And so it begins!

No matter how prepared I thought I was to leave, there are always a million and a half little things that need to be done the day of departure.  (This will be a short post.)

I'm heading out!  It's actually here!  Please be praying for safety and alertness as I drive, and for time to mentally and emotionally prepare for the things that lay ahead.  Pray for all of us on the Wilderness Ministry Professional Course as we learn, teach, lead, and seek the Lord together.  Praise God for time to say goodbye to loved ones, for the provision of a place to stay overnight mid-way to Wyoming, and for the overwhelming response to my financial needs!  God is so GOOD!  

Thank you all for your prayers, I could not do this with out your support!

"Oh ye of little faith"

A wise friend used the phrase "obedience begets intimacy" during a group devotion one morning.  When I am feeling far from the Lord, that phrase often comes to mind and I have to be honest with myself about whether or not I have been obedient and faithful.  Not that my obedience or faithfulness merits God's favor, but my obedience does draw me closer to Him and allows me to understand more of His heart.  The more I lay my will down and seek His will, the more I want to conform all of who I am to who He calls me to be.  It's like running:  that first mile off of the couch sucks.  The second mile sucks.  Heck, maybe even the third time out, it still sucks.  But pretty soon, you start to look forward to running and you realize that those first few miles don't seem as long or grueling as they once did.  In fact, they're pretty enjoyable.  You stop looking for excuses not to run (I already showered today.  I don't have time.  It's too hot.  It's too muggy.  I just washed my running shorts.) and start making time in your schedule to get out and go.

This past week has been a lot of learning what it looks like for me to step out in faith and obey.  As I sort through clothes, papers, and knick-knacks (really? since when have I collected so many tiny useless things?), packing has become an act of faith for me.  Each time I close a box, I'm effectively saying "okay, God.  I trust that I won't need these things until I'm unpacking them in Wyoming."  Which, as the Wilderness Ministry Professional Course gets closer, feels like a bigger and bigger step of faith.  I'm just past the halfway point of where my monthly funds need to be to stay on at SROM as a full time staff member (take a moment to celebrate with me here?  I think that's definitely worthy of celebration.), which means that I will most likely not get all the funds I need by next week, and thus will be returning home after the course instead of staying out in Laramie on staff.  So much has been provided already!  But there is still so much left to go.  Packing has been a good reminder to me that all God asks of me, even still, is humble obedience as I seek greater intimacy with Him.  Yes, packing feels a little premature at this stage.  But I want to step out in obedience and in the faith that God will use this season to bring me closer to His heart.

Faith is scary.  It is not something that comes easily to me.  But I do want to set patterns of obedience in my life.  I want to start making time in my schedule to seek ways to obey, not looking for excuses to live life centered around myself.  Maybe this season of packing up all my cold weather clothes in boxes to store out in Wyoming is helping me to learn what that obedient faith looks like.  Maybe I'll just end up being cold this fall in Illinois as I wait on God's provision to be in Wyoming.  Either way, I know that He will provide everything I need...even if that doesn't necessarily look like what I think it will.  Jehovah Jireh, Lord give me the faith I need.

"Glorify Thyself at My Expense"

What does it mean to glorify God?  What does it mean to be a 'woman after God's own heart?'  When I say that I want to live a life in pursuit of God, what does that actually look like?  And, when I'm honest with myself, how do I move my abstract ideas of 'living missionally' into day-to-day love for the people in front of me?

There are a lot of questions I'm wrestling with as I'm preparing for the Wilderness Ministry Professional Course.  It's unbelievable to me that the course starts only three weeks from now!  Three weeks seems like such a short time to prepare physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually!  And yet, three weeks seems like such a long time to wait until it all begins.  I have plenty of articles to read, lessons to plan, gear to drool over, miles to run, and support letters to send out before August 21st, but a big part of me is impatient for it all to begin!  

Many of the questions I'm asking are life-long pursuit kind of questions, more about the asking and exploring than settling on one "right" answer.  The only thing that I can rest in and be settled by is remembering that I want to glorify God.  Or--more accurately--I want God to glorify Himself in my life.  When I try to act of my own initiative, imagining what I should do to please God, I find that more often than not I end up trying to serve my own agenda, trying to please a god that resembles my own self more than living in worship of a God beyond my comprehension.  All of the best I have to offer is still selfish, narrow-minded, and empty, because all of the best I have to offer still begins and ends with me.  Asking "How can I glorify God?" immediately puts Olivia in the power seat, as if I am the one in charge of making God look good.  When I remember that my life begins, ends, and exists with God, my prayer becomes "How will You glorify Yourself in me?"  It is not my strength, wit, wisdom, or power that adds to God's glory; it is for His glory that all of me exists.

In preparing for SROM during these few weeks, there are so many doubts, fears, and questions that nag at me.  Is this really where God has me?  Do I still have what it takes to do this?  Can I do this?  And the prayer that I have been given for these times is "God, glorify Thyself at my expense."  In preparing for the Wilderness Ministry course, glorify Thyself.  In preparing for full-time ministry, glorify Thyself.  In difficulties raising a monthly support network, glorify Thyself.  In saying goodbyes at home, glorify Thyself.  In my doubts, glorify Thyself.  Whatever it may be Lord, glorify Thyself.