Almost time

Just a Quick Update

Hi everyone, this is a short one just to say It's almost time!  After year and a half of waiting, I will be leaving for Guatemala in just under a month.  I am very excited to finally get there, and get my feet wet, and it sounds like I'll be hard at work in the busy and short handed group home.

Right now Hogar de la Esperenza has 12 children and is full to the brim.  The rural village ministry is now traveling to 25 villages and visiting 78 families.  Life looks very busy, and I am eager to jump in and become familiar with the flow.  

Thank you all for your prayers, 
~Katie~

--after His heart--

What do we look like?

 “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians.  Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” --Gandhi

I’m afraid that’s all too true even more today.  In fact, the world has come to see us for everything we should not look like.  In a poll by Barna researchers, Americans view Christians as judgmental, hypocritical, out of touch with reality, insensitive to others, and not accepting of other’s faiths.  Christ countered each of these by forgiving, being genuine, truthful and aware, loving and inviting to members of all faiths.  

God open our eyes to understand the revulsion of this.

The study shows that “American’s involvement in some type of sexual behavior, including looking at on-line pornography, viewing sexually explicit magazines or movies, or having an intimate sexual encounter outside of marriage.  In all, 30% or born again Christians admitted to at least one of these activities in the last 30 days, compaired with 35% of other Americans.  In statistical and practical terms, this means that the two groups are no different from each other” (The Whole in our Gospel).  

No different from eachother?!?!?  

How can this possibly be? 

We look nothing like our Jesus!  

We can try to argue it, but the perception of the world were trying to reach screams back at us. 

I dare you, Google image search 'christian' and see the impact we've really made.  

I may be stretching, I have no biblical theology foundations, but I think this is largely in part of our discipline.  I once confessed to a ladies group that I had been struggling and had not had my devotion time in four days.  One by one the ladies present with me shared that they also had either neglected their time with God several times that week, or they never really had routine quiet time.  

Discipline.  

We were sharing all the struggles we had been having, not understanding why it was so hard.  It was because without that time, we were doing it alone. 

1 Peter 4 talks about suffering.  In a discussion this weekend, this suffering was compared closely to discipline.  I had never thought about this before.  This is not to say that they are the same, but comparable (again, no bible scholar here, very flawed thinker making observations).  Vs 13 says: “Instead be very glad—because these trials will make you partners with Christ in his suffering and afterward you will have the wonderful joy of sharing in His glory when it is displayed to all the world”. 

 

Without fellowship with other believers, we will grow dull. 

As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.– Proverbs 27:17

Without prayer, we will grow sick and weak. 

Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.  James 6:5

Without mediating on his word, we will become apathetic and ignorant. 

“I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you”. – Psalm 119:11

“My soul is consumed with longing for your laws at all times. 21You rebuke the arrogant, who are accursed, those who stray from your commands.” Psalm 119:20-21

  

Instead of being defined by what I am against, I want to be known by what I am for. 

We must learn discipline.  "No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it."  Hebrews 12:11

~Katie~

After His heart

Earning

It’s a funny thing, becoming a “missionary”.  It’s not what I expected. 

I’m not sure why I thought that by knowing this calling, I would suddenly be free from all my indecision.  That by knowing where he is leading, I will not wonder every step of the way how it will happen.  Or perhaps I thought that in knowing the call, all my fears would go away because those whose faith is the most secure have no more fears.  But I fear messing up just as much now as I did before.  The uncertainty of ‘how’ remains on my mind. 

I did not anticipate this constant second guessing of my actions.  As though every step must go in a direct unwavering line straight to where I ought to go with no delays.  Like every choice I make is being judged, like I am constantly trying to prove to myself and others that I am worthy of this calling. 

But this is wrong. 

I acquire nothing through merit. 

I am earning nothing. 

Every choice is not weighed and deemed successful or selfless enough, and by believing that, I am holding myself capable of living selfless enough to earn God’s approval.  And I suppose also to gain the approval of people. 

Galatians 1:10 says ”Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.” 

Though this is part of a larger message, this phrase has always stuck with me.  It is not possible to be fully a servant of God while I am still trying to prove myself to people, or to myself.  I am trying to do both by trying to make every action altruistic. 

This is dangerous because it places my “success” and worthiness on my own actions which fail time and time again to meet the standards I was never meant to meet on my own.  I set myself up for failure again and again. 

Who wouldn’t burn out? 

Then I grow distant again. 

Guilty again. 

Ashamed again. 

Defeated again. 

This is not the life to which we have been called. 

So I need to stop trusting myself and trying to “prove” myself because He has already proven Himself.  By struggling to succeed in this whole missionary thing, I am yet again humbled ad I see that my perceived failure to succeed is itself a failure because I thought it was my struggle and my strength with which I was failing.  

My strength was never enough.  

But “the issue is not my strength, but His, which is limitless”. 

Well, that’s it from this very human daughter. If you would like more specific updates, send me an e-mail at katie@hopeforhome.org, or find me on facebook.  I would love to share with you online or in person anything and everything!

~Katie~

--after His heart--

How are you?

"How are you?"

These three simple words have been washed over and transformed into a standard empty greeting.  Their meaning changed from an honest inquiry into a person’s well being, and into a vague and nonspecific set of words to be carelessly flung at any passerby.  A simple acknowledgement, and then move on.  

        Where did the depth go?  

                Where is the caring; the love? 

I have a friend of many years who up and messaged me those three underrated words: “how are you?”.  This message originated from a flight below me.  I retrieved my phone and began the standard reply of “fine, and you?” before something stopped me.  These words were nearly hidden in the meaning that often is for the meaning that was intended. 

This was not an empty question.  It’s response deserved an equally full answer. 

This friend of mine could simply have walked up the stairs and asked in person.  In fact, we had conversed among a group of friends not an hour earlier.  So why ask?  Or rather, what was it he was asking?  This was not an opinion of the day, a passing thought amongst a firestorm of passing emotions. 

No. 

This question written was a question to my spiritual state of being in a format allowing for my thoughtful contemplation and complete and honest answer.  This was a question to the health of my walk with God. 

A question of accountability. 

I was struck by this. 

My answer to those three words was perhaps the first honest recount of my spiritual life that I had given in some time. 

                                It was raw. 

Again, I was struck by the simplicity of the words ‘how are you’, and the complexity of their answer are. 

        This is accountability. 

                            The real. 

                                        The raw. 

Answers that you can’t always speak out loud. 

After a few years of our back and forth exchange of the words ‘how are you’, and their variations, we have maintained an accountability that I can say has pushed me a lot.  To my knowledge, we have only spoken in person to this degree a few times.  Partly due to busyness, and the privacy indicated by our very personal struggles, and partly because to talk like this face to face removes some of the evaluation and reflection we are allowed by writing, evaluating, and rewriting. 

I wonder what it is about us that makes us want to bottle up any sign that we are actually human and put on a facade of these others around us.  Why pretend we are different from anyone else in our own weakness? 

As Christians we have read that in our weakness Christ’s strength is made perfect.  

“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’  Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me”.  2 Corinthians 12:9

So why would we try to hinder perfection?  

So what would you say if someone asked you how are you?  No really, how are you?