It’s been six months already… wow, hard to believe that one short year has gone by since we made the decision to move. I remember the weekend we were deciding, I was at a youth retreat at EBC, one of my youth leaders already knew what was going on, she would take me into a quiet room once or twice a day and we would just pray; pray for our hearts, for our decision, for God’s plan, for Peru, it’s love like that that had made this journey so much easier.

Love like when my friends from home just message me and seriously ask me how I am, love like those who have come to visit us already, love like receiving packages or letters from back home, love like hearing the words “I’m praying for you”, love like the Father gives us, shows us, and teaches us.

I remember in January I was having a really rough time, it was our first Christmas here and even though my aunt and nana were here, it was weird not being at home with all of our loved ones. I wanted to go home so desperately, I wanted to have one more summer at the Ranch and I was determined to get there. I would search for cheap flights every time we went in to get Wi-Fi and decided that I would convince my parents by completely paying for it, needless to say, there were no cheap flights that I could afford. I finally gave up, I was sad and I was crushed and all that was left to do was turn to God. I had to apply a lesson I learned in Haiti last year, I had to give everything to God, trust him with it and then praise him no matter what the outcome was. Months passed and I was good, I was okay with staying in Peru for the summer, I was even looking into online summer courses so that I could do some school! Then it happened, my Father, who loves me so much knew the desires of my heart and out of pure love made them come true, my parents sat me down and told me that I had been offered a job at camp this summer, (WHAT?! GOD ARE YOU SERIOUS?!) and that my flight had been paid for by unexpected money that had come in. (YOU.ARE.AMAZING!!!!!!) I was and am so excited, to think that God knows m and loves me like that is crazy and that’s just one of the many things God has taught me in these last 6 months.

It has been hard for me cause it’s taking a long time (in my eyes) to get our ministry started, I thought, without knowing it, that we would just get here and the home would be started in no time, unfortunately that’s not the case. It will take a while to get started and I’m gonna have to be okay with that but I’ve been thinking, and maybe the point of being here earlier than I was supposed to had absolutely nothing to do with ministry. There’s a line in a song that I love and it says  “give all I have just to know you,”  I think that’s what God had in mind for me, obviously I didn’t give up everything, we still have a lot of luxuries here that we really don’t deserve but I did give up a lot to follow Jesus and maybe it wasn’t to d ministry right away, maybe it was simply just to get rid of the distraction I had in a first-world country just so that I could know my LORD better.

God has taught me that he is enough, that even if everyone I love is gone, I’ll be okay because I’ll still have Christ no matter what (Isaiah 49:15-16), along the same lines of that, he has taught me that I don’t need stuff to be happy, I just need him; he is teaching me that it’s only be grace that I’m saved, not by anything I do but by what he did on the cross (Galatians 2:19-20), that I don’t need to have a mask on, that I’m not defined by my past and that I don’t have to be perfect, that I just need to be real and authentic because that’s why God gave us the gift of community. He is teaching me that I don’t need to be fearful, and trust me I am afraid of a lot! I am always safe with him and he will not forget about me and because fear has no power I need to be reckless in my love, I need to love people like c r a z y, even if it means putting my life in danger. He is teaching me how to be beautiful by his standards and to not worry about the world’s standard of beauty. (Proverbs 31:30)

2 Corinthians 4:16-18 (The message version)

“So we’re not giving up. How could we! Even though on the outside it often looks like things are falling apart on us, on the inside, where God is making new life, not a day goes by without his unfolding grace. These hard times are small potatoes compared to the coming good times, the lavish celebration prepared for us. The things we see now are here today, gone tomorrow. But the things we can’t see now will last forever.”

Yes, God is good all the time… and all the time..?

Happy Wednesday folks xo