The Call

Amidst the mess of all my boxes, I just discovered my journal from the very first mission trip I was apart of, with YWAM LA, back when I was only 13 years old. My handwriting was terrible. But my notes and entries blew me away; God did mighty things in me in those two weeks. I found the following excerpt from the day after I heard God's call to ministry.

Father, at last night's lecture you gave me the chance to give you my heart, and life. Thank You. Do You know what? I'm very glad I took that chance. I no longer have to worry about my future, my will or my plans. I've heard Yours. I accept. I give You my heart, my soul, my past, my present and my future. Take them please. I am willing to give You my life, that it may be a blessing to others. You gave me a message last night, "Go ye into all the world and preach the good news," "To the ends of the earth." You have sent me and I will go, into all the world, preaching Your Good News! I find it so amazing that You would pick me to go into all the world. That you would fit me in to the Great Commission. That You have the time to look at me and say; here is where I want you and this is what you should be doing. Well Father it goes over my head. You want me! Please don't let me dissapoint You. May I make You proud. Thank You for choosing me! Amen.

Oh man, I wish I had that kind of clarity and certainty now! I was passionate, my thoughts were simple, I was naive. But I loved God, I had met Him, and I knew I would follow Him from that point on. I can remember that lecture. Not anything that was said, but where I sat and what that moment was like.
And I look back now, almost 10 years later, and wonder that God has indeed sent me into the ends of the earth, and called me into His work. That He has seen fit to use me. And I wonder, how much that decision and promise made to God, have shaped the course of my life. And if this is what He has done in the last 10 years, what will He lead me into in the next decade?
I marvel at my 13-year-old words and faith. And then I remember that I also saw fit to eat a bag of M&M Peanuts for breakfast each day of our trip. I was a bundle of maturity, and passion and childhood. Perhaps I still am. But He has seen fit use me!

Wrestling

Life is an interesting mix of totally wonderful and enjoyable experiences; treats, time with friends and new adventures. And loneliness, discomfort, hard questions and suffering. I suppose I'm incredibly lucky to have so much of the good!
Lately amidst fun and chances to minister, my heart has been wrestling with some difficult questions. Every day I work here I meet and serve alongside families who do not eat 3 meals a day, their homes teeter on stilts over filthy water, or rise as shacks over years of garbage. I test the vision of children who don't even have clothes, and are instead covered in black dirt I don't want to touch and have sores oozing from their faces. I'm not trying to make you feel guilty or to paint for you a sort of World Vision commercial, I'm simply laying out the honest truth I see day by day. And the thing is I'm only the one seeing it. I'm not the mother, daughter, father, son living that life. I'm not them and I can't imagine being them. But being among these children of God brings so many questions to which I have no answers.
How now do I live? Is it okay, that people live like this and I go to Starbucks? And how should I respond to the child begging at my taxi window? And is it okay that my heart really longs to live a certain kind of comfortable life at home? And what does the Bible say, what did Jesus do, how has He called us to live?
My mind is swirling with these, wondering about the financial choices I make each day, wondering how I am to live after this year. Wondering if I can't handle facing the poverty, who will? And there aren't easy answers, there might not be any answers. There's just this entangled web of questions, one leads to the next and then back again. I don't think that it's either/or, black and white. Instead it's just a mess.
I encourage you to ask these questions too. Sorry, I'm encouraging you to enter a confusing and worrisome state! But I think it's important, and I think it's essential to being a disciple. And it's tough. If you have any wisdom on the subject, or if you've asked similar questions, then let's chat about it, cause I'm looking for wisdom and Godly answers.

Big Change

Forgive me for not posting in an inordinately long time, I've been contemplating a lot and facing a big decision. And all of it has had me quite preoccupied. But now the decision is made and I'm facing big changes.
With a lot of prayer and heart-searching I decided that I won't be finishing my program with the school I'm with. I am still passionate to become a midwife, to serve the poor and especially to care for women and children. But I really feel strongly that this wasn't the right path for me. I am wishing them well, and it is so sad to move away from the family I have been a part of here in Pingkian. I have had some of beautiful experiences in the last couple months, and these people really matter to me. This has been a tough choice.
But now I'm in the process of moving, both from my house and ministry. I will be volunteering here in the Philippines with a Christian development and social work foundation, and I will continue to study midwifery on my own. Later on this year I hope to re-enter midwifery training and ministry, and am really trusting God to lead that and put me in the right place at the right time.
I thank you - my friends for your love, support and prayers for me! This is as unexpected for you as it is for me. But I want you to know that I am trusting God, I feel safe in this choice, and feel like I'm being obedient to what He has put inside me. There is peace and joy!

Miss-Adventures

We've had a couple miss-adventures this week and both right in the coziness of our own home! Well on our patio at least. Do you remember that I told you about the rat problem? In the spirit of selfishness, we eagerly placed plates of rat poison in both our attic spaces (ie: the space between our ceiling and the corrugated metal sheets hung over it, it is not sealed!). And I am here to inform you that it kinda worked...
Two days ago I noticed a foul odour occurring right outside our door, and upon investigation we found a dead rat tucked very tightly in the drain underneath our cement walkway! Yes, pleasant isn't it! Well God happened to send our dear Aussie friend to visit us that day and she (being G.I. Jane), went in after it and pulled it using muscle and plastic bags alone! Thank the LORD for Kerrin!
So now here we are with a dead rat in a bag in a tupperware container (bye bye tupperware), and its just been garbage day and we don't want a rat carcass stinking things up, whatdya do? I've realized that we have a luxury at home I've never before appreciated - the Yellow Pages! Well, this was just miss-adventure #1, there was more to come!
So yesterday afternoon I step outside to make lunch (we have an outdoor kitchen), and I hear this sad soft whimpering. And I say, "Dear sweet goodness, WHAT IS IT?" Well, its a cat, yes, a sad wreck of a cat that is not in good shape (on it's best day), and is currently in it's last moments! Yes, we had a cat die on our porch, probably after it was in our attic and eating our rat poison. And that one had to be put in a plastic bag too.
So now we have two dead animals in bags, just sitting there. Luckily when we had our Filipino friends over for dinner they decided the best thing was to go up the street to where some garbage trucks are parked overnight and throw em in the back. And so we said goodbye to our four-legged friends.
This morning our dear Ate Doris came back and the brave little women climbed into our attic spaces to search out anymore failing animals, which there luckily were not. And we took down the rat poison too. I must say I'm a little afraid to step outside now, what might we find next? Yes, these are the miss-adventures of a house of girls in a foreign country!

Names in the Masses

Yesterday was good for my heart.
Let me be really, really honest here. The last week or more I have been having a hard time dealing with some of my inner-criticisms. I've been beating myself up because I feel so detached from the needs and faces around me. I've felt disdain for the idea of missions and my desire for comfort. And I've wrestled my dislike for this enormous Metropolis that is currently my home.
That is my reality - sorry if its a little glass-half-empty. I suppose some of these emotional pitfalls are part of the all familiar culture shock.
But I said that yesterday was good for my heart, so there is an upside... Yesterday Mia and I joined Gerlene, the dear Filipina midwife we work with, and went with her on home visits. This will be a regular part of our work here, walking throughout the community and stopping in at the homes of the pregnant women we care for. The community we are working in is a short walk from our home and the area houses some 300,000 people. The people who call this place home are all poor, families here might live on $100-200 a month!
So we walked about, visiting of our pregnant mommies; we stop in at their homes and perform prenatal check-ups, talk and maybe enjoy some merienda (this is the name for a snack, basically anything without rice!) Our merienda yesterday was Sprite and white bread and mayo sandwiches - nutritious and delicious! During home visits we meet family members and neighbours and have a chance to see their homes (most live in the maze of closet sized cement box houses).
In all of this, my spirit was somehow renewed and I saw the chance to know these women, to be a part of an intimate time in their lives, and to show care for them and their families. In this kind of care we are able to enter their lives not just for the moment of birth, not just as health care providers, but as friends, and hopefully as the light of Christ!
There is a mysterious attraction and beauty in the slums, in close-knit families, in people taking care of each other, in children playing in the lanes, in simplicity, in generosity and open homes. And I find that my heart quickens, that my spirits are bolstered when I walk there. That doesn't erase my questions and it doesn't change the fact that these people live in incredible need. But in a city I dislike, there is a beacon of warmth, in the midst of the masses, people become human. They have faces and names; Gemma, Alma, Irene, Melba, Grace.

On to Manila!

So our time on this little island has come to a close. Tomorrow we catch a morning ferry back to the largest island of the Philippines - Luzon. By tomorrow evening we will be in our new home, starting to get settled in and make it ours, so that starting on Friday we will begin our acclimatization to Manila, figuring out our way around a city of 17 million!
The past 1.5 weeks has felt enormously longer - it's hard to imagine I left home such a short time ago! But these days have been good, I had such a hard time leaving home this time, and God gave me time and scripture and friends to help me move beyond that and trust Him. Also we've had chances to relax on the beach and for snorkeling. We've visited a local tribal village, and a century-old femme sage. We've had classes and reviews to prepare us for the life that starts next week! And like last Wednesday, this morning I had the chance to practice prenatals.
Today I stepped beyond observation to actually being the caregiver! I can no longer say "I will be a midwife", because I am a midwife! One in training, one still learning, but hey, midwives are always learning. It's lifelong.

The Little Children

So today contained more adventures! We went with friends up into a local Mangyan village, a place that is very poor, and seems a step back in time.
Our friends have been visiting this village for several months now and just try to help meet local needs and have fun with the kids. So our medics set up a little clinic and a bunch of girls were cutting and washing kids hair, and scrubbing up their little hands and feet. We also had bags of baby clothing and blankets to give out to those who were buntis (pregnant) or had batas (children).
Really all of these small gifts were for their health, the medic work is obvious, but washing their hair helps keep the children from itching their scalps and causing wounds, wounds which don't don't heal quickly in this kind of humidity. And cleaning little fingers and under nails helps stop the spread of diseases when little kids are always putting their fingers in their mouths. And the clothes also gives them something clean, and something warm.
We had a lot of fun, but it is always sad to me that we have so little real lasting help to offer. That is why I am pursuing Midwifery, so that I will have a real, necessary skill to help impact the health and safety of mothers and babies, and in turn entire communities!
I spent most of the morning playing "photo" with the beautiful children! I took pictures of them and they would ogle and laugh and screech! They loved it and would have loved it until the end of time I'm sure. Anyway I have uploaded all the pics into an online album, so click HERE.

All of the 100 Quotes

If anyone is interested in perusing through ALL 100 Quotes just follow this link to The Travelling Team website. You might wanna work through them in shifts, or set aside a good 15-20min to take on the whole lot!
Be moved, inspired, empassioned and then go ahead and MOVE! Much love.

100 Quotes

A friend of mine recently posted these 100 Quotes of missionary "greats", inspirational types and the Bible itself. It was a long list, and I must say a rather convicting one. The missionary voices are rarely easy on Christians - they demand a high standard of service, obedience, prayer and evangelism. They refuse to console our consciences. They are harsh.
But they also inspire, they awaken our hearts to the call of God, to our very small place in His very great work and to the glory of our Redeemer!

After reading that whole long list I thought I slim it down a fair bit and share with you my personal Top 10, here we are:

"What are we here for, to have a good time with Christians or to save sinners?" - Malla Moe

"God's part is to put forth power; our part is to put forth faith." - Andrew A. Bonar

"I am ready to burn out for God. I am ready to endure any hardship, if by any means I might save some. The longing of my heart is to make known my glorious Redeemer to those who have never heard." -William Burns

"His authority on earth allows us to dare to go to all the nations. His authority in heaven gives us our only hope of success. And His presence with us leaves us no other choice." - John Stott

"Tell the students to give up their small ambitions and come eastward to preach the gospel of Christ." - Francis Xavier

"Some wish to live within the sound of a chapel bell, I want to run a rescue shop within a yard of Hell." - C.T. Studd

"There is something wonderfully misleading, full of hallucination and delusion in this business of missionary calls. With many of us it is not a missionary call at all that we are looking for; it is a shove. There are a great many of us who would never hear a call if it came." - Robert Speer

"None but women can reach Muslim Women... So we have a solemn duty in this matter that we cannot shift. The blood of souls is on our skirts, and God will demand them at our hands." - Missionary wife from the Middle East

"We have a God who delights in impossibilities." - Andrew Murray

"You can do something other than working with God in His purpose, but it will always be something lesser, and you couldn't come up with something better." - Steve Hawthorne

You Bless Me

Yes folks, here I am hugging the swan. Why would I be hugging the swan?
Well because you from the Swan City Church of Christ have become the most amazing blessing in my life. I don't think I have ever seen and known God the way that I've been seeing Him and His faithfulness this month! I don't know how to pray my thanks and I don't know how to thank all of you. "Thank you" seems like such small words to express what I feel and need to tell you. You have blessed me, you have blessed me, you have blessed me.
I've told you before that I felt God's call to midwifery more than anything before in my life. But with that being such an internal, intangible thing my assurance of it fluctuates. Not that I am any less interested in midwifery, not that I for a moment want out. But that I wonder - has God really CALLED me to this? Calling is such a big idea, one that I have previously shied away from. But last fall when Midwifery School hit me, and now after a month like this and a BBQ like yesterday's, I am so humbled. And I look at God with amazement at the ways He provides, that He would use me, and that He has moved you to be so generous. You encourage me, you give, you love me.

THANK YOU!

The Anti-Hero Gospel

"As Christians, when we start talking about simple obedience, there's a triggered-mechanism within us that pleads for the dramatic over the daily and begs for short-term heroics over the long-and-steady obedience that comes with taking the commands of Jesus seriously. I think it happens whenever we cry out, "I'd die for you," or, "I'll burn my CD's for you," or maybe something like, "I'll move to Antarctica and freeze to death for you, Jesus." When really, all God wants is for us to take him seriously where we're at and make his way a pattern of life."

A really neat article on Relevant today, check out The Anti-Hero Gospel. Like the author, the Superhero phenomenon hits home for me too. I may not be dreaming of saving the world from some alien invasion, (believe me), but I often feel this superman-complex about needing to solve the world's ills. When really Christ hasn't called me to save the world. I can't - and well He already did. He is calling me to be faithful, He is calling me to love the poor and forgotten. He isn't looking for a spandex outfit or web-throwing skills. Thank goodness - both scare me!

Five Loaves, Two Fish - from May 2006 Chronicle

Do you ever pick up a newspaper or turn on the news only to see that people are still poor, still hungry, still waging wars, that AIDS is still spreading? Do you ever look around your workplace, your school, your neighborhood and see people who are lonely, angry, bored, hurting, sick? Do you ever feel overwhelmed? Do you ever feel powerless? After all what difference can one person make? The numbers are all wrong, the odds are against us. The global situation doesn’t often make one feel very hopeful.
But that can’t be the whole picture, because there’s a story in the gospels about a time when the odds weren’t so good for Jesus, his pals or his audience either. The story I’m referring to is the account of the greatest seafood buffet of all time; as Jesus takes five loaves and two fish and feeds more than five thousand people. You’ve heard of it right? Here’s what I find interesting, each of the gospels records the story, but only John tells us where the foodstuffs come from. They come from the hands of a little boy:

“Jesus soon saw a great crowd of people climbing the hill, looking for him. Turning to Philip, he asked, ‘Philip, where can we buy bread to feed all these people?’ He was testing Philip, for he already knew what he was going to do.
Philip replied, ‘It would take a small fortune to feed them!’
Then Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, spoke up. ‘There's a young boy here with five barley loaves and two fish. But what good is that with this huge crowd?’
‘Tell everyone to sit down,’ Jesus ordered. So all of them - the men alone numbered five thousand - sat down on the grassy slopes. Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks to God, and passed them out to the people. Afterward he did the same with the fish. And they all ate until they were full.”
John 6:5-11

Now I have a feeling that Jesus probably didn’t need this little boy’s bag lunch. He could have just as easily fed the masses from nothing. In fact it might have been an even bigger show of power, He could have been “The God Who Makes Pop-Tarts Appear from Thin Air”. But I think Jesus had a point in borrowing the fish and bread.
All the problems we face each day as we look at the world, at our communities, at our lives, they seem monstrous. There are no easy answers, rarely good solutions and it seems like no end in sight. These are God-sized problems! How are we supposed to help, what good can we accomplish in a world in so much need? Ultimately the answer is that only Christ can bring the healing and peace we need; it is what we look forward to with His return. But while we are waiting for that day, we can learn from this story that Jesus is the Humble King. He isn’t just looking to perform big production miracles for His sake, but He sees His children’s needs and invites all us to be involved and to join His work.
There is a moment in C.S. Lewis’s “The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe” where Mr. Beaver tells the children “…Aslan is on the move.” And to me those five words are beautiful. Aslan, our great God is coming to rescue His children, to break evil’s spell, to end the terrible winter. Where is God moving near you? He is not blind to the heartache in your home, your workplace, in the ghettos, in Africa. He is not blind; He is on the move. And He is inviting us to join Him. You may already be there, involved with God and others all around you. Or you may be seeing that God is calling out to you to join Him with your time, your heart, your prayers, your skills, your money. Wherever you are, know that God is not daunted by the odds. Even when it seems that the needs around you are enough to drown in, or that what you have to give is barely enough to be counted, know that God is bigger than bad odds, and that He is calling you to be involved.
This summer I’m offering God my five loaves and two fish, it isn’t much but it’s what I’ve got: two hands and my heart. I am heading to the Philippines to work as a midwife in an urban slum in Manila. There I will be working with my classmates to run a free birth clinic, providing maternal and child health care and love to families don’t have the resources to see a doctor or go to a hospital. Last year I began to feel God calling me join Him in this work, to be a part of what He is doing through the Mercy In Action Maternity Center. And I know that I can’t solve the maternal health needs of the world, and in the end I’m not what these women and their babies really need, they need the Great Physician. But I trust that by doing what I can, that we’ll find God moving in miraculous ways, that we’ll see life where we did not expect to find life. That we will see hope and smiles return to women who have not had any reason for them. Against all odds God’s grace is breaking through in Welfareville, Manila and I have the chance to go and be a part. Perhaps you would like to join what God is doing with a young, rag-tag group of midwives, if so send me an email, lets be in contact.
“…Aslan is on the move.” Does He have your five loaves, your two fish?

Seven Rules for Daily Living

1) Seek to give much, expect nothing.
2) Put the very best construction on the actions of others.
3) Never let a day pass without at least a quarter of an hour spent in the study of the Bible.
4) Never omit daily morning and evening private prayer and devotion.
5) In all things seek to know God’s Will and when known obey at any cost.
6) Seek to cultivate a quiet prayerful spirit.
7) Seek each day to do or say something to further Christianity among the [lost].

-1894, written inside the Bible of Canadian
missionary Jonathan Goforth in China

The Calling - from March '06 Chronicle

The Question.
What are going to do when you grow up? It’s the question we ask kids from the time they begin to toddle. And the pressure only gets worse through high school and college, as everyone wants to know what direction you’re heading in. Some people seem to be born knowing what they will do, others of us have to search and wait. Almost four years out of school, I have searched and waited and searched some more. I’ve always been very interested in missions, but I’ve fretted about choosing an education and career that would work both here at home and away. The world offers a smorgasbord of options and I was beginning to feel that I was drowning in the middle of them. One day I stopped asking God to help me choose well, and started asking Him to choose for me. I don’t know if God always answers that kind of request, but He answered this one. He answered by giving me the clearest sense of a calling that I have ever known. It is a calling I am ecstatically excited about, and I think I’m well suited to, but I never could have expected it.
The Calling.
Did you know that over half a million women die each year in childbirth? Or that 32,000 children, under the age of five, die each day of preventable causes? Both of these tragedies are complex and require much prayer and work for those numbers to fall, but both of these statistics can and must be changed! Seven weeks from now I will begin a mission-midwifery school that will prepare me to assist women in having safe and loving pregnancies and deliveries. And to offer health education regarding the care of young children. On June 12 the 2006 Mercy In Action midwifery school kicks off with three months of condensed study in Boise, Idaho. Followed by a year of clinical work providing free midwifery care to the poorest of the poor in Manila, Philippines, where we will learn and use skills to literally save lives. After completing this school I will have the certification required to register and work as a midwife nearly anywhere in the world! And hopefully, the chance to go as God calls and offer compassion to His children.
The Future.
What the next two years will hold for me, I can barely imagine. I expect they will be both very exciting and very difficult. As I step into this calling I hope I can be the hands and feet of the GP Church of Christ offering mercy in the Philippines. I am hoping to build a team of people here who support me and this work that God is drawing me into. If I have piqued your interest, or if you have any questions for me, feel free to send me an email, or stop me at church on Sunday.

“Mercy and truth have met together, righteousness and peace have kissed each other.”

Psalm 85:10