"The Unknown God"

I believe that I need to begin to keep a record of the words that God gives to me that are for His people. This last Sunday as I spent time in prayer and worship God spoke this word to me and made it very clear that it is a word for the Body of Christ. I want to write it down as best that I can remember it before it fades. I know that God's word is powerful and penetrating, so my prayer is that as you read this you will be convicted and will ask the Holy Spirit, what am I to do?" and then allow yourself to be filled with the Power of the Holy Spirit to "do" what it is He tells you!
A Word from God-
22 Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: “People of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. 23 For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship—and this is what I am going to proclaim to you. 24 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. 26 From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. 27 God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. 28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’[b] As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’[c]

29 “Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill. 30 In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. 31 For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”

Now I recognize that we know our God, but because our God is infinite, beyond our finding out, indescribable, our thoughts cannot contain Him, we have settled for a God that can be described and understood. We have brought Him down to our finite minds and believe that that is all that He is. In this we have grieved the Holy Spirit. How have we grieved the Holy Spirit, you ask?

Think of someone that you love dearly, as a mother loves her child. Now imagine the grief when that child chooses to settle for so much less than what that mother knows is possible. She has gifts and blessings that she wants to bestow on her child, but they are never claimed, in fact they are rejected as not worthwhile, perhaps not cool enough or exciting enough.

This is how we have grieved the Holy Spirit. We have denied Him, we have rejected the outpouring of His Life and His Power in our lives. We have instead chosen to live out of our own strength. If we truly believed what we say we believe, that God is in our midst, when we gather is His name the doors could not contain Him! People would be clammering to get a taste fo this Wonderful God that we serve. But we don't really believe that He is in our midst. We are not excited and overcome by His Presence. We sit together not even engaged, complacent and dare I say, bored? My heart and His is broken by our apathy!

To live a life in the Spirit is to live a life that is bigger, greater, more powerful than anythingwe can do in our own strength.

Revelations 12 tells us how we are to overcome the enemy, the accuser of the brethern-
“Now have come the salvation and the power
and the kingdom of our God,
and the authority of his Messiah.
For the accuser of our brothers and sisters,
who accuses them before our God day and night,
has been hurled down.
11 They triumphed over him
by the blood of the Lamb
and by the word of their testimony;
they did not love their lives so much
as to shrink from death.

The blood of the lamb-this work has been done it has been accomplished, Praise God!
The word of their testimony-we need to open our mouths and tell of the great things God has done for us! This is ongoing, daily even.
We need to love God more than we love our own lives! We cannot do this without God moving on us in a Powerful way. We must confess, we love our lives, we do not want to sacrifice when God tells us to move, to act, to obey.

How do we move close tthis kind of relationship, this kind of intimacy with God? It is very simple , but extremely difficult. Every time you hear God speak and tell you to act, do what He says-no matter what it costs you, no matter how others might ridicule you, no matter how much it hurts.Do not start that dialogue that says, "that wasn't really God", "I don't need to give up that thing, or call that person, or speak that word". Every time you say yes and do, you move closer to that intimate place with God, more Power will be bestowed upon you and more of His Grace will be available to you. Every time you say no, I cannot, you will move farther away, and His voice becomes less audible, and confusion reigns.

So today, chose life!

Worshipping Together

March 6th, Saturday Evening

After the tent city we went back to our home and had dinner. We then went to see the school where the men we met this morning were having a small church service. When we arrived they had already started. We crowded into the room where about 30-40 people were gathered to pray and worship, mostly women and children. We sang along with them in Creole recognizing a few of the tunes! After the service we mingled with these wonderful people trying to talk with them as Toby along with Reggie inspected the building for the Pastors. The structure was so small and primitive (see photo), but they felt so blessed to have it. The children were so sweet and Susan was a hit as she played a game massaging their hands and then tickling them up their arms! One of the hardest parts of this trip was not being able to communicate. I realized how much I could be accomplishing back home just because I can communicate with people. I pray that God will show me where to serve in my own city!

March 7th, Sunday

So many church services start at 6:00! As we drove through the city slightly before 6 am there were dozens and dozens of people walking to church! We get to the Methodist church at around 6:15, they are still setting up sound equipment but the place is about half full. We are led right up to the front row and we take our seats. This church had been distroyed in the earth quake so they were meeting under tarps between some other building and the compound wall. There was at least 40o peple there. It was so good to worship God, even though most of the service we could not understand we enjoyed being with God's people. They had a baby dedication, prayer for a member who was moving with his family to Canada,(very moving) and an altar call at the end of the service when 4 people came forward to receive Christ.

Single Acts of Obedience

God is more concerned with our obedience than with our sacrifices. Often we feel justified by the "things" we are doing for God. But God very clearly says in His Word, "Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold,to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry."

I had an opportunity last week to obey, failed the test, but God was faithful to bring the exact opportunity around again to see if I would be true to my word and obey Him the second tome around!

I was running around the park, very early in the morning, there is rarely anyone out there at 5:30 in the morning. I passed a woman who was walking around the park the opposite way I was going.I clearly felt God tell me that I should stop and pray for her, that she had been struggling with her health in some way. I kept running and by the time I was part way around again, I told God yes I would pray for her. (This was after trying to come up with all the reasons why I shouldn't!) So I watched for her but she did not come back around. I kept going , further than I had planned hoping to see her, but she had evidently gone home. I had seen this woman many times before over the last several years, so I told God, "when I am out here next week and I see her I will stop and pray for her."

So yesterday morning,5:15,I am out running in the dark and here she comes. I ran on past her and then I began to come up with all the reasons why I did not need to pray for her.
"That was last week, her needs are probably not the same now."
"She will be scared and think I am crazy."
"She doesn't really look sick"...
Then I remembered that I have been hearing God tell me, "single acts of obedience". Don't worry if it will have a grand impact on the other person, but I certainly will be changed as I learn to hear him and obey Him, no matter what.

As I came around the park again, here came this woman, walking toward me. I stopped, walked up to her and said, "Sorry to bother you but I saw you last week and felt that God wanted me to pray for you, would that be okay? She asked, "are you a Jehovah Witness?" "No, I am a Christian who just loves Jesus." "Me ,too", she replied. She asked if there was anything specific I wanted to pray for her, "no", I just felt I should pray for you." She said okay, and I held her hand and prayed for God to meet her, to bring His peace and healing upon her life and a few other things. She said her name was Kathy and she thanked me and we parted.

I continued to run and as I came around again, she came across the grass toward me. She said, "I work out on the highway and I have been hit three times. You may have heard something from God and you may have saved my life today." I asked, "will you be out there today?" "Yes", she replied. "I will Pray for you today, Kathy", I told her.

Thank you, God for giving me that opportunity to be obedient and to be changed by it. Thank you for letting me be a blessing to Kathy yesterday. My pray is that I would learn to hear Him and obey, without hesitation. I do not want to continue to miss out on opportunities to obey, because of fear or anxiety or lack of faith!

Busy day with Answered Prayers!

March 6th, 2010
Last night as we gathered and prayed, we verbalized our frustrations and prayed and really felt that God spoke concerning why we were here-The things I shared on the last post.
1. "Do you love me? Feed my sheep." Jesus told us.
2. "Nor do I count my life dear to myself." Acts 20:24- Never consider whether or not you are of use- but always consider that "you are not your own, you were bought with a price". 1 Cor 16;9

He really heard our prayers! We met with two pastors in the morning. Really dear men, full of faith and integrity! We listened as they shared their story of struggle and faith as God had called them to start a school for children that would be affordable and meet the great need for education in Haiti. They also had plans to start church services and were currently meeting on Saturday nights for worship. They had about 150 or so children, some of them orphans who were students at the school. They shared how God had provided a place for the school, even though not exactly what they wanted, it was a building that they could meet in and God provided for the money for rent and even things like benches for the children to sit on.
They have a great need for two large tents so that they can start school up in April. We really felt God lay it on our hearts to try and raise the money to buy the tents and have them shipped to them for the school. Even very basic supplies such as paper and pencils are difficult for them to buy.

We then went to a building in downtown Port au Prince that was run by a Methodist church. We met the pastor who was involved because of Reggie's friend's wife. She was running a small community health clinic from the same facility. They were reaching out to the youth in the community by having drama classes and also evangelism.They also were involved in relief efforts to those living in tent cities around the area.
After a bit of a wait, we began putting together hundreds of small packages of basic hygiene supplies like toothpaste, soap, and toilet paper. We then piled garbage bags full of these supplies into the back of a small pick up, we all climbed into our Jeep and followed them to two different locations. At the first one the pastor had us unload several of the large bags to a compound where numerous families were living in tents to be distributed by them. We then went to a large enclosed soccer field that was now housing over 200 families.It must have had over 600 people living here. We waited outside while one of the men went through the locked gate to find someone. they came back out, led us into the compound carrying the rest of the supplies that we were going to give out to these families.

What happened next is hard to describe, but it felt like at any time things could get completely out of hand. These people were so desperate for anything that we had. The man who was the self appointed leader of this small town had established a system of government. The city was divided into 12 sections. Each section was overseen by a woman that he appointed. As new families came to seek help here, they would be assigned to a particular section. He also designated some of the young men to be security. They wore black shirts that said "Securite" and carried clubs and bats to maintain order. They made everyone line up to start getting one small bag each and people quickly started pushing and crowding us. Every few minutes the Security would yell at us to stop handing things out until they could control the crowd. They were yelling and banging their bats and clubs on the metal booth that we were in. People would come at us from the side just trying to get something. I had women bring their babies, up grabbing my arm and begging me to give them something because they had a baby.

We of course did not have enough supplies, and it was heartbreaking to have to say it was all gone.Once we were done however, the crowd quickly dissipated and we were able to walk around the compound and talk to the leader, which is when we found out how it had developed over the last 6 weeks or so. We were very impressed with his leadership and knew that the pastor we were working with would be able to come back and bring more supplies.The children every where were just so precious with beautiful smiles and waves for all of us! Really gut-wrenching to know how little we could do for them.

Sister Eli

March 4, 2010

Today a friend of Reggie's family took us to a location right in the center of Port au Prince where an order of Catholic nuns called the "Sisters of Salesiennes" were running an orphanage and a school. We were shown around and were able to see the school in action. Their chapel was totally destroyed in the earthquake and many of the other buildings were damaged. One of the great needs in Haiti is education. Approximately 70% of the population is illiterate. They normally housed about 65 orphans and school for those and others in the community who pay to go to school there. Because of the earthquake they were caring for up to 1000 families, helping them with food etc.

We then drove to another location and met with Sister Eli, a dear sister who ran the orphanage. She was a beautiful Haitian woman and I immediately felt a kinship and connection with this woman. She graciously took time out of her very busy schedule to visit with us and tell her story. She had been raised in the orphanage, then a benefactor paid for her to be educated in Canada and she had come back to her country to serve God at this place.

At one point she and Reggie were conversing in French and I just sensed that he needed to tell her what God had shown us about feeding His sheep and being an encouragement to those who were doing God's work in Haiti. As I started to tell him to share the story with her, I realized that is exactly what he was doing! Reggie confirmed this when I asked him.

It was so clear that we were to give her financial support, so we gave some of the money that had been donated by a few generous friends to help them feed all of the children that were being served here at the orphanage. Sister Eli was very moved by our spiritual support and also by the financial support,she was a precious sister in Christ and Ann said later that we had witnessed "true religion", as it says in James- to care for the fatherless and the widows.

This morning God spoke again through Oswald Chambers devotional. He reminded us that we should not count our lives as dear to us, or our acts of service. "Our ordinary and reasonable service to God may actually compete against our total surrender to Him". It is more important that we experience humility and recognize that it is God's work, not our own. As we felt somewhat useless God was saying "that is good". Oswald said, "never consider whether or not you are of use- but always consider that 'you are not your own'. 1 Corinthians 6:19."
I was reminded of this as
God allowed us to bring blessing and encouragement but not to physically "do" anything!

Arrival in Dominican Republic/Haiti

Our trip to the Dominican Republic was smooth and uneventful. We arrived after traveling all day at around 9 pm in DR. We stayed the night at Ralph and Madelyn's house. They live in a small flat that is typical of the DR. Lots of walls around the homes with razor wire and bars on all the windows and doors. The city is fairly clean, however. We took a bus the next day into Port au Prince. We really prayed and asked God to help us get our supplies over the border without any problems. We had heard that the government was charging organizations for supplies that were being brought in over the border. Even though we did not have large quantities of supplies we had antibiotics and lots of medical supplies. God arranged for us to not even have to go through customs on the way in. Normally you have to get off the bus, haul all your bags into the customs office and they go through everything. We did not have to even get off of the bus! We really believe that God covered us in that way. March 3, 2010 Arrived at Reggie's parents yesterday, set up our tents and had dinner, etc. We did not sleep inside even though the house was relatively undamaged as there is concern for more aftershocks. His parents have a makeshift room outside with tarps under some trees. We heard a church nearby singing worship songs last night which really encouraged us. We spent the day driving around the city, assessing whether we could find a clinic or tent city where we might be able to help. The connections that we had prior to coming were not working out, they just did not get back to us. We were unable to find anywhere that felt safe enough for us to help or even get out of the car to go and talk to people and assess their needs. The devastation, the garbage, the rubble, the overwhelming need! The streets are overflowing with all of the above, plus people, cars and motor scooters all vying for their place on the street! There are no traffic laws observed and it is up to you to make a way on the streets. Really crazy, at times cars, trucks, motor bikes three and four abreast going both directions. A red light is merely a suggestion, and don't stop if it is remotely clear or you won't get anywhere. That night, as we met and prayed, I was very discouraged. I really was concerned about the appropriate use of our resources, since I felt a great responsibility for the funds that others had given for us to bring there.Reggie reminded me of the word that God had spoken to us that morning as I read my devotional from Oswald Chambers. John 21:17 "Feed my sheep". God reminded us that if we loved Him, we should feed His sheep. I recognized that God was telling us to care for His people in this city. The work that they are doing is difficult and much of what they have has been destroyed. We were to continue to seek God for His leading and not worry about our ideas and thoughts of how it should look. We were to be "poured out" for Him!

Where do I begin?

I have a story to share and am not sure where to start it. Somewhere in themiddle I guess, so here goes.

After about 11 years of marriage, I found myself praying fervently for my husband who had stopped going to church with me about 9 years prior. We went through a very devastating time in our marriage early on and he was very wounded. I, on the other hand, recognized that I was doing a very lousy job of living my life and that I had totally messed things up. I turned to God desperate for His deliverance and recognizing that apart from Him I was lost utterly and completely.

I remember very clearly one day that God spoke a revelatory, what I believed at the time was even a prophetic, word to me as I was reading my Bible. The word came through John 11. It is the story of Lazarus and his death and how Jesus raised him from the dead. Several things stood out to me. Lazarus was sick and his family sent for Jesus. Jesus responded, "This sickness is not unto death but that the son of God would be glorifed". It also says that Jesus loved Martha and her sister and lazarus. Because He loved them, he stayed two more days where He was!

I wrote in my journal that day that I believed God was telling me that my marriage was going to die and that God was going to resurrect it. I did not really understand this but knew that God was speaking. The other part of this story that really stood out to me was that when Jesus did arrive and He raised Lazarus from the dead, Lazarus came out of the grave but he was bound hand and foot with graveclothes. Jesus then turned to those that were with him and said, "loose him and let him go".

Within less than a year my world fell apart. My husband and I were seperated and I was trying to survive without really having a way to provide for my four young children. I was devastated and one of the things that gave me hope was that God had told me this was going to happen, but He had a plan and a purpose in all of it, to save my marriage and to bring Glory to His name!

Preparing for Haiti

We leave in 1 1/2 days to travel to Haiti. I am so excited to be able to go and help the people in Haiti. I really believe that God is leading us and He has provided what we need for this trip. In many ways there are alot of unknowns. We are going to be staying at a home just outside of Port au Prince that is the home of a friend's parents, Reggie Jean-Gilles.

We will be gone for 10 days. As I have prayed over this trip, God has spoken two things very clearly to me.
1. Meeting physical needs is good and necessary, but temporary, but meeting a spiritual need is eternal!
2. If we believe and plan for God to do big things He will not disappoint us!

The team is flexible, willing and wanting to see God move in us and through us. We are going forward on faith as not all of the connections that we thought we had have been solidified.

I believe that God is able to show His Supernatural Provision when we are devoid of self-sufficiency (From a study by Beth Moore).

So here is to further posts, coming when I return from Haiti of all of the amazing ways that God showed up and lifted His name to be glorified!