No Greater Reward

I have the privilege of working in the missions dept at Healing Place Church. One thing I get to do is read over the newsletters we get in from missionaries we support. Today I was reading one from a missionary in Asia and he said something that hit me like never before:

"You go each time we go, you share each thing we share, and you preach each time we preach. Your reward will be the same as ours on that day. Pretty cool."

I guess I always thought that those people who are actually on the field roughing it would have bigger mansions and more crowns to offer than those of us who JUST support them, but the truth is that the reward is no different. What makes the difference is that you are living the life and doing all that God called you to do. Whether you are a missionary in Asia or supporting one from your cubicle in Louisiana, the important thing is that you are following the calling that God has for YOU!

I told these thoughts to a local missionary and he replied in one line what took me three paragraphs: "If we’re doing what God wants us to do there is no higher calling." Amen.

4th of July = Holiday = Blog Time

It has been a while since I have posted pictures on my blog because it takes so long to upload (mostly because I don't know what I am doing). I wanted to share some pictures with you of some people that are important to me here in baton rouge that many of you don't get to meet or see often.
First and foremost, this is... Robert.

You may have seen the video of him from a while back but this is him. He is on staff at Healing Place Church working in our Creative Team with Video Graphics and Editing as well as helping to plan and pray for the details of our new arena that we are in the process of building. He is incredibly intelligent, funny, and the perfect complement for me.

Next, this is the 2007 graduates of Full Time Elevate.

Some of the funniest, most diverse, crazy, radical men and women I know. I had the privilege of spending 24/7 with them for the last nine months. They are like family to me so you are sure to meet them one day.

Hopefully you have been able to go to the Children's Cup website to see the pictures from the mission trip FT elevate took to Mozambique in April. Below are some of my favorite pictures from this trip:

This is of a bunch of us playing red light green light.


Below is when I had the opportunity to teach at a kid's club in the church. Mashalayla (I spelled it phonetically) translated for me and all I could think to say over and over is "Jesus loves you!".



Next is a cool picture of Brandon, Isaac, Charles and Barton. So cool to think that three months ago we were all together and now... Brandon is working with our kids camp at HPC:Highland Campus, Isaac is pastoring the HPC:Mozambique Campus, Charles and his wife Kristen are working with Children's Cup in Swaziland, and Barton is serving at HPC: Danville Campus in California for the summer. Talk about Going Global!



Finally are a series of pictures that Dan Ohlerking took of my favorite (you always have a favorite) Martinya (pronounced Mah Teen Yah) and me. If I could have brought her home I would have. She is too cute!

Hope you enjoyed the few photos. There will be more to come. Have a happy 4th!

Wisdom from Bro. Pete

I have been reviewing my notes from the classes of Elevate this past year and I encountered this great thought from a class Bro. Pete Wunstel taught us: "Jesus doesn't want you to speak FOR Him. Jesus doesn't want you to minister FOR Him. Jesus wants to speak THROUGH Him. Jesus wants to minister THROUGH you.
If you ever have the opportunity to spend some time with Bro. Pete (or his remarkable wife Ms. Paulette), I would HIGHLY recommend it. He is incedibly wise and has spent many years walking hand in hand with Christ. He has a great heart for the poor and missions and... well you should just go talk to him. Or rather go LISTEN to him. It will be time well spent, I promise.

A few months later... and finally pictures

I have been meaning to put my pictures from the trip we took to Mozambique in April but I just never make the time to get around to it. But Dan Ohlerking and Jarred Ray (who took all the photos) have so generously uploaded all of the pictures to the Childen's Cup website. You have got to also check out the incredible video the creative team made! Thanks so much to everyone who supported me on this trip: financially, prayerfully, and emotionally. It meant the world to me to be able to travel to a place that is near and dear to my heart and to be the hands and feet for Jesus by hugging on, loving and playing with the kids of Mozambique and Swaziland.Thank you.

Elevate ended... and so did my friendships

Funny how life is different now that I no longer spend 24/7 with 13 of the craziest, most diverse, fun people. I am learning all over again that friendships in the real world take effort, energy and lots of time. I no longer have 5 lunch options and 13 people who are always in for any crazy idea.

This has been a recently thought on my heart. I really want to make more of an effort to keep up with friends and family. I want you all to know how valuable you are to me and how often I think of you even though I may not call or write. There is this funny thing that I do- if I have a friend that I haven't spoken with in a while, I tend to put off calling them even longer because I want to talk to them for a long time but never make that much time in my schedule just to sit down and call them. So then more time passes and they think I don't care because I don't just call them. I should just pick up the phone even if I only have 5 min. At least to let you know I care.

I want to work on making relationships a priority in my time. We did this "living your strengths" test and half of mine were work focused and the other half were people focused, so naturally I am torn between my to do list and my relationships.
But now I have recognized this, I will be working on it.