On Mission

My friend Tom is proposing to his girlfriend, Alli, as we speak. Our little community has been planning this out for quite some time now. Everyone has had a hand in making today super special for Alli. Dan and Emily have been practicing the songs that they are singing, Charity and Mark prepared the food, Tom and Dan did tons of stuff like renting boats, borrowing cars, and driving a few hours north to get the ring. It's been cool and fun to see everyone working together to accomplish the goal.

Yesterday afternoon everyone was over at our apartment running through the final plans. And last night Emily and Dan sang the proposal song as a final practice. When Tom realized that the next time he would hear them sing that he would be engaged, he started to get nervous for the first time, and everyone else had the feeling that you get on Christmas Eve. After that the guys said goodbye and we all went to sleep. 

When I woke up this morning the apartment was already buzzing with excitement. Lor was curling Emily's hair, Charity was looking up the recipes, and I was walking around thinking "Merry Christmas! What should I do?"      Soon the guys came over and we were getting closer and closer to fulfilling the mission. It was just so cool to see everyone working together to help out our brother Tom. The people who are making this possible are not gaining anything from this, they are doing out of love for Tom and Alli. 

Right now our church is having a Gospel conference. We are meeting together daily this week and strategizing the best way to live out the Gospel. We are finding that the most Biblical way to do this is to live our normal lives. but with Gospel intentions. Just like our little group has been strategizing and doing everything in our power to make Tom's  proposal the best that it could be, we should be working together and meeting together with the purpose of sharing the Gospel with the people who are in our lives. 

The end of demolition.

For the past two years and three months, God has been tearing down the temple walls that house the idols in my life. Now the walls have been torn down, and lately he has been going straight for the actual idols and destroying them altogether. Let me tell you, it hurts to have those things that I love and worship torn away from me. But thanks be to God that through His grace He is destroying them for me. It probably wouldn't hurt so bad to have them stripped away if I weren't grasping them so tightly, but where I  am weak, God is strong. Where I have failed, God's grace is abounding all the more! I am glad that it has been this painful so that God's grace might shine through, rather than if I would have had an easy battle and not received as much of God's grace, because If I did not have such a tight grip on those idols, the measure of God's mercy and grace would be less.

I know that it's too soon to say, but I think that this morning was the end of demolition--well, at least in one area of my life. I am finding it hard to articulate my experience with grace, and I don't want to make light of it, so I am just going to give a little nugget of goodness for you to chew on for today.  

When Jesus rose from the dead, he rose to show that God's wrath was satisfied in the sacrifice of his perfect and holy Son. When I sin, and I beat myself up about it and feel guilty, I am insulting God, saying that His grace is not enough. The blood that Jesus shed is enough! With that knowledge, I can enjoy the grace that Jesus died to give me! God has graciously saved me from his wrath! Before I believed, he poured his mercy out on me until the day that his grace captured me and saved me eternally! Hallelujah!! Amen. 

defining the term

MISSIONARY.

What exactly is a missionary? Here at Cornerstone and EBC we throw the term around quite a bit. I have heard people use the term "missionary" in these ways:

"We should all be missionaries where we are; in our neighborhoods, at work, and with our families."
"You are a missionary wherever you go."
"I want to be a missionary."
"A missionary is one who preaches the gospel where Christ has not yet been named; every thing else is just cross cultural evangelism."

Ok, so often times when I talk to my dad on the phone, I ask him when he is going to be a missionary. I usually get the same reply, "I am a missionary. God has called me to do Upward Basketball." Dude. That is totally legit. But for some reason I keep pressing. I just feel like using my life to tell the unreached about the Gospel is so important, and I want others to share in that joy with me...I especially want my parents to share that, because I love them so dearly.

So, yesterday I brought the question up again. "Dad, when are you going to be a missionary?" He replied, "If I am going to be a missionary, I am probably going to do domestic missions. I would probably go to the poverty-stricken Appalachia region." I accepted the reply not so much out of satisfaction with the answer as out of respect for my father.

Then this morning I was praying for him. I asked God how I should pray for him, and God totally humbled me. God pretty much said that being a missionary to Appalachia was more an act of humility than going to an unreached tribe somewhere over seas. For my parents to get up and move to the most un-glorious place in America, for the sake of the gospel is truly sacrifice.

As much as I would love for them to experience planting a church in the jungle somewhere, I think that being a "missionary" in the Appalachian Mountains is a greater sacrifice. Who wouldn't want to go live in the beautiful jungle, learn a new culture and language, and then see a pure and beautiful church form out of nothing? There is so much reward in that, even here on earth! But to go live in the poverty of forgotten America, among the narrow minds of the religious folk and the moonshine and shotguns would take a serious act of humility.

With all of that said, I still think that a missionary is one who goes out to the unreached. Sharing the Gospel where you are, that is called a Christian.

So, if you are seirously staying in America as an act of submission to God, and not as a cop-out for going overseas, Hallelujah! Praise God that you are so overwhelmed by his love that you are sharing it with your unbelieving friends here. But if your reason for staying is that you have not felt "called" to missions....we have some talking to do.

forgetting what we dont know

At the beginning of this month, we started approaching prayer as if we knew nothing about it. It was raw. It was pure. It was sweet. We learned so much because we had so much to learn.

But lately we have forgotten our place in the story of God. We have seen God do so many amazing things through our prayers, and so we turned the camera onto ourselves. For a while we imagined that we were the main characters. We started praying for the needs that we saw without asking Him what the needs really were. Because we imagined our roles to be greater than they really are, we tried to play a part that was not ours to play. We have also stopped asking God to grant us the grace to pray, and as a result, we have been neglecting to meet together some times.

Tonight we are going to start fresh again. I am excited to pray again. And I am so thankful that I do get to play a part in the story of God. And the part that I play is not insignificant, as long as I play the role that I have been assigned.


In his grace,

bethy

Psam 86

86:1 Incline your ear, O Lord, and answer me,for I am poor and needy.
2 Preserve my life, for I am godly;save your servant, who trusts in you—you are my God.
3 Be gracious to me, O Lord,for to you do I cry all the day.
4 Gladden the soul of your servant,for to you, O Lord, do I lift up my soul.
5 For you, O Lord, are good and forgiving,abounding in steadfast love to all who call upon you.
6 Give ear, O Lord, to my prayer;listen to my plea for grace.
7 In the day of my trouble I call upon you,for you answer me.
8 There is none like you among the gods, O Lord,nor are there any works like yours.
9 All the nations you have made shall comeand worship before you, O Lord,and shall glorify your name.
10 For you are great and do wondrous things;you alone are God.
11 Teach me your way, O Lord,that I may walk in your truth;unite my heart to fear your name.
12 I give thanks to you, O Lord my God, with my whole heart,and I will glorify your name forever.
13 For great is your steadfast love toward me;you have delivered my soul from the depths of Sheol.
14 O God, insolent men have risen up against me;a band of ruthless men seeks my life,and they do not set you before them.
15 But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious,slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.
16 Turn to me and be gracious to me;give your strength to your servant,and save the son of your maidservant.
17 Show me a sign of your favor,that those who hate me may see and be put to shamebecause you, Lord, have helped me and comforted me.

My brain is so very scatterd right now, ok, not my brain, my thoughts, but just work with me people. I just have so much information to process through right now and I hope that you guys can help me work through it. Ill tell you how:

Background information: When I went to Africa in '06 I went with an orginization (it just took me 3 tries to spell "orginization" because I am listening to music right now, and I CANNOT multi-task.) called PIONEERS. They are a missions agency based out of Orlando, FL. When I was in FL for briefing and de-briefing, I met the Director of Recruitment, Lauri Neivius. She is a way cool lady, and so very wise.

I found out that she was going to be in Southern California for a missions conference this week, and we planned on meeting up, but with the conference and all, it just didn't work out. So we had a phone conversation instead.

(I just want you to know that it is very hard for me to focus right now because there is a sea-gull in the dumpster and a random orange cat on my upstairs balcony. I don't know how it got up here. Crazy cat!)

The conversation with Lauri gave me so much clarity about the past three years of my life, and gave me some direction as far as preparing for missions goes. I was so ready to go, but I just didnt know what steps I needed to take next. Lauri gave me some great new jewels of wisdom, and confirmed some of the thoughts that I had already been thinking through.

This is where you come in. Sometime I will tell the story of everything between Africa and today. But as it is, we will start from today, and just take it as it comes. Today I am just asking you to pray for me. AHhh! Prayer. Prayer, prayer, prayer. OOhhh there is so much power in prayer. In prayer God reveals things, He uses prayer to accomplish is will, and it is just so sweet. I LOVE PRAYER. (Hmmm. I am going to write a post about prayer soon.)

-->Pray that I would find a group of 5-6 people who will committ to praying for me through this decision making process and who will even be willing to debrief me when I come back to the states on furlough. It would be best if there were some older people in this group, and preferably at least one person with missions experience.

--> Pray that I would choose the best orginization to serve with.

--> Pray for the people group that I will be serving. Pray that God will make ready their hearts to hear the Gospel.

--> Pray for the team that I will be serving with.

I am fully convinced that spreading the Gospel is the only thing that is worthy of spending my life on. I hope that you will join me as I continue taking steps towards the unreached.

In His Grace,

Bethany

Learning to enjoy Him

I have a hard time being still sometimes. I just don't like wasting time. I don't like wasting anything really, but that is beside the point. This is the story of how Emily and I enjoyed God for an afternoon.

Lately I have been in this crazy funk. I can't seem to figure out what God is trying to teach me. I have been really really selfish for the past two weeks, and I am allowing my feelings manifest themselves. Ugh! I hate hate hate being selfish. I really hate being in this place, where everything makes me irritable, and where I have to work so hard to love people. But I don't want it to pass yet. I really want to know what God is trying to produce in me.

Anyways, yesterday after class, Emily and I went to the beach and just enjoyed God's creation. The sun was so soft on our skin. It was warm, but not harsh. God allowed the sun to kiss my skin without burning me and causing me pain. I read Romans, and meditated upon chapter 8. It is so good. I am starting to think that the reason that I am in this "blah" state of being is that my whole self is groaning for the future glory that is to come. So, right now I am trying to process how I am able to enjoy God and his creation, and what my "groanings" tell me about this life. Hmmmm.....

Romans 8 talks about how the whole creation is groaning as it waits eagerly for the future glory. More on this later, but for now...go read Romans and then go back and meditate on chapter 8.