see what happens....

-------------------------------------

When will I begin to love others?

When will it stop being about myself?

When will I look at the church and all who go there and think, I will die for them?

When will I stop wanting the recognition or the admiration?

When will I truly walk in humility?

The mystery of God is namely this: Jesus Christ.  

Jesus is understood when we are united in love and encouraged in our hearts -col 2:2

I want a firm faith!

I want this to be my perspective and desires:

For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. 

Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, 

so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side

 for the faith of the gospel, and not frightened in anything by your opponents. (The enemy is real, but he is nothing compared to God, he tries to scare us by making himself loud, dark, and noisy, but that's it.  That's all the enemy can do...try.  We don't ever try in Christ, we just win.  It's that simple.)

 For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake, (Philippians 1).  

The deeper I go with God the more opportunity for me to have difficulties...it gets harder and harder, so unless I really know God it will be hard to let go of everything each step of the way.  God must be worth me losing everything....cuz everything is a lot to lose! Haha. 

Get deep in the word, study it, find out who God is, and see for yourself if He is worth giving up life itself for. 

J

I'll just say it

I wonder if Paul liked being in prison, like if it made him feel more like a warrior or a champion?  I wonder if he liked all the opposition he got from the religious leaders, knowing that Jesus got the same kind of opposition.  How sometimes to be esoteric feels great, I wonder if he actually got a sense of enjoyment from things that most would look at as "suffering" or "difficult".  Markers for dislike, for me personally, are usually isolation from others, crying, and at the worst turns into a strong desire to sin (be lazy, be apathetic, and rebellious).  Did Paul ever cry in his cell?  Did he ever just up and leave to be by himself?  Did he ever feel the weight of his areas of weakness, did he fall into sin and feel ashamed?  Was sin still so tempting for him?   Everything in me says YES! Because he was human.  But ...how did he do it?  I want to know, because I am not there.

Or was he a lot like Jesus, always knowing that although temptation was alluring, God held the real glory?  

I mean, what I'm really wondering is: did Paul always have it all together? Cuz he went through the worst of the worst...

2 Corinthians 11:24-29

"Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. 

Three times I was shipwrecked; 

a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; 

in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night,

 in hunger and thirst, 

often without food,

in cold and exposure."

"And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches. 

Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant?"

" If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness."

Ok Paul.

So did he have moments where he forgot to trust in God, or was that just never a problem for him?  I mean, moments where he just downright pouted amidst a bad circumstance, or maybe pouted is too feminine, maybe he was sulking, glaring at nothing, griping over every little thing...?  Hanging his head low. 

Because man am I feeling beat up by my sin right now.  I feel like I have one tooth left dangling, a bloody and bruised upper lip, a cut up eyebrow, mushed up muscles, and the strongest desire to just fall to ground in defeat.  I am complaining inside, I am getting so affected by how people will view me if I do this or do that, I am letting thoughts of irritation proceed and expand, I am judging myself harshly, I am thinking others will also judge me harshly so I'm getting irritated at them for something they haven't even done yet.  I am responding to my King with cowardice, with anxiety, with pride, with a desire to sit on the throne of my heart.

  I have a massive headache.

  I'm hot and sweaty.  

  I feel seasick.

I came back to my hotel room to lie down, missing my morning lecture, and feeling ashamed for doing so, and angry at the people who will start judging me for doing so.  Thoughts of outreach, once again, bear down on me like two walls closing in on me like a human sandwich.  I'm thinking this is it, I'm gonna get smushed.  I can't do this. 

And in this moment I feel God...should be angry at me, disappointed at my lack of trust.  I know God hates sin, so much so He died to take it away, because sin is what separates us from Him.  So God really hates sin, and really loves me.  I have sinned in so many ways just now, wallowing and griping over my circumstances.  God should be angry, because my sin is detestable. Yet I sense His overwhelming love for me as well, strangely.

Hosea 11:8,9

"How can I give you up, (jamie)?

How can I hand you over, (jamie)?

How can I treat you (like dust)?

How can I make you like (a forgotten person)?

My heart is changed with me;

All my compassion is aroused.

I will not carry out my fierce anger,

Nor will I turn and devastate (jamie).  

For I am God, and not man--

The Holy One among you.

I will not come in wrath."

Instead I rest in Him.  

I am gathered in a mighty embrace of all of Gods compassion.  

He is with me,

He is for me,

And He loves me.

As I figure out more of how I can stop the lies that cause so much fear in me, as I return my gaze to Jesus, I take a deep breath.  Still a little begrudging at Paul, but moreso thankful and humbled by Gods grace for my situation.  I don't want what Paul went through, I just want his stamina.  :). 

Heading back to class now.  With about an hour left, praying first that I will not harbor any preconceived allegations from others.  

Jesus help me now to walk in love and humility.  

J

The Valley of Achor?

Tonight is another one of those hot and sweaty nights that make me feel like crying.  This is just so bad.  I'm sweating all along my forehead and my back is drenched.  This makes me look at my calendar where I count down the days til I will be off on the plane to Korea then back home.  Home.  Just 92 more days and I will not be where I am right now, sweaty humid bed.  

I love Cambodia so much, but I dislike Cambodia so much too.

Right now I dislike it so much, I just want to leave and go anywhere that isn't humid.  It's so bad, I can't even do anything about it.  I want to cry but that would be so lame.  Crying over this.  But I want to leave.  I don't want to go on outreach.  I want to be home with family and friends and wear cute clothes again (instead of the same dri fit shirt and capris everyday.  I feel like a frump.  And my hair...seeing as how I sweat the entire day, all I can do is tie it up and away from my face in a bun, and my bangs too...my once quirky cool bangs that I loved are forced to be pinned back.  I do all this to protect my face from too much dirt and sweat and oil.  I want to have a soy latte.  I want a really good turkey burger that hasn't been laying out in the heat all day swarmed by hundreds of flies.  I want air conditioning.  I want my feet to stay clean all day without having to scrub dirt off of them at the end of the night.  I want to go for a cool crisp morning run along the mountains in my backyard.  I would really like to not be bitten and itchy from bugs for an entire week.  I want to not sleep in a room with 7 girls with one bathroom that feels like a sauna.  I want to cuddle my dog Linus.  I want to wear shoes that are not flip flops.  I want to see grass!  I want to be somewhere really clean!  

I know... It's this humidity and heat that is making me so irritable.  So it's a huge refining moment for me to throw aside all of my wants and my desires and just press into Jesus.  I know He brought me here, and I have been learning the most fundamental truths about who He is and also about who I am or have been.  I just ...

I'm really thankful for Gods grace.  

He cradles me.  Calms me down.  I have to fight this, this groaning attitude in me.  I am broken in this.  He is good, He is always good to me.  

Help me Lord, to see You in this moment of so much discomfort.  Help me to embrace the heat because I see that You are with me.  It's not just the heat, but the underlying foundation of my rights.  My time.  My schedule.  My time.  My sleeping hours, my mealtimes, my bathroom time, my routine (that I often have hated so much before), I want routine that I know I will hate!  I am such a wreck, and my only hope is my Jesus.

....the next day...

I was asking myself and God a lot of questions this morning.

God seems to love questions, because He always encourages me to ask more by showing me the answers to other ones so that I feel comfortable to get more curious.  

I was sitting on the balcony outside my bedroom, watching the stillness before me, the many different trees standing in their places, the ground looking up, and it was as if they and I were, together, looking at God.   

I was drawn to the book of Hosea.  This book is all about God demonstrating His love for the Israelites through the prophet Hosea.  He had Hosea marry a prostitute, then when she would leave Him to go after other men, God told Hosea to not just get her back, but to woo her in love.  To pursue her despite how she implicitly hurt and wronged him. This was a direct representation of how God would keep loving the Israelites even though they would keep turning away from God and going after other things.  That God would always be wooing us...

"And there I will give her her vineyards

    and make the Valley of Achor (Achor means "trouble") a door of hope.

And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth,

    as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt."

-Hosea 2:15

I have hurt God with some of the decisions I have made, and for wanting other things (career, admiration, accolades, accomplishments) or other people more than I wanted my truest first love.  Actually I continue to hurt God, everyday.  Yet, He pursues me, woos me, and that is so tremendously loving, I am left shaking in tears for having ever turned away.  I want His love.  I am speechlessly overwhelmed and thankful for His love for me and how through Jesus I am made clean again.

Never once have I felt like God had had enough of me when I turned to Him in my desperation and broken spirit.

A plethora of things throughout today have led me to the simple fact that I need Jesus.  Real Jesus.  Not a man from way back who has a beard, wore a robe, and picked up sheep.  I need the Jesus who was nailed to a cross because there is no greater love than that!  He died an innocent death, and then significantly rose again from being dead so as to show me that death was not the end for me.  My sin: my lying, my cheating, my stealing, my lusting, my jealousy, my pride, my greed, my envy, my arrogance, my selfishness, my idols, all of my sin completely separates me from being able to be with God because He is holy; set apart from sin (like water and oil but immeasurably farther from one another).  But the sacrifice necessary to clean up the mess of sin in my life, the very thing making it impossible for me to be with God, was made by the real Jesus.  He had to die because death is the only just punishment for sin.  So Jesus died.  He took my punishment, and being God He was the only One who could and would and did take all sin and offered Himself as a sacrifice that only had to be done once because He is God.  The truth in this lies not in that Jesus was the only sacrifice capable of taking sin down, but that Jesus chose to take sin down...how big is His love that He would even do such a thing?!  

It's kind of like....ok, let's say you need a doctor because you got into a car accident, and you're just all busted up!  You've got a broken rib, broken leg, punctured lung, and so many cuts and bruises you're almost unrecognizabke.  You need a really good doctor and a hospital, but you're in Cambodia and they don't have the right equipment or meds to treat you.  You're incapable of flying out anywhere, but if you don't get adaquate help soon you will die.  A well-known physician in Vermont hears about your condition through an email and decides to take the red eye flight that very night to you in Cambodia, dropping his schedule, leaving his awesome family behind, and making phone call after phone call to have all the proper equipment sterilized and shipped piece by piece to get there through priority shipments.  At the airport they say he will have to pay extra because his luggage (with medical supplies) is too heavy.  Then at the security checkpoint they make him take everything out of his bag, they question him because he looks middle eastern and his eyes are red from not getting enough sleep (again, all because he was packing and trying to have everything done to get to you as soon as he could).  Finally he gets on the plane, a 16 hour flight, he has the middle seat between a crying child and a chatterbox woman who won't stop talking about her cats, and he is also by the lavatory that reeks of piss.  When the flight lands he then has to wait in the customs line in the sticky heat for 7 hours  without access to food or a toilet.  After he exits the airport he has to ask someone to help him get a bus ticket to the location you are at, which is another 8 hours.  He gets on the bus, some kid steals his bag with his passport and wallet inside, but somehow he manages to find his way to you.  He arrives, the medical supplies arrive, and you look up at this disheveled face, and he just gets right to it.  Cleaning your wounds carefully, reassuring you that you are in good hands and that everything is going to be alright soon.  You heard vaguely about how someone was coming to help you, and you waited impatiently for him because you were in so much pain, at times you even got annoyed at how agonizing the wait was, but you have no idea what this guy went through to get to you.  You have no idea until you start to ask questions.  You find out little by little, detail by detail, and then you start to also get to know this doctor personally.  You find out that he decided to come to you because he wanted you to live, because he had seen a photo of you and felt compassion and cared about the fact that you were in pain and would likely die if he didn't come.  He dropped everything, and the more you get to know Him, the more you trust Him because of what you discover about his character.  

Your life is saved because of Him.  He didn't have to come, but he put in a lot of effort and intentionality in getting to you.  He suffered to get to you.  Would that not amaze you?  Would that not make you forever indebted to Him?  It wouldn't if you never found out and really knew what He had left behind and what He had to go through to save you.  

Jesus went through much much more to get to you.  To make a way for you to not fade into death.

 Sometimes I forget that Jesus became a man out of an intense love for mankind, I forget that what Jesus did was because He loved me.  Sometimes I start to think He just died a historical death that really has nothing to do with me, Jamie.  Or worse I let ignorance of the details make me feel like what he did was a mere expectation, as if Him being God means he owes me salvation.  That makes no sense unless you're completely unaware and utterly self-centered.  However, it is when I am in the valley of Achor, the valley of trouble and pain or suffering, that I cry out to God for relief, for purpose, for hope.  God always reminds me that if I see how much He loves me I will see the door of Hope, the bridge leading to Himself.  I am drawn to Jesus and what He did on the cross so that when I feel the depravity and dirtiness of my sin I can more personally feel the love of His cleansing blood.  

When I see what my sin looks like in the light, I fall in love all over again like the first time.  Like the Israelites when they first were set free from Egypt, I come back to freedom, joyously! 

J

Processing

As I am getting to know God more I like Him more and more.  Getting to know the real God is eye-opening and burden-lifting!

Yet in the process I find those roller coaster moments of my hesitation (especially when I feel like someone other than myself is "burning my ships"--explained in a previous post) that I am:

still timid before Him

Still insecure about my place in His family inheritance

Still cynical of the magnitude of his love for me

Still standing as one who needs to earn His approval

Still affected by the guilt and shame of my sins

 

These "still" truths are revealed through a few things-

silence in me, usually from shame or guilt for disobeying Gods voice in a situation (like a child who knows they did something bad, and in their guilt they remain silent so as to steer away any attention to themselves)

Secondly, a sudden lack of confidence in me.  My worth becomes questioned due to my disobedience.  I suddenly feel like I am an orphan and not a real daughter, because you know, real children never disobey their parents... (Meager sarcasm there).

At the bottom of one of my roller coasters I usually feel utterly hopeless.  As I am becoming more and more aware of my intentional sinning (it's rare that any of my sins are unintentional) I become ever more desperate to know that I know that I know that God is good and that God loves me unconditionally.  

So I pray.  I ask Him.  

"Can you show me that You love me in a really obvious way?  Not just through a pretty picture of nature or a piece of dark chocolate found on my desk, but something that only You know is in the deepest part of me...."

He always, always, always does so.

 I have to be told by Him (and I am) how much He loves me, and how He always wants to spend time with me.  

My fault lies in my lack of full acceptance that God is good, and that He loves me.

  I think I've accepted that God is God, so now it's just the other two that I need to see with more precision.

  It's a choice to accept the truth, and the truth never changes in Gods case.  He was the First, and He is the Last; He was the beginning and He will be the end.  He holds all things.  For him and to Him and through Him all things were made.  

The choice to accept that truth means getting up and off the throne of my heart.  To not be the "final say" in my decisions, even and especially in my most possessive decisions, but to yield trustingly all the small and big things.  Why?  Because He is a good God who loves me perfectly.  

--

In my experience, when I choose my sin rather than choose to love God (through obedience) my ability to serve and love others is drastically diminished.  Guilt is a silencer. 

In contrast my obedience bursts open the floodgates of my heart's ability to genuinely love others, and people are revitalized by me.  I can't explain it very well right now, but it will clarify itself to me more as I continue to choosing to love God.  

When we choose to love God through our obedience we burn brightest.  I burn brightest.  I have found the power of God defies my logic haha in so many ways, it's humbling.

--

I know my mom is always battling for me through her praying and probably sometimes pleading with God for me, and that's so comforting for me. 

I am reminded to pray for others and battle for them as well.  I am apart of one body, if I'm the eye and the hand is hurt, then MY hand is hurt. 

--

Ok this just happened...this guy next to me ordered a smoothie.

That awkward moment when you are down to the very last sips of your delicious smoothie from a straw, sitting in a quiet room, when that slurping sound increases and you fight a battle between social etiquette to cease slurping and your own special delight in having every last sensational drop of your wonderful drink.  It's always funny when the person chooses instead to try the happy medium of taking several quick sips, rather than one really long and loud slurp.  Teehee hilarious.  -__-  ok perhaps you had to be here.  

J

What the enemy intends as harm, God can just snap into good.

I want to write even when I am in a low place, a place of some deep-rooted sense of abandonment and rejection; a dark place where my past failures or people who have hurt me try to define who I am, try to pull off my "new wineskin" with the old one, the familiar one, the self-condemning one, the prideful one, the immediately gratified one, the hopeless one, the fake one, the scared one, the untrusting one, the self-reliant one, there ready to smother me again.  Where so much confusion arises, questions emerge regarding the legitimacy of my relationship with God, the reality of God; where apathy tries to make me saunter aimlessly toward sleep.  

 However, I know, or feel strongly convicted, that I have light, and the light I have breaks any darkness I may find myself in (whether during temptation, during sin, after sin, while desiring sin, or feeling shameful and guilty of sin), all the while I am reminded that I have the light that makes the darkness dissipate.  It's not some chant or prayer, it's not an act of kindness that releases the light.  There is no prerequisite.  Light is there.  So it's choosing to bring the light into the darkness.  It's always a choice, we were created by God to choose.  

John 1:5 says

"The light (Jesus) shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it."

This world runs contrary to what Jesus says.  He says give up everything to Him and you will gain everything!  He says die to yourself and you will live forever!  He says to consider others before yourself and you will be provided for.  He says that you will have joy during suffering!  The light makes no sense to the darkness.

John 1:9

"The true light (Jesus) that GIVES light to every man was coming into the world."

Anytime we are given something we have the choice to take it or not take it.  We are given gifts or given insults, but we choose if we take those things to keep.  Jesus desires to give us Himself, the light, but He doesn't force us to take anything because He wants us to want Him (as anyone who has ever been in a loving relationship knows; it's always miraculously sweet to be wanted by the person you love so much).  Bargaining sucks out all the intimacy in a relationship, thinking I'll do this so you give me this......but I bargain with God all the time, still, even now I caught myself bargaining with God.

I hadn't fully faced it before, but over and over I have heard my thoughts say something like this:

"God You are so good, and I know You have the best for me..." 

 Then without really looking at what drove me to those words (because they are true, but God is always about the heart) I saw that the end of that sentence continued: "so I'll keep trying to be better so that You'll give me the best future husband, kids, writing career, international itinerary, and anything else I am unaware of that will make me happy."  The motivation to "repent" or strive more courageously toward Him and away from sin was to be given things in my future.  It was about me.  I was bargaining with God.  I have been bargaining with Him, and seeing that just shakes me up.  How all this time He knew, He knew exactly that that was what I had been doing; that I was bargaining with Him.  He was patient with me.  He loves me ferociously, evidenced in that He gave His Son to step down from His perfect presence, His throne, and onto earth, where people stab others in the back, steal other peoples' wives, go sexually rabid, and contemplate suicide.  So it makes sense why He is so patient with my conniving heart.  His love for me is vigorous!  Always at work against the things that try to turn me away from Him, because apart from Him He knows,and even I know, that I will suffer exceedingly.  Father God always outsmarts the devil.  As my good friend put it:

"I don't get the enemy at all. I mean, he KNEW God, they hung out- there is no way Satan wasn't aware of how awesome and powerful God was and yet he rebelled. Why did that seem like a good idea at all?"

The enemy is a puffed up idiot.  

I am so empowered by the precision and finality of that often overlooked, yet so obvious fact.  

So one more time, and probably many more times to come, I pray that I have a heart that stops loving sin.  I pray that I exercise my will to choose what brings life.  I pray that I would want God just for being God and not because I'll get anything else in return.  I pray to love God even if that means I have the worst life, a life filled with suffering, loss, pain, rejection, physical deterioration, whatever may happen to me, I want to love God just because He is God, He is good, and He loves me.  To love Him purely.

----

Some previous thoughts I had earlier...

Psalm 51 is the epitome of genuine intimacy with God.  David says:

"For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me."

I, too, know when I walk contrary to what my Creator Father tells me to do or not do.  I know so well that my sin is always before me!  

"Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a WILLING spirit, to sustain me."

To grant is to ask for contribution or help, to want to WANT a will that chooses God.  That may sound nonsensical : to want God to help you WANT to choose Him.   But David wrote this, I think, saying "God show me more of who You are because I am after You, I am seeking You, and the more of You I see, know and understand, the more clearly I see why I want to choose You!"

  All God has to do is show more of Himself and all the evidence, motivation, overwhelming sweetness is there to "grant" or contribute to our wills choosing Him.  Which in turn looks like a change in the way we choose to treat people, choose to spend our time and money, choose to live our lives!  Everything begins to change, I would think, once you go from choosing to seek Him to then falling madly in love with Him back.  

I can choose to seek God, and I pray that I would be unrelenting in my seeking!  I don't know if I truly love God, but the more I see Him the more I want of Him, because He is God, He is good, and He seems to really really love me.  

J

Wineskins

A moment of frustrating truth:

I am refusing to give God a few specific remote controls in my heart. 

In other words, there are things God has asked me to give to Him (since He wants everything), that I have found too exceedingly frightening to let go of because of my selfishness/greed and an obsession over the control of my self-preservation.  To give those things that I hold so tightly to will allow me to no longer be bound to them, because if nothing matters to me anymore except for Jesus then no matter what I attain or lose in life will make a difference, because things will be given to me and things will be taken from me, but God says He is always with us into eternity.  I would live so exceedingly confident because I would have the one thing that I needed for true joy and real love and intimacy and peace while all other things would and could come and go in and out of my life.  This I know is true and revelational, but knowledge is futile if steps are not taken to implement and apply those truths.  

As I was sitting at one of my favorite cafés (Jaan bai, an NGO run by a cool Aussie by the name of Tom) I sat there almost tangibly feeling the bubbling of a potent mixture finding those cracks in my heart. It was very much like the churning of cement in liquid form as it smoothly oozes over and covers all the little holes and cracks of a surface.  It starts out soft and watery, appearing harmless then very soon it begins to harden and once cement is hardened it is very difficult to break down.  This is very much like the process of our hearts becoming hardened.  It always starts out easy and smooth, we think things like "next time", or "I know this already", or "oh well, I tried my best", or "there's nothing I can do about that" and so on.  We are victims, or we are honest but lazy, and we let the oozing settle nice and easy over those areas we don't want exposed.  Then the more we continue to ignore it the harder those spots become until they are so concrete we find it way too difficult to even attempt at hacking at it. 

But good thing God is God, and there is nothing He cannot take down.  

But that does not mean it will not hurt.  It will hurt, and we ourselves are to blame for having let the hardness in our hearts continue to ooze in all the different areas as we ignored them.  Understanding that you are responsible for your sin and the difficulty in getting rid of it is essential to helping yourself become hungry and desperate for God and to see how good He truly is.  

One of my school leaders walked in while all this was happening (the oozing cement in my heart), and spoke to me gently.  I was honest with him (without getting too specific because I'm still afraid for some reason).  It was as if I just sat there defeated while he began to get a shovel and remove all the cement before it could harden.  His words were not just right and encouraging, but his demeanor towards me was so caring I almost got upset.  This guy, why did he have to start helping me, making me feel like a bad person (though he was doing the opposite and I was the only one making myself feel like scum), making me feel convicted to not let my heart become hardened.  It was difficult because I didn't want to pick up my own shovel, but to just stand by and watch became more and more difficult.  I cried, which I absolutely still hate.  Why do I have such a problem with crying in front of people?  Probably because I am one of those people who get annoyed at people who cry so much, judging them to be too emotional and sensitive.  Yet I find myself....to be THE MOST emotional and sensitive person before God, especially when face to face with my own sin and the grace God has for me by never changing His love for me whether I obey or disobey.  Understanding that He never ever wanted me to repent out of guilt.  He wanted to be sure I knew first how deeply His love for me is.  

God doesn't want my guilt.  I am learning that repentance is not a means to relieve my guilty conscious, and then going back to that sin and repeating a process of words without action.

  Repentance is humbling myself before God and before others.  True repentance is giving up a sin (especially the strong habitual sins that have built up a callousness in our hearts over the years) and then, in humility, choosing a friend (not expecting them to be perfect as we ourselves are not perfect) to go to 10-20 times a day, or however many times the thoughts of temptation begin to surface, and saying "hey I need your help, I've been having these thoughts of persistent temptation and I need you to pray for me."   THAT shows hunger and desperation to do WHATEVER IT TAKES to overcome sin and walk in holiness.  It's so humbling because nobody likes to feel like a burden or an annoyance to someone, neither does anyone ever really want to reveal how weak they are.  But we humble ourselves before God, NOT before people.  If you find that you cannot do that (commit to asking someone multiple times a day to help you fight the temptations you face throughout the day), then you're lying to yourself when you say you are hungry for God or that you hate your sin.  You probably, like me, just hate the guilt and shame and consequences of your sin, but the sin itself, whatever yours may be, that sin, you love.  

It was so disgusting and frustrating to see that I loved my sins more than I loved God.  Right now, I'm still not sure if I love God more than my sin.  I hate my guilt, but I love my sin.  And this morning my prayer, as I broke down crying (again), my prayer was that I would hate my sin, and love God more.  I am moved to do so when I remember that even when I loved my sin more than God, God loved me the same as when He chose to give His only Son to suffer and die on a cross to redeem me.  His love, that sacrificial and ferocious love, is the same regardless of my love for Him or lack thereof.  

And that kind of powerful love transforms me.  I fall madly in love with God all over again because of that love.   When I love someone I do what I know they want, not what I want.  God hates sin, and so I want to hate sin too.  But my love for God needs to go deeper, be way more intimate; I need more closeness with Him.  So I will seek Him more by taking desperate measures.  Being that person who asks my friend 10-20 times a day that I need them to stand by me as I fight this temptation, and rest assured that God gives us what we need to overcome temptation.  We need each other, we need counsel, we need to have personal lives of prayer and study the Bible, we need to avoid going there or talking to that person; we have everything we need to overcome temptation.  So it is left to the simple reality of "do you really want to get rid of your sin?"  

If the answer is "no", then ask the Holy Spirit to help you have the desire to love God more than sin.  Just be honest.  

I prayed this morning that God would change my mind about my sin.  I prayed "Lord, I hate my guilt but I still love my sin, and so please help me to hate my sin."  

Now I need to pick a friend....or friends, and through this I see how arrogant and self-righteous, prideful and fearful of man that I am.  Otherwise this step would not be so difficult.  Haha but I feel blessed that God has even helped me come to this meager degree of hunger and desperation to get rid of my sin and get to experience grace, His grace, that as my leader who spoke to me at Jaan bai said, "grace breaks all the rules".

God's love will transform you.

God is pouring so much into me, and the only way those words will remain in me is if I get rid of my old ways and habits of thinking and take on a new way of thinking.

22 “And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. For the wine would burst the wineskins, and the wine and the skins would both be lost. New wine calls for new wineskins.”

-mark 2:22

I can write and blab and speak all the right and convicting things, but "new wine calls for new wineskins".  I must get rid of my old self first.

J

Nuttiness can be good. (Like almond butter)

Once again God speaks to me about the true condition of my own heart.  Amidst the feelings, the fears, the distrust, the things that look so safe, the comfortable, even the spiritual verbatim and those areas where my confidence is so concrete that at times it makes me think I don't have to work so hard to stay strong (which is idiocy from pride + self-righteousness), He asks me, "Do you, my daughter Jamie, have a desperate hunger for Me, and only Me?" Or to be more specific, "are you hungry enough to not just stay and finish the next three months in Cambodia and Burma, but are you hungry enough to finish all while choosing to fight every complaint and anxious thought?"  

 A hunger is either there or it's not there, you can not fake hunger to yourself or to God.  

So I ask myself, am I hungry enough to combine belief with action?  (Which equals faith).  And that is so difficult to answer, because I hate the heat and humidity here so much.   Why should I suffer like this?  Why don't  I just go home and serve God there?  But as my friend had helped me find footing the other day (before I paid the remainder of my fees), I am reminded of her words, that this is a season of suffering, it's temporary, and I am so hungry for God.  3 more months.  I can't do even 3 more days, but God can.  So I stay because I'm utterly powerless here, and the less power I have over my circumstances the more I find that I press into Jesus with everything I have left in me. 

Hunger leads to desperation, and desperation leads to doing things you normally would not do (like living in Cambodia for 6 months haha).   I say, after careful reflection and immense gratitude, that I am hungry for God, I have become increasingly ravenous for Him, desperate to know everything I can about Him, thankful that He has led me up to this point of such a hunger where I desire and seek Him, and I see Him more clearly now. 

Before this year I had asked God many times to give me a hunger for Him, the desire to know Him, motivation to live more radically for Him, because I was in a long season where I hungered for other things more than for God.  I was hungry to be a published writer, a beautiful wife and mother of 4 children (with an equally or more beautiful husband), have a nice toned body, be admired and seen as gifted, I wanted fame and to travel the world singing or signing my books, constantly be living an adventure (whilst staying in air-conditioned nice hotels with free breakfast).  I convinced myself that I was doing everything I could to love God, tears convinced me of my sincerity, but when nothing changed I got confused, frustrated over my sin, and then I found myself just growing apathetic towards God.  If He wasn't going to meet me on my terms then all that was left was either apathy or different terms.  Apathy came easier, it was comfortable yet agonizing.  

   I felt nothing toward God, words of "I love You" came out, but they fell like ashes to the ground and were blown away at the first hint of wind.  I had little to no desire to really know God let alone give Him anything of mine that was difficult to give up.  For a long time God was just convenient for me when I needed to cry or someone to point to for something beautiful I saw or felt.  He was just a facilitator for when I wanted an emotional release or, as some say, a "spiritual high".

 God does desire for us to experience Him, which often brings tears, and to acknowledge and thank Him for creating the beautiful things our eyes behold like the mountain peaks early in the morning or a beloved friends face during a refreshing conversation, but He will not settle for just your emotions.  He wants all of you; your intellect, your emotions and your will.  

I've given Him plenty of emotion, even lots of my intellect (by just trusting the things He says that I don't understand to be good), but my will I have held on to for so long. My actions.  My decisions that represent my rights.  Rights to comfort, rights to be happy, rights to be healed, rights to run away and hide when things become overwhelming, rights to eat what I want when I want it, rights to go where I want to go, live where I want to live, do what I want to do;  all of these rights I have held on to when God asked me to give them to Him.  Not because he is a cruel God who wants to see me suffer and be unhappy, but because He is a good God and knows that I can only serve one of two masters.  I will either be a slave to sin which leads to death or a slave to righteousness which leads to eternal life (Romans 6).  The more I give up to God (emotions, intellect, will) the more I get back: a life that has joy and hope. This doesn't make sense to most people who use the mathematical logic of 9-8=1 which is significantly less than what you started with.  Right.  It's crazy!  

So I, and pretty much anyone who says they are a Christian, am either on a one way road to the nut house or I am on a one way road to eternal life.  Personally, I have enough evidence in my life to bank on the latter, but it is still scary as swimming with sharks.  Or perhaps to hit home even further, it's as uncomfortable as sweating through 3 outfits a day in 104 degree dusty weather all the while not being allowed to wear shorts or tank tops for the cultural conservatism and effectiveness for our ministry.  

Maybe soon my entries will contain less complaining and more thankfulness.  I hope so, but in the meantime I will be honest about my struggle as well as about what God is teaching me.  Everything has to be real, cuz this is not funny.  Well, it's funny to say that, because after all it's "just sweat", but yea.  I guess that says a lot about my tolerance for pain, but on the brighter side, I found a cockroach in my shirt and wasn't scared haha I looked at it and shook it off.  So my fear of bugs has dramatically decreased.  :)

J

A way to grow your faith

(This entry comes before wineskins)

I had a brief meltdown yesterday; quivers and some tears (kind of embarrassed since my dear friend saw, but grateful that she was the one who spoke the words I needed to find my anchor again) suddenly so unsure if this was really what God wanted for me (similar to my meltdown in preh vihear on my bed).  Going back to Preh Vihear province for even one more week is so terrifying, but to go back for four weeks will really put my faith to the test, or is putting my faith to the test.  I leave in 5 weeks (April 7).  

Yesterday I kept contemplating and trying to hear God's voice about why I should go back, and I wrote the previous blog ("careful afterthoughts"), then while night was upon me and the heat was unrelenting I had such a difficult time falling asleep due to the sweat that coated my back, neck, and behind my knees.  I just felt like I would drown in sticky, itchy sweat.  Which led my thoughts to preh vihear and how exponentially worse it will be there, and fear began to choke me, anxiety started to seize me and I found myself losing my footing once again.  "I can't go back there."  "Why should I pay to go back just to suffer?"  I even heard thoughts and excuses that sounded godly like "well, maybe God doesn't want me to finish the school here, what if I just don't want to go back (to the states) because of what people may think of me if I just left, I shouldn't care what people think, it's more humbling to go back home."  Or "God just isn't calling me to preh vihear because I don't feel a desire to go there, those people who liked it there should go, not me, I wouldn't do much good."  

Then I remember Jonah who had no such desire to speak to Nineveh, or the disciples who took in Matthew the traitor tax collector as one of their own, and of course Paul who suffered and suffered and suffered and suffered so many times for the sake of the gospel.  Having a realistic perspective is essential, I think, to obedience.  Ignorance will only delay severe and fatal disappointment over the truth that actually releases joy. 

But perspective is learned and experienced, it starts out very narrow, and we choose to widen the scope by seeing through the eyes of others.  But even that is difficult, because we like to have the control over what our eyes see, we choose to see what we want to see, it's comfortable because we have all the control and we can monitor our ignorance so as to avoid feeling guilty or unjustified in our set ways, but gaining a wider perspective gives us more a view like Gods.  The only one who sees all.  When my eyes saw what I did in preh vihear I saw more of What God sees, and that really shook me.  To see that God is glorified by those who suffer so much daily (whether they lack food, clean water, beds, or air conditioning in smoldering heat) showed me how small my faith was, but it also taught me how to make my faith grow.  Allowing bad things to happen in life and still giving God praise seemed so difficult for me, but after I saw how some people see God for more than just the gifts He gives us was humbling and really beautiful.  God will not be mocked, and if we think we can say the words "I love you God" without really meaning it (in other words by our disobedience to His commands and ways), we are living in denial for the sake of a false comfort. 

You might ask "how do I know what His ways or commands are?"  The answer is:  read the bible.  Don't choose ignorance. 

So many times here I have asked myself, if God is not real this is not worth another day, not another day or another $950!  This place goes against almost everything I enjoy, and yet if, if God is real and He has led me here then I am in the only place that will bring me more joy through a deeper intimacy and bond with God.  Even if that means hacking my way through the thorns and weeds to get to where I need to be.  Preh vihear and Burma may be difficult, it may be the season of some of my most painful discomforts, but God never said it would be easy to follow Him.  So again, my faith is to walk on the water of going forward to preh vihear and Burma, despite everything in me that wants to turn away.  (Even if that means I will be crying the entire 7 hour bus ride there, I'm still going.) 

---

I burned my ships today.  (our lecture  on the cost of discipleship gave the example of Cortez who went to discover new lands, and when he found one he saw that his crew got scared and were thinking of sailing back home so he had some men burn the ships.  There was to be no plan B or back up because even the thought or option of going home weakened the hearts of his men to boldly do what they had initially set out to do.). So I burned my ships today, there is no more plan b, my fees are paid, and although I'm for sure going to fall into a sea of fear and anxiety again and again in the coming month over going back, I'm going to do whatever I can to burn every ship, and be forced to have boldness.  That is what I think "giving it all" means.  It's more than just a feeling or desire to obey, but it's doing everything you can to prepare for what may hinder that obedience (because there will be hindrances). 

If God speaks I ask for conviction, clarity of His words, and courage in heaps to obey.

My confidence comes in waves.  Yesterday I was certain that I could never pick lice out of the village kids' hair (as one outreach team did), and yet today I know I could.  Although the thoughts of touching lice eggs still grosses me out to the same degree. 

"Sometimes you might feel that it is impossible to endure to the end (like my survival in preh vihear for 4 weeks!)  That may be right!  BUT when we come to the end of  what is possible for us (hmm, I could possibly do 3 more days in preh vihear), then we can see God do the impossible.  Faith has not begun until we believe God for the impossible ("For what is impossible for man, is possible for God"-Luke 18:27).  

-The Father Heart of God 

By Floyd McClung 

I may think I will not be able to endure the suffering or task God asks of me for the hot season (next 3 months) and that might be true!  However I will do up to what I can (which is getting on a 7 hour bus ride and maybe lasting 3 days before the pain really starts rising), then from there my faith kicks into gear and I get see God fill in the rest."

Today I feel empowered and even equipped to go back to preh vihear.  A few reasons are that my faith will be exercised which means a deeper trust and a deeper intimacy with my God, and also because, I'll be honest, I know that it will be temporary.  I will be there for four weeks, and unless God calls me back there, I feel more confident that this will be a really refining and sweet season in my life if I go. 

 Up until today I was so sure that I could never or would never be willing to pick lice out of the village kids' hair and the lice eggs (which is what the other teams had done), but as grossed out as even the thought of doing that is, I see now that even that was something God wanted me to give up (my intense grossed out-ness of bugs), and I'll do it if He asks me to.  I will do as much as I can until all that remains in mere faith in God to finish the rest.  However, that would seriously ....oh man...be so disgusting, yet so humbling and such an example of love and serving others very selflessly (for me at least haha, if I did that I would be 100% confident during that time that I was selfless and not selfish;  or maybe I'm wrong, but it feels that way! Haha) 

Joyfully,

J

Careful afterthoughts

After thinking about my outreach week and having spoken with a number of other people here on base about how difficult it was, but also how exposed I was to even more of the sin in my heart, and how at many times I cried out to God in my anguish as though this was not part of Gods plan, that maybe God had taken his eyes and hands of love off of me in a moment of neglect or forgetfulness, I can see now what God was doing in my heart.  I was having a hard time trying to find my joy when my external conditions beat me down with a spiky bat.  I mean most of my struggling was utterly physical pain and discomfort.  I'm so used to struggling internally, and I see over the years how God has healed me of that and made me so much more confident in my identity, so transitioning to the external was a whole new beginning for me.  

I think God is now working on how I am to be trained in physical pain, which sort of helps me recognize the growth in myself now that I am moving on to newer areas that need strengthening.  Once one muscle is trained you continue to maintain that strength, but at the same time you begin working on a weaker muscle until that one is also built up, and then you maintain that as well as the previous muscle and move on to the next, until you have trained every muscle and work on continually maintaining your strength as much as you can to be strong and healthy.  In that way I think God has trained me in many internal areas that I now have to focus on maintaining, while I am beginning to work on building up the strength for combatting external circumstances.  Both the internal and external affect the way I think and the way I respond, and both reveal a different lens to what really lies behind the walls of my heart.  Internally I have learned that I did not revere Gods holiness. 

I set myself on the throne of my heart and God was only there to grant me my wishes, and I justified that system by deluding myself into thinking I actually could earn any of it by my actions (which brought me so much frustration as I could never uphold my end of the bargain for very long). The cycle of failure brought me to desperation, and then recognition that God will not be mocked as One who grants wishes based on our actions.  He is Holy and set apart, and there is nothing I can do to earn His goodness, so to have thought that was ridiculing His nature.  He will have all the glory of every throne in every heart and will not settle for anything less than all.  Once I got that straightened out I began to see the tiny seeds of where sin had been sprouting, very subtly.  By His grace I asked Him to help me pull all the weeds of those seeds out, and it was and continues to be a long process, but so much has been taken out (though so much still needs pruning) and I am slowly seeing Him more clearly and walking toward Him.  

The more clearly I see God the more real He becomes, and the more real He becomes the more I can give up, and the more I give up the more my faith and intimacy with Him grows, and that is where I find my joy, my peace, and my eternal perspective in living everyday surrendered to Him.  For me life without joy and life without peace and especially life without a hope for what will last forever when my time on earth is up is not worth living.  I have very little in me that can settle for the fluff and be fine with that.  God is my rock, and all the fluffy sands of the things apart from Him just crumble eventually.  I can not but strive to cling to the Rock.

So as I have one more month here in Battambang for lectures, I pray that the teachings will prepare me for my two month long outreach time.  That terrifies me since I barely survived a week!  But I don't want to miss out on hearing God's voice or gaining new strength in weaker areas, because the more I train the stronger I become.  This is definitely so hard for me, and I have so many thoughts of giving up all the time!  God is so good because even when I get angry at Him over how frustrating the heat and the Mosquitos and everything else are, He still comforts me out of love but always in the way I don't expect Him to.  Maybe that's His way of reminding me that I have no control, haha.  But by Gods grace (and this brief moment of being in cafe eden's air conditioned room haha) I feel empowered to continue on, pressing further into my weaknesses and trusting that God will take care of me.  It's not a mystery as to what God wants from me or from anyone.  He wants it all, and a lot of the times I think my all is just the things that are only a little difficult to give up, but that is partial.  Everything includes that which causes both internal and external discomfort In order that God can reveal Himself by throwing our logic to the wind.  Anyone can trust in a situation they have complete control over (that kind of trust requires little to no faith at all), but to let go of control and trust despite that lack of knowing really amplifies a person's faith.  I want my trust to be beyond the borders of my control so that my faith would grow, and being here right now, and especially gearing up for 2 months in outreach (preh vihear and Burma) are definitely pushing that training on me.  And like I've told almost everyone who has asked me how my week in outreach was, I say again that "my body hates it, but my spirit loves it". 

Deuteronomy 30:11&14

Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach.

No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

--

Be encouraged (and humbled haha) that what God wants from you is not a mystery, nor is it hard to find but especially that it is not tooooooo difficult (it's very difficult, but not difficult enough that we cannot do it).  It is right there in front of you, and you alone are responsible for the decisions you make, to obey or not obey.  

But again, I must emphasize that God is real, He is goooood, and He loves you.  So let Him have everything, be persevering in the pain, and see for yourself that He is all of those things and more! 

-j

Most difficult time of my life

Outreach in preh vihear province:

Duration: 7 days

Some thoughts:

First bucket shower...awkward.

A bucket shower is literally filling up a bucket (that is actually a large plastic bin often also used as a trash bin) and using a smaller bucket to scoop out the water and pour over yourself.  Is the water clean? Probably not.  But it's better than keeping the mixture of dirt and sweat on yourself and getting some sort of rash.

No toilet paper, no hose, such a mystery, kind of don't want to know.  I mean how do you...? Yea, I probably want to remain ignorant in this area due to my sensitivity toward bad hygiene.  It's not that they are dirty to a degree that's unlivable, but it's that I'm not used to the way they do things here.

Yea, brown water bucket showers and no toilet paper........then there's the food: lots of oily rice with salty msg soy sauce or sugary chili paste with meat that's not been refrigerated. 

But my faith grows.  I can not help but press into God when everything both physical and mental begins to sink it's teeth into my life.  There is hardly a place of relief here, but instead relief comes in moments, or more like minutes or seconds.  I'll have a minute where I feel a cool breeze or a few seconds when I don't see Mosquitos, or I'll get to enjoy a banana for a minute.  All of these are moments that I truly thank God for. 

---

And my little melt down before God:

Through all the mundane and all that's uncomfortable (bugs, sharing a squatty potty with no hose or toilet paper?!, hot weather, questionable food) I ask You God, what is the purpose for all of this?  What are You trying to teach me?  Team unity?  Fellowship? 

Day one (Monday, preh vihear)

Man I am so self centered.  I made sure that I had the best seats in the van (because I was concerned about getting motion sickness), the best mangos, a full egg and a quarter (when some people only had half), and I keep my snacks to myself (my almonds, my turkey jerky, my gum.  I share here and there, but not as much as I keep for myself.  I also take showers first, and wash my hands in the bucket when I shouldn't (mostly clean hands, but still).  I am so selfish.  I keep hearing "outdo one another in honor", but the application is difficult for a selfish soul like mine.  I have yet to let go of my self preservation control issues.  Oh that God would heal me of my greed, and that my faith would grow higher and stronger in moments when I am afraid that if I don't get me mine first then I will regret it or be miserable.  

Wednesday (preh vihear)

Yesterday was a good taste of real team unity.

Today was good in that God spoke to me through peace.

I had a good talk with two of my teammates.

Sarah told me about how she could see herself living in preh vihear! (Unbelievable!  Especially because we both suffer the same things together, but what she said really shows that it's from God and not herself)

So piep asked me to speak truth into her life, to keep her boldly and honestly accountable.

I got bit 13 times on my back alone.  Then 9 on my left arm, 2 on my left hand, 5 on my right arm, 5 on my left leg, 7 on my right leg and 1 on my right foot.  Do the math.  Gah.  Heat that causes excessive sweating and mosquito bites that cause excessive itching.  If those two things were subtracted I would say this is one of my favorite places (Cambodia). Well, also there is the worms in food issue, sanitation issue and dirt clogging everything issue, and poor plumbing issue, but this is the daily grind for most of Southeast Asia.  Live and learn, and love.  So yea, maybe not my favorite place, in fact I mostly dislike it here (if I'm honest my body hates it here), but I am oddly joyful albeit, so therefore it is one of my favorite places. (I'm talking about Battambang and not so much preh vihear, preh vihear was just all around difficult)

Thursday night (preh vihear)

Showered with 2000 Mosquitos or so it definitely looked like.  My body is fatigued and I have a big bug bite on my cheek that has swelled.  It's hot.  I'm sweaty and I have to shower twice and change clothes multiple times during the day.  I find it difficult to just be dirty, yet showering multiple times is also difficult because we have to conserve water for everyone else, and the water itself is not too clean, and I get attacked by legions of bugs whilst trying to get "clean". Then the more I change clothes the more hand washing laundry I will have to do which is tiresome to the fifth exponent.  

---

Lord,

Thank You for blessing me albeit my circumstances and attitude.  Thank You for every good thing, but please clarify what You want from me.  Am I believing in a genie god?  Is my heart still bargaining for marriage and children or am I willing to obey You whatever You ask of me?  This is so difficult.  The Mosquitos, the sweating, the heat, the dirtiness, the food, the bathrooms, the beds, the people.  Lord, where are You now?  I don't feel You near me right now, and I'm so scared.  I'm scared because I feel like I may be doing all of this for something unreal.  I don't want to be doing this without You always with me, teaching me, and loving me.  I loathe it here.  I don't like it at all.  It's not even just the discomfort, but the lack of production, the lack of motivation in me to serve.  I am so dry and lost here.  I feel like most of what I do is still selfish.  I just don't want to come back here.  Maybe You want me to stay in Burma?  I do love my English class students (won nah, liep, geeah, som-nang, ree, maraka, rothana) but it's so boring.  I feel like it's meaningless.  I am learning how to always make use of my time, and to taste the life outside my blessed life, but Father what do You want me to do?  Please speak to me loud and clear and I pray the itching ceases and that no more Mosquitos bite me, please.  Protect me Lord. 

I like the fruit.

I like the people.

I like encouraging others through prayer. 

I like that I push into You as my source of strength and comfort 

I like that I can see for myself how people live and what they suffer, and how they worship you in their settings.

So please.  Please hear my plea and answer me about why I am here and if I am to come back?  

---

Then I heard God saying:

Pray for those who suffer these very same things all the while also struggling with insecurities, broken families, abuse, depression, loneliness and fear.

---

I remember thinking, not verbally saying "I can't get too close to the village children (not even touch them) because I might get lice or some other disease."  What a terrible thought!  Why and how can I be so in love with God yet think such things?

After I bathed two kids, I threw their dirty village-worn clothes in the laundry pile, but their dad put them back on, I felt terrible for assuming they had other clean clothes to change into. 

I also made a comment about how something was "only 25 cents", but to a khemi person I maybe sounded offensive.  I need to be more careful. But I noticed that in my hesitance I heard a thought that also said I shouldn't have said that so that he doesn't know that I have enough money lest he use me for that!  What a terrible thought, again!  I am so greedy, and the only cure for greed is to give more. 

Friday

So hot I am overwhelmed and faint.  Weak.  So faint.  Overwhelmed by the heat and the excessive sweating.  My stomach is hurting from bad indigestion and I'm so bloated, and feel sick in my stomach.  I need more of You Jesus. 

Tonight went from the worst to kind of really great.  I got to pray during Friday night bible study, then enjoyed some boiled eggs at the night market with the other missionaries. I spoke to the khemi people a bit, as hard as it was since I kept thinking about the fruit I had just ate that had ants on it, but hunger threw caution to the wind.  Why.  Anyway, they say that when we come back in April for a month it will be the intense hot season (in the hundreds).  And...scary as that sounds, especially when the "cool weather" now is already giving me heat illness and dehydration and constant sticky neck, back and hair ....I will carry His name, for Jesus, I always have to remind myself that he stepped down from perfect heaven to come and meet with wretched and cruel and imperfect man.  What He did was for the sake of eternity, because He loved us, He wanted to be with us forever.  So I am reminded that whatever discomfort I may feel (and might I repeat: I FEEL IT AND IT IS PAINFUL TO THE POINT OF DESPERATE CRIES FROM MOMENT TO MOMENT) this is not about me, my life is not mine anymore.  I have to see the eternity in my obedience.  Why is the question.  I always ask why.  Why am I here in preh vihear when I hate it so much?  Why do I have to be with these people who are all so much younger and different than me?  Why do I have to hand-wash my clothes in scorching heat?  Why do I get bit by the Mosquitos the most?  Why did You create Mosquitos?! God?! Why?! Why is it so smoldering hot here?! How do people live like this?  It's so terrible...and I begin to cry.  Why did You bring me here God?  Why couldn't I serve You or learn the things You taught me here back in California? Or Nashville?  Why here?  After I am done venting to my Maker and Father I calm down a bit.  He gently lifts my chin and says "I am."  And it all gets cleared that why is a good question, but where is the one that makes all the pain and suffering worth it.  Where are You God?  And He speaks.  To me.  He speaks to me, and I don't know why but for some reason I hear Him much more clearly in Cambodia than in California or Nashville.  He was barely a murmur in California, then a soft whisper in Nashville, and now I hear Him speak as one who is face to face with me.  That is the answer to all my "whys".  Where He is is where I have to be to live.  

So I'm itchy, sunburnt and getting a disgusting tan (all who know me know I embrace my ghostly paleness), eating food that will eventually give me worms if I'm not careful, sharing a toilet with no flush or toilet paper with 10 other people, sleeping on a wooden slat on dirty unwashed bed sheets, sweating excessively through 3 shirts a day and scarring from all the scratching, and having to hand wash my laundry in what appears to be questionable water....and those are just a few of the external difficulties.  I am just venting to you now, maybe I'm looking for pity or admiration, but regardless I know I'm still so selfish all about my self preservation, lacking in love, compassion, generosity, and just a heart for those who don't know that Jesus loves them.   I have so much pride, shame, guilt, and apathy always lingering in every corner, waiting to tie me up and if I'm not close to Jesus I let the lies of the enemy slowly but meticulously entangle me in all my past.  How I used to be is no longer who I am in Jesus.  Thank God that I belong to the One who is over all, and whose mere name holds power over any enemy.  

And now, today is Sunday.  Thank God I'm back in Battambang, which once felt so difficult but now is luxury compared to preh vihear! Haha. God sees me, loves me and I'm learning to see more and more of Him through every hardship and every blessing. 

J