We get ever closer to our leaving date and Thank goodness we now have our tickets purchased all the way to Monrovia. Liberia. We have been busy presenting Mercy Ships to our church and related groups which has been so encouraging!. We have been so touched at the way people have taken not only Mercy Ships but also us into their hearts and are committed to supporting us while we are away!. Last time I went was a solo effort in a lot of ways and I feel like I go this time with more prayers than I can count and that is truly a covering that brings such peace! We also see God`s hand at work that even when we have moments in the future where it gets hard we know without a doubt that we are called to be serving on the mission field in West Africa. I have even been asked to come and share about Mercy Ships with my old highschool! What an amazing oppurtunity to share with those girls how Jesus took an ordinary girl and gave her a crazy story of adventure, love and more stories than she can share!
People keep telling us how great it is what we are doing but I feel that we are the ones who are blessed beyond belief!
There are so many emotions going on for Michael and I right now! Grief mixed with excitement! Hows that for confusing! Grief of the long drawn out farewells and future grief of the family moments that will be missed..... First words and steps... graduations, 21st`s..... death`s??? Can`t even bear to think about that too much! But its like a bubble in my gut that rises up sometimes and catches me unawares! I am more aware than ever of the call and cost of being a disciple! In all of the gospels we are told that such things are the cost but its only when I am away that I really feel like there is much of a cost! I think my life in general is quite comfortable!
I feel so incredibly human in my desires sometimes! But at the same time I am compelled forwards as I think of the plight of the weak, poor, enslaved, outcasts, sick and dying in the nations of West Africa and I am once again pulled towards a foreign land because my heart is burdened that now I know (like the line in the Brooke Fraser song" Now that I have seen I am responsible, faith without deeds is dead!"). When leaving Africa last time I vowed I would not forget the need and our responsibility as Christians to reach out to in physical ways to those around us who are in poverty!
However I know how easy it has been for me to try to push those thoughts away as comfort has taken over! Once again I will find myself back in dirty, sweaty, diseased Africa and I pray that I never get numb to the pain and suffering! I pray it breaks our hearts forever! I want to be changed forever because of it! Even if that means never being able to live in Australia again!
As our family and friends I pray that you won`t see us leaving as personal but instead see that you wouldn`t have all of us if we were here because when you aren`t living out what you were created for, you are like a shadow of the real you! I feel like I am almost a shadow here..................
