New Jersey...kinda

So you might be wondering what is going on in my life?
Well, to tell you the truth, nothing and a lot, if that makes sense.
We arrived in New Jersey on Saturday, September 29th in a little town called Kearny near Newark in the North of Jersey. Interestingly enough, we never planned on coming here. Jersey, yes,  but we were going to go to a bigger church a little bit south called Old Bridge, but I was looking through my messages and a friend of mine had messaged me before we even started the trip & said that we should stop by her church. That's another funy story-years ago when I lived in Orange County, I became great friends with a girl that I worked with. She was great friends with a girl from her school, Alice, so I would randomly see her around. Now, years later, she's graduated & moved back to the east coast & all of a sudden it makes sense why we met-God knew that one day, when I was walking with Him, I'd be doing this trip & He really wanted us at Calvary Chapel Kearny! Ok, backstory finished, we showed up at CC Kearny & planned on being there for about 3 days and then heading south. Two and a half weeks later, here we are, still in Kearny. So what happened?
Well I'm not really sure. We spent the first couple of days here-we went out witnessing, had dinner with Alice & her husband, Jim, and did our usual thing. On Tuesday evening, we went to the church again-they were having a servant class that Jim & Alice attended & invited us to, and we like to get in as much church as we can, so we went. Afterwards we were talking to different people & we met the pastor, who invited us to stay in his downstairs apartment, so we did. The next day, he literally spent almost the whole day with us. From 10am-6:30 pm, the three of us hung out & he just poured into us. He taught us, he shared his heart with us, and he even bought us lunch. Mmmmmmmmm :) So we ended up stay for church that night. Instead of the usual mid-week service, they had a time of prayer, worship, & sharing. I felt like I was supposed to share, but I really didn't want to because I wasn't sure if it was from me or not, but I ended up getting up.
I introduced myself & gave a very brief background of our trip, our trip home, and our return. I also shared with them how I prayed and prayed that God would let us go home. The last week of being home, I realized that I didn't want to leave. I wasn't ready. I could be used there, I loved it there, I was with all of my friends-right where I wanted to be. Adventure time was over, I was ready to be done but I knew I couldn't be without God's blessing, so I prayed and I prayed. And He said, "No". It wasn't time to go home. We had a mission, a great commission, to fulfill and we weren't done. I tried to encourage the body-there are going to be things that God wants us to do that we don't want to, but we have to remember that we don't live this life for ourselves. We live it for the glory of God and to bring others to Him. After all, "How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent?" I know I should be blessed that God would allow me to serve Him and most days I am, but some days I just miss my friends. I just want to be home doing ministry, but God has called me here, so here I am, trying my best to be obedient.
So anyways, that was Wednesday. Then Marc was invited to the Men's Retreat that weekend. He didn't want to leave me alone, but I really thought that he should go, so he did. In the meantime, I moved from the pastor's house, to stay with a family from the church, the Loaiza's. They are super awesome. They have been so welcoming and truly treat us like we are family. God is good to us, man.
So we've hit the streets a few times and had great conversations and not so great conversations. It's hard to get people in this area to care about what we have to say-everyone has an attitude of "What do you want?" so it can be a little bit tough to break through that. Mostly, I think that God is teaching me (or trying to teach me) about being a good wife. You always hear about letting your husband  be the man and not trying to take control, but I think it's pretty easy for us to justify why sometimes it's ok not to, but really, those are excuses, and bad ones. So I'm trying to work harder on following the design that God set out for marriage-for me to submit to my husband, to let him lead me, and to follow him as he follows Christ.
I feel as though there is a reason that God has had us here for so long, but I'm not exactly sure what that is. Either God hasn't revealed it to me yet or I haven't been listening hard enough. I'm not really sure which one, but I seek Him nonetheless.
I'm sitting here, trying to think of stories from New Jersey to tell you, but all I keep thinking of are mindsets and lessons I've learned. I guess I just have a lot on my mind today. Today's blog is a bit scatterbrained it looks like!
One good story-we were talking to this man in Newark and he goes to church but doesn't exactly believe in heaven/hell. That's about as much clarity as we got from him on that topic-he was kind of ambiguous. He seemed to have the attitude of "religion is helpful, but it's just psychological". As we were talking, he said, "Besides, the Bible has been changed so much over the years," and before he could even finish, this panhandler jumps in and says (loudly), "No it hasn't! People just think that because nowadays you have these watered down versions like the NLT & NIV!" It was pretty funny. She was very passionate, though.
Perhaps my brain will allow me to blog a little better later, but for now, that's New Jersey.

New York and .....Uganda?

Hello again :)

In my last update we were on our way to Canandaigua, NY for a pastors/leadership conference. It was really awesome because we got to spend the week with a family that we met last time we were there and are totally in love with, the Kenney's. Joe & Shannon have 5 kids who are crazy and awesome and we love them, but their heart is for evangelism and reaching the lost, so much so that they are moving from their awesome home that sits on 4 acres, to live in the ghetto of Buffalo (or Rochester) and minister to the people there. Sweet. 

So we got there and went to the conference which lasted from Monday afternoon-Wednesday morning. It was cool but it wasn't really anything outstanding. I guess I expected more from it. Don't get me wrong, the messages were good, it was good encouragement, but my mind wasn't blown. We did get to meet Pastor Joe Focht who is the pastor at a Calvary in Philly, so he's going to be able to direct us to people we can do ministry with. 

So the conference ended on Wednesday morning and we weren't sure if we should leave that afternoon or wait, but we figured we could just go to church that evening and leave the next morning. So after church we were hanging out for a couple of minutes, saying hi to some people we had met last time, when we ran into Jen. When we were in town in July, we met her & her 5 kids, but her husband was in Uganda at the time. If you've been following my blog for long enough, you'll remember them. Well, after church, we finally got to meet her husband! Let me refresh your memory if you don't know who I'm talking about. This family of 7 (Tyler & Jen, then their 5 kids aged 8, 6, 4, 2, & almost 1) that has one on the way, are moving to Northern Uganda to live in a hut and share Jesus with the people. It's a little more complex than that, but that is basically the purpose. How awesome! Back story aside, her we go with the story-we met Tyler and as we were talking to him, told him that we wanted to visit him in Uganda in a couple of years. He said, "Please do!" And I said, "We want to! We've been praying about it for years!" 

Knowing that we were leaving the next day, they came over that night and Tyler shared the vision with us, which I will share with you!
Ok, so for those of you who don't know, Uganda is central eastern Africa. Southern Uganda is pretty modern-settled cities & stuff, but in the north, it's all huts and whatever the opposite of modern is. Because of the decades long war that went on, people were living in UN refugee camps and now, don't know how to work their land. When the Goodens (Tyler & Jen) get down there, they'll be taking over the work from this guy, Zane who has been down there for some years now, but his wife had to come back to the states because she has Lyme's disease & will die if she goes back to Africa. Zane is still down there because they adopted 11 Ugandan kids & now have to go through the legal process of bringing them home! A sticky situation! Please pray for them! So as I was saying, what Zane does & what Tyler will do, is find people who have land then make them a proposition-give us your land for 2 years. At the end of the 2 years, we'll give it back to you as a working farm, to which everyone says yes! So now they have land-who's going to work it? The locals! Genius, because it creates jobs! The locals work the land and are paid according to how much they work. Over the 2 years, they raise up people to oversee the farms and to disciple the workers, so not only are they providing for themselves & their families, they're hearing the gospel! 

One thing that I thought was really cool and a very sharp contrast to the people in America-the people in Uganda think it is rude if you don't stop them & talk to them! When we evangelize here, we just have a few minutes of sharing before the other person doesn't wanna hear it or has to be somewhere. In Uganda, Tyler was telling us that they call street witnessing "house visits" because you stop one person to talk to them & they want to know more so they invite you to their house! Not only that, but they bring over their family and as many people will fit in their hut to hear the gospel! You can share with them for hours and they sit and listen. How wonderful is that?! 

Here is the problem-what about afterwards? Who will disciple them? Who will teach them to follow the Lord? US!!! Jesus said, "The harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few." Exactly dude! Are you afraid of evangelism? Talking to people you don't know because of the fear of rejection? But you want to share your faith? Pray about going to Africa! Seriously! 

If you want to check out the Gooden's story, here is their blog:

www.curlyheadedfamily.blogspot.com

Needless to say, I believe this is the reason that we went back to Canandaigua-not for the conference, but to sit down with the Goodens and get a heart for exactly what they're doing. But that has brought up another problem-my heart is so excited for Africa, I want to go asap! Like, go home, get a job, save for a couple months, then bounce, but God hasn't told us to go home yet. The Goodens aren't even there yet! 

So that's where we are with that. Finishing this trip, praying for the Goodens and Zane & Summer. 

Also, while you're praying, pray for the Kenneys! The 1st family I mentioned that are moving to the ghetto. :)

While we were there, we went with them to Rochester to serve with this guy who opened a mobile soup kitchen and the only thing he's ever paid for is the bus. Did I mention they've been doing it for a year and a half AND their office is a house? That was donated! And all of their food is always donated! They go out about 15 times a month with food & clothes and they feed the people but before they do, they give them the gospel. It's pretty fantastic! We got to have a really sweet conversation with this girl who said she was an atheist, but that's only because she had never really sat down & talked about it before. It was so awesome, she really listened to everything we had to say.

Next up: New Jersey. Stay tuned. :)