Bogota 1-2012 Day 3

Our devotion this morning was Mission Imagination. I started out with a few of my favorite quotes on “thinking big for God”

“If your vision doesn’t scare you, then both your vision and your God are too small.” – Brother Andrew

“Faith does not operate in the realm of the possible. There is no glory for God in that which is humanly possible. Faith begins where man’s power ends.” – George Mueller

“God loves with a great love the man whose heart is bursting with a passion for the impossible.” – William Booth

We serve a big God!!!  He cannot be exaggerated!

Eph. 3:20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us,

“Dreaming is a form of praying and praying is a form of dreaming.” – Elizabeth Elliot

Faith is like imagination

Heb. 11:1 Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.

“Oh you of little faith!” Four times in Matthew Jesus rebuked His disciples for not believing big enough about some pretty scary things. What in our life is He saying, “Oh you of little faith” about?

Matt. 6:30 Food and clothes
Matt. 8:26 Storm!
Matt. 14:31 Walking on water!
Matt. 16:8 No Bread!

John 14:12 “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these he will do; because I go to the Father.

Can you imagine?

Immeasurably more than we can imagine…

I then told about Brother Yun from the book Heavenly Man and about his dream to send 100,000 chinese missionaries west through the 10/40 window all the way to Jerusalem.

Can you imagine? How big is your God? Can He be exaggerated?

Today was another beautiful day in the fields of the fatherless. We returned to Santa Maria orphanage today and spent more time loving on and witnessing to the precious 185 girls there. Because of many of the relationships we built yesterday it was easy to pick up where we left off and go beyond to spend more time sharing about Christ. Bill brought 12 EvangeCubes with him on the trip and these were a big hit today. Once we showed the girls how it worked and told the story of salvation many of them took the cube to other girls and retold the story with the cube. It was amazing. Many opportunities for sharing Christ arose today and one of our team members, Patricia, who is originally from Ecuador and speaks fluent Spanish was able to lead one of the workers to Christ.

Another blessing today was that my friend Raul Velez who runs an adoption ministry out of Florida was here today with 4 pastors that he brought from Florida. I was blessed to introduce Raul to Jose Vicente last year and they are working on some exciting projects together. We had a nice time of fellowship.

As I was standing talking to Raul my phone beeped that I had a text. I quickly looked down because I knew my daughter in law, Jana, was at the hospital with my daughter Beverly and other daughter in law Misti and that Jana was about to deliver her and my second son, Levi’s, first baby. Sure enough! When I read the text from Beverly it said, “The Baby is here!!!” I turned to my wife and said, “You’re a grandma again!” What a day! Now I’m a double grandfather or doble abuelo as they say here. Thank you God for all of your blessings. Jana is living with us while my son serves on a destroyer in the Mediterranean with the U.S. Navy so I will get to hold that precious little bundle when I get home on Sunday.

At noon Jose Vicente, Bill, Dave, and I had to leave to go to a very important meeting with the Colombian government. It was a blessed meeting. The rest of the team stayed and played with the girls. At 3:30 p.m. as planned Javier played some Spanish worship songs and then Luis Acosta, Pastora Liliana’s brother, preached an amazing message (from all accounts) and there were many decisions for Christ. Then the team headed for the bus and there were many tears as they said farewell to these beautiful girls for the last time on this trip.

We met up at a nearby restaurant for a wonderful time of fellowship and food. Thank you for all of the prayers. We love you all.