I love you and thank God for you and ‘long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.’ (Phil. 1)
I can’t express my appreciation and love for each one of you
enough, but those words should be said more often, and how rarely do I get to
express them.
For now, I will update you quickly on the main highlights of
my life and ask only for prayer in being Spirit led in all things -- that I
would have ‘ears to hear’ the voice of the Lord speaking into each moment and
faithfully guiding me by His presence and love through the days given me here.
1.) Teaching
has been EXHAUSTING! My kids are a joy --
we laugh, we cry, we struggle, we overcome, we make a mess, we pray, we
make changes, we improve, we hurry, we listen, we work hard, and we love….oh
all the life lessons, the daily teaching all wrapped into this job of mine and
I love it…yet it takes all of me.
2.) God
has provided the funds for a car and this has been a HUGE answer to prayer and
a blessing to the ministry the Lord has given on so many levels. We have not
purchased it yet, but wait for what the Lord provides, for that will be best.
When I shared with my friend Ruth that I had asked God for a way to get to the
orphanage every other weekend, so as to be a blessing and not a burden to this
ministry the Lord has put in both of our paths her eyes just brimmed with tears
and though quite speechless, she said, ‘Wow, thank you for having an open heart
to the ministry God has for you, for asking of Him these things and believing
in Him to do them. You are not who I thought you were Julie Nyhoff’
3.) 6th
grade girls bible study has been overwhelmingly successful, not by any work of
my own, but in seeing the girls’ hearts and desire for the Lord and His word.
We have met twice now and each time about 12 have come to listen intently, to
learn from God’s word, and to apply it to their lives. Our next meeting we’ll
be going through the 3rd chapter of Joshua and the insights the Lord
have provided are great indeed.
At chapel last week we were presenting our
class lists of gathered items of thankfulness throughout the week. My name
showed up on the 6th grade poster with specific insight and
encouraging to continue my heart in striving alongside these kids and sharing
the wisdom and joy of Christ with them each day.
4.) Ministry
outside of school has been interesting. The lives of the people here so
desperate and broken. I have entered a time of seeking the Lord for the role I
am to play in each of these lives and I need insight and wisdom to know how to
love these people… to set aside the temptation to be the white American that
just steps in and fixes things temporarily with money or gifts…but to truly
INVEST the time, the relationship, and the prayer into striving with those here
and asking GOD to be the one to show up, to rescue, to work, and that HE would
care for HIS people here in HIS way and HIS time…and that maybe, possibly, He
might use me in the process.
5.) Relationships
at school have been riding the wave of busyness along with me, and it has been
difficult. I am so blessed by the people in my life and those of you far away.
I need to pour most all my energy and time regarding each person first of all
into prayer and then into ministry, but there are times when I need to rest and
relax and have fun and do crazy things, and so I am seeking how to best do this
with the community here and the time I have.
6.) I
had a solid week of tooth pain leading to a root canal and lots of hours spent
in a dentist chair, but have learned much through this experience, though the
week of dealing with this was not enjoyable.
7.) A
dear dear friend from home has the opportunity to visit over Thanksgiving and
I’m delighted to see what this time will hold for us while she is here. The
Lord knows just what I need and what is best for these vacation times. I look
forward to those days and ask you to pray for the preparation of that time in
advance.
Until the end of November then, I leave you with many
prayers and a desire to continue on with ALL of you in the work the Lord is
doing…yet it is almost impossible and so I listen to the Spirit and seek how to
be present in where the Lord has me.
*Ann Voskamp Quote: Suffering nourishes grace, and pain and joy are arteries of the same heart -- and mourning and dancing are but movements in His unfinished symphony of beauty. Can I believe the gospel, that God is patiently transfiguring all the notes of my life into the song of His Son?
The truths that have been written recently upon my heart:
I have felt overwhelmed….hard at work and never getting
ahead. You’ve heard the quote, “if Satan can’t make you bad, he’ll make you busy.”
Or the acronym for BUSY – Bound Under
Satan’s Yoke
I feel as if this has been my most recent spiritual attack
as the workload has set in heavier than I can remember in years past and my
time and energy widdled away to nothing each day. I accomplish a HUGE amount in
the time I’m given, handling things on a million different levels and trying to
listen to the Spirit in each thing thrown at me, but when I get to the end of
the day I’m still behind, I still have more and more to do, and I eventually felt
like I was drowning under it all. At different points in time I realized what
was happening….there was justification in that the we are in the end times, the
world is spinning faster and faster towards the end, everything accelerated and
we feel the effects of this in our daily lives. Partly I took it as a season
that would pass once I just ‘got things under control’ but things just kept
coming. No matter if I said ‘no’ twice or twenty times, there was still a hundred
other things to come in and steal the place of the one before.
If any of you have felt similarly, this is my call to draw
us out of this, to set us above the rush, confusion, to-do list, and chaos, ‘For God is not a God of disorder, but of
peace.’ (1 Cor. 14:33)
First some insights came from Ecclesiastes 3 – the passage
known as ‘a time for everything under the sun.’ Well, reading more of this
chapter in a different version opened my heart to some truths.
‘ It is beautiful how
Elohim has done everything at the right time. He has put a sense of eternity in
people’s minds. Yet, mortals still can’t grasp what Elohim is doing from the
beginning to the end of time. I realize that there is nothing better for them
to do than to be cheerful and enjoy what is good in their lives. It is a gift
form Elohim to be able to eat and drink and experience the good that comes from
every kind of hard work. I realize that whatever Elohim does will last
forever.’ (Ecc. 3:11-14)
Everything changes when I ENJOY the ‘good that comes from
every kind of hard work’ – but realizing that whatever God does will last
forever, not what I do…the things of this world are fleeting, passing,
changing, gone in an instant…whatever my God does lasts for eternity. But how
refreshing to read that first line and to truly let it sink in – ‘ It is
beautiful how Elohim has done everything at the right time.’ Though I may not
understand the timing of things, though all that is in my mind might never fit
in a day, there is a time for everything and God is the one who does everything
at the right time and whatever He does lasts forever.
YES -- there IS a way to pull my head above the overwhelming
flood of things to do and to breathe deeply and look to Him and realize that
all I am asked to do is be cheerful and enjoy what is good in my days.
I do this by GIVING THANKS – as my thankfulness journal is
growing and stretching me as it expands. To see every LITTLE tiny minute detail
as an opportunity to give thanks…talk about making time stand still.
Because not all of you have read Ann Voskamp’s book “One
Thousand Gifts” I’ll just share with you the idea of the writing down in a list
1000 gifts in your life as a way of seeing God in everything and learning to
give thanks for all things and in all circumstances. What a difficult and
joyous process this has been.
Ann writes, “This
daily practice of the discipline of gratitude is the way to practice the
delight of God.’ Always looking for just one more in this unfolding of a
chronicle of grace, our life story in freeze frames of thanks ant only the
numbering leaving traces of our days, this counting blesssings was the
unlocking of the mystery of joy.”
Just 10 of them pulled out of the middle of mine…..
291.) grammar jingles sung at the top of the lungs
292.) Best friend’s voice on the phone
293.) Tea time talks on the bed
294.) Spanish dinners with gringos all trying hard
295.) obedience – pure and simple
296.) the 6:30 am bells that toll the time and I scurry out
the door
297.) honest tears of a child -- unhindered
298.) The words ‘te amo’ that squeeze insides like a tight
hug
299.) tennis balls on the bottom of chairs covering sound
that grates on nerves
300.) popcorn during long team meetings
I feel as if this is the time set aside in my life to teach
me what thankfulness in all circumstances really looks like…it almost seems as
if each small or big thing is specifically designed to test this resolve and
teach me the sometimes HARD act of that ‘sacrifice of praise’ that comes on a
deeper level, the acceptance of everything if sanctified by thanks and the word
of God…and the entering of God’s presence with thanksgiving. All are different
steps in this process, and all have been lessons that I thought would be simple
to learn….not so. J
As I’ve been sensing these spiritual lessons and asking God
for perspective and vision he brought me to a passage in John 17 and new truths
began to jump out there. In this chapter, I was astounded to see the
relationship of the Father and the Son, to enter a heart to heart conversation
between the two and to desire this in my relationship with the Trinity also. To me, the gospel all of a sudden became so
evident, as well as my calling and purpose.
“After all, you’ve
given him authority over all humanity so that he can give eternal life to all
those you gave to him. This is eternal life: to know You, the only true God and
Jesus Christ, whom You sent. On earth I have given You glory by finishing the
work You gave me to do. Now, Father, give me glory in Your presence. I made
Your name known to the people You gave me. Now they know that everything You
gave me comes form You, because I gave them the message You gave me. They have
accepted this message, and they know for sure that I came from You. They
believed that You sent me.” (John 17:2-8)
Wow – the heart of Christ and the communion between the
Father and Son. This is eternal life…to KNOW the only true God. ‘On earth I
have given you glory by finishing the work You gave me to do.’ – And this is
the most important work of all, this is the work I should be striving to
complete, measuring daily to see if it has been done….to ‘the people you gave
me’ the ones placed in my life in this TIME….that ‘they may know that
everything You gave me comes from You….they have accepted this message, and
they know for sure that I came from You.’
This is my mission, this is my calling, this is what I fix
my eyes on…that in everything those people entrusted to me may see that
EVERYTHING I have comes from God and that they would accept the message,
knowing that it is from the Heavenly Father…then there is glory in ‘finishing’
this work that is given….for the work of God is eternal, and this work is for
eternity.
How often though, do I get distracted, depleted, and
disgusted with the work of the here and now, the daily grind and the never
getting ahead? It is because I’ve taken my eyes off the prize…and that is
Christ, that is ‘to know the Only true God and Jesus Christ.’ This is the gist
of it…this is all I am called to do: make Christ known in all things, that He
may be glorified in me, and to ENJOY Him, giving thanks for the GOOD that has
been placed in my life and experience the good that also comes from every kind
of hard work and letting God do the eternal, lasting work in the process of it
all. With this perspective only will I ever rise above.
