How Great Is Our God

So most of you probably know that my heart is burdened for Africa and has been for years. I've wanted to go there and serve as a missionary, but I've always been scared!! Scared that I wouldn't know what to do, or how to share the gospel with them, or that I would be ineffective, or that I just wasn't trained enough...etc. But after the past year of my life, I know that God can use me anywhere if I just let HIM. If I submit to Him and just say "Okay, I'll go," then He will be faithful in providing me whatever I need to do His work. Now I am ready to go.
So I have decided to move to Swaziland (South Africa) in September to work with a missionary called LeeAnne, whom our church supports. I met LeeAnne last summer and absolutely loved her and told her then of my heart and that someday I might want to come and serve with here there. So here we are many months later and LeeAnne just returned for a brief time before she transitions into a different location in Swaziland. I spent a lot of time talking with her about me coming there and working with her. She was all for it and said now she's gonna hold me to it! So I plan on moving to Swaziland in September and staying for about 3 months. So back to how great God is...LeeAnne put together a short missions trip for families of our church-for one week in April, during the Easter break. Well, I really wanted to go on this trip...but the flight to Johanessburg is not cheap-around £600. The accommodation and everything is really reasonable, only £350 for everything once we're there (including a day safari trip thing)...but the flight jacks the total cost up to about £1000. That's a stinkin lot of money. I don't have that much money. So anyway, I started praying specifically that if God wanted me to go, He would provide the money. I told God that I wasn't going to ask anyone for any support in this, and that if He wanted me there, He would speak to people's hearts and they would come forward and help me bring down the cost. God answered in a big way, because He is FAITHFUL. Sunday morning after church, a couple called the Herberts told me that they wanted to pay for me and Andy (my co-worker) to go on the Swaziland trip. Pay in full...not a portion to help us, but the entire thing. I was astounded. I almost started crying, and thought I was going to. I mean, how amazing is that. How do you say thank you to someone for that??? I just told her straightaway that I had been praying specifically for this. Lynn (Mrs. Herbert) did the talking and her husband, John, just stood there with a smile on his face, looking very content. It was so precious. God has blessed them so much financially, and they are generous enough to bless others with it. How great is our God.

My days in England are coming to an end...

So I finally decided that I will not be returning to my current job after summer. A week ago I was really undecided still and praying about it...but I feel that God let me know last Thursday that it was time for me to move on. He just has really put a peace in my heart about it. I'm excited to get onto my next adventure....which will be: a) going to Africa (Swaziland) in September for probably 3 months. b) becoming an au pair in Australia/New Zealand for a while. I will probably go to Africa because I can do Australia after that. I have been looking at au pair jobs with Australia in mind, but I have found a couple of pretty cool opportunities in the states. One is in Oregon and looks like awesome, the other is in southern California, right on the coast. There's another au pair job in the Cayman Islands that looks pretty sweet as well. So who knows what's in store next. I do know I'm not ready to be back in Texas yet...still have too much other stuff to do before I settle into a career of any sort. The way I see it-I will be in a career for years and years after I settle down, so probably will not have these kinds of opportunities...so as long as I'm still single I think I'll continue on with some other adventures. Basically, what I'm saying is that I'm a Yeppie (Young Experimenting Perfection-Seeker - they are all about collecting as many experiences as possible). Yes, I am a yeppie. I am an "experience junkie." I had never heard of yeppies until Megen showed me an article from the London Times describing what a yeppie is-because she thought that we were yeppies (except not completely, only somewhat). There are 2 articles about yeppies from the Times. The shorter one is here and this the longer one. They define yeppies as people who "are life shoppers who browse careers, relationships and lifestyles in search of the dream existence, putting off grown-up decisions and commitments until they are satisfied they have exhausted all the options. " This is why I say I am only somewhat a yeppie...I am an experience seeker, but I realize that there is no "dream existence" and I know that I will be happy wherever I live because I will always be walking with the Lord and I trust that He will always bless me with great friendships and His provision. That's all I have to say about that.