lessons from summer.

The most beautiful thing about the epistles is that you can feel their heart a little. Paul and John, when they write, their heart is aching and yearning and moving for the people they are writing to. That depth in the lord. And I feel with them for school as it comes time to go back home to Raleigh, home that is sort of home. That I go back different and the same.
The same because I became a lot of who I am there in Raleigh. It changed me forever. God used it to mold me into something even more His. I came back to Chesapeake different mostly and only a little bit the same. Now I go to school the same mostly but a little bit different. Different mostly because of Haiti. Because its part of my heart. Because there are kids named Jeff, Chicowski, Delco, Lovely, Niaka, Sammy, and Woodlin that I love. A country that I love. A people that I love. A God that I learned a lot about this summer. A lot about Him from Deuteronomy and Ezekiel. About the obedience he demands. The absolute surrender to Himself.
I'm quieter too. I forget often, but still realize that I actually know very little about this world I'm living in and what God wants for my life. And I just have to let him lead me day by day, as He leads most everyone, according to the bible. I learn that there is no on and off switch for ministry or serving or pleasing God. I am part of his workmanship. And its always on. Always is about obedience, never about product. And its not about me. Whether I do good or bad. Not about me. And I cannot do good. He can do good in me. With me. Thorough me. And to me. But my heart, without him, protects self, loves self, serves self. He has no need for any work I can produce. Yet he loves me.
Hes good and He loves us. And Jesus is it. Press on to know Him. Say, I surrender all the way to you Jesus. Im not kidding. Say it again and again and again. Right now, get on your knees and do it. Til you feel it in your soul. I'm yours Jesus. And he will work that surrender and that desire to surrender into being. Miracle of miracles that he can do that in you and in me. He must increase, we must decrease. My life is not my own any longer. If I strive to be more of anything, I must strive to be more humble. Which is why those thorns remain in my life. Just like to Paul he says, no I will not remove those thorns because my grace is sufficient for you. Don't ask for anything else, I know what is sufficient  for you. It is my grace. Which is why I'm with my family, because nothing is more humbling than my impatience and selfishness with them. Rest because we cannot forget how dependent we are on him. Work because we glorify him with all the work that we do. Read the word. All the time. Memorize it. Love it. Go slow. Let it whisper to your heart-deep cries out to deep. Read the old testament. And the new. And pray. Prayer is maybe the scariest thing of all. No one wants to be alone with their thoughts for long. And where prayer feels like it fails, keep praying because the spirit prays on our behalf. Pray before work. Its stupid to think prayer is not part of work. And love. Love people like their sons and daughters of God. Brothers and sisters in Christ. Paul said, "I will gladly spend and be spent for your souls." We must make that our lives. Look someone in the eye, or conjure the image of them in your mind and say, God, I will gladly spend and be spent for their souls. Listen to people instead of talking. Pray for them. All the time. What else have I learned? Its messed up to love playing with kids in Haiti and not with my younger siblings. If you run towards God, you'll serve more than if you run towards serving or towards people. He knows them better than we do. He loves them more. We've got no heaven to take them to, no matter whether we extend or improve their life a little bit. Whoever it is, they've got a savior and its not me or you or anything on this earth. Because everything here will die one day. Its fading even now. Days are numbered. But there is love everlasting in one named the Christ.
Thats some of what I learned this summer.