God Loves!!!

Wow, there's always so much to tell about and never enough time to write. But I must start with saying that God is awesome! We have been studying the book of Ephesians while we're here and it's really good. I read Eph 5:1-2 Monday night in prep for Tuesday night's study and it just hit me: God loves me. I know this, but I finally realized it! It hit home. Ephesians (and much of God's Word) is so much about love. I am amazed He gave His perfect life for my imperfect one. This is truly love. This is the highest form of love! It is pure and perfect love that I can't receive from anyone else because we all have imperfect love. So, this caused me to 1) praise God for His incredible, awesome love and 2) realize that I can't live my life seeking out imperfect love, but that my life is best spent being in love with God and learning to love as He does.

The Texans who have been here for 3 weeks are going home tomorrow. They've been a lot of fun and it's sad to see them leave. They're from the Austin church that Chris Tomlin helped plant and so, naturally, they sing a lot of Chris Tomlin songs. One that seems to be a theme for the summer, and one we sing a lot, is called "God of this City." You can see it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d61LamkXfwk. My favorite part is, "Greater things are yet to come, greater things are still to be done in this city." It reminds me that God loves people here in this city and most don't have any access to knowing that. Almost every day I've questioned why I'm here. Is it worth it? And remembering that God is passionately pursuing people in this city with His amazing, perfect, incredible love makes it worth it for me to be here. And so I've been encouraged.

This morning was really cool. We heard from a couple who are believers and their stories. I'll tell you about the woman and how she and her family heard about Christ. First, her young nephew had a very high fever. Her sister-in-law was concerned about her son's fever and was afraid she was going to lose him. She was trying to lower his temperature by putting wet cloths on him and was working really hard to lower his fever, but it wasn't looking good. He was even staring at the light and saying things like, "Do you see all the people?" She left the room for one minute to change the water for the cloths, and when she came back, his fever was gone. Because it was so sudden, she asked him what had happened. He said, "Didn't you see the man? He touched me and said, 'You're not to come now. You are to stay.' " She said that she hadn't seen the man and asked what he looked like. He said that the man had pierced hands. So, she knew it was Jesus and her and her husband (he is the brother of the woman who told us this story) became believers in Christ because of their son's miracle!!!! Soon, the woman speaking became a believer while visiting them and within the next few years the rest of her family began to believe in Christ as their Savior. It was so awesome to hear of this story. I've heard that 80% of believers here became believers because they had a vision or dream of Jesus. Isn't that amazing? In this instance, God used a miracle to draw this family to Himself. I'm in awe.


One fun little thing that we got to do is go to the public bath. It was very relaxing and fun! They exfoliate your whole body and then wash your whole body and then your hair. It was very refreshing to do that on our day off and have some resting time while connecting with one another (only girls, of course). We thought it was funny because we had been learning about taking off the old self and putting on the new self in Ephesians 4. We felt like we were taking off the old self by becoming free from the dirty, grimy dead skin (from being in the city) and putting on the new self (lotion)! It seemed like an appropriate analogy to our study. Plus, it was fun and restful.

Wednesday night we leave to go 12 hours south of here and we'll get to visit the ruins of the Eph church! I'm really looking forward to going. Pray for us as we debrief and prepare to come back into America. Also, I am still considering my future and if I will come back. One thing that has really got me thinking is how God will guide me. I read an article and, in summary, it said that it's better to draw closer to the Guide than ask for guidance because in doing so, guidance from the Guide will happen. And so that's what I've been doing. I want to know God more and more so that His direction for my life will be clear. With that said, I've been praying a lot and my tentative plan is to come back a year from now to do this same work and learn a lot of language. I will stay in touch with some friends from here and, hopefully, they can teach me language (especially pronunciation). Keep me in your prayers - that I can know the Guide and that guidance will follow.

I look forward to seeing you all when I get back!