With faith I keep walking...

I just looked back at the past few entries I have made. For one I laughed out loud because what I was SO sure of in the moments leading up to writing the post, and even for the briefest time after, is nowhere close to my present reality. I am in fact still in Atlanta, I still work with the same family I have been working for the last two plus years, I am still attending classes at the same university, and I do not live with my aunt and uncle. I thought things would be different than they are, I thought I would be on some grand adventure with God, but I have come to realize this one truth, I am on a grand adventure with God. He is working in my heart and my life to bring glory to his name. I don't have to understand why things are the way they are nor do I have to know what the next chapter of my life will hold. I must simply trust that the Lord knows best and has wonderful things waiting for me.

Since I posted how much my life would be changing it has changed, only in ways I didn't expect. I have an apartment in a nice area of the city where I live alone, which was a terrifying thought at first. I have grown to enjoy this situation for the most part. The only time I really mind not coming home to someone is after a long week when I want to have a meal with someone, snuggle on the couch, and watch a movie. These things are in my future, I just have to wait on God's timing.

I have moved into a stronger position of leadership in my church as more and more responsibility is coming my way. I am happy to be in a place to be used as an example or encouragement for my fellow Christians. I have felt like a small child for the past five years, and finally feel as though I am now an adolescent (adulthood is something that comes with MUCH more wisdom and experience than I now have). I by no means think that I am anywhere close to being perfect, in fact I am FAR from it, but I am striving to be the person God has called me to be and that says something about the work God has been doing in me.

Even though I am filling more of a leadership role, and my impact on our church members has grown, I feel the slightest pull away from my home. The pull is gentle but constant. I feel drawn to a new church that was planted out of our church in the later part of last year. The appeal comes in the form of a smaller, tightly knit community that has welcomed me in. These are people who are seeking God for their lives as well as their communal purpose in the city and the world. These people have matured enough in their walks to be able to help support the people around them, which is something I desperately need. I don't know if or when I will make a full break from my home church but I do know I appreciate the community I am a part of in the new church.

I still have a heart for the world and desire for every nation to turn to Christ as their saviour, however I no longer believe the only way I can make a difference in the world is to live in a third world (or other developed) nation. I live in the middle of Atlanta, surrounded by people from all around the world who are hurting and in need of the love of Christ. If I can't love on people here then why would I be any more effective in some other country? I do believe that God will provide work for me outside of the United States at some point in the future, but I no longer believe that I have to wait to leave the country to fully serve the Lord.

That being said, I love China and the Chinese people with all my heart. I didn't understand the depth of my love until this past January. While at a conference the Lord revealed to me that my heart breaks for these people in a couple of ways...ways I did not expect at all. I don't think I have ever cried while looking at a book of photographs from a town I have never been, or a video diary of a person I have never met, but I did this day. I wept at the sight of a town in China I have never been, the faces of people I have never met, a nation I love without understanding. I am still baffled by the emotion brought forth by these images and the stories associated with them.

The strongest desire God has ever given me is to be a wife and a mother. In the past six months this desire has been intensified...in part to do the increased number of people in my community who have gotten married and are now having babies. This is the thing that is hardest to trust the Lord for, or rather to have patience in trusting the Lord. I have learned in the past year or so that I am the kind of person who enjoys immediate satisfaction. When I want something I want it now...this is a bad trait, and the Lord is working on me. I believe that I will be a wife and a mother, and when I am I pray I honor God in both roles.

I don't pretend to know the plans God has for my life. I would be a fool to say for sure that God was going to do things XY and Z. I do know that His ways are superior to mine, that he loves me, and that I am walking in obedience to His call. There isn't much else I can do. God is good, even when we don't feel it, God is good. And, I love how much I ramble given any opportunity to try and process the thoughts I have in my head :]

God. Is. Good.