Foto Friday~ final days of summer

From the temperature outside,
It feels like summer is just beginning!

That is good for some end of the summer, pool fun!

I remember being a kid and it seems like the summer went SO fast!

Nothing has changed!

Even though I am a "winter" lover,

and can't wait for it to get here,

I can't help but feel a tug at my heart that the memories we have made are now considered the past and another summer is on the brink of ending!

Sweet times with lots of things to look forward too in the coming fall!

Many new changes on our horizon as we wave good-bye to summer 2011!

Enjoy your Labor Day Weekend!

Dedicated

Just as Hannah did to Samuel years and years ago,
3 weeks ago we dedicated out little bundle of sweetness back to God!
(Since my older kids left for Africa, I have truly realized the sacredness of this act to God!)

This is what I wrote to her and read a loud at her dedication:

My dear sweet child, you have been given to us by God. 
You are a blessing and a true JOY! 
When God brought us down this journey of allowing Him to choose our family size, we NEVER dreamed He would send 12 blessings to us! 
I am SO thankful that we choose HIS plan for us.
 For that reason, you are in our arms! 
 I know He has a perfect plan for your life and we will do all that we can to raise you up and train you in the ways of Jesus. 
 We give you to Him because we know you are a gift to us but not ours! 
You are His! 
 For that I am truly thankful.
  He is a perfect parent.
  When we fail you, He will not! 
 Look to Him for everything. 
 He will never let you down and He will never let you go! 
We love you precious girl! 

Not many pictures of just mom, dad and her!

The entire gang!  God is sooooo very good! 

"Fear Not..."

I sit here tonight amazed at the road I have been on!  I cannot believe where I have come from!  If you have known me or read my blog for very long, you know that I have battled fear.  The kind that cripples.  The kind that influenced most of my decisions in my life.  Sadly to say, in a not so great way!  From the time my head hits the pillow at night to the time I lift it up in the morning, fear always surrounded me.  I have suffered many losses in my life in the past, maybe that is why.  But for whatever reason, I lived in it.  Worried of fires in the middle of night and that I would not be able to save my children, to my husband dying on the way to work!  And ALL the in betweens!  So for me to send my two oldest children to Africa was a miracle in itself!  God started small.  First it took faith to even think of them going.  Then it took more faith to continue to watch them buy the tickets, to getting all of the rest of the money to go then sending them away on the plane in Chicago!   I was really strong!  Until...

...I said goodbye to them as they left me at the security gate at the airport!  2 kids who had never even been IN an airport to now flying by themselves half-way around the world!  How do I give up control in that way?  How do I rest in the reality that I cannot take care of them?  How do I REALLY give it up and let God take care of them?  Is it really possible!  For days, not so much!  I had the fear that did not allow me to sleep at nights.  The fear that had me pull over in a parking lot to cry for a bit just because I had to let it out somehow!  I really felt like sometimes, I was in a dream!  A night-mare really!  So, at some point I knew that I had to let go!  They were thousands of miles and an ocean away so what really was it doing for me to fear?  AHHH, maybe just maybe, this is the point God was trying to show me my entire life!  Whether it is a fire I fear, my husband being killed in a car accident, or my children half a world away, I CANNOT control it anyway, so why do I even try!  It hit me hard!  Then I got it!  I can trust God!  Not that anything bad will never happen, but even if it does, I am in His hands!  I obey and have faith and He takes care of the facts!  A spiritual light bulb moment!  It took this long for me to get to where He has wanted me to be for years!  He is God and I am not!  So I no longer need to fear!  I have such peace!  A faith and rest that I have never known before!  I said to my mom today, "I feel like I have grown up!"  I used to feel like a small child scared of the dark, everyday of my life!  Now, I am walking in His light and feel like with Him, ALL things are possible because HE is in charge, not me! 

I talked to my daughter today and they are doing so well!  They have climbed a mountain, and gone horseback riding on the African terrain.  They are studying the word of God like never before and feeding others His word because of it!  They will be in the villages all week this week!  No comforts!  A tent, no electricity, plumbing, showers, or "normal" food!  They are preaching and teaching 3 times a day to people who have no bibles because they do not have any in their language yet.  People who are SO hungry for the word of God that they don't care about blessings or heaven!  People who are just SO desperate to hear the words of God because they KNOW that it casts out all fear and if they can just hear it, they find comfort!  My daughter said that the holy spirit is SO thick in the villages because there are no hindrances!  No clocks, TV's, meal-times, toys, malls or ANYTHING that gets in the way!  Villagers who are so HUNGRY to hear the word of God that they sit for as long as they can at my children's feet just to get a taste of JESUS!  My children have given up all their comforts to tell other's of Him, and God in His grace, has allowed me to "give up" my children so they can reach those who need Him!  No glory in it for us, just proof of how God works in you if you allow Him to!  Obedience is not easy, but ALWAYS worth it!

I am for the first time in my life, free of fear!  If I can send my most valued thing on earth, to Africa and leave them in God's hands, I know I can leave EVERYTHING in God's hands!  Even my husband driving to work in the mornings!  (Now if he would just get a job!)  Oh yeah, I can EVEN leave that in His hands and no longer worry about that either!  What freedom there is when we choose obedience over our ways! 

My children's journey to Africa is almost half-way through now and this week, I will have very little contact with them, if any.  So I may catch up a bit on the other things that have happened around our home!  Stay with me and stay tuned!  Oh and remember, do not fear anything!  God has His hand over every one of our situations He is in charge!  Rest in that! 

  

Do you?

Do you ever feel like this...

Some days, this is how I feel!

And then I remember who is in charge of my life!

It is not me!

God is the one who I can trust for everything!

That just makes it all okay!

Remember...

Psalm 147:3

He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.  He counts the number of the stars;

He calls them all by name!

Two weeks out...

Well, we are two weeks out since my kids left for Africa!  It really feels like a lifetime ago in many ways!  This week was better because I have had communication with them almost daily.  There is 7 hours difference so we can at least talk while the other is still awake!  I actually have been doing REALLY well!  Many tinges of missing them but SO much better than last week when we had no contact!  They were in the bush so there was no way to get a signal.  That was HARD!  I was doing really well UNTIL today...

Today was hard!  INCREDIBLY hard!  My daughter is SO VERY homesick!  It broke my heart!  There is NOTHING I can do to help her!  The hard part is, as she said, "There is nothing to do to even help me feel like I am home!  I am in a 3rd world country mom!  Not even a mall or a Walmart to go to!"  AND to make it worse, she said it is not like America where you can FIND something to do!  After their classes are over at around 3pm, they really just go to their host-home and read or something quiet!  Which is not all bad, just different!  She misses her brothers and sisters, making meals for everyone and all the things she does at home!  EVEN chores!  :)  With that being said, she said today was the worst day she has had so far with being homesick but she knows she will make it through and she is really enjoying the school and the villages and her time with the people!  I told her to enjoy her time there because in a few months, she will regret not taking it all in!  (EASY for me to say!)  I just feel like she is having to grow up so fast!  I also know that God is there with her and He will hold her up! 

They will return to the villages on Monday and will be out for an ENTIRE week!  No electricity, plumbing, "normal" food or home!  A tent and blankets!   The last village they were in, my son killed a goat with a knife, (because the villagers insisted!  It was an honor to be selected!)  and then they ate the stomach, intestines, eye-balls, and everything in between!  My daughter, who HATES bugs, noodles and looking at raw meat, ate it also!  I was so amazed!  They are my heroes!  I don't think I could do all the things they are doing!  They are so brave!  They said that the interpreters that are with them, are amazed that they STAY in the villages!  Most missionaries that come, just stay for a few hours and then choose to go back to their hotels to sleep and eat!  They were shocked!  My daughter said that she can't imagine really REACHING these people without being there to live their life even for for a short time!  She said we in America, are just so used to comforts that we just don't get anything about life!  She was not angry about that, it was just  a realization!  My son is taking everything all in and even chased a giraffe the other day! 

 (He is very adventurous! :)  The people in Malawi are so amazed at "white skinned" people that the native kids will yell with fun and point at them as they walk by.  He said that is VERY strange!  The other thing that is very strange, is their bus they commute to school in.  It is a 12 passenger bus but has at LEAST 18 people in it every morning and double that in chickens!  Pictures of that coming soon!

I am going to close now...so much I could write!  The sleepless nights are endless, the ache in my heart to hold them and see there faces is SO deep!  God has still been showing me how His heart longs for us in that way!  I know God is holding them but I want to hold them SO bad!  I can't imagine what it will be like at the airport when they step off that plane!  Maybe a touch of what it will feel like when Jesus sees my face in heaven some day!  Just as my daughter is longing for her home in America, we should be longing for heaven!  This earth is NOT our home!  Someday, I won't send my kids to Africa or out into the big world!  

We will all be sitting at Jesus feet and hopefully with these people they are witnessing to in Malawi!  That is our focus!  This time on earth is only a vapor in the wind and what we do with our time on earth DOES matter in eternity!  What an awesome thought! 

Love your kids today as if they are leaving for Africa tomorrow!  Oh how I wish I could hold mine! 

Pictures from Africa

I heard from the kids and even got pictures!  OH YEAH!  They are doing really well and they have already been changed in the past 10 days, from the inside out!!  I can't imagine what they will be like in 4 weeks!  They left me as teenagers and will come home adults!  They said they feel as if they are in a movie!  The surroundings are so "unreal" and the people are INCREDIBLE!!  The people in the villages have so much respect for "white man".  A reverence like they are king and queen or something of the kind!  My daughter cannot get over it.  She said it is very uncomfortable to be so honored just because of her skin color! 



She was preaching in one of villages over the weekend, and she tried to sit down on a rock and they would not let her!  They hurried over with a chair for her because they think of "white man" as such much higher than them and they cannot sit on the ground!!  She said it was so sad!  Her sermon was on being the same in God's eyes because He looks at the heart, not skin color or anything else we look at as humans.  The women of the villages are also treated so much more inferior.  Do you see how all the men are in front on chairs, and the women and babes are in the back on the floor?  It is so very poor there.  Most of the pastors do not even have bibles!  When she reads from her bible, they have a hunger in their eyes like she has never seen before!  They anticipate and savor every word she reads because they cling to every word from God because they can't read it for themselves!



This is a little girl named Naomi that got very attached to my daughter.  As she was holding her, the mother was scurrying around and the interpreter told her that she was feeling terrible because she was holding her little girl and she was not worthy to have a "white man" hold her child!  My daughter was so shocked at how they feel and was just heart-broke that they feel that way!  They need to know the love of Jesus and it would set them free! 



This was the village they were in over the weekend!  They said they hunger for God so much.  They don't desire money, or even heaven!  They only want to hear the Word of God and learn about Him.  The only blessing they seek is the Holy Spirit!  We in America just don't get it!  The comforts get in our way of true surrender and holiness! 

I am so blessed to have been able to talk to them today!  My son has come down with something and hoping it is not Malaria!  Right now, treating it as food poisoning but he came down with a fever now.  (That means another restless night of sleep for all of us!)  :(  Prayers for him would be appreciated!

 I will report back soon!

Remember~  Love your kids today, like you are sending them to Africa tomorrow!

Foto Friday

A day on the farm,
or the fair if you are a city dweller!

 

picking veggies,

Gathering corn,

filling the tractor with fuel,

Off to work!

  In a little boys world anyway!

P.S. I will have an update from Malawi next week!  I sat down to write yesterday, and after I finished my post and was in the process of editing it, and I somehow deleted the ENTIRE thing!  So just to get back at my computer, I decided not to use it the rest of the day!  :)  To make a long story short, my kids called the day I was at the fair and my husband was home and got to talk to them for a LONG time!  I did not even get to hear them for a moment!  I was very sad to say the least!  I know that as of Thursday, they were headed to the bush to tell other's of Jesus in the villages!  No plumbing or electricity for many days and sleeping in a tent with who knows what kind of animals lurking around!  Ok, that's enough for this mama's heart to take right now! 

More to come!  Blessings to you this weekend!

Remember~  Love your kids today as if they are leaving for Africa tomorrow!

Waiting...

I think of another little taste of how God feels when we come to Him first thing in the morning!  He waits for us and longs to hear from us!  I get up every morning and check my messages just to see if my kids have left somthing for me to read!  I long for it and smile and cry when it is there and I have  evidence that they are thinking of me!  It has been such a sweet discovery while missing my earthy children, how God has shown me His desire to be with me! 

Here is the latest from my kids: ( I do not include their names for privacy reasons)

Hi mom!!!! This is A...!! I'm having a great time! I LOVE Malawi!! I'm having so much fun, and experiencing soo much!! Today we went to an amazing church service. Probably the best I"ve ever been to in my life!! It was GREAT!! Last night I slept for about 6 hours, and it feels sooo good!! My allergies are bad here :P I'm so glad that we took the allergy medication for A......'s poison ivy, because it's really coming in handy!! Well I don't have any more time left on here, so here's A......!! I love you!!!!!!!!! I miss you!!! (my son): Im out of time :( its prepaid internet. I love you and miss you!!

It is such a JOY to hear from them!  They seem to be doing wonderful!  That does a mama's heart good!  I still have SO many questions for them!  I want to know what they are eating, where they are sleeping and what they are doing.  Maybe as my husband told me, it is better that their contact is limited because God can maybe accomplish more in their hearts if He is their main source of dependancy!  And maybe even better for me!  I have only had my faith in Jesus to take care of them and rest in His ability even when I don't have any facts.  To watch over them, feed them, protect them is HIS job!  I cannot, but He can!  I have realized He does a better job than I could ever do anyway!  So although I miss them terribly and everytime the phone rings, I am like a girl in love dashing to the phone just to hear their voices, usually to feel that pit in stomach sort of feel, when I find out it is not them calling!  It has been 5 days since I have heard their sweet voices!  I wonder how much longer it will be!  God knows and in His timing, they will call!  Until then, I will wait! And you can be sure you will know when that is!  You may even hear me answer the phone from where you live from all the excitement!  :) 

Remember~  Love your kids today, like they are leaving for Africa tomorrow!

More to come...