Brazil- The Beginning

I’m finally in Brazil! Thank you so much for your prayers and support! God has worked in amazing ways to bring me this far… and the exciting thing is He is not finished! I know God is going to work through me and in me while I am here. Please continue to pray for my team and I as we learn a new language, start getting involved in the ministries here and possibly creating our own, and as we start to make our life’s here… moving into an apartment, learning the bus system, and making friends.

Moving to a new country is much like being a child again. I can’t have a full conversation, sometimes I need help ordering food, I don’t know my way around the city… I have to rely on others for most everything, but most importantly I have to rely on God. Jesus says “unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes a humble place- becoming like this child- is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” Matt. 18:3. Since being here that verse means much more to me. It’s not always easy to become like a child, but the blessings are astounding and it’s what we are called to do. I have never had to trust God my Father more… just like a child reaching up to their father so often all I can do is reach up to heaven in prayer.

For I know the Plans I have for you declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and to not harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.- Jeremiah 29:11-12

Blessings:
• My family
• Making it to Brazil
• My team
• The couple I am stayed with the first weeks in Brazil
• My supporting church

Supposed to go...

I know where he's going. He's going where he's supposed to go. So he can be where he's suppose to be, at the time he's supposed to be there. Why? So he'll be liked. My God, a whole country of us who only want to be liked.



But to be liked, you must never disagree. And if you never disagree, it's like only breathing in and never breathing out! A man can suffocate on courtesy.



What if God wanted to be liked instead of loved? What if the Almighty delayed every decision until He was sure it would please the majority? Great whales might have offended some legislature, which God knew would rise one day to speak endlessly of Common Good!



Common Good be darned! Give me something magnificently uncommon!



--- From the play The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail

A little on love

I found my journal from summer 2006 a couple weeks ago. Bellow is an excerpt. The strange part is that when I wrote it I had never felt the feelings that I wrote down. Looking back I remember it just coming to me. Sorta just from my hand to the paper, hardly even understanding what I was writing down, but I felt like it was something I had to do for later. Well, now the bellow is how I feel. I have been reading this allot lately. Its been comforting to me, especially knowing that God knew what I was going to go through even before it happened.
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8/19/06
Love makes you crazy and do things you would never do other whys. It makes you float on air but then breaks you in ways you could never expect to be broken. It drops you from the clouds of dreams into reality, hard and without warning at all. The fall is so great because even as you're falling you still can't believe your falling. You're still in such great shock that the one you trusted betrayed you, went against his word and hurt you like he said he would never do. He lied and that's the way of life. But the dreamer and lover inside of you says that's not the way it has to be. But you know if it could have been changed it would have been changed centuries ago, because the cycle of life has always been. Love. Hurt. And love again. You must love again. And you will be able to. The grace of God will find a way.

I'm Letting Go!

I LOVE this song! It's so beautiful!
It's really my "heart song" right now.
I love the line " I'm letting go of the life I planned for me and my dreams, Loosing control of my destiny". I guess I like it so much because that's what I will be doing by going on aim next year. This song really says alot about how I'm feeling about next year.
I'm so excited to "let go"!

Francesca Battistelli - I'm Letting Go

From the album My Paper Heart

My heart beats, standing on the edge
But my feet have finally left the ledge
Like an acrobat
There's no turning back
(Chorus)
I'm letting go Of the life I planned for me
And my dreams
Losing control Of my destiny
Feels like I'm falling and that's what it's like to believe
So I'm letting go
This is a giant leap of faith
Trusting and trying to embrace
The fear of the unknown Beyond my comfort zone
(Chorus)
Giving in to your gravity
Knowing You are holding me
I'm not afraid
Feels like I'm falling and that's what it's like to believe
Feels like I'm falling and this is the life for me



http://www.francescamusic.com/

The Man of the Hour, and Every Hour

I know everyone says they have the "best" boyfriend or girlfriend, but I really do!
He really does love me ALL the time and no matter what happens. There is never a moment that he isn't there for me. He can never be too far away. No long distant relationship! If I'm having a bad day he understands and even feels my pain. He cries when I cry. Laughs when I make a stupid joke! When no one sees my hurt, he does. "He sees the depths of my heart and loves me the same".
I don't have a picture I can post to show you, in fact I have never seen him, but I feel his love.
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I'm done filling my heart with a temporary guy when I can be filled with the powerful love of the Lord.