Time to turn the page, it's the dawn of a new day...

As some of you know, returning from my last trip to Haiti was very different than the first. I knew it would be. I was returning to my home town for the summer after having a crazy last week of school. My teammates wouldn’t be just across campus to hang out with whenever I found myself upset or in tears. I would begin preparations for my summer in Peru. I expected those differences and had tried to prepare myself as best I could. Although I wasn’t ready to leave Haiti at all, I was looking forward to sharing the things the Lord had taught me with all my dear loved ones.

But God had something in store for me that I was not at all prepared for. That day of leaving Guibert, Haiti and returning to Aledo, Texas felt like much more than just 24 hours. The only way to describe it is exhausting – physically, mentally, spiritually, but more than anything emotionally. That day held more heart breaks than expected, but the Lord is most evident in the midst of brokenness. I had already learned that through my experience in Haiti. Feeling & seeing the Lord work in my weakness since my return has been a surreal experience. He has only begun to mold my heart & mind into one such as Jesus Christ, and the journey has been beautiful so far.

Over this past year God has revealed to me His abounding love for the people of every nation in a whole new light, but I think somewhere along the way I lost my grasp of His love for me. Jesus loves me, this I know and have always known. I didn’t forget that. But there’s a difference between knowing Jesus loves me and truly basking in His infinite, unconditional overflow of love. He has loved me before anyone else. His love for me was greater than that for His only son who He sent to be born into this sinful world and save all the wretched people of this world from the penalty of our own wrong-doings. He watched His son suffer under the hands of His own creation and die on a cross because He so longed to be reunited with each of us for all eternity. And if that is just a glimpse of God’s love for me then what should be my response to that?! A crazy love like nothing our world has seen!

After reading through Genesis, Luke, and Acts, the Lord has revealed many new truths to me, but one has stuck out above all the past couple of weeks. All the people I have read about – Adam, Eve, Cain, Able, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Esau, Jacob, Joseph, Mary, Herod, the disciples, John the Baptist, Zacchaeus, Pilate, Paul, and so many others – their lives were such a short moment in the timeline of the world. Some of them chose to be sold out for Christ and be used by the Lord to impact the world. Others of them were too consumed within themselves to be any kind of positive change. I am not going to allow myself to be one of those people who held out because of their self-consuming mindsets and never lived to make any difference. I will be a vessel through which Christ will impact the world. I choose to be wholly and completely in love with my Savior and live my life with my eyes & heart set on Him alone. Everything else is insignificant in comparison.