Aloha, oy!

Well, it has been an eventful week here in Hawaii.

I arrived on Thursday night last week exhausted from an 8 hour layover in Calgary and ready to fall into my bed, which was the second bunk out of all our 3 layered bunks.  It's pretty sweet.   Look below for a short video tour that I made of where I live! :)

On Saturday night, we found out that we would be going on an "Exodus" expedition.  Before we left, we had a scavenger hunt all throughout the Island and ended our adventure on a volcano in a place called Iao Valley. It is this really awesome place that has representation of all the different ethnicities that are represented on Hawaii. So there are a bunch of houses that are built in the style of each ethnicity. We started our chat in a japanese house with a wonderful hawaiian lady named Momi. (Moe-Mee) She filled us in on Hawaiian culture and how to respect the island. Then we moved to the Philipino house and from there we spread out and spent our first "Quiet Time" with God.  I felt very disconnected during my time.. I have been trying to escape my thoughts because of everything that I left behind when I came here.  It was pretty discouraging, but when we gathered together again to share, the three people who shared spoke right to my heart. I shared about that and officially kicked off our DTS with the first tears. Haha.. I think God just really wanted to speak to me and remind me that He is part of my life.

We went out to the wilderness and camped right beside the ocean.  It was incredible! Each day we had an hour set aside to spend with God, hearing his voice and reading his word. I loved it.  On one of our days, we hiked up a mountain. It was absolutely amazing! On the way back down, I caught my ankle on a root and heard it pop in three places.  I forgot to take a picture of the golf ball sized lump on my foot, but the bruising is still very beautiful.

I finally went to the doctor today (the $300+ bill made me extremely appreciative of Canadian healthcare) and discovered that it could be fractured.  I will have to return in a week and have xrays again to find out if it is fractured.

Today I found out where my outreach is! It's in Asia and I am extremely excited to bond with my team and to actually leave to go there. Anyways, if you really want to know more details, you can always email me:)

So far in my time here, I have really been humbled by everything that has happened in this short week. Through my ankle, I have been forced to allow people to serve me.  It sounds really stupid, but I am really bad at receiving blessings and accepting help.  I don`t like to be vulnerable so it has been a really trying time.

Anyways, I am just so incredibly grateful and blessed by everything and everyone here.  I love every single person here, and I feel like we are a family.  I'm already getting sad thinking about the fact that I will only have 3 months in total with some of them, but I'm making the most of our time together.

Prayer:
My ankle is a huge setback, and as much as I have seen how God can use it to speak, I don't believe that it is what He wants for me right now.  I have been praying, and the girls here have been praying over it with me for a speedy recovery and a complete healing.

I am slightly worried about raising support. I know that God will provide. Pray that I won't allow this small detail to distract me from learning and hearing what God has for me in this time.

I miss you all soo much and I love you even more!
Blessings in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Love,
Ehjae

Prayer, prayer and more prayer.. the cries of a humbled, broken, imperfect person.

** You might want to read the previous post to know what I am talking about in this post..**


It has been a rough week.  I wrote the previous post on Wednesday, August 25th.

I was so excited, so high on the greatness of God's faithfulness. I was ecstatic and sharing my story with everyone.. I couldn't wait to leave and continue watching my life unfold in this story.

Life is not always perfect.  Life is not always happy.  When my best friend's mom died in a tragic car accident on Sunday, August 29th, I was not excited.
To be honest, I was absolutely furious.  How can we ever say that someone aged 47 leaving 4 beautiful daughters and so many others to grieve is fair, or even a good thing? Of course, we know in our hearts that if the person who has passed had a relationship with Christ, that we will be seeing them again but death is one of those many things that does not invoke excitement in us. We don't run to grieving loved ones grinning and exclaiming, "congratulations!" In fact, I have really been learning about how we really don't know how to treat grieving loved ones at all.  (Do they really need 50 dozen platters of baked goods? lol)
I have been so humbled in the past week and a half.  God reminded me that we don't go to bible school, missions work, or even to Him as happy, perfect, whole human beings.  The whole reason that He exists, that those things exist, is BECAUSE humans are imperfect, broken creatures.
I was mad because I've waited all these years to see what God had in store for me regarding YWAM.  I knew something great was coming because He had made it so clear.
I'm mad because I know that this is the right time, this is the time that He had in store for me to go, but it's so not the right time.  I want to stay.  I don't want to go right now.  I don't want to leave my family.  I don't want to leave Melody.  I don't want to leave James.
I feel like I can't trust God. But I can, I know that I can. But I'm struggling.

I wish I could stand before you and honestly exclaim to you that I am living the christian dream, feeling God's presence in every moment, seeing his goodness in all creation, that I am whole and happy.  I'm not.
 I sense that God is calling me to YWAM as broken as I am because it's not about how whole I am.
It's about his redeeming love.
It's not about how happy I can pretend that I am.
It's about a real relationship with a living God who accepts me and loves me with all of my faults.
It's not about what I can do for the world,
It's about who I can share with the world.

More than anything, this story is NOT about me.

I will be sharing intermittently about how God is recreating, molding and humbling me through my YWAM experience.  I would love prayer from you, and I would love prayer requests from you. How are you doing? Let me pray for you :)

"May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word" 2 Thessalonians 2:16

YWAM Adventures

It was a hard decision to leave my position as Youth Worker at Rock of Ages, but God was leading me in every step.  Some of you may have heard that I am going to Briercrest in Caronport, SK.  For a while, I thought that was what God had in store for me this year, however, as this summer progressed, he made it clear that he had different plans for me; plans that have been in the works for years.

This story begins in my grade ten year, in the winter of 2005. I was picking someone up from a conference in Saskatoon.  I wasn’t originally supposed to be there.  I arrived at the tail end of the speaker’s talk, he was talking about being willing to go when and where God calls us.  It moved my spirit and my heart responded.  As I was praying, I heard an audible voice say to me, “Papua New Guinea.”  I had no idea what that was, (I thought it was a state in the US) and after discovering there was no recent disaster that needed my 15 year old help, I put it on the backburner and simply remembered to remember that country.

Sometime in April, 2008, it was the last week before grad at CLBI.  I was wrestling with returning for a second year, when I thought about it, it didn’t seem right.  I began to pray about different options, one of them being YWAM.  On Wednesday of that week, one of my friends approached me. “Ehjae! I’m going to YWAM!” It sparked a reminder for me to pray more fervently about whether that was God’s leading for me. So I asked God to give me a clear indication if and where I should go to YWAM.  That Friday night, I ended up staying over at that friend’s house.  While I slept, I had a dream that I was walking on the beach in Hawaii with my DTS classmates.  I woke up the next morning frustrated.  “Thanks God! There isn’t even a YWAM in Hawaii!” I had arranged to meet with a fellow classmate on Saturday, because we hadn’t hung out very much during our year at CLBI.  As I was telling him about my frustrations, he almost laughed at me, “Ehjae, there is a YWAM in Hawaii.”  With that, he dragged me to the school library and made me look it up on the computer. 

There I discovered that there was a YWAM in Hawaii, in fact, there were two! Of course, my impatient heart looked up to God once again in frustration, how was I supposed to know which one?  However, as I continued to peruse the two websites, something caught my eye and my heart skipped a beat.  On the YWAM Maui page, there was a write-up about their recent outreach in the country of Papua New Guinea.

With that, I knew that if I were to go to YWAM, it would be in Maui.  I asked God for a sign to show me that YWAM was in fact where he wanted me to go. 

That night, I was packing up some of my things.  As I was pulling out my t-shirts, I pulled one out that I had bought two weeks earlier and had yet to wear.  It was a green t-shirt with the word “Hawaii” printed across the front.  “I knew that was there, who doesn’t want to go to Hawaii?” God, please give me a sign that is extraordinary, something that couldn’t just be a coincidence.”

The next morning, driving home from church in Camrose, AB, the vehicle in front of us was a jeep…  with a Hawaii license plate.  From there, I began my process of applying for YWAM Maui.

That summer, I became very sick while travelling with CLBI’s summer teams.  I actually came home early from teams and began going through test after test.  Everything came up blank or negative.  With those results, my doctor advised me to not go to YWAM, because we didn’t know what travelling to a foreign country on outreach would do to my immune system. 

Disappointed, I looked up at God and asked him why he would keep me in Saskatoon after having made it seem so clear that I was supposed to go.

Well, the most amazing thing happened when I stayed in Saskatoon.  I got involved at my church volunteering with my youth group. Eventually, I ended up working full-time with the students, and working at an amazing job with awesome people, shaping me and humbling me in God’s presence every day.

As time progressed, I felt that I needed training, I was inexperienced, young, and I wasn’t offering my best to the students because I didn’t know how to.  I began to pursue training via long distance courses from Briercrest.  As time went on, I spoke with Brian (the pastor at my church) and he suggested that I consider taking a break, or a sabbatical, to study.  As I began to consider leaving for a short while, God began to push me and challenge me to trust him enough to leave in pursuit of full-time studies. I wrestled through it, and after a long time of prayer and restless nights, I decided to leap out and trust God, I resigned at Rock of Ages and put in my application for the Biblical Studies program at Briercrest. 

The whole time after I resigned at Rock of Ages, I was uneasy.  Something wasn’t right.  I still wasn’t at peace, I was wrestling with something mentally, spiritually, I couldn’t put my finger on it, but my spirit wasn’t at peace. I began to remember that God had made it clear to me about YWAM, so I began trying to find places that offered summer DTS programs.  That way I could attend Briercrest for a  year, go to DTS in the summer and go back to Briercrest for second semester to continue my studies there. 

Every summer, I work at a camp in southern Saskatchewan. On July 4^th, 2010,  I went to church in Shaunavon before camp began.  That Sunday just happened to be the Sunday that my friend was preaching about his YWAM experience, and what he had learned at the program that he had just recently returned from.  While he spoke, it sparked something in my heart; an urgency to go to YWAM, it reminded me of everything that had happened while I was praying for clarity from God years before.  I began to pray fervently about whether YWAM Maui was what God desired for me. I prayed for clarity, I prayed for affirmation and peace.

After I returned from camp, I discovered in my emails that I was a recipient of a very generous scholarship at Briercrest. Here was the affirmation I had been praying for! However, it was not the affirmation I expected it to be.  As I sat there reading that email over and over and over again, feeling uprooted and as if everything that was wrong rested on the fact that I was getting a scholarship,  I knew that Briercrest was not where I was supposed to be.  I wish I could explain why, because I know it seems crazy.  It felt as though God was saying, “Ehjae, I can provide. You know in your heart where you desire to be, and where I desire you to be. If you go to Briercrest just because of this scholarship, you don’t trust that I will provide for you wherever you go in life.”  So, I called my parents and told them what I had decided.

We met for lunch the next week to discuss details.  As I walked up to the restaurant doors, parked right in front of the doors was a red Carerra with Hawaiian license plates. I stopped to stare for a few moments.  I’m glad that it was a nice car, because that way, it was sort of normal for me to stare, walk around the car and kneel to be at eye level with the license plate.

After I got home from lunch, James came over. As he walked up to my house, I could only stare at him.  He was wearing a green t-shirt with “Hawaii” printed across the front.

That day, I put in my application for YWAM Maui.

Today, I begin my journey... or continue it..  I am so excited to see this story continue. It's been such a testimony to God's faithfulness and his answer to prayer. 

 Notes about this story:

The girl from CLBI who told me she was going to YWAM didn't even go! Cool how God uses other people's stories to weave ours together..

CLBI= Canadian Lutheran Bible Institute. Located in Camrose, AB

YWAM= Youth With A Mission: an international volunteer organization with a main focus on training and giving people opportunities to demonstrate the love of Jesus to the whole world

DTS= Discipleship Training School, prerequisite for all other YWAM training programs. Some focus on particular areas of ministry or places in the world.

wow.

Step out in faith

FAITH




To be honest, I have been struggling so much with this.  


Often we think of this word as meaning "belief in someone or something.."  The top definition in the dictionary is in fact "confidence or trust in someone or something"


My 'faith' in the sense of believing in God, believing that he exists and that Jesus came and died... that has not waivered.


My 'faith' in the second sense of trusting him- that is where the epic fail is. 


"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight." Proverbs 3:5,6


This verse is well known, and yet when God brought this one to me the other day, it still made me cry. When was the last time I trusted God with all of my heart, with all of the things that are embedded within my heart? 


When was the last time I NEEDED God? Truly allowed myself to need him?  I am so independent. I am strong. I can do it. I don't need anyone.  
NEED= vulnerability. Who in their right mind chooses to be vulnerable? Living in a country where my needs are limited. I am limited to living a life with everything I could possibly ever NEED, yet a dry life with dry spirit NEEDING God's fullness of life.


How do I choose to need God? What a weird question.  "Ehjae, obviously everyone needs God, you can't choose to need him. You already do."


Isn't it easy to NOT need God? Isn't it easy to make choices that bring us all we could ever need? And if we go to church and fill our quota of spiritual deeds, we can get by, living on autopilot; especially if the church we go to isn't focused on the conviction of sins- but on preaching comfortable messages that make us feel good. 


Take a good look at your life.  RUN! Run away from things that make you comfortable. RUN away from things that bring you relief and keep you from NEEDING GOD.  RUN to God's embrace. RUN for his glory. 


I am not saying that you should go home today, grab all your clothes and food, throw it on the streets and sell your house and belongings so that you can live in poverty.  I am saying that we should look inwardly, evaluate; what is it that we possess today that is keeping us from realizing our NEED for God?
I am saying that for those of you who are currently living in NEED.. God will provide. Allow him to. Do not live in stubborn independence. 


I am not saying that you should quit your job.  But evaluate; where is God in your job? Are you actively pursuing Him through what you do? Maybe you should make some choices to bring Him into that part of your life. Maybe you should spend less time in the corporate world and more time seeking Him with your family. 
  


As for trusting Him, I struggle with this. I am currently struggling with this. It's so easy to say that we NEED him, but how can we drop all these things if we don't trust that he will provide for us? How can I go on if I don't know that the path I am on is one that he marked out?


He gave me these words from His scripture:
"In the morning, O LORD, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation." Psalm 5:3


My challenge has become this:
1. What are my needs? Lay them before the LORD. I desire to give everything to Him.. I am trying to force myself to trust him.  In my heart, I know that He is faithful and that there is no better place to go.. Where else could I bring my problems? 


2. Expect a blessing.  When I was in high school, heading to an extremely uncomfortable situation, my mom prayed with me, marked me with the sign of a cross, kissed my forehead and said, "Expect a blessing" I went, expecting God to perform some great miracle.  It was still an incredibly uncomfortable experience.  No miracle. One wrought with pain, tears and frustration.. but God was faithful, and I have never forgotten that weekend because of his fulfillment on my expectations, simply through his comforting presence and small reminders of his love.


"Wait in Expectation" vs 3... expect that God will hear your prayers and act.  He will provide. 



This reminds me of the scene in Indiana Jones The Last Crusade, when Indiana is standing over a canyon, wondering how to get across, and he finally steps out in faith, not knowing what to expect.  He holds out his leg and steps down... onto an invisible bridge which takes him across. 


Sometimes I feel like I am at the edge looking down into a pit of hopelessness, the unknown, and a world of hurt.  Why would God bring me so far, just to have me stuck at the edge here?
I'm terrified. But God has something here for me.  I just have to step out and trust that it's here, even if I can't see it.


We have to take the step.  God has provided the way, even if we can't see it, but it won't help us unless we trust that it's there.  




Writing this down has spoken to me more than it probably has for anyone else.  Funny how God works. 

Not This year...

The dates for the trip to Haiti have been finalized... and I can't go.

I am surprisingly ok about it.  I promised some friends that I would play piano for their wedding, the date of which falls smack dab in the middle of the trip.

I think more than anything, I am simply confused.  Why do I continually try to go on these trips? Why do I feel like God is saying "Yes" when it ends up being "No."

I am yearning to find a reason.. some lesson that I should be learning from this.  If it's about trust, I could almost scream!

How many lessons do I need to learn about trust? I can answer that question for myself.. "As many as it takes."

Regardless of the countless times I have had similar experiences, specifically with missions work-- I could tell stories about how each trip ends up not working and I look up with a smile on my face and tell myself, "God has something better planned. I just don't see it yet."

Somedays, I'm tired of looking to see what the "something better" is. Somedays, I'm tired of being so passionate. Perhaps that's why apathy is slowly seeping into my being.

GOD! show me...

What in the World am I doing?

Have you ever wondered what is the point of having dreams and aspirations?

This is an on-going stand-off between me and God. Well, at least I see it that way.

The past few months have been a battle for me. I wake up in the morning desiring fellowship with God, a renewal, and to once again feel that intimacy with Him that seems so long past. I know that I am the one who moved, who changed. God is always the same, today, yesterday.. forever. I know it's me. But I don't know how or when it happened, or how to find that again.

I am a dreamer. When I was a little girl, I would crawl into little spaces or sit at the windowsill and simply dream. I would dream of my life and what it could be. Sometimes this consisted of me possessing superpowers, or having friends the size of my fingers, or friends the size of a two story building, or being in the Olympics. Many times, it consisted of me travelling, speaking and walking with Jesus and being a part of something bigger than myself.

At any rate, I dreamt about my life- and for the most part, I truly believed that anything could become of it. Now, obviously having superpowers or Gulliver's travels type friends are not a reality. But as I grew older, I realized that I could be a part of something greater than me.

Now after years and years of trying to get involved with trip after trip, yearning to learn about missions across the world, and the number of trips I have been involved with: 0.

I know what you're thinking, well Ehjae, get on that. Just book a flight and go somewhere!

Seriously, I've tried. But each time, I had a strong sense from God to wait.

This year, it was different. Last spring, when my friends were telling me about a school in Haiti that they travel to each year, once again it rose up within me. That call to missions, that overwhelming sense of urgency; that I needed to get involved. This trip made sense. I can speak french, I love kids, it's a short trip and the timeline works out perfectly with my job. (I lead a youth group, so my commitment is to them.)

After the disastrous earthquake that rocked the nation of Haiti on January 12, 2010, my sense of urgency to go was magnified. I thought to myself, "This confirms it. I am going."

What I didn't realize was the extent that it would actually effect our trip.

The dates for the trip have changed and I no longer know if I will be able to go because I have a commitment to the youth group, and I put them first. I don't want to leave unless it is a good time for them as well. The cost for the trip looks like it is going to double as well.. we don't know for sure, but that's just another thing freaking me out now.

In the past month several factors have changed. My van needed to be fixed, and ended up costing over $1000. There have been other unforeseen costs with life that would've been ok, but because of the van, I am now having to use the money I saved up for the trip to pay off debt.

So here I sit, wondering, "What in the world am I doing?"

On one hand, I am tempted to look back at my past and get angry with God. "Why is this happening again? Why did you put this unceasing urgency and desire for cross cultural ministry and yet you continuously keep me from going!? I tried to be responsible, I saved up the money, and now it's going to something totally different."

But, in my heart I know that I can trust him. It's just really hard. I have this God-given love for something, and yet he tells me that I can't go. Not yet.

I don't know what he has planned for this year. I may still go on the trip to Haiti. Right now I am in the midst of a story that tells of God's goodness and faithfulness. It's hard to see that until the rest of the chapter is written.

All I know is that God is calling me to trust him; to trust him with the finances; to trust him with the dates and times. To trust him with my life. To trust him with my dreams.

They are from him after all.

I look forward to sharing the end of this chapter with you, and telling you all about how God's goodness and faithfulness was displayed through these events in my life. Whether I go to Haiti or not will be up to him, and as much as it hurts to say this right now....

I do know that if I don't go.. he has a reason. It's hard to accept that though.

Waiting and really seeking to trust Him,

Ehjae