Headed Out!!

I am getting ready to leave and picked up my Jesus Calling for the morning and the words were perfect! It was reasuring me that God is with me wherever I go!! This verse is perfect:

"I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I promised you." Genesis 28:12

Thank you for all your prayers as I am traveling!!!

Getting Ready!

My emotions are all over the place. I am so excited about this journey that I am about to travel but at the same time I am a little nervous. I know I should not worry because God is walking on this journey with me and He is leading the way, but even though I tell myself that I still get nervous. I have never been away from my family for this long in my life so I don’t know what that will be like. I don’t know if I am going to want to come home after a few weeks or if I will love it so much that I want to stay longer. There are so many things unknown to me and unfamiliar that it gets a little overwhelming sometimes. But isn’t that what faith is about? Faith is not comfortable and familiar but hard at times and uncertain. The point of having faith is to trust Him in uncomfortable and unfamiliar places. You have to be willing to give up everything and trust that He will provide and that He will take care of you and that He is right next to you holding your hand when you get scared and comforting you when you grieve. You have to let go of yourself and let God take over. You have to let Him be in control, because if you are in control everything will fall apart. Even though you cannot see Him face to face on earth you have to trust that He is there. (You can see Him in everything around you. Take some time and walk outside and look around and everything you see is proof of Him.) If everything was easy all the time, who would need faith? You would live life with no worries, no fears, and nobody to trust. While all of that sounds like a good life, you would also have nobody to truly love you.

“And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.” ~Hebrews 11:6

“Now it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful.” ~1Corinthians 4:2

"Therefore i tell you, do not worry about your likfe, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not your life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?" Matthew 6:25-27

"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." ~Matthew 2:34

BIG NEWS!!

I've got my travel dates!!! I'm going to Uganda September 10th!!!!! I'm beyond excited right now! I will be traveling with two families who are going to get their children from Amani Baby Cottage. I will be there for 3 months!

Please pray with me for my travel and my stay. GOD IS SO GOOD!!!!

No Excuses

At the age of 9, Okello Ronald was abducted by the Lord's Resistance Army and forced to become a soldier. He watched the rebels murder his father and lost his arm in battle.

This photograph is by Stephen Shames. In 2000 he went to Uganda to begin documenting AIDS orphans in Uganda and came across this boy in the process. He visited his home and on the wall in his room is written "no excuses".

After all this boy has been through, all he has witnessed, and all he has been forced to do, he lives by the motto "no excuses". So many people would give up after going through such horrific experiences, but not this boy. He will do whatever it takes to make it.

This photo reminds me that once we have seen we cannot pretend that we don't know. We cannot just sit around and do nothing for the least of these. Get up, get moving, be active, DO SOMETHING! NO EXCUSES!!


To see the video of this boy click on this link:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/06/28/weekinreview/shames-slideshow/index.html

My prayer for the orphans

"I pray that out of His glorious riches He may stregthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that supasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." ~Ephesians 3:16-19


This was the verse that went with my devotional this morning and immediatly i thought of all those kids who have no idea what love is. I want them to know love so that they may have an idea of what God's love is like.

Drum Roll Please....

I got my email from Amani today!!! So excited to let you all know that I have been accepted!!! Yipppeee!! As of now my plans are hopefully to travel in September! As in one month from now!!!! Do you realize how soon that is?? Ahhhh I am beyond excited!!! I will keep ya’ll posted as the details get worked out!

Please be praying for my family, my spirit, and that all the details get worked out soon. Thanks for all your prayers!!


If you want to help me out with my trip funds please go to shopoatsvallvillage.blogspot.com and purchace one of the new 147 million orphan shirts and put my name in the paypal subject. If my name is in the subject then part of the proceeds will go towards my trip. Thanks!!

Anxious

I have been in contact with Amani and they have told me that I should hear from them this week or maybe next with their decision. I am so anxious to hear back from them it’s hard to concentrate sometimes. I find myself daydreaming about being in Africa and all the sweet faces around me. Every night this week I have had a dream about being in Africa surrounded by these sweet children and every time I wake up either crying or extremely sad that I am not there right now.

Please pray with me while I wait to hear back from Amani. Please pray that God will give me the patience I need to make it through these next few days and that I don’t get too anxious.

Hope to be updating you soon on when I can go to Africa!