Little hands stretched as high up in the air as they could go. Her little voice crying softy but as strong as she could, “Mommy, Mommy”. My little niece desires to be held any time I can hold her but especially when she thinks I am going somewhere. Anytime I head in the direction of the door, she will start waddling after me calling “mommy” instead of auntie because she doesn’t want me to leave her. Aerowyn trusts and loves me completely. She trusts me to hold her, feed her, care for her and protect her. She wants to spend every minute possible with me. Aerowyn doesn’t wait for me to come find her, she follows me every where I go.
Every time I spend time with my niece who is one year old, I think of Jesus and what He said about children. “Then people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked them. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”Matthew 19:13-14. As well as, “Matthew 18:2-5, He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.” As I read these passages I ask myself, “Do I trust God as Aerowyn trusts me”? “Do I follow Jesus where ever He goes”? “Do I look to see where He is at and do I run after Him? “Do I stretch out my arms to be held by my Beloved Father”?
I am committed to trust my Beloved Jesus and Father with the faith of a child. I am devoted to working at having childlike faith every day. What about you? Will you have faith and trust in Jesus like a child? He is worth trusting. He is able to keep you and care for you like no one else can.
“The Lord bless you
and keep you;
The Lord make his face shine on you
and be gracious to you;
The Lord turn his face toward you
and give you peace.” ’ Numbers 6:24-26
I am personally trusting in God right now for a supernatural mission trip with my dad to Zambia and Rwanda Africa. Please pray with me for support and Holy Spirit power on these trips.
I grew up in church… a good PK and as such I had one simple job to do.. be perfect, sweet, and make sure to set a flawless example for all the church to see. My main goal was to grow up leading Bible studies with all the young “maidens in waiting” of the church body because “youth group” was out of the question and one day marry a perfect young man who would become a pastor when he was 16 years old and spend the majority of his time locked away in his library studiously pouring over theology books while I made baked goods in the kitchen of our town house with the whitewashed picket fence and watched our ten children play with their Atlas and puzzles. Lets just say I was the ultimate teenage bigot. But sadly when you live under a mountain of self-inflicted expectation and constant failure to accomplish it eventually causes you to hate yourself and anyone else who does not live up to the impossible standards that you yourself are drowning in. I remember growing up hearing about grace and about how “nothing you could ever do would make God love you any less”.. now I am not here to preach theology to anyone.. trust me I know how much I still need to learn but lets just say grace was for weak christians who couldn’t “keep it together” in my opinion and I refused to be one of “those people”.
Anyway to save on paper and to not put my readers to sleep I will skip ahead a couple of years. At 19 the once perfect saint was now a tattooed, pierced, smoker who wouldn’t dare step foot onto a church’s front lawn let alone attend. A girl who once believed being a christian meant being better than everyone else now spent her days working, smoking, and crying herself to sleep every night. I won’t go into all the details of those horrible days but I can write this with a smile on my face because God did not let that little girl stay there. Through many hard lessons she was finally able to learn and understand what Jesus was saying in Mark 2:17 “When Jesus heard this, he told them, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor–sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.” and it was my greatest joy last Friday night to share that with over 100 or so young men and women in a city park with some paper and colors.
Six of us went out to what is, in my opinion, one of the scariest parks in Boston Medellin. Lets just say its where all the gangs, addicts and hustlers like to hang out day and night. And I could feel the nervousness of every one of my companions as we sat down to play some music and sing right in the middle of it all. We brought with us pens, paper, paint, and all kinds of markers and our strategy was to break the ice by inviting anyone who wanted to “express themselves” by drawing or writing whatever they wanted. To my amazement it worked! I don’t know if it was the influence of the alcohol or weed but these kids LOVED the idea and in less than 30 minutes we had a huge group drawing, singing, playing instruments and listening to us share the gospel with them. One girl in particular I remember was Viviana, she was a beautiful 22 year old girl who was so touched by what we were doing that she asked me and another friend if we would sit down with her. I could feel her pain as she cried on my shoulder and poured her heart out to us. She wanted to know Jesus, she wanted to change and I know that God did something in her heart that night the same way He did it in mine. He is so amazing and we were able to share His story and His love with so many young people that night. I saved the papers with all the drawings and notes they wrote so that I will never forget that night, that experience and never again forget why and for WHOM Jesus came and died.
So blessed to be here, so blessed to be doing what I was born to do… Who is it that God is using you to speak to? who is it that God put in your life that needs Him? What is it that God put in your heart to do with your life? Just something to think about. As always, A HUGE thank you to all you who support us in prayer and financially. It means so much more than you can ever imagine. I could not do this without all of you.
“Wash my heart and make it clean, open up my eyes to things unseen, show me how to love like You have loved me” Hosanna, Hillsong
Every time I spend time with my niece who is one year old, I think of Jesus and what He said about children. “Then people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked them. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”Matthew 19:13-14. As well as, “Matthew 18:2-5, He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.” As I read these passages I ask myself, “Do I trust God as Aerowyn trusts me”? “Do I follow Jesus where ever He goes”? “Do I look to see where He is at and do I run after Him? “Do I stretch out my arms to be held by my Beloved Father”?
I am committed to trust my Beloved Jesus and Father with the faith of a child. I am devoted to working at having childlike faith every day. What about you? Will you have faith and trust in Jesus like a child? He is worth trusting. He is able to keep you and care for you like no one else can.
