Let me back up. There's this women's conference called If Gathering that takes place in Austin. It's a weekend of amazing worship and community and listening to speakers that straight rock your world. The Hubby was able to score 2 tickets to If and so us and some of our besties made a little couples weekend out of it. The girls went to the conference and the guys....well they watched a Fixer Upper marathon. True story. Anyway, there was this one speaker in particular who talked about finding your purpose and saying yes to things that fulfill you spiritually and saying no to things that don't. It really got me thinking, what's my purpose? What fulfills me? So many people would say their jobs or motherhood or volunteering at a local animal shelter or whatever else is fulfilling to them. I love my job and I love my kids and I work hard at being good at all things I'm involved with, but there's not that thing that I'm just like....oh my word, I get so much joy out of doing this?
I came home from the conference with a full heart and renewed spirit and a lot of things to pray about. I immediately ordered a book by the founder of If called Anything. I read it in one week and highlighted more than I ever have in any book, minus the bible. She talks about letting go of our lives and giving our lives to Christ completely and how when you truly pray that God would use you Any way he wants, that he will. That it will be clear and that you must go and do whatever it is he's telling you to do. There is story after story of people praying this prayer and God rocking their worlds with adoption, fostering, moving across the world to be missionaries, selling their companies to give to those in need, etc. I was like, I have to start praying anything!!
So I did, and then the next week I asked the Hubby if I could teach life group and talk about how God was working on my heart and about all the things I took from the conference. We sat in my tiny living room like we do every Monday night, with the people we have true community with, and I challenged them to pray anything as well. How cool would it be to talk about how God rocked all of our worlds a year from now just by praying this simple prayer, and meaning it. Trusting that whatever he lays before us he will equip us for and how he can use normal people like us to do great things in this fallen world. So I prayed and I waited...
For 4 whole days until I was at work the following Friday and my first client was a new one and so I'm asking all my new client questions to get to know them.
Me- So where you from?
Client- New York but my husband and and I recently moved here from Mozambique.
Me- Really? What were you doing there?
Client- We moved there to get some programs up and running to help the people there.
Me- So why are you here?
Client- Well we work for this organization called Children's Relief Int. here in town and we are over the Africa division.
Me- Umm...so do you need volunteers for that?
You mean to tell me that there's a new client in my chair, who lived in Africa (that's so close to my heart), and is working for an organization that does amazing things all over the world and is literally 3 streets over from me and I've barely even heard of it after I've been praying that God would use me any way he wants is a coincidence? I think not.
So I ask to go to breakfast with her and her husband to hear all about Mozambique and all the amazing things happening there and all of the things that still need to be done there and all over the globe. They obliged and the next thing I know I'd booked a mission trip to go see all these amazing things happening across the globe first hand. Bam. Crazy huh?
We leave August 5th and fly to NY with an overnight there, then fly to Johannesburg and switch planes to fly into Mozambique. While there I will be visiting women dying of AIDS in their homes and doing bible study with them and taking them food or whatever it is that they need. I will be working in a clinic there for women and their infants to come and get nutritional support and care for their infants and loving on them and resisting the urge to sneak a cute little black baby in my suitcase and bringing them home (because clearly I need a 6th kid). But mainly I will be learning all the ins and outs of a program called Green Door where they build homes for families in need. I would love to work closely with this project when I get home, raising support for these families who need homes.
It's going to be a life changing trip, I just know it. I drink wine, I have tattoos, I sometimes dye my hair blue and I curse a little...but I love Jesus and he loves me enough to give me a purpose and help me carry it out just because I was willing to do anything for him and that's pretty freaking awesome.
