Hope Will Lead Us On

HOPE: to cherish a desire with anticipation; to expect with confidence

TRUST: a belief that someone is good, honest, reliable.

 Earlier this week I came to a realization that if things seem hopeless and a situation is desolate, I take my heart out of the situation and accept the fact that things won't ever change.
I said, "God, how can I hope for this?"
His words came immediately, "Leah, have you seen me be faithful before?"
And I have. I've seen His faithfulness in so many ways. In my broken heart as He healed it in his timing. With so many children in India, Cherokee and at Yolijwa. I've seen his faithfulness come through again and again.
Why was this so hard?
Because Love hurts. And if I choose love in this situation, it will hurt. But it will be worth it because Hope does not disappoint. This truth is whispered to me in Romans 5:5.
It says this
"We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us."

It is hope that allows God's love to be poured even deeper into my heart. It is His Love that keeps me thriving.
I will choose to hope. I will allow it to permeate every circumstance I pray fervently for. I will allow it to be the window to the light that shines show brightly just outside the window. I will remember God's faithfulness to me and I will Hope for the future.

Little Wonders

1 Peter 1:9 "though you so not see him, you love him. Though you do not see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory."

I have not seen Him, but I have come to know Him. It's real and tangible. Although my fingertips cannot touch his face, I can feel him there. Though my eyes have not looked into His, I have seen Him in every sunrise, butterfly and rainbow. I have heard him in every gentle breeze across my soul.
I know him.
The promises he writes on my soul, the way he made me fearfully and wonderfully.
I know him.
I feel him in the soft brush of the breeze. He is the devastating winds to my complacent heart. He is the constant lap of water on my feet, and the waves that destroy my shore.
I know him.
I have tasted and I have seen the goodness of the Lord. Have you felt him the way I have?
I want everyone to experience this love. This deep, intimate place where he speaks life over the death in my heart, where he rises up the ashes of the hopeless winter. It is s beautiful thing to feel emotions with such depth. One of the greatest things of feeling everything so deeply is that I get this relationship. This love that is inexplicable. But feeling things so deeply involves taking others pain as my own. I can feel, I can relate. I can make the hurt mine. So often it weighs me down and crushes my spirit. But promises have been spoken over me this week. It is not my burden to carry, I am here to feel, hold people above the waves and point them to the Lighthouse. My role in feeling so deeply is intercession, love and understanding in the pain. My place is never to be their Savior, never to change their circumstances, but to be a prayer warrior, a lover and a friend. Because I have a God who loves them so much more deeply than me. And that places me in awe. Because not only is he the God of every single person that walks this earth. He is the God of little wonders. Who paints me pictures of his love. Who takes me out into places that seem to have never been discovered before, and he created them just for me to be in awe of his glory and fall in love with him once again. Because I've fallen so deep, I am drowning in an ocean  of love, mercy and grace. It compels me to want to share it with the whole world.

Sing Your Song

"Leah, be a bird. Be free, sing your song." 
These are the words I feel deep within my heart as I spent time with Jesus early this morning. The birds are free, nothing restrains them. They fly to and from. They sing their songs loud. And on this early spring morning their songs became evident to me. One was excited, another was peaceful. One had an angry cry. And they all sang their song. Honestly and freely.
And after a week of learning about my personality, I can't help but make the connection of the freedom I am called to.
Some birds sit on a tree branch for hours. Some fly far and long.
They are all so different. But they all sing their song. They all be who they are created to be. They never conform to one another. They are just themselves.
Why is it so hard to be free? Why do we think it will benefit us to keep the invisible shackles around our wrists that bind us to be someone we are not? Why is freedom so frightening? I'm not sure yet. But I want to live free.
Bondage creeps up so quickly. He hides in the corner of my room. I let him in too often.
India I discovered the life in freedom. I want to keep that with everything in me.
Jesus makes me come alive. So I'll pursue him. I'll be the bird that he has called me to be.
His grace is so evident to me when I choose to walk in stubbornness. His grace is so evident to me when I tell him that I can maintain it all on my own. I don't need anyone.
But, oh How I need Him.
And it's here that I can feel the extravagance of his love, the depth of his grace and the joy in His freedom. Yet I don't want to stay here. I want to find how deep, how long, how far and how great his love is. I want to drown deeper in the ocean of who He is and I want to be so much freer as every weight and chain falls off and I press on toward the goal of the prize of which He has called me heavenward.

For Your Glory

Sometimes I find myself in that place where I cannot put words to the emotions, where I cannot explain the feelings stirring deep within me. This time it was overwhelmed. Not in a bad way, but it's like I'm drowning in an ocean of You. The qualities of who you are weigh on the things I cannot understand, your incredible beauty.

 Oh, how lovely you are.

 Your wrath against my very nature.

 Oh, how holy you are. 

You built the tabernacle to find a place near to me, you built it as a bridge to let imperfection meet the Holy of Holies. 

And because of your great love, now the Holy of Holies resides in my heart. Just think about that! The holiest thing, so bright you cannot see without dying, lives within you! 

 Oh, how phenomenal you are. 

And I'm on my knees again, arms raised high whispering a thanksgiving to my Creator, my Redeemer and my Lover that will never suffice. It's in this place that the pain and the hurt whisper at my heart, persuading me that God has failed me, that I say, "Jesus, I just want to see your face. Please." But it's in that moment when He is so close that I can feel his arms wrapped around me and he is so close I can almost touch him that I can say, "It will be worth it. This will be worth it. I have to believe that." It is in that place that I remember the look on my mom's face when she saw Jesus, when she looked into his eyes and left this earth behind. It's in that place where I remember the man in India see Jesus for the first time, that he denounced all the other gods. They saw Jesus, the met him face to face in that moment, they saw his worth and were willing to give up everything. I have to hold onto that when things get hard and I cannot press forward on my own strength. He whispers these precious promises to me, "Beloved, Be free, Be mine." 

These are all promises I must choose to walk in. I must choose to be loved so I can in turn give it away. Jesus unlocked the chains on my wrists but I must remove the shackles. I must choose to rest solely in his love. This God is not a god who just calls me to serve Him. He served me first, He loved me first. He is God. So worthy of my adoration. So incredibly overwhelming, I'm drowning in all of his attributes and characteristics. I'm amazed at His grace and His love. I'm still breathing, yet I have seen His holiness. Moses had to turn his face, Isaiah had to taste a burning coal, I have Him living within me.

The Holy of Holies lives inside of me!

I'm passionate about Him because He is passionate about Him. Anyone else, it would be pride. But he is God and he longs for his worship. He died for it! 

This is for your glory. This life is offered up to you, for your glory. 

Love, Raw and Dangerous

I didn't know that India would capture my heart the way it did. I don't think it was the place, it wasn't the glorious landscape or the mounds of rice that stole my heart. No, it wasn't the trash or the poverty. It couldn't have been that. What was it about this place that stole my heart? I think it was the eyes that were tunnels that led straight to the depths of their souls. It was the heartbreak and repetition written on every woman's face. It was the confusion mixed with desperation and joy when a child felt something different from us.

It wasn't because we were white, yes, that brought them close, but what allowed us into their hearts for just a moment was Jesus. We were glowing, not just our skin, our hearts. They could see it in our eyes and they wanted it. And that was love. It was that one thing, that one raw and dangerous emotion that tied my heart to the country of India.

 An overabundant, never-ending fountain of love. It started in the morning as I spent time with Jesus as he whispered it across my soul. Showing me exactly what my heart needed, rescuing my from pride that could so easily step in. He whispered the words so often early in my trip, "Stay soft, Leah." Preparing my heart for the outpouring of this love. Giving me my sustenance, my joy, my peace, to sustain me.  But it didn't end there, because throughout the day, I just felt this overwhelming urge to tell these people, these children about the love that I know so personally. It wasn't just words, it was real. "Jesus loves you so much," was a truth they had to know. I needed them to understand. In those moments, I felt Jesus' heart for them. How he undoubtedly loved them, How he was pursuing them through the strangest of instruments, me. He orchestrated this moment in time in the most beautiful of ways. His Love flowed through me that gave me a capacity to love. And I never ran out, it was endless. Psalm 92:2 was so real. It is good... to declare your steadfast love in the morning and your faithfulness by night."
The morning I knew his love and by the end of the day the only words I could express were words of gratitude. I sat on the roof many nights with my friend, Liz, and said, "God is so faithful."

I remember holding a little girl in my arms as we walked through the village. The look on her face was confused. She hadn't known this. But she was reveling in it. When she was just walking beside me she had been excited, jumping up and down, but now, she was peaceful, soaking in something different, something that resonated with her heart. Her eyes that led to her soul showed me a glimmer of gratitude because for the first time, she knew what it meant to be held, to be loved.

So how did a home so different from my own take my heart? It was Love Himself.
It's the same with Camp Yolijwa and Cherokee, North Carolina.
They are both places I learned to give love, places I felt my Savior so strongly, that my heart was stolen, captured.
Maybe it's not the places that have a hold on my heart, although I left pieces of my heart behind in those beautiful places, but it's Jesus.

And I have come to the conclusion, Love is a raw and dangerous place to be. Love is hard and can sometimes break your heart. But if you close your heart, you'll miss it. If your heart is stone, you won't see it. Love breathed life into my soul, but it put me at the greatest risk, because I've given my heart to so many, I could fear there will be nothing left. Love is the greatest emptier, but it's also the greatest filler. I've poured it on so many people, but I've gotten so much in return. I didn't know a little child who didn't speak my language could give me so much love. Or an old woman with tumors on her face could hug me and put me in the place of Love, but she did. Love has the potential to hurt, Love holds the ability to break you, and sever your heart in two. Love can leave you with wounds that lay open for a long time, hurts that have been rubbed raw. But at the same time, Love is the most healing of places, and it is worth every single jagged breath I breathe.
Because love is raw and dangerous, but Love is the most adventurous, the most fulfilling. And I will choose love with every step.

My God is Faithful

I sit to write this blog that I've been trying to write for about 2 weeks now and I am at a loss of words for how to describe my past five months. So many words float in my head, but none quite fit this indescribable feeling. None of the words would begin to explain how credulously alive I have become. How my finiteness compared to my Creator's infinity has put me in awe. I could say how India taught me so much about myself, but that would pale in comparison to how much it taught me about my Savior, my Friend and my Jesus.

My God is so Faithful.

Those are the only words that even begin to come close. He is so wonderfully, beautifully, and incredibly faithful. His love is so captivating, He has stolen my heart and I'm never going back to what once was.
5 months ago I drove to Louisville, Kentucky with absolutely no idea what I was getting into. I jumped into a lake and had not a clue where the bottom was or what was in the water. I followed God's leading and have been brought to the most glorious place.
5 months ago the Lord took my heart on a journey. A journey I'm still on and one I pray will never end. It has been hard but oh, it has been so beautiful and exciting.
He took this heart and healed it. From my beginning, all I ever wanted to do with my life was help people, love on people. And he has taught me how. He healed the broken places of my heart I never wanted anyone to see. He held me as I expressed every emotion that had been pent-up for years. Sometimes I yelled and got really angry. Sometimes I cried. But oh, how faithful He was. He showed me freedom. He showed me a love deeper than I had ever felt. He plunged into the depths with me. I love going deep. Deep into the ocean and deep into hearts. And now I'm free, now I'm captured by a love that holds me in the sweetest of chains.
India taught me how to love, whether it was holding a woman who just needed to cry into someone's arms as she felt a glimpse of the love of her Savior, or it was holding a little girls hand saying, "I know what it's like to lose a mommy too." Or maybe it was standing across from a girl who knew the love of Jesus but everyone around her didn't, and she didn't know how to keep on going by herself. India taught me that sometimes I can't fix things. Sometimes I can't hold things together, but I can be Jesus' hands and feet to the needy. I can sit in a dark-lit room or sit in the dirt with children and just be the person they need me to be, Jesus. Or I can play with orphans who never knew a parent's love or don't understand what happened to their parents, and I can give them love, but they give me so much more. How is that?
How is it that I went to India to tell them about Jesus, a place that worships 300 million other gods, yet they taught me so much more about Jesus? How does that happen? It's because His heart is for humanity. It's for me, It's for the women that couldn't quite see that the baby in her arms was God's faithfulness to her, when she had prayed to him as a last resort and he had provided a baby after 8 years of praying to false gods. It was for Sweta. It was for Pandireyvadi, and for Keithana and Pavithat and Ama. It was for every single Indian I came into contact with and remember their face but not their name. It was for every one who had a story and I had a privilege to listen to. His love is so deep and so wide. His heart is so big, so strong and so mighty there is nothing He cannot do.
He is the God who has left his trace all over humanity.
He is my God who doesn't just say, "Leah, trust me." He is my God who has shown me why I should trust him. He has proved his faithfulness to me again and again. Over and Underneath, in every single place I might have had an ounce of doubt, it has been obliterated, because I have seen the love and faithfulness of my Jesus and I am never going back. I will choose to follow my Jesus who has become my everything wherever He wants to take me. Because He is faithful and my heart is His.

And now you may ask what is next for me? I'll be in Lancaster for about a month to fundraise and hang out with friends and family, then I'll be returning to Louisville for the secondary school. It is the School of Ministry Development. I will study leadership and develop my calling and my passions. And then this summer I will go on another outreach!

Sweta, Augustia and Me

Her name was Sweta. She trailed behind me in the village. Leading a stash of children, loneliness radiated from her being. I would turn and smile and wave at her she would hide her face and fall back with the crowd. "What is your name?" I ask. She doesn't understand.
We lead the children to the center of the village doing a program for them. At the end our translator said to pray for the children. Everything in me screamed "tell her about Jesus!" How could I? She didn't know my name. The Spirit inside me gently whispered, "Tell her I love her."
Her eyes captured me. Her loneliness compelled me. The dot on her forehead motivated me. The language barrier terrified me. But in obedience I turn to this little girl, and with some prodding  and other children's help, I learned her name was Sweta and she was 4. But she ran away. I prayed for a few more children, but I had to tell her. So I followed her and room her hand. I start to say the most important truth I have ever been told, and a girl, my angel, appeared out of nowhere. She said "I'll translate." I said, "Sweta, Jesus loves you so much!" She smiled, and lingered with me for a while. The other girls name was Augustia. She said "I love Jesus too." I got to encourage her and tell he to share Jesus with her friends. Her father is away and she said "I miss him, but Jesus is my friend.
I made two friends that night and I learned my obedience will be rewarded. If God tells me to go, he will provide a way for it to work. He is faithful, and he cared enough about a little girl named Sweta. I pray she will always remember the white girl who held her hand and gave her the greatest gift she could receive. God cared enough about Augustia who was a little discouraged to be the only one who loved Jesus to send me to encourage her heart. And he cares enough about me to teach me a tiny lesson of obedience. The way Jesus aligned all of our stories together amazed me.

So this week we have moved to Salem, India. The food is so much spicier and India hasn't gotten any less silly or rediculous. Like  stopping our van because the is a herd of goats in the middle of the road. But his voice is so clear to me, and I am finding the line between recieving his love in the morning, and giving it throughout the day, pouring into these people. And at the end of the day singing of his faithfulness.