Weightless

Tonight I went flying with Dad. I love spending time with him, doing what he loves and letting him show me how. It was a calm night, perfect for flying and escaping to a place high above the noise and busyness of life. I've always loved the take off. It's an amazing feeling when suddenly your no longer touching the ground and everything is slipping away, growing smaller. But more than that I think I love it because it's a feeling of total surrender, faith in something out side of your self. In that there is freedom. I have no control, I'm left with nothing but the choice to trust in what's holding me.
We flew over the Iowa sunset and watched it until there was only a little shimmer on the horizon and then as it slipped away completely, or until tomorrow when in God's perfect timing is rises again. I found as we coasted 3,000 feet up that I was calm and peaceful, the thoughts and stress of life I had left below. That is what I want for my life everyday, even when my feet are on the ground. To be completely suspended by trust, holding on to nothing that might weigh me down or cause me to doubt the one in the pilot seat. I don't want to be tied to this world or the wealth and empty promises it brings, not bearing the burden of my own selfishness or need for control.
As we turned on final I could see the pale blue and teal lights of the runway, so perfectly aligned as if they had always been there to lead us home. They reminded me of the simplicity that comes in trusting God's plan and direction when we're willing to let him be the pilot of our lives.

All There

School has begun! Change is sometimes a hard thing, I'll admit that it was difficult for me to let such an amazing, life changing, exciting, wonderful summer go! Looking back over the memories, I truly feel blessed. While change is hard, it's almost always a good thing. A new chapter of this thriller story called life. So with the new semester in my view I have several choices to make. What will I make of it, what will I let it make of me? After spending a month in Africa this summer it's easy to compare what I'm doing now and view it as trivial, unimportant, certainly not as glorious. I'm so excited about the ministry opportunities God has given me for the next couple of months and can't wait to see what he has in store, yet school seems daunting at times. It's tempting for me to not want to care about it.. to just "make it through" and get it done. But then I think about it and I realize that THIS is what has been given to do. At this moment, for this time, this season, this is my ministry my chance to serve Christ in ALL I do. My parents have always told us to "Do your best" and sometimes I cant get that to stop echoing in my head. Just getting it done is not my best. Too many are satisfied to 'just get by' when we're called to do each task whole heartily- as unto God. I may seem small right now, a class, a paper, an assignment, but those who are faithful in little are faithful in much. I'm finding I can't get there all alone. I need accountability to push me through and I'm so thankful for the ones holding me to it! Most of the time its the small things in life that show our true character and how hard we're willing to work for something. It's not about going through the motions. One of my favorite quotes is by a man named Jim Elliot who said, "Where ever you are, be all there". So obvious, yet I'm challenged by it's simplicity.

People keep asking me about pictures of Africa and I have most of them up on Facebook, but here are just a couple.

Fingerprints

I've been reading the book of Galatians this past month and Chapter 4 has really stood out to me. In it, it talks about Abraham and his two sons. One of those being the son that was born by his slave wife and the other from his freeborn wife. Verse 23 hit me in a way that I had never thought of before. It talks of how his slave born son was a human attempt to bring about the fulfillment of God's promise, and how his son born from his freeborn wife was God's own fulfillment of his promise. It just made me think about how there can be such a difference between a human attempt of something and God's own fulfillment. I don't want to have anything that is born of my own human attempt to bring about God's promises and plans for my life. Yet it's so easy to do when you start to look at things through your own thinking and not by faith. It's easy to make decisions and get ahead of yourself when you're excited about something or when your afraid or simply because you haven't taken the time to pray about something and so you act out on your own reasoning. I would imagine that that was the case for Abraham and Sarah. Through their eyes they believed that it would be impossible for God to fulfill his promise through them, so they came up with their own plan. I think for myself I like to try and figure everything out a head of time, my own life plans and possibilities, but I'm realizing that I have to be patient and that the only place to be is right where God has asked me to be at that very instant. When we were in Africa we talked a lot about God 'messing up' our dreams and how to truly serve him we have to let him lead us even when that mean letting him take what we hold dearest to our hearts and what we have planned for our selves. It's only then that he can truly lead us and we can learn to trust him. When I look back over my life I want to be able to see HIS fingerprints all over it, not my own.

Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not on your own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. Proverbs 3:5-6