Making The Impossible Possible

I had a wonderful dinner last night. My roommates and I had two of our girlfriends over. All of us at the table have been on the mission field more than once so it was really encouraging to talk to them about their experiences and it made me even more excited for my upcoming journey to Czech. Afterward Tiana and I cleaned up the last few dishes and got into our Bible study. We began an old Testament read-through in the end of January and are almost done. We have been reading it in the Jewish Bile order. This week's discussion was on Esther and Daniel. I find it incredible because Lamentations ends with 5:21 "Restore us to you, O LORD that we may be restored; renew our days as of old, unless you have utterly rejected us and are exceedingly angry with us." And then Esther is a story of God appointing her to a position so that tho Haman tries to destroy the entire Jewish race she is able to convince the king to restore them. Mordecai encouraged Esther to have faith and to stand up for her people saying that even if she didn't God would eventually restore His people. And then after Esther you have the story of Daniel. I have always loved the story of Daniel and his friends. Of their faith in the face of a lions den and a blazing furnace. That they all believed that even if they did die, God was still God. 

After our discussion of these two books Tiana and I began to talk more about how God makes the impossible possible. We talked of testimonies of our friends who have beens saved from all kinds of evil and crazy things and brought into the Kingdom of God. And she was saying that sometimes when we don't have wild crazy lives before Christ its hard to remember that He does amazing things to save and restore His people. And as I lay in bed praying for a friend of mine who is going through a really hard time I began to recall stories of God making the impossible possible. I thought back to Abraham, the "father of the faith" and how God chose to enter into covenant with him. And in this covenant He told Abraham that he was going to be a father of many nations. Most people, maybe everyone (actually even Abraham, then Abram) thought that this was an impossible task. An old man with a baron wife becoming a father of many nations, as many as the stars in the sky?! Impossible! But God did just that! He gave Abraham and Sarah Issac. And when it was looking like Issac might never find a good godly wife Abraham sent his servant out to find one. And Rebekah enters into the scene. Not just a godly woman but a woman from Abraham's own relatives. And tho it is seemingly impossible for the second-born child to have any inheritance of worth Jacob got the blessing, got the birth-right not Essau. The God of Abraham, Issac and Jacob. Of course the bible is full of stories like this (I feel I'm rewriting Hebrews 11 right now). God delights in making the impossible possible. When the men who had spent three years following Jesus saw the man who they believed was the messiah, was the Son of God hanging, bleeding. dying on a cross there was no more hope. Their friend was dead. He was buried in a tomb. End of story...but NO! What may have seemed impossible, the most impossible of all things, became possible three days later when Christ was raised from the dead!!! 

So what is your story? What is my story? I am on the verge of this dream I've had for five years now coming to life. I'm about to go back to Czech. At this point I am still low on funds. Yeah, to some, it may seem impossible to raise such a large amount in a short time. Some might say that given this economy and the recession its just "not possible" but I don't believe them. I have too much evidence of God making the impossible possible to buy into the fear around me. Yes the economy sucks. Yes there is a recession. Yes people are loosing their jobs left and right. But the LORD is still the same today as He was in times of prosperity. He is still the one who provides all our needs. He is still, as He has always been a God that delights in making seemingly impossible situations possible. So I want to encourage all of you to asses your life from that perspective. What things in your life right now seem impossible? Is it a loss of a job, a loss of your health, a broken relationship, lack of money whatever it is take time to see it from the eyes of faith. The eyes that Daniel and his friends had when facing the lions den and the blazing furnace. Lets be part of the story that is highlighted in Hebrews 11. Lets be people of faith that believe that God exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.

Ways to pray in response:

*Pray that God will bring in the rest of the money quickly. That He will encourage the hearts of those I've sent letters to that He wants to participate in this journey by giving financially

*Pray for God to even now begin to pursue the hearts of the Czech students I will meet, some who at this point might not even believe there is a God.

*Pray for my Czech friends who know the Lord to be bold in inviting their friends to camp

Love you guys, In Jesus Faithful Name,

Em

Simplicity and Excitement

Through The Eyes of A Child:

I was able to take a trip home this last weekend to see my nephew for his 3rd birthday. It was so fun to be able to see life from his perspective for a couple days. To see that there is magic and wonder in simple things like train tracks and sprinklers and throwing balls. I hadn't seen him since Christmas but we reconnected immediately. He would ask "where's Em-oh-lee" everytime he'd loose sight of me. I hope to keep that perspective, to see the joy and fun and magic and wonder in all small things and not just the big things. John Eldredge talks about this  in his book "Walking With God" he says we need to see what God is giving rather than focus on what He is not giving. I like that. May we not be too focused on what is missing from our lives to miss the small but wonderful gifts we have right here and now

The Countdown:

In five weeks I will be landing in Vienna! I will meet my team there and we will begin our summer adventure of impacting the Czech students with the love of Christ, with the hope of the gospel. I just found out who will be on my team yesterday. My leaders will be Brad and Lucie Kaspar. I met Brad first when I did my internship in 2003. And I met Lucie last time I was in Czech in 2004. She is a good sister and I am so excited to serve with them both. Also on the team are two new friends Sarah who is 19 and from Illinois and Chris who is 23 and from Minnesota. I can't wait to get to know them. We have a smaller team but I think this will give us more opportunity to get to know each other. 

How to join the adventure:

1) Praise God for my nephew Damian! Pray he grows to be a man who loves the Lord passionately and be a light to his/our family.

2) Please pray for our team, for Brad and Lucie as they get the last of the preparations ready for us to arrive and for the five of us to be united even now, before we meet. That we as a team will be an incredible picture of Christ's love to the Czech students (and to each other)

Love you guys! Til next time...

Em

Its "a'blog" time

Its been a long long time since I last wrote and I'm not sure how to best update you on all that has been going on so I will try and break it up a bit. From here I'm going to try and write more frequently so I can just write and not feel the huge weight to update you on everything...

Stepping Out In Faith:

I am currently in the process of raising support and getting things ready to go to Czech as a summer intern with Josiah Venture. Raising support and trusting God to provide in this way is something I haven't done in so long it has seemed a bit foreign. It seems tho, each time that doubt and fear try to sneak in God keeps opening the doors and asking me to trust Him. He has put a friend  in my life that has said he will give just about half of the amount I need to raise. Another good friend who is a pastor in town invited me to come to their missions Sunday April 26th. The money has to be in by May 1st but at this rate its looking like it just may happen.  

Life and Death and the Hope of Christ:

This past week a few of my friends died. Two of them, Tony and Laura died in a rock climbing accident. Tony was on the police force here in Gresham and Laura's dad is a fire fighter. Laura and her husband (who is Tony's brother) Bobby used to be in my home group a couple years ago and when I was in college I used to hang out a lot with Bobby and his twin sister at their parents home. It was a really powerful funeral. 1500 people were there. And both Tony's and Laura's story spoke to a life of passion of Christ. Afterward there was a small copy of Heaven by Randy Alcorn for everyone to have. FIFTEEN HUNDRED PEOPLE. Many of them who did not know the Lord. May they not be able to escape the reality of Christ now that they have known Tony and Laura and have seen their life and death. On my way to their funeral I read my email and found out my friend Pavel from Czech died of lung cancer. Pavel also lived a life passionately for the Lord. I met Pavel the last time I was in Czech. He was the translator for class and he was also asked to translate my testimony. We had good talks that week about faith and trusting God and believing in His grace. We've kept in touch some through the years. When I bought my one-way ticket to Prague, that as you know, I didn't end up using Pavel was really excited to think of me coming back to serve for a longer time in Czech. I will miss Tony, Laura and Pavel. There are a couple things tho that really stood out to me at Tony and Laura's funeral and thinking about Pavel too, one is that it is so worth it to live passionately for Christ, to live fully and to live lives that are drenched in Christ's love. I'd way rather live a life of passion for Christ than to buy into the American Dream. Another thing is that with these friends of mine, with our friends that know and trust Christ, when they die then death does NOT have the final say. Death does not get the last victory. My brothers Tony and Pavel and my sister Laura are now with Christ! So when our friends, when our Christian brothers and sister die we do grieve, we cry, we hurt, but we also celebrate the lives and the examples that they showed us, we celebrate the passion that they showed us and we hope. We have HOPE. That, is amazing.

Prayer opportunities:

Please pray for me to be able to raise the support I need for this summer. Please pray for the Czech youth group leaders and the Josiah Venture staff who are right now getting ready for this summer. Pray for all the students that are going to come to camps this summer who don't yet know the Lord. And will you also please pray for the Silva family, for Bobby Silva who lost his brother and wife in the same day. Will you pray for the Gresham Police Department who lost one of their fellow officers. Pray that Tony's life/death would speak to the officers that don't yet know the Lord. And please pray for Pavel's family and for his friends in Czech and those who were close to him. Thank you so much!

More coming soon,

Emily