A scandal: grace

As I got into the taxi for the 3-hour ride from beautiful Battambang to the airport in siem reap, I started seeing all the faces and places that I suddenly realized had captivated me.  We began driving.  I was not aware of just how much I would be loved and love here.  So many people that I would miss, that I did suddenly miss but could not see from my seat in the taxi.  We drove past coconut trees and tin roof shacks with bike tires hanging like bangles.  So many similar shops lined the red dusty roads, large old fashioned coca cola bottles filled with diluted petroleum for moto bikes, the dark skinned men standing in front of their garage-like shops and the women in colorful pajamas sitting or sleeping in hammocks.  The school children on bicycles in their white shirts and blue pleated skirts and pants.  The other children riding their bikes with a bit of carefree rebellion in their smiles.  Mangoes, bananas, baby watermelon for sale on small wooden tables.  Trash piles being burned, smoke rising over piles of ash.  And a face.  Then another.  I love the people here.  My heart hurt to know that my seat in the taxi meant I wouldn't see them for a while.  Our physical friendships became mortal and driving away meant I'd miss them, wouldn't have them with me anymore, and that made me sad.

  I thank God for having brought me to Cambodia, first to show me more of Himself, second, for the people, and third for the experience that taught me how there is a bigger meaning to living than what I know and we should always praise God for His love.  I never see the full picture, but once in a while i get a glimpse of God's bigness as one might see when looking down on earth from space.  The nations.  The cultures.  People and their languages.  All were made to praise God, and none is better than the other.  I want to see more, meet more, and share the amazing gospel of grace more.

Grace.  A word I have heard and said and read a million times like "I'm good" when people ask how I'm doing.  I'm not always "good", hardly ever actually, but I say it because that's what we say when we are asked regardless of what's really going on.  Maybe I'm confused or angry, lonely, bored or apathetic, but "I'm good" cuz I don't want to think about it in front of people.  I could be feeling amazing, full of happiness and excitement, and I will still say "I'm good".  It's strange that I don't expand on my inner self to others very much, but probably because I also know "how are you" is not really asking how I am, but that's also something people just say because that's just what we say.  It's routine.  

In the same nonchalance I used to talk of grace.  It was nice, cute sometimes, like a soft smile or polite nod.  "God's grace" was more of a decoration in the church, said to sound Christian or because that's just what you said; routine.  The word was utterly devoid of it's catastrophic birth and preposterous meaning.  If the church really knew what grace was and is it would be so scandalous!  Judgment of others would rapidly fade out.  Love for God would increase exponentially.  And maybe, just maybe more people would have the Holy Spirit as the result.  

So I am still in the process of understanding this unbelievable grace of God until, hopefully, it is believable to me.  What I write is from my time spent talking with God through the bible, prayer and fellowship with others.  There is nothing you can do that will solidify your faith more than seek God for yourself.  I hope you can come to your own understanding and conclusions and not just agree or disagree with what I say (or what anyone says for that matter).  God desires us to know Him, not know about Him.  

Here's what I think God showed me regarding His grace.

Grace was a changing room before standing at Gods throne of judgment.  It was built by Jesus, who  made it for everyone, and so wanted everyone to know that it was there.  This changing room had a shower and fresh clean clothes.  It also had a fireplace where you could forever burn your dirty clothes.  

At the door I am filthy, and the Enemy is there to point out each of my sins and the fact that I am unworthy of being Forgiven or given another chance.  The enemy's words feel right because they are true.  I am such a hopeless sinner by nature, instinctively selfish, greedy to no end, and self indulgent for instant gratification.  He does and will do everything to prevent my guilty conscience from walking through that door.  Grace is the changing room to become clean before God.  

My filthy rags of sin in exchange for the linens of perfect righteousness.  

For free?  

Sounds implausible, dubious, insane!

Grace itself begs the question:

"...should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace?" 

-Romans 6:1

The enemy will even allow me to know grace, by definition and still use guilt against me.  He'll use logic against me by making me think that grace is unbelievable or that it's for the "real children of God" and that therefore I have no right to enter into it.  

He tries to get you to not enter.  That is His number one goal.  He uses thoughts to torment us, condemn us, and keep us in our rags.  He lies.  He fills our minds with lies.

The only way to counteract a lie is with the truth.

"There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." 

-Romans 8:1

(If you don't read the bible how will you know the truth?  Someone charismatic and confident might tell you, but nothing is stronger than being certain for yourself, seeing and hearing with your own eyes and ears.  That kind of personal faith is unshakeable.)

He often uses our illusion of familiarity to make us think that our rags are more comfortable than changing.  Regardless He will do everything to keep us from turning that knob.

But we can always Enter. There is no key, it's like a retina scan and all you need is yourself present there.   Jesus made it for everyone. 

"And he died for all (I repeat: for all), that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again." 

-2 Corinthians 5:15

Maybe you didn't know that, maybe you thought you needed a special key and you had to somehow work your way to finding it so that you could open the door.  I always thought I needed a key, or a password, and then every time I entered the password would change.  That's what I thought.  It was something I had to work to get into again and again.  Or that there was a guest list, and I was sure my name was not on it.  And so I found myself sulking with tears of regret and shame right outside what was freely my choice to enter into.  All because of some lies and a lack of truth that I had not really bothered to look into.

How dare we try to make what Jesus did on the cross in vain by not entering!  His death on the cross was excruciating!  He, Himself asked the Father if there was any other way, but that not His own will be done but the Father's.  People often think Jesus is the nice guy and God is the angry, wrathful one.  But they are One, and the Father's will was for Jesus to die so that we could have a way to Him.  It's the Father's heart, His benevolence, His love, that nailed Jesus to the cross.  Instead of focusing on the appearance of things we should look at the grand portrait in it's fullness.  He died so that we would be without sin in order that we could be with Him.  God and sin cannot be together.  He is set apart, Holy.  He had a plan from the very beginning, when His beloved Adam ate from the tree that birthed sin in him.  

God had a plan even when he knew that with the gift of free choice Adam would choose sin, God was ruthless in making sure we would still have a way to be holy again.  

The bible in it's entirety reveals that one plan: Jesus.

Let grace soak in otherwise you will not believe it.  Most people don't actually believe that His grace is sufficient for them.  They just feel cozy with those words, but it's all head knowledge and not heart known.  Not lived out.  Grace is not sufficient to people, rather, more money is sufficient, relationships, food, clothing, accolades, promotions, recognition, and children are what they think is more sufficient for them.  

Sufficient = enough

Do you think you have enough?  Or do you want more?  What do you want more?  When you get more is that ever really enough?  

 I mean, I myself am just beginning to see the fringes of this grace, it is still so impalpable to me, but the more I seek God the more He focuses my lens of perception.  The more I see the more I fall in love with God.  The more I understand grace the more I let go of the sin that so easily entangles me.  Because when I see that grace truly is enough it will inevitable lead to such contentment as Apostle Paul talked about.  To have enough is to be content.  So if we understand grace we should be content. I think that means that right now, if you don't feel content, you'd don't understand grace.  It's just a word, it's "I'm fine" it's "how are you?".  

I don't say that to offend people, but to be honest to myself.  I don't understand grace fully, but the more I do the more clearly I see God.  

"... I have learned to be satisfied with what I have and with whatever happens.  I know how to live when I am poor and when I have plenty. I have learned the secret of how to live through any kind of situation—when I have enough to eat or when I am hungry, when I have everything I need or when I have nothing."

-Philippians 4:11,12

I am not content yet, but it makes a bit more sense now:

 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 

(2 Corinthians 12:9 ESV)

So then after grace sinks in, we begin to believe it more, see how amazing it is, and we fall in love with God.  The more we love God with all our hearts the more we begin choosing His ways.  Walking in line with His Spirit in us.  We may have the Holy Spirit in us, but are we obeying Him?  How do we know?

Some helpful evidences are found in Galatians 5:22,23:

But the fruit of the Spirit is 

love

joy

peace

patience 

kindness

goodness

faithfulness

gentleness 

and self-control. 

Against such things there is no law.

Those characteristics become you when you are walking in the Spirit.

I'm sorry if that scares you if you look at that and realize that those are not words that would describe you, but instead of fear let it come as what it really is.  God's mercy on you to see truth and do something about it!  Stop sulking at the door of grace, and walk in.  Believe that your old rags are forever burned and you stand before God in fresh and forgiven linens of perfect righteousness.  It is that kindness that continually leads us to repentance.  

Grace first.  

Then fullness in Him. 

If something in Romans 8 is difficult to understand, then seek out the meaning for yourself.  Pray, ask God, ask other believers, find out until you are satisfied with the answer.  But be careful lest you find yourself at the door to freedom locked out by your own lack of knowledge that there is no key required.  

Grace and peace to you!

J

See?

God do you still love me?

That's what I find in my heart, I cannot deny that there is a feeling of dissapointment from God towards me for not completing my dts here.  

Does God still love me?

I was told that God loves me more than my mom.  I am comfortingly certain that my mom still loves me (if not even more than before, her love seems to just grow to newer heights and I am so excited to se her again without any shame) so if it is true that God loves me more than her, then why doesn't it feel that way?  I feel like I need to go sit in the corner and think about what I've done in shame.  I think it's because my view of God is still a little distant.  I am super close with my mom, I talk to her almost everyday about everything, and I have no secrets from her (I don't think, haha).  I think that's why I feel so loved by her.  She and I are always communicating, and I feel I can be myself around her.  I think I keep trying to impress God rather than just be myself.  Maybe that's why I feel like I let Him down.  I mean, I am covered in this amazing grace of His, because I don't deserve to enter into His holy presence, but His Word says that when I accepted Jesus as Lord, I died and became righteous.  I don't feel righteous, in fact I feel scared and a bit like a failure, but His word says I am righteous through Jesus. I repent everyday and find myself in complete and utter gratefulness for His sacrifice and kindness that bends my knees down again and again.  I am loved by God.  I am righteous.  I will strive to become more like Him despite my weaknesses and stumbling moments.  His kindness brings me to this sincere desire to change and let go of every idol that vies for the throne in my heart.  Nothing is better than when I am in His presence.  So I'm not going to walk away from it feeling condemned, but I'm going to step back into it with confidence and joy that I am His!  There's nothing more to it, I choose Him.  

His grace never runs out for me.  Even when all I do is fail and sin and leave outreach early, His grace still keeps pouring.  Why?  Because of Jesus.  I hope you know Jesus.  What He did changed everything.  He loves you.  He loves me. 

He is coming soon, and when He does I'll be seen in glory with Christ.  I want you to know this kind of excitement!  I want you to know Jesus, He is the best, and better than anyone and everything.  

For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. (Colossians 3:3, 4 ESV)

Your old life is dead. Your new life, which is your real life—even though invisible to spectators—is with Christ in God. He is your life. When Christ (your real life, remember) shows up again on this earth, you’ll show up, too—the real you, the glorious you. Meanwhile, be content with obscurity, like Christ. (Colossians 3:3, 4 MSG)

I'll continue running...making Jesus known.  

This is all my hope and peace,

Nothing but the blood of Jesus. 

This is all my righteousness,

Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Oh precious is the flow,

That makes me white as snow!

No other fount I know,

Nothing but the blood of Jesus. 

Covered in grace,

J

A letter to myself.

To God's beloved, 

You are lavished by God's grace.  This letter is just to remind you that you are still walking in Gods perfect will.  You are anointed with intercession, grace, and favor!  Be thankful for that everyday.  So now, it is time for you to take the next step along this perfect path toward God. 

 I want you to remember everything you saw and learned through dts lectures and outreach.  Remember the Relationships, how you grew to love the very people you thought you could never love (which you couldn't do on your own, but with Christ in mind you could begin to think like Him).

  Remember the people on outreach, the old lady sitting on the little shovel, and how God revealed how He loved her.  Remember the struggle, and how you knew it was your weakness and spiritual unrest that took you out of it.  The heat was painful, the humidity was agonizing, the bugs were overwhelming, the smells, the dirt, the trash, the still days of having nothing to do.  Remember handwashing your laundry.  I want you to remember these things because they were so difficult for you to cope with.  They were so difficult, but they were very loud indicators of the nature of God in His bigness.  Trust in God looks like more than you think.  

He is conducting His will in the thick of poverty, and He rains down pure joy to those in dire need of the basic necessities like clean water.  He gives and He takes away.  He causes all things to grow according to His perfect plan.  He is the big God who sees the small people of all nations.  His ways and His thoughts are higher than yours in every way. 

 Jamie, He wants to work out your life for good things so don't stop loving Him with all your heart.  Always check your heart thoroughly.

Jamie, don't forget that the other reason you chose to leave early was because you wanted to fix the relationships back home.  

You are ready to walk in humility before your dad, your church leaders, your friends, and yourself. 

 I want you to always remember that this life is a vapor, and that if you truly believe in Jesus then you can walk confidently in Him in everything and anything you do.  Remember that.  

Don't think about perfection, but rather keep your mind and heart and eyes on Jesus and eagerly anticipate Him.  Continue taking up your cross and going forward.  

You could have stayed and suffered more for outreach, but you knew God would love you just the same if you left (even if the reason for leaving was because it was too hard for you both physically and spiritually) remember that God knew and He loves you like a father.  He loves you more than your mom loves you, and he wants intimacy and closeness with you.  Your mom wanted you back home, and perhaps God wanted you not to suffer longer in Cambodia.  Perhaps.  But regardless, keep walking in humility because it is futile to walk in apathetic or three-fourths Christianity.  

Always strive to be like Christ.  Strive everyday through prayer, the word of God, community, and worship.  

Be grateful for His favor on you, be excited for His anointing on you, be fervent with His gifts to you. 

Keep putting on the armor of God, daily.  Arm yourself with the Word of God, and speak truth into your mind with knowledge of His Word.  God's Word will nourish your mind and body, so don't ever stop reading and knowing more of who God is and what He is speaking to you.  In that way you will walk, then run, then soar as one who cannot but love God with everything.  In this way you will begin to have a greater faith that will lead to a more ruthless trust in God, and God always wants to talk to you.  Perhaps you'll be back in Cambodia, so always be preparing for wherever God leads you. 

He is all, and in all.  He is in you, Jamie, and you are His Beloved.

-----

I just wanted to include that my experience here has so shaped me up to want to follow God with all I am.  I have had the privilege and joy of meeting a community of strong believers here in Battambang, which is one of the strongest indicators that God led me here.  I have tasted and seen the goodness of pure hearts, and I will truly miss so many people here...until I see them again.  I would advise anyone looking to do a dts to not think twice about applying here.  I have gained a valuable gift here, and that is my own raw and real love for The Lord.  Even though I am not going to formally finish my dts, I have finished what I came here for in the first place and that was total transformation.  I still want to teach the bible as a missionary, and I hope I can be who God has anointed me to be even if my weaknesses seem to obscure the way.  I will not be able to attend SBS in Montana as I had planned, but God has His way with me especially in my weaknesses.  I trust in His unfailing love.  

So begins the next leg of my race...

In other words it is time to put into action all that I have learned here back at home.   

Prayerfully, 

J

I lose my way, and He is still there.

I have so many questions.  I guess it feels like I am just making stuff up and calling it "faith" or "spiritual warfare" or "Gods voice".  This is just so opposite of my normal life.  Things are hyper optimistic, I learn to do anything with a grateful heart...but it does not come naturally.  I mentally fight to stay in the arena of this outreach.  

I wonder, almost shamefully, if God sees my broken heart.  That I feel like I have been left.  Abandoned.  Forgotten.  

If He is really God, then I can't hide anything from Him anyway.  

I hate it here.  

Not all the time, but most of the time.  Especially when I'm burning up in the sun like a lava rock, just coated in perspiration.  Or when I am scratching the huge bug bites all along my legs and arms, or when the beetles cannon ball into my food and hair, or when I'm hand washing my laundry and it just smells disgusting. 

Walking to church for 20 minutes on the dusty trash laden road was miserable.  I had my usual dri fit outfit on, a plastic fan and a hat.  I was so ... I felt like I deserved better. I was angry at God for having me here when He clearly told me that He loved me.  I did not feel loved in that moment, I felt alone.  I felt hot and so, so, so uncomfortable.  I was suffering, and this sounds dramatic but even death sounded like a reasonable option to get out of here. To prefer death to preh vihear....geez.  I mean it's not even that bad, but there's something else going on. 

 I'm dying.  Little by little I am dying.

It's not about me anymore...and that part of me that wants it to be is fighting to stay alive.  

Everything freaks me out here.  I don't even want to look at the ceiling of my room and bathroom because I know I'll see something that will make me very uneasy.  Trash is everywhere.  Dirt is everywhere, the air I breathe in is disgusting and I am beginning to smell too.  The "showers" are not really clean, the water is not clean, and I feel so helpless a lot of the times.  I am dying here...

---

So this morning it started pouring refreshing cool rain.  Not the humid rain that sucks, but the kind of rain you want in Cambodia because it  washes away all the dirt and brings a cooling for the day.  

I don't think this is normal weather behavior so I like to believe that God heard me yesterday on the walk to church. It's either that or chance, and what were the chances that this would happen?  Wouldn't it make more sense that God heard me and changed the weather?  :)

Believing it was my King who saw and heard His daughter makes me really grateful, joyful, and confident that God is with me, I am empowered to keep going strong,  while the other (thinking the rain is by chance) makes mildly relieved...like a flat soda in a thirsty moment.  But, to me, the truth matters.  So what is the truth?  

Perhaps it is just chance. 

 I will be grateful still, because God had planned this out from the beginning for my good.  He knew I would be having a miserable time walking to church in preh vihear in the heat, He knew beforehand because He's God.  There is nothing that exists or happens outside of Him, because He is before all things (Colossians), and in Him all things hold together.  So call it chance if you choose to, but I believe in God, my God who sees me, and is for me.  I believe that every moment I suffer He is aware, and knows beforehand with a bigger plan in mind than what I see.

----

2 weeks down in preh vihear, 2 more weeks to go, and then we take a bus to Thailand where we will stay for 3 weeks with the Burmese refugees.  I'm excited for that, but until then I just have to keep praying for God to transform my mind about this place. I do love it at times, for minutes, because of the people, but I want to love it forever because God loves this land and the people living here.  

I've got a stomach illness, so I'm feeling pretty weak.  It has given me ample time to think, reflect, and just converse with God.  Questions arise.

What do I do now, God?

"for it is God who works in you, 

both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

 Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, 

children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, 

among whom you shine as lights in the world,"

(Philippians 2:13-15 ESV)

I am a daughter of light.

All I do is shine.

Jesus made the sacrifice, what I'm going through is not a sacrifice, it is His mercy.   I just need to follow Him and obey, and once in a while I'll get lost or I'll stray behind, but I am never too far from His vision.  He who is everywhere brings me back to Him.  I am blessed.  His light in me is all I need to be.

The old lady

On a walk around the province, we passed by so many tanned faces, people wearing hats and jackets to block the sun from browning them.  You can spot a foreigner most times because they wear shorts and tank tops or short sleeved shirts.  In hot weather like this you would think that'd be common attire, but beauty is all about being light skinned here; that and some others believe that if you cover your skin from the Sun's rays then it feels less hot.  I just can't grasp wearing a turtle neck long sleeved silk shirt in 108 degree boiling humidity.  Cultural opinions.

I walk in grace, God's grace, I walk in an atmosphere rich in His grace.  

My team of two and I came across an old woman.  Her two teeth were jagged, and the gums where teeth used to be were like open sores and bleeding.  She sat as if squatting with her bony legs protruding in front of her, but I noticed she was actually sitting on a shovel, or some sort of metal pipe with a small scoop at the end.  The sun was beating down on us, but in my heart it just felt right to stop and share the gospel with her.  She was an old lady, she was not very pleasant to look at, and she was stooped low by her shack of rusted tin walls near a running sewage.  It smelled, and her teeth frightened me.  But I was compelled to stop and give her attention.  We began talking to her and she had never heard of Jesus.  She told us how she went to the temple across the road, built of stone, and every so often would sacrifice a chicken or small animal on the altar.  Clearly there was no relationship in that custom, it was just a custom.  

We asked her what she thought was going to happen when she died.  She said she didn't know, and my cambodian brother began telling her about a God who had a plan from the day He created us to have us with Him for eternity, to bring us to heaven.  

As he was talking to her (in Khmer) I couldn't stop looking at her teeth.  They were so gross.  She had a jagged tooth dangling in the front that made her look kind of sinister.  I thought of the witch from Snow White.  

Then I began to ask God: 

"Do You love her too, the way You love me?  Do you desire so strongly to have her with You for eternity?  Does she matter to You?" 

Because she does not seem to matter to me.  I mean I stopped for her and I was the one to tell my teammates that we should share the gospel with her, but as I looked at her I did not want to go too close to her.  I didn't want to be in the sun.  I wondered if the time would pass by quickly.

Another part of me was warring for her, though.  Another part of me stooped low to level with her squatting position, despite the pain and stiffness in caused in my knees. I wanted to tell her that Jesus loved her, and I wanted to view her the way God viewed her.  A part of me endured in the sun for a long time, as sweat poured down my face and back, I just kept my eyes on her.  

I started conversing with God, through inner prayer, and told God that I wanted to see this woman give her life to Him.  I wanted her to literally say the words "I want to believe in Jesus".  I wanted this so badly, so much so that I began to poke at God.  I began telling Him that I believed Him when His word said that He loved us.  That He especially loved the poor in spirit, the poor, and the widows.  (I didn't know if she was a widow, but with all that happened during the Khmer Rouge it was highly likely.). But I was getting weak, spiritually, I was drained from thinking about her, and praying for her.  I felt my faith trembling as I tried to work out why God would not save her this day.  I wondered why He wouldn't just open up her heart to receive Him.  I wanted to know for certain that God loved her, crazy bloody teeth and all.  I wanted so badly to know that God saw her, and that He wanted her with the same passion He wanted me.  It burned in me to wonder if God loved the unseen elderly.  Wasn't she still a soul to be brought into eternity?  She seemed to have very little in life to live for.  When we found her she was just sitting by the side of the road picking at the clumps of mud on the ground. 

And there I was.  A girl from California, in about 2 months I would be back home, driving my hybrid, eating organically clean food, sleeping on a temperpedic mattress, laughing with friends over soy lattes, and going to a nice air-conditioned church praising God.  People would tell me I looked pretty in my brand new clothes, $80 heels, and perfect skin.  My make up would be on, my hair done, and I'd smell like jasmine and vanilla.  And I know for certain that I would not remember this old lady in preh vihear.  I would be all about me.  I'd be all about the next event or relationship that would makes happy.  I'd feel clean and happy, I'd feel good about myself, and I would know that God loves me, because look at me!  I've got all this good stuff!  

But staring at the old lady with sores in her mouth, I questioned if God really loved her.  She was nothing like me! 

 As I began recalling what the bible said it made so much more sense that God loved her.  And at the time I remember just praying for God to show me, for the sake of my faith, that He wanted her like the bible said.  I wanted to hear her renounce the temple she uselessly went to, I wanted her to be so intrigued and drawn to the gospel my friend was sharing with her that we would have a moment of asking her if she wanted Jesus to come into her heart, and she would say yes, emphatically.  And we would pray for her, and ....and then maybe tell her about the local church and have them take care of the rest.  Because I didn't really care about her.  I just wanted to see a conversion.  I wanted to speak and see change.  

Looking back, even my evangelism was about me.  My view of God's love was so superficial.  I keep thinking God will only love me if I'm clean, if I'm put together and if I myself feel happy and comfortable and deserving.  But Gods word never says that.  If that were so then God is a small God, because more than half the world does not have all the things I have.  There are thousands of villages, slums, and tribal groups that I would view as wretched and dirty because they eat food with worms, have bloody gums, or sleep in rusted tin shacks.  What about them?  Were they not also made by God's very own hands as well?  Did Jesus only die for the first class citizens?  Definitely not!  So why, when I dig through my mentality, do I find that to be something I believe in (by my actions).  Where is my compassion?

Why do I not passionately want to bring her to Jesus?  Why is it always about me?  Or why is it that only a very small and quiet part of me fights for her soul?  

And right now I am aware that God is bigger than my comfortable life back in the states.  That He sees the lowly, and He loves them, and it's why His desire is that His children obey Him when He says to go into all the world and tell people about Him.  He asks us because He loves us.  He asks me to be His representative by loving the lady with scary teeth, because her physical externalities are here today and gone tomorrow.  Eternity does not carry the burden of our physical bodies.  Eternity raises the soul, while the body decays and turns back to dust.  What I see is not what is seen by God.  I see a poor village lady, God sees a perfect soul that He made and that He sent His Son to die for.  I see a life full of nice things back home, but God reminds me that this life will pass away so fast, but souls are eternal.  

He is showing me a little more of Himself as I struggle with all the heat and bugs and dirtiness, I can do little but press into Him, question Him, and ask Him for help in this place.  

It is not about me.  I am not God.  And I am so worn out from that very disconnect in my mind and life.  

I throw off this blanket of apathy.

It's too hot for blankets here.  I just want God to show me Himself. 

 I want to see God.

I want to have His power in me to do what He wants (serving others, walking in the sun, teaching the bible)

I want to hear His voice more clearly.

I want the real thing, the intimate understanding, to know that God is with me, to know God, and know that He knows me.

I want to love the old lady, because God loves her.  (And because one day I'll be an old lady too, and I hope someone will still love me at that time).

(By the way, the old lady began to agree with what my friend was sharing, but we ran out of chatting time and so plan to visit her again soon to continue what God began.)

Quick update:  

We just got back from another village where I sat and sang with the kids and prayed for a lady with an open wound breast cancer.  I wasn't even grossed out.  That's awesome.  God is with me. 

You are worthy

Preh vihear

Day 1.

Power outage = no fans = more sweating = joy to suffer for His Name's sake!

Day 3, still no electricity, so no fans for this horrible heat and humidity.   4 showers in one day.  My record.  It comes to a point where you just accept the sweat.  It will not cease.  So I embrace the sweat.  Sleeping in my pool of sweat with prickly heat powder all over my neck and arms and behind my knees.  I look like a sad clown.

But the mornings are always merciful.  The air moves a little bit so as not to stay stagnant with the moisture.  

Day four, we are about to eat our meal in pitch black darkness (all our phones, flashlights, and computers have died, their batteries having been spent on cooking, showering, and checking the time.  I sit herein the dark.  I want to go home, I don't want to be here.  I won't be able to see and pick out the bugs that fly into the food, I won't be able to see the toilet or the sink or even the steps to go up to my room.  I am wishing I was not here, wishing I was anywhere but here.  My clothes stick to me like glue, I have so many Mosquito and other bug bites that I have scratched til they bled, and earlier today I slipped in the bathroom.  Pretty much my worst nightmare.  I banged my elbow, back and butt.  But worst of all, I fell in the squatty potty bathroom.  I'm so disgusted.  I want to burn my clothes.  Scrub my body til I take off a layer of skin.  

Yet here I am.  And it's not so bad, because I am reminded that God loves me.  I am loved by God, the only One who can hold the seasons in His hands, the oceans in His palm, and the One who made me, Jamie.  I am loved by Him.  

Why does He love me?  I slipped in a disgusting bathroom, I'm coated in sweat, I am so dirty!!!  

This is not so different from my spiritual self.  I am filthy in my sin.  Though my physical eyes cannot see my sin for what it is, I now have a really accurate assumption for how it must be like in the light of God.  This sin is disgusting, it can't enter into the presence of my Holy God.  

Thank God for sending his Son to take away my sin by taking it all to the cross and putting it into the grave, he nullified my sin by dying for me.  There was no way for me to come to God, and Jesus made a way by making the biggest sacrifice, Himself, for us.  So now my sin has been nullified.  Why then do I continue to live as though my Jesus did not die for me?  Or why do I choose to walk in sin rather than toward God?

It is because I am being renewed day by day.  I can slip and fall again, but I am not unable to be clean again.  I am able to be clean again.  Because of Jesus.  So I get up, I may have a few bruises and sores, and dirty clothes, but these are temporary.  I will heal, and I will be clean again, whole again.  So in my sin, I repent,  I renew my mind through Gods Word, and know that I will achieve fullness in Him.  It is a daily renewal.  

Our power came on.  I almost cried, and we all screamed hysterically out of so much happiness.  

But thank You God for showing me Your mercy again in the suffering.  

By Your mercy I am here in Cambodia, because You love me I am facing all kinds of trials to strengthen me, and because You have anointed me I am able to struggle with all Your energy to walk into Your perfect will for my life.

You are worthy of it all.

I'm sorry for not believing that at times.  

Grace is the ability say "no" to sin

In me there is good and in me there is bad.

In me is one against the other.

So I find myself thinking two ways. 

One is always good and the other is sometimes hard to decipher as good or bad.

I question my beliefs a lot of the times because of this very dark dichotomy.   A dichotomy between thought and action.  I want to do good, I think many thoughts and imagine all the different ways I can do good for others, but what I do...what I do goes contrary to what I thought about.  Even if I do the good, I muddle it with my thoughts of wanting recognition or admiration or attention.  

I want my actions to be inspired by getting Gods attention only.  I know His love for me does not change in even the smallest degree no matter if I do good or bad, since my sins have been nailed to the cross and completely forgiven, but I want to be transformed by the Holy Spirit (the spirit of God-- in case you are not aware there is in the trinity: God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit all in one unified deity).  But I won't go into that now, it's something I truly believe can only be given to those who earnestly desire to know God, only God can make that which is impossible comprehensible to us.  Like love.  We think love is a feeling, but love is so wide in scope, it is never fleeting as feelings are.  It is alive and mobilizes our intentions to bring about changed directions.  Likewise, when I started knowing more about God and He started telling me He loves me through so many people and things, I began changing my mind about myself, changing my direction, wanting to leave behind everything in pursuit of Him because He loves me.  

So transformation.  I have my doubts sometimes about whether or not can change.  Most of the time I want to change due to something I want.  However, I want to change because God loves me.  I want to change forever, and not just for a season.  I want change that makes me u recognizable, change that makes me surprise even myself!  

What if life is more than myself?  

I know it is, but I certainly don't live like it isn't.

What if being in community and serving others not just with my hands or feet and money, but with my heart too, what if that was what the mystery of life was all about?

His grace teaches me to say "no" to living a life all about me.

His grace helps me live self-controlled, upright and godly.

His grace is what stirs in me a compulsion to think things through for the sake of being less about myself and more about the people He so loves that are all around me.

By grace I am transformed.  It is in God's wonderful mercy that I begin to be more loving and giving and kind and gentle and live a life worthy of Him.  

Wherever God leads me will be more evidence of His grace.

He places me where I need to be, wherever that is, in order that I be even more conditioned to respond to my King in the way that I was made to.

"For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people.

 It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, 

and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, 

while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, 

who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good."(Titus 2:11-14 NIV)

I am eager to do what is good.

However I continue after God's heart even when I am utterly desolate in my mind and covered in the filth of my selfishness, because I want so badly to be given a new life with a new heart that pleases God.  I want to stand with God on the mountain top.  I want to hear Him speak and have conversations with Him.  I want wake up with joy and go to bed thankful.  I want to pray and see things happen according to my prayers because He listens to me.  I want more of Him and less of myself.    

I have lived 27 years of my life for myself, and it has not been sufficient for me except in those brief moments when I was close to God.  

I want to breathe in His love for me, to trust in it, and do whatever is set before me with the knowledge that He loves me.  

"But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, 

he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, 

but because of his mercy. 

He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.

 This is a trustworthy saying. And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. 

These things are excellent and profitable for everyone. 

(Titus 3:4-8 NIV)

As I leave for outreach tomorrow, I will be careful to devote myself to doing what is good. 

Because of His mercy.

Lavished by grace,

J

Outreach for 2 months

I leave for outreach tomorrow.

A little more prepared for it than before,

Not so scared of the heat, bugs or toilet,

Seeing God's mercy in being able to go.

I need this.

Please pray for me, that I would share the amazing love and gospel that is the greatest hope for everyone.  And pray that I would have the gospel in my heart, always lighting up the hope I have in Christ, minute by minute.  

I want outreach to be one more place where God graciously shows me more of Himself. 

I want to love people truly.

People are important.

People are on Gods heart.

"For God so loved the world (people)..."- John 3:16

I want have a heart after God's heart, because I want to be as close to God as I can get til I die.  To me, nothing is more meaningful than knowing my Creator since my hope rests in what will be forever: His glory.  

How do I value people, or rather, do I value people at all? 

What does it look like to genuinely value a person, and I'm not talking about your friends or family (although they are included), I'm mostly speaking about people.  Any one person that comes across your path: your neighbor, the grocer, the old lady at the bus stop, the homeless guy passed out on the floor, the bellhop who takes your luggage at the hotel you stay at, the barista at Starbucks, the lady who sells you fruit, the big girl you sit next to on the plane, the guy with piercings and tattoos who sits alone with his laptop, and it goes on and on.

  People are real and they are everywhere.  Look around you or go outside, who do you see?  But more importantly what do you feel when you see them?  Does the thought of them maybe not having Jesus and a hope in eternity even cross your mind?  

I ask myself, do people matter to me?  

I am trying to understand myself, as I prepare to leave for outreach where I will be spending two months with the sole purpose of telling and displaying to people who Jesus is in hopes that they would know Him and enter into the hope of eternity with Him.  

"...in hope of eternal life, which God, who never lies, promised before the ages began..." (Titus 1:2 ESV)

why is it that my heart doesn't really break for strangers who might be headed for hell? 

I find it not ok with me that I am so unaffected and unmoved to really love others.  Why do I not care for others the way I feel others have cared for me?  Or moreso, why do I not love others the way God has loved me...even if just to a degree.  

That bothers me...

I mean sometimes I really love people, sometimes, but most of the time it is more of a response of their love for me.  I fear my love for others is rarely ever the initiator.  And if it is, I am afraid that the motive behind such an initiative is selfish, perhaps to appear "good" or "humble".  I just want to love because God loves me, and not for any other motive.  But I find in me an uneasiness about the actual reason for why I do love some people and not others.  

All my life many people have shown me so much love, and such an interest in befriending me.  It has gotten so overwhelming that I am now, more than ever, so desiring a heart to love others the way God loves me.  

Let's unravel my brain a little...

I am afraid of intimacy; this explains why I prefer to be by myself, and also why I say really odd and rushed sentences when a guy shows interest in me.  

So a few thoughts have surfaced.

1.  Perhaps I use a mask to give people the impression that I am "good", and in order to keep them focused on the mask I skip out of sight when they try to get too close in case my mask falls down by accident.  This way I am Jamie: the always joyful and confident and sometimes witty gal.

  However, this is something I have put an effort into avoiding.  I try to tell people when and what I am struggling with and let my weaknesses show....but I have to question even that.  When I do that are my motives pure?  Is there something still in that action that still has some stem from my selfishness in self-glorification?  Do I sometimes do that to appear humble?  Because if so, it is so pointless.  To appear humble is still wearing a mask.  Sometimes my intentions are from a heart that is wanting so badly to make right what has gone wrong, and sometimes my intentions are crooked and selfish.  Both are there, always warring within me.  

2.  Perhaps the sinful nature in me is just in every way contrary to Gods nature (which I actually believe it is), whereby making my selfishness the fuel behind why others matter less than how much I want them to matter to me.  

"For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do." -Galatians 5:17

3.  People are broken and in need of the fullness that only God can give them.  As I struggle with overcoming my battles with sin, I find it difficult at times to be the hands and feet of God because I feel like a terrible representation of my perfect Jesus.  

This is perhaps what stops me from ongoing fellowship with others on many accounts.  I am afraid they will see me, the me that is sometimes so not pretty, and that would make my Jesus look bad, and yet still there is selfishness in that because it would also make me look bad, my mask would fall and they'd see a hypocrite.  

And man I am reminded in this moment how grateful I am for what Jesus did on the cross...taking my hypocrisy and nailing it to the cross to make me clean.  

4.  Something that always pops up in my head when someone is trying to befriend me is that this person really wants to be my friend because they think I am rich.  It's true that I have never known what it really meant to be "impoverished" or in debt, or really in need of anything.  I have always had good food, good clothes, a car, a home, and all the other luxuries like movie theater nights, trips overseas, study abroad, dental care, skin care, iphone, a bachelors degree, and whatever else I've had.  It's all this stuff.  Yet, I myself am terrible at making money for a consistent amount of time.  I tire easily and get burnt out if I work at the same place for over 4 months (freakishly similar to my dating records).  So I myself would not be considered rich, but I tend to work to keep my life flowing comfortably in all my fluffy stuff. 

 Yet, I have never been in real need.  I have felt, on numerous accounts, very anxious and fearful of reaching a point of being in need, but I have never actually ever reached the end of all my resources (in large part because of my parents who I know will help me out whenever I need them, but also I realize now that I have this idea that they have endless amounts of money, which when I think more clearly on I know is not true). 

And, again, here I find my fingers tracing back to the root of all this which is my selfishness.  It's about protecting all my stuff.  This stuff feels sticky like the sweat that clings to me here in Cambodia making it very hard to stay asleep.  Yet I want it, the stuff that is, not the sweat.  But this selfish propensity to hold tightly onto stuff is as discomforting as the nightly sweat I hate so much. It makes me fearful and anxious.  I am afraid of what it may be like to be in need, afraid I am not equipped to handle such a circumstance.  I mean, what would I do?  If I ran out of money....what would I do?  I wouldn't be able to eat my organic vegan food, which is painful to think about.  I wouldn't be able to buy another pair of high waisted shorts, also kind of painful to think about.  But really, if I really ran out of money I'd be.....poor.  Average.  In need.  Maybe even lacking some necessities like toothpaste or toilet paper.  Then what?  ....then what?  Well, the only conclusion I can come to is that I would then be suffering, but not just suffering like I am suffering here in the heat and humidity, but I would be suffering in poverty.  That's a whole different kind of suffering.  That's like actually suffering.  Whoa.  That would be scary.  And in unraveling this thought I see my neural gears kick into full self preservation mode, and I am all I see and care about.  So if some person is just trying to befriend me to potentially use me for my money when my guard is down I can see how and why I am shunned at the idea of them getting any closer.  

My selfish ambitions are deeply embedded in the unseen places of my heart.

"Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves."(Philippians 2:3 ESV)

The selfish and the selfless in me are the body and spirit in me.  My good intentions are always there scattered among my bad intentions, almost inseparable at times.  

Again, I remind myself that there is now no condemnation in me, but rather an overflow of thankfulness for Gods love and grace and mercy.  That there is no sin in me too deep that Christ cannot uproot and throw away.

(Read Colossians)

This is also why I daily need to feed my spirit with Gods word, lest I let my body smother me with myself.  But God says to love one another, so I must find out if and how I can do that.

--

And so loving others is proven difficult when all I really think about is myself.  

Stop thinking about yourself.

I need to stop thinking about myself. 

That's hard,  sounds kind of impossible.

"But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26 ESV)

Hallelujah.  Thank You God.

So in closing...

1 John 4:7-12

7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

I am gifted with interceding in prayer, I can start loving others by using my gift to bless and pray for them.

-j

Totes falling asleep now.

It is not about me.

Who is jamie? 

Am I one to say this should be mine? 

Or am I in a place to say that I should have something more than someone else? 

Is that not just a selfish ambition? 

"Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves."

(Philippians 2:3 ESV)

-seriously that is such a difficult verse to apply in my life. 

Is not even just a cool breeze a gift? 

I cannot control the weather, therefore by design I am just one experiencing what is given to me.

If a blistering heat is bearing down on me I have nothing but to stand under it. 

If a cool breeze rushes all around me, refreshing my skin, then I am filled with gratitude! 

But I find in me a groaning when I get what I do not want.  Like searing heat.  As I examine the place from where this stems it seems to come from my perspective that I should have what I want, and when I don't have it I should do whatever it takes to get it...why?  Because nothing else matters, no one else matters but myself.  This perspective appears to be comfortable, nice and self preserving, but in fact, so much of life is out of my control.  I cannot control the weather, my organs, my breath, the people around me, or even the drool that comes out when I sleep!  

Therefore my life becomes a constant struggle for things I have no full power over (I can change things that might help to steer or increase chances of certain things towards my desired direction, but for the most part I am just a product of what happens as it happens.). If this is so, would it not be more wise then to live as one who takes both the bad and the good as just life itself, all the more being full of thankfulness for when something good happens?  (And I have noticed that when I am renewing my perspective that way there are so many good things that happen to me everyday.). 

When I stop complaining and start just understanding that this is life, then when a cool breeze comes, or I am given a fresh slice of pineapple, or I wake up and I feel awake and eager to go about my day, I see life from the present lens, I see Gods love, His gifts to me, and the joy of being thankful for every good thing.  Since every good thing comes from Him. 

" Everything good comes from God. Every perfect gift is from him. These good gifts come down from the Father who made all the lights in the sky. But God never changes like the shadows from those lights. He is always the same."  - James 1:17

When I am thankful I am happy, for what I have was a gift and that means I am loved! 

When I am complaining, all I see is how I should have more (for no other reason than because that is what I want, regardless if others have it or not...it makes no sense). From this view I feel less valued, ungrateful, and I start to shrink back from life, hoping in the future for things to get better and missing out on all that life is right now, today.  

I want to wake up every morning and think: 

Today is going to be an adventure.

Or 

Today is going to be the best day of my life.

Or 

Today I'll see something epic.

Why?  

Because I serve a God who rains down adventure, best days, and epic sights, and so much more beyond the parameters of my feeble scope.  

Yes, the heat, the bugs, the dirt the food is all difficult and often uncomfortable.  However, it was never my God's intention for me to suffer, but His intention was for me to come to Him so that I would rest in the fullness of God where nothing can take my joy, and nothing can overcome me.  Right now I'm still affected by my circumstances, I still get angry and irritated at having to take out the trash crawling with red ants in the fierce heat, or having to sit in lecture for 3 hours drenched and itchy.  

But once in a while I get a glimpse of Him, and this joy just fills my heart!  I am still sweating but it doesn't bother me.  I don't even notice it!  It's weird, but when my heart is fully set on God, I become invincible.  Nothing can separate me from His love and the joy that He fills me with!  

Of course these are still but glimpses, moments, that I hope will turn into days, then weeks, months, then years, and perhaps by Gods grace I will wake up one morning and look back at the journey God took me on to be at a place where He is really all I want, all, ....even if I lose my job, my family, my sight, or all my money, I will have joy because I only need Jesus.  Then my joy would last for eternity.  

So I press on.  

By His mercy.

By His grace.

Holy and loved. 

J