Open the eyes of my Heart

I love fall. It's when seemingly fresh leaves turn beautiful and then ugly brown and then fall away, only to be replaced with younger, fresher ones. It's a season of beauty into a season of cold into a season of new. Doesn't life seem to work like that as well? When your life is seemingly okay. It's under control--your control. Life is good. You have friends, you have family, you have a job, an education. And it's beautiful, right? It's pretty..people like to look at it, people admire you for it. But then something happens. You slip up and turn mean, your heart is cold, your actions show it, too. The leaves of life begin to fall and it's God humbling you and bringing you to a place of surrender, humility. You fall back on your knees. Falling through what seems like dark storms, and maybe it is. You realize that you are dead in your transgressions. And for a season, a whole long, dark, cold season you sit on the ground, waiting and wondering. But ...

Both of my older brothers have left home for college before, giving me an opportunity to go through family dynamic change during that transition. But this year it has been different. No sibling has left home this year,  so it hasn't been as painfully different. Last night the old faithful SOS girls had a sleepover..I guess you could say our last one before the older girls (we call them the excluding exorcists) leave for college.  Bittersweet is an understatement for how it was. As we sat and laughed, we looked at our photo books that Mama D (Deanne) had made us.  We went through every fundraiser, event, and meeting, marking in our books quotes and memories that we had made. What a journey.  Remembering every prayer time we had before every event. When God was slowly covering us with protection by the prayer warriors that so valiantly served us. Faithfully giving their prayers.  Remembering every laugh that we shared, every embarrassing moment that...

There is power in the name of Jesus. I have never seen it like I did that day. It was our free day, with not much to do. Earlier, we had passed a big hindu temple on the side of the red hills, and then into a small village that looked untouched by the mzungus. Some of the team had mentioned how it would be really interesting to go to that village for a day, so we went! As we climbed out of the too-small-van onto the staining dirt roads, we prayed for His will to be done. Whatever it was, to let Grace fall on these people. And it did. It was like fire spreading. And it was fire spreading; we dispersed immediately in all directions, carrying the news of redemption, salvation, life with us, hoping to give it away. Nathan, Nick, Maggie, one of the interns, and I started walking down a path worn down by bare feet and skinny, deprived legs. A couple of uninterested, non-english speaking children walked up to us, said a couple words and then went on their way. By this point Nathan h...