Sport and Jesus!

During my summer internship I was sent with a team of five interns to do outreach in Romania. As we traveled to Romania and worked there, our leader introduced us in the following manner, “They are here because of two reasons: they love sport and they love Jesus!”

Sport is everywhere! In every nation, in every people group one will find some kind of sport. In January 2011 I felt the Lord calling this ministry to reach and disciple through sport, especially football. In May I left for an intense summer training/internship in Italy. Upon its completion, I was excited (and somewhat nervous) to return to Ghana and see what the Lord will do here.

I arrived and met with a man who has been through the same program. I have seen the work that the Lord is already doing in Ghana and excitement runs through my veins!

I spent this summer with sixteen other people who are passionate about sports and Jesus. I arrived in Ghana and am working with young people who know sports and know Jesus but the passion has not yet arrived for either.

Sunday begins a brief training similar to what I experienced this summer. Godson will attend. This training will be a precursor to the next level training available in September.

I ask for your prayers regarding Godson. From early in his faith he was placed in a position of leadership that I believe has hindered his growth in Jesus. He is busy tending to others and his own faith becomes neglected at times. Often he is seeking the Word to prepare a sermon and it doesn’t reach his own heart. This training will be unlike anything he has EVER experienced. Please pray that our Father in heaven would give Godson eyes to see what He is doing and ears to hear what He wants.

Please also pray for other leaders to join. I have a few days to “recruit” and other than one young man, I am not aware of any in this area who have chosen to follow Jesus outside the church doors. I know there are some, but I haven’t yet met them. We need disciples who want to grow, who want to love and who are willing to set themselves aside for the sake of Jesus, for the sake of those who don’t know Him! I asked a female friend about any young women and she said she doesn't know of any who are passionate about Jesus.

I plead for your prayers throughout the upcoming week!

Loving the Unloved

Please hear a portion of my story…

“But then I will win her back once again.

I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her there.

I will return her vineyards to her

And transform the Valley of Trouble into a gateway of hope.

She will give herself to me there,

As she did long ago when she was young,

When I freed her from captivity…

“When that day comes,” says the LORD,

“you will call Me ‘my Husband’ instead of ‘my Master.’

I will make you my wife forever,

Showing you righteousness and justice, unfailing love and compassion.

I will be faithful to you and make you mine,

And you will finally know me as LORD.

I will show love to those I called ‘Not loved.’

And to those I called ‘Not My people,’

I will say, ‘Now you are my people.’

And they will reply, ‘You are our God!’”

The above is from Hosea, prophesying about God’s people, but is very much how God has moved within my own life. Because of a past experience, Hosea speaks to the depths of my soul.

There definitely was a time that I was held captive to things as a result of my decision to choose life without God. He did lead me into the desert and He did speak tenderly. Even upon my refusal, He continued to speak. And finally in the Valley of Trouble and Pain and Despair, I heard. And He gave me hope! So much Hope that in that moment, I gave all of myself to Him, to be as I was when I was young, before my captivity. That day, upon choosing Him, I was able to call Him my Friend and my Husband rather than only my Master, someone I only feared. I am forever His, aware of His righteousness, His justice, His unfailing, NEVER-ENDING LOVE, and His compassion. He has been nothing but faithful, (even when I have not been), and I am His. He is my Lord and He loves me. He is MY God!

And because He is my God, the filth, the destruction and the lies have been exposed and wiped away. Isaiah 61:10 describes my heart, “I am overwhelmed with joy in the LORD my God! For he has dressed me with the clothing of salvation and draped me in a robe of righteousness. I am like a bridegroom in his wedding suit or a bride with her jewels.”

Because I have been in the Valley of Trouble and have experienced dark times, I feel that I understand the place of one who is “unloved.” I understand hopelessness. I understand why people fight the One who wants to love them most. And because the Lord has brought me through the Valley and proven His love for me…because He has made me His, it is now my turn to share Him with those who are unloved, who don’t know True Love.

How can I give you up…?

How can I let you go…?

How can I destroy you…?

My heart is torn within me, and My compassion overflows.

No, I will not unleash My fierce anger.

I will not completely destroy…for I am God and not a mere mortal.

I am the Holy One living among you, and I will not come to destroy.

For someday the people will follow me.

Do you hear this?!? For someday the people will follow me. I have hope that the unloved, once they experience True Love, will follow Him. I feel that it is the job of those who have chosen to follow and who know Love Himself, to go to the poor, needy, oppressed, widow and orphans, the prostitutes, and all who are looked down upon.

Please pray for the Lord’s direction within my life and this ministry on how we can better love the unloved. My heart is very heavily burdened these days.

The Lord says, “Then I will heal you of your faithlessness;

My love will know no bounds”

Akpe Yesu!

Hosea's Wife

For years one of my favorite books of the Bible has been Hosea. Hosea is a prophet of the Lord and God tells him to take a prostitute to be his wife. God did this to give a picture of how his own people had been unfaithful to Him.

"Go, take to yourself an adulterous wife and children of unfaithfulness, because the land is guilty of the vilest adultery in departing from the Lord."

During my freshman year of college my roommate, Elizabeth, loaned me a book called Redeeming Love by F. Rivers. It was a fiction book, set in the western days I believe, of the story of Hosea and his prostitute wife.

For different reasons, this story was always incredible to me! Imagine a man choosing a prostitute as his wife. Choosing to love her. Choosing to stay faithful to her.

Then realizing that God Himself has done the very same thing with mankind. He has done everything to redeem mankind and still we prostitute ourselves to the things and ideas of this world, straying form Him time and time again. But He chooses to love us. He chooses to stay faithful to us.

I can think of many times where I have chosen to step away from Him because of my circumstances, past, issues and uncertainties. He chooses me although He knows I'll be unfaithful. He chooses to be faithful regardless of me.

I've probably posted this song before but it just absolutely speaks to me and I feel like it describes how great the Father's love for us that even in our unfaithfulness He is faithful and loving, wanting our best.

ACRES OF HOPE

by Shane Barnard and Robbie Seay

He will allure her
He will pursue her
And call her out
To wilderness with flowers in His hand
She is responding
Beat up and hurting
Deserving death
But offerings of life are found instead

She will sing
She will sing
Oh, to You
She will sing as in the days of youth
As You lead her away
To valleys low
To acres of hope
Acres of hope

Here in the valley
Walk close beside me
Don’t look back
For love is growing vineyards up ahead
You have called me master
And though you’re in the dark here
Call me friend
And call me lover and marry me for good

She will sing
She will sing
Oh, to You
She will sing as in the days of youth
As You lead her away
To valleys low
To acres of hope
Acres of hope

How the story ends is
Love and tenderness in Him
Not safe, but worth it
So the valley’s up ahead
Or the ones we live
We’ll sing together
We’ll sing together

We will sing
We will sing
Oh, to You
We will sing as in the days of youth
As You lead us away
To valleys low
To acres of hope
Acres of hope

“Lord, sustain me in the valley. Give me ears to hear Your sweet tender voice and lead me in to acres of hope in this dry and weary land.”

"Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt. ‘In that day,’ declares the LORD,’you will call me 'my husband'; you will no longer call me 'my master." (Hosea 2:14-16)

And as I've been made aware of lately...nothing grows on a mountaintop. But looking down at the valley, its full of lush, green growth. I'll not discount the valley anymore and I'll thank the Lord for drawing me to Himself in love!

abiding

So the other 16 interns and leaders left this morning to check out the tour de France. I however am stuck at the training center not feeling well. Today actually makes a week of feeling "bleh."

As my dear friends headed out they asked if they could do anything. I said, "Yeah, pray I learn what I need to learn so I can be done with this junk!"

One young woman's response- "Maybe you just need to rest and wait on God."

She was right. I have spent all morning in the bed and in the bathroom and during this very long morning I have been made aware of how much time I spend striving.

Striving just sounds like an exhausting word. We can strive in so many ways and I feel like lately I've been striving in every way! Emotionally, mentally, spiritually, and physcially I've been striving toward the next best adventure, idea, level, and (okay maybe physically I haven't been striving for much more than feeling well!

Nevertheless, its tiring to strive and I venture to say, spiritually, its not all that healthy...in the ways I've been striving.

For a few weeks I feel like God's been trying to teach me to abide in Christ. Everywhere I turn the lesson is there. I've been asking people, searching scripture, observing others and I just can't figure it out!!! Why is it so difficult for me???

And then this morning I was reading The True Vine by A. Murray and read this...

"How much weary labor is involved in striving to understand what abiding is! How much fruitless effort goes along with trying to attain it! Why is this? Because the attention is turned to the abiding as a work we have to do, instead of the living Christ, in whom we have to abide. He is Himself to hold and keep us. We think of abiding as a continual strain and effort--we forget that it meas rest from effort to one who has found the place of his abode."

HELLO!!!

I think this morning is evidence alone that all I need to do is rest in Christ and He will do the work. I've been this sick twice in the last week and both times have turned out to be a huge blessing.

In My Utmost for his Highest by Chambers I read, "...there is no circumstance of life in which we cannot abide in Jesus."

I believe that to be true. My heart's desire is to abide in every circumstance.

It may be cheesy but I like the picture that the following gives of losing myself as I abide in Christ...

abIde
ABIDE
ABiDE
ABDE
abde

Or

When it comes to Jesus it can only be one of two ways...

chrIst
CHRiST

He is greater and I am less OR I am greater and He is less. I vote for the former. :)

Akpe Yesu! Mawu lolo nutc! :)

Pretty sure I'm going back to bed...