Off to Thailand!!!!!!!!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! I was able to be home from Dec 18th to Dec 27th for a greatly appreciated Christmas break. It was so great to spend time with my family; I have missed them all so much! I had a wonderful Christmas, and this year it really was about being together. I was able to unpack from my time in Orlando do laundry, shop for Thailand and Christmas, do our annual Christmas crafts, and repack all in 9 short days. It was quite busy to say the least! 
I am off! I am back in Orlando now, and then I will be heading to Thailand tomorrow at 5:45am! After getting over the stress of having to put everything I will need for the next 2 months in a backpack I am starting to get really excited! I am leaving December 30th for Thailand and I will be there until February 21, 2009! At the moment our itinerary looks like we will be in Thailand the whole time. Originally we were hoping to go to Cambodia for part of the time but due to communication break downs on the part of YWAM Cambodia we are unable to go. I am sad but I am also thankful that God knows best and He will have us where he wants us. For the first month we will be traveling up to a small mountain village called Pai, where we will be working with a small local church to reach out to the community. It looks like another VBS is in the plan which I am excited about! We will also spend a lot of time building relationships to encourage and disciple the local believers. Our second month we will spend in Bangkok working with a ministry to the sex trade victims. The ministry is called The Well because of Jesus’ encounter with the women at the well in John 4. I am not exactly sure what we will be doing yet but I will know soon. I am so excited about working with the girls. I can’t even imagine what these girls have been through at such young ages. 
 I don't know when i will be able to get internet again but i will bo my best to write again soon.
 

To NC and back again

 Well first I want to apologize for waiting over a month to update my blog. Well this has been quite an eventful month! Classes have gone very well and I have learned a ton. 

       Last week we drove to North Carolina to the YWAM Charlotte base in Monroe! We went for a gathering of all the south east YWAM bases. Back when I went to Scotland in 2003, ’04, and ’05, I went with YWAM Charlotte so, I got to see my old friends who are on staff! Kristina, and Amy my Scotland leaders in 2005. I love them!It was fun to get to meet DTS students from different YWAM bases around the area. It was so much fun! We had a very exiting 12 hour trip up in an old yellow school bus. I was in the back which meant I got the breeze of all the slightly open windows, it was chilly. Plus to add to the drama the bus stalled out twice! Oh No the bus died again! (my roomates Kelsey, Jordan, and carsia)Me and Lish, staying warm

I also got to go home for a few hours which were amazing. It was so great to be back in the NC, cause I have missed it. I have also really miss fall and cold weather. One afternoon a group of us went to the YWCA and had a great time with some inner city kids, I loved it so much. We did a little teaching on the fruits of the spirit, and then danced and sang a bit. Afterwards we helped them with their homework and played. It really wasn’t much but you can tell it meant a lot to the kids. Me teaching the kids some motions to the fruits of the spirit
Our teaching last week was on evangelism and spiritual discipline, it was good, although most of it I already knew. But my highlight of the week was on Thursday night when my family came down and Ken Helser came and we worshiped and just had fun in the presence of God. It was so awesome! On Friday we drove back to Orlando!

        This week is Thanksgiving! And although it feels nothing like Thanksgiving due to the fact that the temp is in the 70’s I am convinced it is. ;) YWAM Orlando has a big Thanksgiving blow out every year and although I am sad to miss my family I am excited about the YWAM Thanksgiving Extravaganza! Each person is supposed to make something but if you know me one thing is never enough, so…one of my house mates is helping my make 4 dishes. We are making sweet potato casserole, cranberry relish, fresh broccoli salad, and a cheese ball. It is going to be sooo much fun, I can’t wait. Even though it looks like I will be up all night Wednesday night to get it all done, it will still be fun.  

Destination...Thailand!!!

I found out yesterday that I will be going to Thailand on my outreach!!! I am very excited. My DTS is made up of 29 students and the outreach possibilities were India or Thailand. Our school leader asked each of us to pray and ask God where he was leading us to go and write it on a little piece of paper. So we did, and 14 people wrote down India, and 15 wrote down Thailand. It was an even split...crazy. So God knows what He is doing after all. hahaha. Today we found out who our team leaders and staff are and I am thrilled. We are not sure at the moment what we will be doing in Thailand but I know it is going to be awesome.

 

This week we have David Hamilton as our teacher. This man is truly devoted to God and to missions. He has been to 183 nations in his life time, preaching the gospel and spreading the love of Christ around the earth. He is teaching on knowing God, because only when we are in pursuit to know God can we begin to make him known. One thing he said that really stood out to me was his definition of true love, “To discover the dreams of your beloved and to live your life to make those dreams come true.” It is so crazy to think this is how I am supposed to approach God. He is my true love, wow, what a concept. What then are the dreams of God? Anyway, this week has been filled with treasures both big and small. 

Got to Love YWAM

Well tomorrow is the 3 week mark of this adventure! This has definitely been a time of learning and fun. My second week of class a woman named Jill Bills came to teach us about hearing the voice of God and intercession. It was wonderful. I realized that although I have been around intercession a lot I haven’t had any formal teaching on it. It is crazy to think that God is always speaking and he is just waiting for us to stop and listen. The power of intercession is incredible, and I was really blown away by the importance of it. The God of the universe has given us dominion on the earth and he wants us to ask him to move. Jill’s parents Jim and Joy Dawson were very influential in the beginning days of YWAM so it was awesome to get to hear from Jill.

                                            Jill Bill's and Me

 This last week Ezra taught on Lordship and Missions. Ezra is great. He really went in to depth on how to make God Lord of all areas of life. It was very good and convicting. The second half of the week he spoke on missions and the 10/40 window. It is crazy that the largest concentration of unreached people in the world have the fewest missionaries. In some Muslim nations there is about 1 missionary for every 1 million people. The harvest is indeed plentiful but the workers are so few. Life on earth is so short it seems crazy to not devote my life to the advancement of God’s kingdom. 

  "People who do not know the Lord ask why in the world we waste our lives as missionaries. They forget that they too are expending their lives ... and when the bubble has burst, they will have nothing of eternal significance to show for the years they have wasted." - Nate Saint  

The girls in my dorm Nichole, Brianna, Erin, Kelsey, Me, Jordan, and Carisa.

                                            Our House

                                            Friends!

                    Theresa and Dean Sangrey, my amazing DTS leaders!

I'm Here!

Well I am now offically apart of the YWAM family down here in Orlando along with about 60 other students! It is very exciting. I am living in a house with 7 girls plus our dorm parents. Yeah 7 girls and one bathroom its crazy. Out of the 60 students 31 are in my DTS! The YWAM staff down here are awesome and I am so glad to be down here with them. 

                  New friends! Jordan, me, Shalyn, and Leah!

                                              Elizabeth and me

                  Lauren, Erin, and Brie                                

Today we went on an outting to Kelly Park, a local fresh water spring. It was a beautiful day and it was an awesome place to be. We had a huge cookout I had so much fun floating down the river in a tube.

Off to Orlando

In 3 days I will be heading down to Orlando, Florida to join Youth With A Mission Orlando for a 5 1/2 month Discipleship Training School. I am really excited about this opportunity to pursue God and missions. This has been on my heart to do for a long time so I am thrilled that it is finally here. The adventure ahead is completely unknown to me and it is a bit scary to jump in with both feet, but I know God has led me here and He will not leave me now. I found out that my DTS is about 33 people, which is very exciting! I am not sure where I will be going on outreach yet but probably either Jordan/India or Thailand/Cambodia! These options sound amazing to be me and I will gladly go wherever God sends me. Well, I have a ton of packing to do so I should go do that. :)

Cookies

For the past few years Martha and I have been decorating cookies and selling them to my grandmother and her friends. On Saturday for the last time in 6 months we made cookies! On next Saturday Martha will be leaving to go to IHOP Atlanta for the pursuit internship for 3 months. I am really going to miss her. :( Anyway we had a lot of fun with our individual pieces of edible art! 

Home from Haiti

Well I just got back from a month in Haiti! It was wonderful to be back with all the kids. Many things at the mission have changed since we were there in January, Keith and Cindy now have their own home placed conveniently between the boys home and the crèche, and Vance and Hanna now live down at the boys home where they are the parents to 32 boys as well as their own 5 children...wow. It was such a privilege to be able to join this family in serving over 60 children. Due to the current crisis in Haiti many have come to our doors in need of help. There is so much hunger and so much need in this tiny country. Our family grew by 6 children in just the month I was there, one of which was a 12 day old named Davidson his mother had died from child birth and his father could no longer take care of him. He is a precious baby and I loved holding him even though he liked to keep me up all night. I was blessed to be able to spend a lot of my time down at the home helping Aunt Hanna and getting to know the boys. Each one of those boys is wonderful and I am so excited to watch them grow up in the Lord and one day change Haiti from the inside out.

                                            Davidson 

              Some of the boys at the home

              The beautiful girls at the Creche

                  Us making banana bread for 94 people!

                    Hanna and Vance's daughter Emily Grace and me

first post!

Well this is where I will keep all who care to know about my life and current adventures updated. I am just writing this so I can see what it will look like to  have posts on my blog. I am still working on the design of this blog and I am sure it will need quite a bit of help before I am done.