Gotta share this amazing story! I found a prayer journal of mine from 2004. We were living in Iceland, had no children yet, and I was praying for God's will for Jeremey & I's life together to start happening! We had no plans of getting out of the military, or of moving to South Dakota. I prayed in March 2004 that God would open the door one day for Jeremey and I to have a ministry together (in my mind, I was asking for 18 years down the road, when I "knew" Jeremey would be retiring from the Air Force). When I prayed that, I wrote down that God was showing me a picture of a youth group and I didn't understand what that meant.
4 months later, the base we were stationed at closed down. We were given two choices on where we could move. Clovis, New Mexico or Rapid City, South Dakota. Jeremey had to decide on the spot, there was no time to think it over- so he went with his gut feeling and chose South Dakota. Little did we know the Lord's plans for us here. Not 5 years later we are out of the military, and serving God in full time ministry which we STINKIN LOVE! Before you go thinking, aw how cute their life is perfect....there are frustrations! Like the constant attacks from Satan, dude is that getting old! And I kind of feel like Moses when He was telling God, "but I am not a good speaker, why would you send me to talk to Pharoah. Please send someone else!" Except I have said... God, I don't really like people sometimes! They frustrate me! I can hardly deal with myself! Why would you put me in ministry when people drive me nuts?! lol probably to teach me a lesson on how to love people more. That's God for ya.
Even more so, I can feel that God is preparing me for something. I am praying huge prayers of faith, like I did in 2004 and I know I will see them come to fruition. I can't handle 3 kids, or 4 kids, not on my own anyway. But God is with me and He is stretching me, preparing me, working my heart everyday like a piece of clay in his hand until He gets it ready for use. Not that I'm not being used now, but boy do I have a ways to go before I am ready for a new purpose.
When we moved here, I read about Pine Ridge Reservation. My heart felt like it was leaping out of my chest as I read. I told Jeremey, " one day I want to go there, do something for God." He wasn't so excited because of the level of danger and kind of discouraged the idea. I of course, with my stubborn nature, prayed anyway. Fast forward 5 years, and God has ordered our steps and for the first time, my feet landed on the ground in Pine Ridge just a couple weeks ago. The Dream Center has been built. God is doing something, and has been doing something HUGE on Pine Ridge for the last decade, but something new is happening. Prayers are being answered, lives are going to be changed. Jeremey and I are soooo very excited to be forming a coalition of youth pastors who will help make this happen. God is so good.
Another prayer answered- I am going back to college to finish my bachelor's in elementary education. I got Pell Grants (thank you Jesus!) and FAFSA loans to cover the rest- but we were looking at $19,000 of loans. Which didn't thrill me, but I was moving forward. My prayer has been that I will get to teach at a low income school, well come to find out the government has a program where if I work at a low income school for 5 years they will forgive $17,500 of my student loans. WHOA! So for $1500 I am going to finish my degree! Did I mention GOD IS GOOD!? Every single one of the schools on my list (General Beadle, Pine Ridge Elementary, and Black Hills Children's Home) are on the government list for this program.
THAT IS THE POINT OF PRAYING!
No comments:
Post a Comment