Love Peace Joy

Friends and Family! I know only four days have passed by since my last blog but some awesome things occurred so I thought I would post a short one with some more cool testimonies. My heart is sinking more and more into the Love of Jesus even though some of the lessons might not be so easy to learn. Many people are beginning to miss their homes already along with the comfort. We have basically been out of running water for ¾ of the time and having bread for breakfast and beans and rice for lunch and more rice for dinner everyday. I personally love rice and beans haha but others not so much. But anyways I am going to share about a cool experience with the Mozambique Pastors and then another testimony of a family, and then I will end with what Jesus is teaching me. And maybe one or two more cool things.

On Wednesday during our class period time, I experienced something I will never forget. They brought in the Mozambique Pastors from the Mozambique Bible School so that we could all participate in the washing of each other’s feet just like Jesus did with the disciples. It’s one thing to read the story and to actually do it your self. In Mozambique peoples feet are hard as rocks and always dirty which makes it very very honorable in their culture to wash another’s feet. They began to worship as we the Internationals washed the feet of the Mozambique’s first. As I began to wash these feet covered in callus my heart sunk deeper and deeper. To think that the King of the world that could strike the whole world dead in one second came and took the LOWEST role still blows my mind. He came to show his love and goodness, and I’m beginning to find it’s more and more irresistible. We then switched and they washed our feet. Let’s just say it hit me pretty hard haha. Tears began to roll down my eyes as I pictured Jesus the one washing the feet. It was an amazing experience. Later that night at our night class I heard two of the most amazing testimonies in my life, but I will only tell one.

           

They put two young men on the stage that had grown up through Iris at the base and are now amazing men of God. This story I will never forget for the rest of my life. He was now a 24 year old pastor/interpreter which began being abandoned as a baby. His mother could not afford to take care of him so just a few weeks after he was born his mother put him on the street to be ran over by a car, but God had other plans. The first truck that came was an army truck that stopped before killing him and picked him up to take care of them at one of their refuge bases. After 5 years there his grandmother showed up one day and took him to her home. Two years later his grandmother decided she can’t take care of him anymore and threw him on the streets at age 7. Only a few weeks went by before he heard a voice say that he loves him and he is sending someone to take care of him. The next week he met his first white person and it was Heidi who immediately invited him to the base and he obviously went. This was the hardest time of Iris ministry as it was in the beginning and there were only 90 or so kids. He went on explaining how they were beaten and persecuted, kicked out of their base and never had a steady home until a few years later in Pemba where they are currently. He has never met his mom or dad. When Jesus talks about building a house in heaven it’s people like these that have mansions waiting for them.

Thursday was a normal awesome day and then Friday came around which is where we do our practical mission jobs. I have intercession in the morning and then I went on outreach to the village with a Harvest School friend and a Mozambique friend to interpret. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into but God just showed me how easy it is to love people especially when they are hurt and in need right next to you. We walked maybe 200 yards away from the base as we stopped at a house with a family outside. We quickly found out that the mom was in severe pain. It didn’t take long to figure out that in a group of about 7 or 8 people, 1 mom was very sick, 1 kid had malaria, 1 baby was sick, 1 was pregnant and the other wanted us to pray for her to find a husband. Yes it was awesome to see the mom healed and be able to pray for the others but that was not the best thing about bringing the kingdom. Even though the kid with malaria was not healed we left that place 2 hours later with more joy in us and in every person there than what we came with. Both moms looked depressed when we were arrived and had huge smiles laughing by the time we left. There were also 3 to 4 more kids that were all having a blast with us playing around. Prayer might have only take 45 minutes total for everyone but the rest was just loving and hanging out with them. Restoring the kingdom is bringing his will on earth as it is in heaven, which includes joy peace and love. It was funny how I thought I was going to go through town praying for multiple people and Jesus just sais nope I want you to sit with this family the whole time and just love them!

It really is funny how much I have to learn and just how far I am from knowing the fullness that the Father is and what He has for me. I am learning sooooo much about being content wherever I am because of the culture and how long things can take and how late everything occurs. It’s like he brought me out here to sit me down and say stop all of your agendas and walk as I walked, which is loving people and loving God. I am almost fighting being at rest and thinking that I still have to be doing something “productive”. Of course there are always practical ways of love and living it out but a lot of times He just wants us to sit next to the person we are by even if we don’t know them and just love them. Not preach not condemn or judge but just love!

If I could encourage any of you guys back home to do anything it would be to do just that. I know everyone lives crazy lives and stuff needs to be done, but people are ALWAYS more important. I encourage you to stop by the people that are by themselves and just ask them how there day is going. It’s about being obedient to the gospel and if were really in love with Jesus these things should be done every day. People say “how can there be a God with so much evil and sadness and poverty” and the Father created the world to work with His sons and daughters. Stop excepting the evil and depression in this world and start to realize that we are the ones that need to stop it and make disciples. For you Jesus freaks I believe God is wanting to deposit a deeper hunger than we ever thought possible. That we would be so in love with the King that we would lay down our lives every day with more joy than we ever imagined. But I will go more on that later!

Went longer than I thought but that’s okay! Mary if you or anyone else would want to send clothes or anything like that I will get the info by next post! Again you guys are all amazing and can’t wait to share more! Until then I love you all and thanks again for reading!