Week six of dts has flown by and I’m already beginning my seventh week here in Deutschland. I also find out my outreach locations this week, and will inform everyone of where that is soon after I know for sure.
Again, forgive me from being so absent in my blogging, but also emails and facebook. It’s quite a struggle to keep up with life here, and find time for internet when I don’t have access to it where I live in the apartment in town. I shouldn’t say struggle, that may give the wrong impression. Life here is extremely different from life at home, but I am in love with it. Living in community 24/7 is something I never thought I, an assumed introvert, would be into. But so far it has been the best thing I have ever been a part of. It’s funny… in high school I always wished that I could live in a house full of girls and travel before I got married. The dorm thing was never in the cards for me, and I never saw myself having money to travel. But then God was like, hey, I’m calling you to Germany and you’ll live in an apartment with twenty of your sisters. Yeah, that’s my God. This is better than I could have ever imagined, and I am intent on soaking up every minute of it. It’s such a gift to live in a community people trying to center their lives on just simply loving Jesus and loving each other. Beautiful.
It’s not perfect, there is the occasional drama of someone not washing their dishes, or maybe someone not cleaning out their hair in the tub after a shower.. But what miniscule things in the bigger picture of how awesome this living situation is. I love it.
Anyways, moving onto week six. It was one of my favorite weeks here!
Our speaker was Dan Baumann. What stories this guy has! Whew. His testimony is one that you listen to and just sit back in awe thinking…. God is freaking awesome. His love for Jesus is so evident, and even through stories like being imprisoned in Iran for nine weeks, He is just bursting with a heart for God. I wish I could write all the stories we heard.. not only did we learn a lot but he had us laughing so much.. the guy has a way with story telling. If you want to look into that, he has a couple books ‘Imprisoned in Iran’ and ‘A Beautiful Way’. Highly recommended.
Anyways, God really blessed us with having him here the week we did. The week before was really heavy, and through Dan, God really picked everyone back up on their feet.
Things that really stuck out to me this week:
- Life is about discovering how good God is over, and over and over again.
- The Christian life isn’t always about knowing what we’re doing, it’s knowing God is good and in charge.
- Everything we do for God, will come from intimacy with Him.
- Jesus is madly in love with us. Not for what we might become, but He loves us now, for who we are every moment.
- A lot of times, we want God to make things clear, we want confirmation so we don’t fail. But rather than being stagnant, it is okay to live according to what you think God is saying, rather than leaning on our own understanding. Trust His character.
- Money does not make decisions!!! (big one for me). God is bigger than money. God is bigger than the economy. God provides.
- God is more committed to fulfill His will for our life than we are to find it.
- God is more committed to take care of us than we are to ourselves.
- There is never a fear that can keep us from obeying God. Fear is a distraction; go forward no matter if you’re feeling the fear. Don’t live for this earth, live for something bigger!
- If God has asked us to do something, we are ready, it doesn’t matter how we feel.
- God will give us the grace and the power to do the next thing He askes us to do.
- Life is not about what you should and shouldn’t do, it’s about discovering Jesus.
- Passion for God is based on God, and God’s commitment for us, and that He died on the cross, and that we are part of His Kingdom will never change. It’s not about how we feel or the ups and downs of our emotions. It’s about how good He is and that will never change.
- When we focus on what we should or shouldn’t do, it becomes religion. Religion kills. We don’t fix ourselves with religion. Jesus fixes us with a relationship. Instead of focusing on ourselves, focus on falling in love and becoming consumed with Jesus.
- God’s character is the foundation of passion!
- We tend to walk in comparison and that is a killer. God doesn’t have to speak to us in the same way He does to friends. God wants to communicate uniquely with every human on the planet. It’s supposed to be that way.
- We’re in a journey of discovery. It’s more about the ability of His character than it is for us to get it right.
- Many times we pursue God to get guidance. But rather we should pursue a relationship with God, and guidance comes along with it.
- Want clear guidance? Spend time with Him. Know Him. Hangout with Him.
- There is nothing that can separate us from the love of God, and that is better than guidance.
Okay, so those were some points from the first few days. Then he covered something that I really resonated with. Decsion making. Dun dun dun. I have struggled so much with this, just wanting to “make the right choices.” The next points really opened up my eyes… God is so good you guys.
-Options have created a paralysis in our society. There are so many! We analyze them. We just don’t know the right one and we’re scared to make a mistake.
- What should we do? Run to God! Dive into the word. Spend time in prayer and simply with Him. But at the end of the day, DO SOMETHING! There will not always be confirmation. Take action! Love responds! Live life lovingly, rambunctiously loving God rather than sitting around waiting and waiting!
- If we fail, or realize we should have done something else, we fall into the unconditional love of God. Not so bad, eh?
- When we don’t know what to do, God is very clear. LOVE GOD. LOVE PEOPLE.
- Do we still ask for specifics? Of course. We are in a relationship with God and must always run to Him. Never stop running after Him, but when He doesn’t give specifics, do something loving God and loving people.
- We will not miss His will for our life if we are pursuing Him. Just do something.
- The big deal is not where we’re going, it’s who we’re getting to know in the process.
- Step out and start going forward. Step out in love for Him, love does things.
- We look for a formula to get it right, and there isn’t one. God wants us to have something better, Himself. We run to Him, not to a formula.
Phew. How good is this? God is awesome. And I don’t mean that in a fluffy phrase that Christians are supposed to say, seriously, all caps now so you know I’m serious, GOD IS AWESOME! He is bigger and greater than we can wrap our minds around.
We also covered topics like fear, and fear of failure (a big one for me).
Then Friday came, and it was my birthday! Yippee. I turned twenty-two!
It was an early morning, I had a photo project to print so since the printer was all booked up I had to get in there around 6am, which meant a 5am wake up time. From the moment I woke up, there was just an outpouring of love. I received the sweetest notes from my friends (was well as chocolates and my obsession here, cashews!) and hugs and well wishes everywhere… my prints turned out perfectly how I wanted.. Coleton stayed up late his time to skype with me and sang me a beautiful birthday song. It was already a great day and it wasn’t even 8am yet! Since it was a Friday, we had worship/praise time at 8:30am, and a friend of mine was leading so it was immediately announced that it was my birthday, so before I knew it I had 120+ people belting out happy birthday to me… it was fun! But more than all that, was the singing. God was so present, and although I know He is always present, this time I could just feel it. Everyone could feel it and it showed. It was awesome. Best way to start a birthday, just praising God and declaring His goodness at the top of my lungs… ahhh. Gives me goosebumps just remembering. Anyways, it felt like that the majority of the day. All day love and joy just seeped through every minute, seeped through every second of the day. And when I thought it was over and time to relax back at the apartment, I arrived home to a surprise party from the girls… beautiful. I can’t tell you how excited I am to start off my twenty second year of life diving into a deeper relationship with God.. I have so much yet to discover about His goodness and character and my wish for this year is that my hunger to know Him grows. It’s going to be a crazy adventure… whoever thinks following Jesus is a boring way of life has got it seriously wrong.
Phew, yeah! Go God.
So that was week six. One of my favorite weeks here, but I say that at the end of most weeks. This week is already underway, praise God for all His goodness He has shown already. Ah.. can’t say it enough.
Again, I’d like to extend an invitation to email me at any time for more information, or elaborations on different things. I share bits and pieces, but it’s certainly not a full story.. Each day feels like 3 weeks, a lot happens! So if you have any questions or anything to say at all just email me at k.calli@hotmail.com. I don’t promise a quick reply, but you will get one.
-Kelsey
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