Anna Updates

“…to hear the voice of God and do His will whatever it is…”  Yesterday I was thinking about these words on my way to Beijing.  “Have I heard the voice of G.? And am I doing His will whatever it is?” It’s a question I think I don’t ask myself enough.  It is sometimes so easy to not have to wrestle with the will of G. in my life. “To love mercy, and to act justly, and to walk humbly with our G.”  (Micah 6:8) To be so busy that the voice of G. seems so far away.  I always catch myself being or thinking I need to accomplish certain things in a day, because in some way it will make me more Godly or something.  Yesterday, I found myself longing to hear the voice of God more and what I mean by that is, when I read His word, have interruptions in my day I wasn’t expecting, or feel my heart breaking or longing for something, or furthermore have a difficult conversation with someone where I become more aware of my failures and my need for G. and His grace and power in my life…that I would hear the voice of G. in those experiences, and respond in His will…whatever it is!!! In a lot of situations I find myself in recently, I don’t know how to respond in G.’s will or what His will looks like exactly and sometimes I honestly want to respond with my instincts and call them the “will of G.” (which I am pretty sure they are not) ha….I long so much to be beyond sinning.  I want to want to do the right thing, whatever it is…in every situation, in every thought…but I am so far… “Christ in me the hope of Glory”  (Colossians 1:27) I can’t wait to completely stop caring about myself and only care about J. and others.  Oh, but the sanctification process is exciting when you don’t fight it right?….wink.

“I will sigh and with all creation groan…as I wait for Hope to come for me!”- Brooke Fraser

I decided to write my update a little early this week:>)  Number 1, I have time today, and Number 2 My heart feels so heavy and writing is the only thing that releases some of the heaviness.  I’ve been writing how I’ve been feeling distant from God the past two updates.  Well, that distance has turned into a raging fire.  Maybe it is because I started doing a new study and the spiritual heat has been turned up.  All I know is I feel terrible anxiety, on top of illness and fear.  Nothing in me feels still, everything in fact feels sick.  I feel a longing for more realness in life.  More realness with people I go to ch with every Sunday etc. I feel heartsick about Elle, the little orphan girl I so badly want to help but have no idea how to.  I was looking at her picture the other day and started sobbing.  I can’t get her eyes out of my mind.  Yesterday Noah and I were eating lunch with friends and my delicious food started to lose its taste as I thought about the missing lady in Afghanistan and how long she has been missing.  Her poor family is heartsick. What is she feeling?  What is she thinking?  I feel upset with the selfish way I love people.  I love people who love me and get upset when they aren’t loving me the way I want them too.  This morning I came out of my room and saw my niece who has cerebral palsy standing in her stander.  She smiled at me and my eyes again filled with tears.  How can someone who has such a broken body and is non verbal be so happy?  I have been pr. that J. will give me more compassion and more of a broken spirit for the things that break his heart.  Maybe that is what is happening…Maybe my heart is being expanded so I can feel deeper the things that J. feels on a daily basis.  I can hardly deal with the few situations I feel heartsick over.  How can J. bear the suffering and pain of the whole world?  I went to grab a scrap piece of paper to write myself a note and turned it over….on the other side was the copied Hymn… Be Still, My Soul- “Be still, My soul! The LRD is on they side; Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain; Leave to thy God to order and provide; in every change He faithful will remain.  Be still, my soul! Thy best, thy heav’nly friend Thro thorny ways leads to a joyful end!”  I so often don’t understand what is going on inside me but I know when I start to fret and freak out and look inward I grow more despondent and discouraged.  It is when I look to the truth that I can be still and trust that what God is doing in and through me is good, because He is good and every thorny way in and through Him leads to a joyful end! Be still my soul, Be still! In every change He faithful will remain!

Noah and I were talking on Sunday.  We were talking about how life is mysterious.   We didn’t really ask to be on earth.  I don’t mean that to sound rebellious.  I am grateful that God has given me not only physical life, but spiritual life as well.  But sometimes I am overwhelmed by the call of G.  Sometimes nothing makes sense, and my nature and the serpent’s cunning is so good at deceiving that I begin to doubt, and I begin to grow dissatisfied and discontent and not wholehearted in my devotion to C.  I just finished reading through the gospels and am gripped and wrestling with J. words.  “Leave all and follow me”  “If you want to find your life, then you must lose it”  “this is how all men will know you are my disciples if you love one anther”  I find the truth of J. scary at times.  I have often looked to other C. for the answers and have often been disappointed.  Life is so hard and it gets old being the different one and I think people are tired.  My most lonely times have often been in the company of C. circles.  I think so often we want to fit J. into our lives and try to fit his truth into comfortable lives pursuing our dreams and desires.  I know that is kind of how I used to think about J.  Of course if I do things G.’s way He will bless me with what I want right? But then my life got turned upside down and I realized that I was believing a lie, a cunning and beautiful lie that it is somehow about me.. and you know the funny thing is, I was never very satisfied believing that…only for a time, and it backfired.  I only feel like I know one thing now and that is this….God loves me and life is totally about Him and it is so fun not being in control or feeling like I have to have it together!  I love His gifts! I am learning to love His ways, and I want to lose my life so I can find it. And that is pretty much all I know!! Life, what a beautiful mystery!

Noah and I just got back from a week in Iowa.  We had a marvelous time! This week as I’ve been trying to adjust to a different time zone and get my brain and heart in gear for what is going to be a crazy busy spring and summer with loads of responsibility, I’ve been struggling with hearing from God and truly feeling close to Him.  This morning Psalm 62 from the message really spoke to me. “…He’s a solid rock under my feet, breathing room for my soul, an impregnable castle…”  meaning, able to withstand an attack; not to be taken by force; unconquerable.  G. will never let go of me! He is breathing room for my soul, a solid rock under my feet and an impregnable unconquerable castle! God is so loving…so steadfast.  I am always comforted when I am struggling to feel God that His steadfast love never ceases….great is His faithfulness! I can love well, because He first loved me and that is the only reason.  “Thank you for your steadfast, solid, unchangeable, breathing love Father…I would be nothing without you! In power me to love well because you have first loved me…Oh God thank you, thank you for NEVER giving up on me and NEVER growing weary when I grow so weary with myself and my weaknesses…THANK YOU that you are always right and always loving!”

  I finished my Daniel study last night. When we finished listening to the last session….we all just kind of set there wondering and marveling how God revealed to Daniel the end of the world, but more than that marveling at the AWESOMENESS of God! Wow, there is so much ahead for Israel and for us!  God is not silent , everything has a purpose and a point! Who is like our God? I got the chills when I was doing my last day of homework before our b. study meeting.  It was about how the final enemy that J.C. will destroy and put under His feet is death! It was an amazing word from God, but even more amazing is the significance of this week.  This coming Saturday my little brother Joshua would be 7 years old…I never really know what to do on his birthday, or what to say to my family.  The sting of death is still there.  Although I have accepted it and know that God makes no mistakes…it feels wrong that he is gone.  1 Corinthians 15:54-56 asks the question “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”  and then answers the question with “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our LRD J.C.”  I found knew hope and comfort in death through my last lesson….death has been made victorious through J.C. and His death.  But it is still a sting that we feel, reminding us that He is coming to defeat this enemy forever!  Have you ever heard the sob of death? I have…It is almost worse to see people you love more than anything sobbing in a way that makes you want to die yourself than when you yourself sob.  I will never forget when we left the hospital without Joshua, after holding him as he took his last breaths on earth, and driving to the restaurant telling ourselves to eat….I sat by my 16 year old sister at the table while she put her head on the table and made sounds I have never heard anyone make.  When someone you love that much dies a place breaks inside of you that you never knew existed.  You yourself cannot fix it, and cannot help it where and when you sob.  I remember being at target and putting my head down in the candy bar isle and sobbing, not caring that everyone in the isle was watching me.  I couldn’t fix that place.  Only the hope of J.C. defeating that terrible sting forever can fix that place in my heart.  He is coming to defeat this enemy forever…Until then I cannot help but dread all the times I may feel that sting again…but I will hope in a perfect Father who even though the sting remains He has made death victorious!  “Joshua, I love you! Happy 7th birthday….every time I feel the sting of your death I have new hope that  J.C. is coming… We will see you again!  I can’t even imagine how happy you are! Save me a big piece of birthday cake will you? I miss you and I always will!”  -your big sis who loves you!  

“Sarah can you come?” I could hardly get the words out of my mouth. It was nearing the end of camp and I could feel my body, mind, and emotions giving out! It was an amazing summer working behind the scenes to help orphans… but I felt at that moment as if Satan’s hot breath that had continually been breathing down my neck was going to win… It felt like there was no relief from the constant pressure inside me to hold myself together for my team, the kids, and volunteers. I was struggling with so many things…But the biggest thing was the voice inside my heart telling me not to leave China when I so wanted to….I struggled with this decision during one of the most stressful summers I have ever had! Later that night as I set in a chair across from my sister with tears streaming down my face she spoke words straight from God to me…she said “Anna, I was pr. for something to say to you, something from God and I feel like He wants me to say “Open Wide your Mouth and I will Fill It” (Psalm 81:10). Those words comforted me and gave me the strength to make the decision to remain in China when I had planned to leave. All through the rest of camp I thought about those words… “God it is only you who can fill it, can fill me! If you want me to die in China and never return to America…I will, I will trust you…I must trust you.” It was the deepest level of surrender I have ever experienced …it was a level in my heart that I could never bring myself to apart from God…it was a level that had been so broken there was nothing left in it except the desire to place all hope in who God is and what His word promises…and in that decision I felt faithless and extremely exhausted. After camp I went home for a short furlough and returned to China about a month later. A few weeks later Wonderful Noah came into my life and my co-worker made a decision to believe and give her life to J.! Last Sunday I was sitting in ch during worship and I opened my B. during singing…my eyes filled with tears as the words “Open Wide Your Mouth and I will fill it…” leaped off the page. For the greatest adventure God is teaching me in China is the adventure of what happens when I KNOW, BELIEVE, and UNDERSTAND I have a relationship with the Living God… and He loves me! “…He Restores my Soul!” (Psalm 23:2)

  Charlie gave me a ride home on his bike yesterday… He insisted!  This young boy is coming out of his shell in so many ways!  He smiles and jokes constantly now.  A year ago I could have never imagined that I would be riding on the back of Charlie’s bike. It seemed to take so long to get Charlie into a better situation.  Throughout last year I felt despair many times that perhaps G. was going to leave Charlie where he was.  It broke my heart!  I never dreamed that God had a plan for me to stay in China, or that Charlie would be my neighbor… and that He would ride me home from English lessons on the back of his bike!!! I never would have dreamed God had a plan for me to be part of healing Charlie’s heart, not just getting him into a better situation.  When I heard Charlie laugh yesterday while the wind was blowing in our faces, as I was riding on the back of his bike…I felt tears come into my eyes. “God is so faithful and loving toward all He has made!” (Psalm 145:13) And then my heart filled up with hope for precious Elle as I often feel despair for her situation right now…God may seem silent but heaven hears our cries and pr. on her behalf! He will not leave his little girl hobbling around on painful feet with a broken heart forever! We pr. to a God of Hope! We believe in a God that has all of earth in His power to control, and He invites us to experience Him, to be fools for Him…to love as He does….and to experience the blessings when we put our Hope and Trust in Him!  “This is the One we have waited for…Oh this is OUR GOD!!!” 

  I was putting my nephews to bed last night and we were singing the usual goodnight song, “King Je*u* is All.”  I don’t know the song very well as my brother-in-law usually puts the boys to bed, but when mom and dad are gone I do it….so John was teaching me the song.  Still singing the song my nephew John leaned over his top bunk bed and opened his eyes really wide and sang, pronouncing every word very distinctly: “King J. is All…and that’s all!” and then he stopped singing and gave me a huge kiss goodnight! “Hmm”…I thought as I went out of the boys room “that is so true!”   How simple the thought is that King J. is All and that’s all!  How easy it is for me to complicate my relationship with G at times, especially when I’m messing up a lot! Last week I had two occasions where I really messed up….I hurt my sister and one of my good friends by acting on faulty emotions or assumptions and then taking it out on them.  I felt bad and wanted to fix my  bad behavior, it was also difficult for me to approach G. after that because I was so ashamed of myself.  I despise my weak flesh so much and partly felt angry with G. that I still live in it… as Noah graciously pointed out to me, when we are blowing it , it  leaves room for God to shine…King J. is All and that’s all! I need J. always…He is King and I am not (and that’s humbling and I need to be humbled)  He can do whatever He wants and it’s right.  And how much I needed my King’s forgiveness and mercy and my sister and friends forgiveness…which they gave:>) I sometimes fight the plain fact that I am nothing without Christ.  But try to do one thing without Him and it will not be truly fulfilling, benefiting, or satisfying…  Because this King is SO good, humble, and loving… He turned around those situations and He shone in and strengthened those relationships as He helped me to humble myself and receive mercy and grace. Because He is All and that’s All! “This King doesn’t punish me…rather He invites me to come and sit at His table….” -Brother Lawrence

“God is not proud…He will have us even though we have shown that we prefer everything else to Him”- CS Lewis  

  “Do not be afraid…”  These were the words the angel told Mary and the Shepherds…they were also the words spoken to Daniel (Daniel 10) when a hand touched him and said to him… “Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart to understand and humbled yourself before your God, your words have been heard, and I have come because of your words.” (Daniel 10:12) I have been doing a study on the book of Daniel this fall.  It has been an amazing experience with G.  Everything G. says and said, He has done and will do! I’ve also been thinking about fear …it is the easy way out to fear other things and situations more than G. and when I do begin to “fear” what can happen or what did happen and might happen again in my heart and life, and I become so discontent and anxious…I used to fear that If I didn’t do enough “godly stuff” God wouldn’t love me as much as he loves other people… I feared my insecurities taking over my life…. I now struggle since my brother died of fearing people I love dying much sooner than I think they should….and the list goes on.  Right before I came to China God began to change my life drastically and open my eyes to my fears and insecurities being in control…the past 2 1/2 years he has begun to change those fears as I feel strengthened by him to open my hands a little wider and give all my fears, hopes, and dreams to Him.  It is a daily surrender…and his thoughts certainly are not mine and His ways are definitely not mine.  But “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Romans 11:33)  His ways are amazing leading to a level of relationship with Him that is irreplaceable.  Not only does He give beyond what we can ask or imagine, but He does what is necessary to humble our hearts so that we can truly be alive.  Humility leads to an alive life with JC.  I pr. He will give me such a life and keep my heart longing for what HE Desires…and strengthen me to endure and enjoy what is to come! 

  “Know therefore that the LORD Your God is God…”  We were talking yesterday at ch. about God’s timing in all things and why He doesn’t act in certain situations where you are dying for God to do something… and then in other situations He blows you away and fulfills desires that have been there for years when you least expect.  Who can explain God? Who can try to figure Him out? I think I am done with the wrong thinking that my behavior controls God.  That I can do things to deserve God’s blessings or that If I do things God’s way He will give me what I want….or that when suffering comes that God is punishing me for not doing something right… God is God!  He is AMAZING and shows steadfast love to a thousand generations to those who love Him and keep His commandments….and amazing grace and forgiveness when we don’t. It is because HE is good that HE gives…It is because HE is faithful and steadfast… There have been times in the past 5 years where I have felt that I cannot endure one more breaking from God, that my faith will fail because I cannot explain why God seems so distant and so mean….the questions and confusion have felt choking…and in those times I have searched my heart like crazy and realized that there is nothing to do except BELIEVE God is who He says HE is… That I can choose to believe God and keep going…  Even the strength to BELIEVE God comes from God.  “For in him we live and move and have our being.” (Acts 17:28) He Has been Faithful…He has done everything Loving, He is who He says He is!  I have never felt so loved by God as I do right now….To Feel the love and faithfulness of God is so Amazing….He is Steadfast! He is FAITHFUL!