There and Back

So I went to Namibia. And I served the Lord. And I left my heart in Africa. And now I'm back.

We didn't have much access to internet while we were in Oshakati, so I was unable to blog about everything God was doing in us and through us. Honestly, I don't know that I would have been able to do a very good job of writing about everything God was doing. It was BIG. It was amazing. It was wonderful. It was difficult. It was real. I feel like I've promised to write all my stories, and I will, but I think that I'll need some time to process and a lot of time to readjust.

I'm back in California, back at my mom's. I've visited my grandparents and wrestled with my brother. I've gotten my film developed and been shocked at how little I was able to capture. Also, my flash was out of synch with my camera, so I have a roll or two of less-than-perfect photos. I guess that's the thrill of using film and not digital. I'm relearning how to sleep in, although I've had a few nights of being wide awake at 3 a.m. because my body thinks I'm still in Africa. I'm playing with my mom's cats, catching up with old friends, and seeing my world through completely different eyes.

I'll be back in a little while, when I'm ready, and I'll share stories of God's goodness.

Seventeen Days

I leave for Namibia in seventeen days.

It's pretty unreal, to say the very least.

My passport arrived at my mom's house, and it's currently somewhere between El Dorado Hills, California and Tempe, AZ. Passport? Check.

I got a bunch of shots yesterday and I'm in for some more on Thursday. Shots? Check.

My fundraising is where it needs to be, which is a huge blessing. Fundraising? Check.

Plane tickets? Check.

Sleeping bag? Check.

Amazing team? Check.

I'm seventeen days away from spending roughly a day in flight, and flying into a time zone which is eight hours ahead of my typical time zone. Needless to say, I'm freaking out.

I'm going to Namibia in seventeen days. AAAAAAAAAHHHHHH! Crazy.

I Have No Idea What I Want to Be When I Grow Up

At seventeen, I had my whole life planned out. I was going to go to school in San Diego, study biochemistry, sing in some choirs, and leisurely make my way to medical school. I'd become a pulmonologist and focus on pediatrics. I'd do theater on the weekends to blow off some steam. I had a brilliant, flawless plan for my life.

I remembered this in church on Sunday, as we celebrated the graduating seniors. Sitting there, I realized that I have no idea where my life is headed. I feel like so much of my life is contingent on waiting. Waiting to get into nursing school. Waiting to figure out where God wants me to live after I graduate from college. Waiting to see what this summer will bring. I'm halfway through college, and I've never been more confused about who I am and where I'm going.

It's a blessing.

It's counterintuitive for me to see it as a blessing, but it is. Even though I have absolutely no clue where I'm going, I know Who I'm following. I'm serving a God who loves me and cares about every step I take. I'm the daughter of a King who works for the good in everything, even when it hurts and I don't understand.

If I'm going to be honest, I have to admit that I often struggled with trusting God to work for the good in my life. Some days, I walk around paralyzed with fear, because I don't have a carefully scripted plan for my life, and the happenings in my life don't fit into the map that I've drawn.

But when I step back, it's all good. It's all a blessing. Life is hard, and confusing, and wonderful. There aren't any second chances, which makes any small success a devastating victory.

In the past couple weeks, I've had the opportunity to move into a beautiful condo with four amazing ladies. I have a boxer/pit bull puppy who is beautiful, sweet, and fun. I'm finishing my nursing school application before I leave for Namibia. I've been working a lot, and spending time with friends when I'm not working.

I have no idea what fall semester is going to look like, and I'm ecstatic to see how it is going to work out.

To God be all the glory.

Exciting Photos of Exciting People

Confession: I'm not great at this blogging thing. I don't know if anyone really reads this, but if they do, I would think that they would be bored by my lacking of new information. So here is what went on in March.

At the beginning of March, I went to Colorado Springs for a summer missions orientation. In addition to meeting my trip coordinator and finding out more about my trip, I was able to meet some of the people on my team. Here are a few of the ladies on my team when we went to Garden of the Gods. Leslie, Sara, Kindra, Cat, me, Cierra, and Paige. We're all pretty focused on fundraising right now. I'm excited to meet the rest of my team in June and to spend some hard, fun, rewarding time in Namibia.




This is a picture from the Navs Spring Break trip to San Felipe, Mexico. While we spent a lot of time playing on the beach and eating fish tacos, we set aside a day for serving the people of San Felipe. We split up into a few groups. One of our groups laid electrical wire at an orphanage. My group helped a missionary who had been at a hospital for seven years. He had to move back to the States, because his wife's father had become very ill. It was a really emotional time for him, and we were glad to be able to help in whatever way we could. We mostly moved furniture and boxes, but we also spent a lot of time cleaning the hospital, because it had been closed for two years. There were dead cockroaches EVERYWHERE. It was pretty gross. My favorite part of the day was getting to talk with two other Nav girls about what God is doing in our lives lately and what He has been teaching us.

This picture is really, really fun. One of the Nav girls decided that we needed to have a talent show. This is my Bible study, and we decided to dance and lip synch to "Pop! Goes My Heart" from the movie "Music and Lyrics". It was cheesy, campy, and awesome. We won third place, which means that we get to perform again at the end of the year party; that's the trophy between me and Carmel, the girl in the orange.

Also, if you'll direct your attention to my profile picture, you'll see that I cut my hair. After nearly twenty years of long hair and a lot of thinking about it, I decided that a change would be good. So now I have short hair, which is a new, fun experience.

Only three weeks left of classes! A little more than two months until I leave for Namibia!

Where did February GO???

I feel like time has been sprinting away from me. February was especially busy because of my musical, Valentine's Day, and visits from my family. Here's a quick summary in pictures.

This is a picture of me and my seventeen-year-old brother, Aaron. He's an amazing musician, and I think that he's already mastered the "rockstar look". Aaron and my dad flew out to Phoenix on Valentine's Day, and came to see my musical the weekend after Valentine's Day. One afternoon, when we were driving to the theater, we saw the Oscar Mayer Weinermobile. When we were kids, my brother and I absolutely LOVED the Weinermobile, and my greatest ambition was to sing the Oscar Mayer Weiner jingle on the commercials. Anyway, we had quite the photoshoot with the Weinermobile. It was great to have my family come out and visit, because one of the hardest things about going to school in Arizona is being so far away from my family.

These are a few of the beautiful ladies that I have the honor of co-leading in a study on the book of Romans. Val, my co-leader, was driving the van, which is why she's not in the picture, but she's an incredibly wise, amazingly fun woman. From left to right, Maggie, Krystal, Lauren, and Carmel are some of the most hilarious girls I've ever had the opportunity to hang out with. On Valentine's Day, we decided to give Paul and the Romans a break, and instead, we took a field trip to the movies to see "Music and Lyrics". We laughed, we talked in loud voices, we carried around roses, and we ate some funfetti, pink-frosted, Valentine-heart-sprinkled cupcakes. The thing I love most about studying the Bible with these ladies is that we live our lives together. We're able to come together once a week and share our struggles, our triumphs, and our questions. I'm way too blessed to have them in my life and I love them like crazy.

Here a couple pictures from my musical. I was involved with a musical called "The Wager", which was the biblical story of Job, set in modern-day Manhattan. Our production was the world premiere of this musical, which was a fantastic experience. I played the role of "Julie", the oldest daughter of "Jonathan Brytson" (our Job character). In a nutshell, the musical was about a man who has everything: wealth, power, a happy family, and a perfect life. "Lou" (the Satan character) makes a wager with Jonathan's mentor, "J." (the God character), saying that if J would cease with Jonathan for thirty days, Jonathan would turn from him and curse him. J agrees to the wager with Lou, on the condition that Jonathan himself will not be harmed in any way. Lou causes Jonathan's three children to be killed in accidents. Jonathan's wife commits suicide. Jonathan's business fails. Even through all of this, Jonathan is able to retain hope. At the end, J is victorious, and Jonathan realizes that the most important things are not your external possessions, but your hope, your love, and your faith. All in all, it was an amazing experience. I was able to do theater for the first time in a year and a half. We performed in a 1600-seat theater. This is a picture of me, Javier ("J."), and Kaitlyn ("Rebecca", my sister in the musical)

My mom also flew out to see me. She came to see my show on closing night. I was so excited to see her!

These are a few of my friends. We lived together in the dorms last year, and we all live on the same floor again this year. Matt, me, Cassie, and Alicia.

Forgiveness and Faithfulness

God is so faithful.

That's something I should remind myself of every day and something that I don't reflect on nearly often enough.

God is faithful to me.

I had an experience yesterday that humbled me to the point of tears. The story goes back to my senior year in high school, to a friendship with a person who meant a lot to me. Literally overnight, that friendship was gone because of a few silly words and some serious awkwardness. Overnight, I lost one of my best friends, and I was sitting there, trying to pick up the pieces. I cried. I prayed. I wanted to forgive, but I also wanted to hold onto all the hurt that I was feeling. It was six months before this person and I talked again, and even then, nothing was the same. We couldn't talk in the way that we once had. Our friendship wasn't the same. I'd forgiven him for the hurt that I had once felt, but there was never an apology, and we never talked about what had happened in our friendship.

Yesterday, out of the blue, he e-mailed me with an apology. He apologized for blaming me for the demise of our friendship. He apologized for throwing our friendship away and told me that I'd been a good friend to him. This meant a lot to me, because I'd convinced myself that we hadn't been that close, that it was all in my head, that our friendship was simply casual. It touched my heart, this two-year-old apology that I'd given up waiting for. I cried because I'd already forgiven him, and I didn't need an apology to make me feel better.

"The LORD is faithful in all his words and kind in all his works." Psalm 145:13

When I give my pain to God, He is faithful with healing my heart. I don't understand how his faithfulness is so great and I am so often able to ignore it.

I stayed healthy during the performances of my musical. God is faithful. I'm doing well in my classes. God is faithful. I'm going to San Diego this weekend with dear friends to spend time with other believers. God is super-faithful.

God loves me, and He is faithful.

I'm Going to Namibia?

After nearly half an hour of trying to figure out what I'm doing with this whole "blog" thing, I've finally gotten it to work. So here we go.

At the beginning of August, I was presented with a booklet of summer mission trips and asked to pray whether or not God was calling me to go on a trip. "Namibia AIDS" was the first trip that piqued my interest. I want to help people, especially in the field of healthcare. I prayed about Namibia, asking God to work things out financially. A week later, I received a contract for a musical that I was in, saying that I would be compensated *very well* for my time spent in performance.

A few months later, I was back in school, back in rehearsal, back in the world of worrying about my needs and not trusting God to meet them. I had given up the idea of going to Namibia because I told myself that I needed to work this summer. I needed to pay rent. I needed to keep a steady job. I needed to do all kinds of "important", "adult", "responsible" things. I had started my application in November, well ahead of the December 1st deadline, but on the last day of November, I was nowhere near ready to turn it in. Val, a woman who has been discipling me this year, encouraged me to apply anyway, even if my application would be a few days late. When I went on the internet to begrudgingly finish my application, I found that the deadline had been extended to January 31st. I felt God smiling at me in the way that He always does when He wants to show me something and I try my hardest not to pay attention.

Midway through January, I still hadn't finished my application. In my own mind, I'd stopped thinking about Africa, and about summer mission trips in general. But God had other plans. He kept putting people in my life to remind me about applying. Finally, I gave up and decided just to go far. My application was a few days late, but at least it was done. I felt like I'd done my part by applying. I wasn't sure why I applied, but I only knew that God told me to do it, so I better follow directions.

Yesterday was the 8th of February, and I got an e-mail saying that I'd been accepted to go this summer. "You're going to Africa!" my friends screamed, full of joy. I was terrified. "I might go to Africa," I said, trying to avoid the very real possibility that I might board a plane in a few months and fly halfway across the world. "I still have to get a passport, and fundraise, and besides, I might go to training in March, and they might decide that they don't want me anymore." I was terrified. I AM terrified. I have to fundraise a ton of money. I have to trust that God will take care of not only the money for the trip, but also my rent, my car payment, money for textbooks in the fall.

I hear God, and He whispers the same phrase He wakes me with every morning: "Trust Me." He extends His hand. I place my tiny hand into His, and although I'm still nervous, He is there to calm me. I'm not sure what this summer will bring. I know that it will be difficult, and will very likely be more difficult than I could ever expect. But with my Father's track record, I can fully trust that His plan is perfect. I'm trusting in you, God. Here we go, Abba. Take me to Namibia.