So here it is again, that time to write a blog and share my heart. Hopefully my plan to leave all of you in suspense worked. These past couple of months in Africa have been so good, so hard, so challenging, so rewarding, and a million other emotions all wrapped up in two months. Through it all God is good. Uganda was a beautiful place and the ministry was a lot of evangelism. We worked with Pastor Rosemary and she is one of the most vivacious women I have ever met. She being a widow herself has a huge heart for both widows and orphans. When you look into her eyes, you can see the fire like passion that radiates from her eyes. She is a bold woman to say the least. We had to the opportunity to go with this God fearing woman into the homes around Busia, Uganda (right along the Kenyan border) to sit down with a lot of young women and children and share about Jesus. 8 months of evangelism and it doesn't get any easier. Sitting down with someone who has never known the love of a father or ever had anything easy in life and well to try to tell her that there is a hope for something greater, sometimes I have a hard time believing it myself.

 Rajab and Jisef

So how to begin, the past four years have been quite the journey, quite the adventure and more glorious than anything I could ever have imagined. The taste of freedom is now my beautiful anthem, the love of God is now my driving force into each moment. I walk daily in victory and I am consumed by the fire that refuses to go out. I walk in my moments of wisdom applied and I walk in my moments of fleshly desires. Nothing has been able to separate me from the love of my Father, no forces of evil, no angels, no demons, not life, nor death, NOTHING. I can't do anything, not one single thing to make Him love me any less and I pray that Gods goodness will allow me to have that exact same kind of love.

      I can't even express this glorious joy He has blessed me with, I don't have to see you Jesus but with my heart I know confidently that you are there and I love you. We hear so often in our society, don't use the word "love" so loosely, well it is quite clear that we have lost all true sense of what this word means. God commands us to love one another as we love ourselves. So let me walk around and tell all of his creations that they are loved and let me not just speak it but let the actions behind my words be the truth. I was one of those people who believed that word was not to be used so loosely and even saying it was kind of awkward for me but why should it be awkward to tell my brother or sister that I love them, I don't have to know them, God didn't say get to know people then you can love them. NO, He said love them, this is one of my greatest commands. This doesn't mean you have to fall in love with every man or woman you see it just means that you know truly that you care about your family.

      Family in its purest form has slipped away from our grasp, let us forget that we don't share the same DNA and remove our excuses of being different, different personalities, different interests. We live in a broken world now where there are many who have never experienced the sweet embrace of a mother or father, those who have never been told that they are loved and cared about and as the body we need to rise up and show those who are forgotten daily that there is a hope. Let our love for one another be patient, kind, let it protect, trust, hope, and persevere.  Love will never fail us. These three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is LOVE. If faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains then what can the smallest drop of love do in the lives of others?

      Let our hearts be transformed, let us remove the pains and hurts of our past, let our hearts be opened to truly receive what the Lord wants to give. Let us not live alone on knowledge or faith because without love we are and gain nothing. So let us ask the question, dear heavenly Father, what does it look like for me to love my neighbor as myself? What does it look like to have this kind of love that your word describes?

Here are some pictures from our month in Kenya

The usual toilet in Kenya and Uganda

I know my blogs haven't been as descriptive of our ministry and what we are doing so I figured its better late than never to share with all of you what the Lord is doing here this month. To begin, Kenya is beautiful, as we drove from Nairobi to Kitale (that is where we are living this month), I was captivated by the scenery. The shades of green and the beautiful landscape that was before me took my breath away; I found myself more in awe with our maker. I felt that if I walked out of the bus, I would be walking into a mystical land from a science fiction movie, I found myself wanting to wander through the forest and walk down into the valleys that reflected an innumerable amount of green shades. As I stood there I breathed it all in, I am witnessing the beauty of my creator's imagination.

                The ride was a little bumpy but visually captivating. After several bathroom stops and naps we finally arrived in Kitale 8 hours later. I was very grateful that I had decided to keep my jacket with me because it is really cold here below the equator. After about 30 minutes our contacts arrived to pick us up. This month we are working with Ben and Christine, their ministry name is Shekinah glory. They have been serving the Lord now since the beginning of 2000. They both left their comfortable jobs for the calling that the Lord placed on their lives to pastor and build churches, schools and orphanages. The ministry that we are able to work with this month is very wide spread. They have orphanages and churches that they have begun outside of Kenya as well.

                When we arrived at their home they had dinner prepared for us and made us feel at home right away. This month is really like living in a really close and large family. There are 20 of us crammed into this small house, in our room there is a double decker and a triple decker bunk bed. I am sharing the bottom twin bunk with one of my squad mates. As we have little personal space and time alone but I am enjoying every bit of this community. It is two teams together this month and I feel like there are so many complimenting aspects of our teams that have allowed for us to get along great and learn from one another. We have morning and evening devotionals every day with the Shekinah family. There is a lot of structure to our schedule and I am really grateful for that, it has helped with having better discipline

                It's funny how much we can resist structure yet when we have it; it really changes how we function on a daily basis. This month is going by so quickly at the same time and it is a month that the Lord has set up for intimacy with Him in such a glorious way. I am learning to really love and appreciate the things in life as simple as having dinner together as a family and sitting around playing games.

                Last week we spent a good bit of it painting at one of their churches/ school/orphanage. Kenyans love to come up to you and shake your hand, they love being talked to and their smiles are beautiful. Witnessing the poverty among the people here really opens my eyes to see how wealth steals a sense of joy for those who have all they could want and more.  I loved on the young ones and on the older children; all of them craved the attention that they miss out from a mother of father. There was one little girl who in particular didn't really talk but when she smiles, I know the Lord smiles right back to see the beautiful smile of His daughter. She really took a liking to Katie and unfortunately she happened to pee on Katie a couple of times!

                All of these kids, they have so little and yet they are able to maintain such a joy and it really all ties in with Philippians 4:12-13. They have truly seemed to learn the secret to being content in their circumstance. I grew up with so much that I usually take for granted, such as a nice clean toilet to use, a warm shower most of the time, something other than beans and rice to eat for lunch every day. So I am curious as to whether I am really going to learn from this, am I going to go home and live, am I really going to learn the difference between what I want and what I need? It is such an easy trap to fall into, comfort, luxury, easy. I hope and pray now that I will not walk back into the exact abandonment I was trying to achieve.

I don't really remember someone noticing me for anything special that radiated from within and I can't really say that it was there. So now, my struggle has been really hearing what the Lord says about me, and not just hearing but truly believing it and humbly accepting it. The Lord decided to raise me up as a leader 3 months ago and even now, I sometimes lack the confidence to see what others do, I am quicker to receive how I am doing something wrong that to receive how delighted my Father is in his girl. I find myself really wondering sometimes what it is that someone else may see, I wonder do I really radiate the light of our Lord, are people truly seeing the essence of my core?

And the truth behind all of this is...

I AM ROYALTY

I AM LOVED BEYOND ALL MEASURE

I AM BEAUTIFUL IN HIS EYES

I AM UNIQUE AND ONE OF A KIND

I AM CHOSEN

I AM REEDEEMED

I AM MADE NEW

I AM FREE

I WAS WOVEN TOGETHER BY HIS VERY HANDS

HE SMILES UPON ME AND LAVISHES HIS UNCONDITIONAL LOVE FOR ALL ETERNITY

I AM HIS DAUGHTER, WITH WHOM HE IS WELL PLEASED

I AM MADE WHOLE

            So these are wonderful and beautiful things of the Lord. This is what He said to me one day "I possess the living water, and my source never runs dry. I bring life and I live in you, therefore, allow that power to exude, allow me to give life through you."

            So my faith is not in myself and what I can do, but my faith is in Him and what He WILL do.

Another thing He has continued to show me, every time that I think " how much deeper could we possibly go, there isn't possibly anything left that I could trust Him with, I couldn't possibly learn another thing right now, etc." He shows me, oh Lili, you just wait!!! So I do, and then a tidal wave crashes over my existence. I am tossed in the current, in the moment of learning it, it can be painful and extremely hard.

I am not a controlling person and I have never been but oh my goodness!! This girl needs to let it go, so simple yet so hard, to surrender even more. To be honest, I don't know how to even try to try to surrender (did that make sense?) So back to my original point, I am in capable of even trying to not try!

When I found myself waking up in the morning dreading the day before me, when my joy seemed to have been stripped from me, I really had to examine why I couldn't see the blessing before me. Why did the sun rising seem to lose its glow and why did serving others through loving the Lord seem more of a burden than a privilege. We so easily allow the distractions of the world and ourselves become the focus that drives on a windy road. We forget the narrow path; it doesn't matter if you are sitting in an office 8 hours a day, if you are serving the Lord as a missionary in Africa, If you work for a church, or even if you are strong believer in your faith. The world does shift us at times and I found my focus shifted this past month. In my lack of trust, I began to fear, what comes next, what do you have for me  in the future Lord, what purpose do I serve. I concentrated so deeply on feeling worth through a purpose that I forgot to lose myself in Him, how beautiful it is to lose our selves only to find Him. How majestic, how romantic, how surreal, how fulfilling, to allow the pieces of our lives literally fall into our laps because we stopped caring so much on the outcome and just want to follow in daily obedience and fascination of your heavenly maker.

So yes, I struggle at times, I struggle remembering how fun a past memory was, how much excitement there was in living dangerously close to a line that becomes so blurry so quickly, I remember and become lost in what I had only to forget what I have now. I have a life that is filled with the peace of the Lord, no matter the circumstance or the failure, shame and guilt, they are a fading fragment of how I lived. How can I not rejoice, when the Lord never stops being good, when I have a joy that sustains me. The very things that I lacked in my past life, I lacked waking up in the morning and being able to truly feel filled, whole, complete and loved. I would rather wake up with the Lord one day than a 1000 days of fun recollections, in the end those memories are not what make up how well we lived our life, in the end the synchronized beat of our heart with our Abba's is the only concern of His.

Your fire is my will

Your spirit is my breath

Your strength is my destiny

Your love is my core.

I live in you and you in me.

Faithfully His,

Liliana Michell 

I just want to precede this blog by telling you that I realize our attentions spans sometimes get the best of our abilities. So, I have written this blog and it will be cut into 2 or 2 parts, just so I can keep you on your toes (hopefully J). I know all of you are so eager to read what the Lord is doing! So brace yourselves... and now for our main feature....

I find myself in this situation so often, sitting before this small laptop, just scrambling for words and some sort of coherent flow in my thought structure. I sit and try to find all the right words and descriptions of what I am experiencing and have experienced in these past few months. I wouldn't say that I am a person who processes on a daily basis or even on a monthly basis for that matter. So for the last three months, the writing came to a halt. I found myself with writers block, or processor block ;). As soon as I hit Thailand the Lord knew, it was time for the last 3 months to come out, hopefully not in word vomit (not pretty imagery).

            So, I hand this over to Him right now because I have learned that there is no success in gathering from myself. That the very breath I take to continue life, is all God breathed, the very source of motivation to rise in the morning is realizing the God I serve. The very desire to resemble His son each day is woven into my very making. So what has He taught me? Let's just say it is going to be a long list, so don't give up on reading this just yet. I sat at dinner tonight with my amazing squad leader Vanessa; her questions really got my mind stirring on some earlier thoughts and revelations from this month.

            Let's begin at the part where Peter describes what happens when you live for God. When we live for God, we choose to pick up that cross, we choose to die to our self-daily, so in this long struggle to die to my flesh daily I have recently come to finally realize how much of that flesh has been suffocating for the sting of death. If I am honest with myself, I did not actually pick any cross or choose to walk as Jesus did as soon as I said 'I do'. No, many failed and unfaithful attempts proved how much my flesh had learned to thrive for 20 years of my life. So to say the least, the struggle was an ongoing battle that ended in my failure one too many times. So I kept beating myself up about it, the flesh would win again and I would go about my own journey, my own created salvation, my own idea of what following Christ meant.

            Two years later, I feel like I finally submerged out of the water after thinking I was going to drown for so long. It was like the Lord snapped His fingers and I felt myself finally walk out freedom for the first time in my life. This only happened a few months before the race, don't get me wrong, my struggles are still there strong as ever, but for the first time, I have allowed myself to see the Lord as stronger and victorious. To say the least, these past 6 months have been some very flesh suppressed months and for the first time my eyes have really been open to the suffering that I have taken up from denying myself. I have found my spirit fighting and the Lord stripping (quite painfully at times) the flesh that has tried to take control for so long. I have felt the attempts for it to feed off any and everything possible, any memory has easily turned into, oh remember that one time you did that... that was a lot of fun, or man look at that intense love scene in that movie, that is how love really happens (those love flicks really know how to grab onto your emotions!!).

            So the Lord is stripping and renovating and internally I feel my spirit fighting so hard for me, I feel the Lord letting me know that He won't allow the enemy to harm me, he can take this life but in my death, there would only be gain and glory for the Lord, so the enemy has lost. In all of this stripping, I feel like He has also shown me how much of the physical He has stripped as well. In the past, what I thought of myself was centered on the attention that I received from a guy because he thought I was pretty, so really the physical is where I saw much of my worth. Not that I have cared much about physical appearance but it never allowed me to dive deeper into seeing the woman of God manifesting inside of me.

He is both breath taking and powerful.

to be continued...

As humans, I know we always find ourselves wondering what goes on behind closed doors?  For some of us, curiosity wins, some of us choose to draw our concern away.  I find myself trying to write the story of someone's life that I have never lived.  I try to find myself speaking from the perspective of someone's experience, pain, happiness and sadness. My observations are not enough to know, my guesses could not even come close to taste the stings of life that carry on in someone's heart.  So I found myself walking last night through a street of bars.  The same scene repeated in each bar, older foreign men and young Thai women.  I see these men sitting with girls that could either be their daughter or granddaughter's.  These men are seeking and being broken just as much as the poor women that fall victim to devaluing themselves.  My heart breaks that it is their choice, because they are actually convinced that there are no other options and that their worth can be summed up in currency.

 I desire so much to know what they feel about themselves, what they think about themselves. What lie became so rooted in their heart and makeup that they stopped seeing the beauty of the creator and creation.  Where did they stop thinking and knowing that they are loved and cared about beyond measure, or did they ever really know?  To my sadness, I realize as well that there are people who choose not to be curious and choose not to care; this entire country carries a spirit of apathy to what is occurring in their own back yard!  I just keep asking God to please open people's eyes and burden their hearts.  Many women just don't know where their worth is established.  The norm is having sex and getting paid for it, the norm is being used.  The norm is that they don't deserve any better.  The lies topple and the truth has become so skewed that attempting to find what is buried is a process with time.  So, I want to listen, I want to sit with these women, buy them a drink and listen without any intentions.  My motive is to listen and love, my motive is to shut my mouth and let the Lord speak to His daughter.

            So, you see, I am curious.  I don't want to be curious for one month but allow my entire life to be a curiosity of the Lords creations and to spread that curiosity.  I want it to be contagious for us to want to know and go beyond that. Let us not only pray for a solution but become the solution.  I want us all to learn to steward what the Lord has given us, such as the blessing of knowing your worth so spread it, spread the love and encouragement!  Let's continue to live in the victory our Father already has.  Let our hearts be burdened and our actions show the love that we know.

pictures to come with this posting...

This is what the Lord said

     I have officially reached the half way mark.  My thoughts for this month have been delayed than the usual predicted time frames.  Usually, people reach month 3 and realize I have another 9 months of this! Well, in my case, here I am, leading into month 6 and finding my endurance fade.  The good news about that is that, I don't run this race on my own endurance. I don't wake up in the morning based on my own strength.  I don't have a continued peace and joy from my own efforts and I don't keep going because of myself.  The Lord put me in this equation for a reason, but He bares the glory, He did after all, create the equation, determine the variables and control.  His infinite wisdom, orchestrated the song of each and every one of our lives and His signature is on not only our souls but all that our eyes capture and beyond that.

       I have asked Him, Daddy can I just walk for a minute, can I just take a little break, I am weary and my body is not holding up anymore.  He gently reminds me, honey, you haven't been running this race, and would your flesh have even made it to the half way mark?  In all honesty my flesh would not have made it to the beginning line.  He urges me, keep going, I have you, I am providing the endurance you need, I am providing the strength, the motivation, the drive, the nourishment, and I have it all.  I just desire for you to keep on the path I have set before you.  Don't worry if you trip, I will pick you up, don't worry if your lungs become short of breath, I will breath my holy spirit into you, don't stop if you have a muscle cramp, I will heal it with my gentle hands.  So I say, well then, I will stop trying to gather from myself because I feel tired, we tend to get to this point where we run low and we attempt to gather from our own strengths, our attempts our futile, only He has the living water that will never run dry.

            So, I look back right now and know I am not the same person I was 2 months ago, before He radically changed this journey even more. I realize, 5 countries in 5 months has nothing to do with what and how the Lord reveals and changes us.  It was His means, in His plans, It is all Him who does it, not Ecuador, Peru, or Honduras.  It is the Lord all along.  It is a blessing that He chose to do it this way that I taste abandonment, but even in my abandonment, there are still luxuries, I still have food before me every meal of every day. I have a place to lay my head, stores and malls within a short distance.  I still have to face the reality of life every day, I still have to fight the draw of internet, I still have to learn to be wise about my money, I still have to choose to eat right and to exercise, I still have to discipline myself as I would in the U.S. The beauty of it all is that I don't have to do it alone, that there are more who are hungry, to step outside the boundaries that have been set up by society when it comes to religion. The missing pieces of faith are displayed daily as we see where our qualifications just don't meet up; we are incapable, only God could pull off some of the crazy miraculous things He does.

            Education takes you somewhere, but what is knowledge without removing God outside of that box you seemed to have caged Him in.  Now, that I have run off on a tangent, I can sum things up to something simple  I don't know where the Lord has me right now.  I am waiting on the Lord, and there is nowhere I would rather be. 

Destination: Tegucigalpa, Honduras

Mission: Unknown

            When I first looked at the contact information that was emailed to me about our ministry in Honduras, there was nothing written except that there were two neighborhoods that our contact worked with. We all went into the month not knowing what to expect and leaving completely blown away. I want to start with telling you the story of Christopher. Christopher is a 16 year old boy, the oldest in his family. The day before we came, he hit what our contact, Tony, called 'rock bottom'. Tony found Christopher passed out underneath a large pile of trash behind his small brick house. His face was filthy and he had dried blood running down his face. He was stoned out of his mind from paint thinner. Fast forward one day. We arrive and Tony proceeds to tell us that Christopher has been addicted to paint thinner for over 3 years. He had a mission in mind for the month of April though, that is where Eden comes in.

            Eden is the name of the farm, in which Tony lives. It's a safe place that he has brought back young street kids to experience a taste of something different then their normal gang activities, drinking, drugs, neglectful homes, and poverty. These kids have no hope, I literally felt the atmosphere of hopelessness fall heavy as I walked around the neighborhood of Los Pinos. The homes are probably the size of a middle class living room with probably AT LEAST 5 people per home. The mothers, some may be working hard and some may have just given up to go hang out with their men. I was shocked to hear the stastic that some 85% of children born in Honduras do not have a father's name on the birth certificate. Funny enough I fall into that category, so I can relate on some level. The level I cannot relate on is how these kids have nothing and nothing to live for.

            This is where Tony's mission is very different. His ministry is not based on a go and do basis but I saw him just live his faith by spending time in this neighborhood and gaining the confidence of the kids and teenagers. I have never seen the father's heart displayed in such a tangible manner than Tony and his boys. Being burned and experiencing rejection time and time again has not stopped him from trying to love them. He refuses to give up on the boys and he goes into the neighborhood to simply love on them and live life with them.

            Now back to Christopher, in the past 3 years, he has not gone more than a couple days clean and sober. Tony gave him the option of staying on the farm for a month (with no plan after that), which meant he could not go back home, it was a commitment, that this month would be dedicated to trying to begin a new life. Tony was fully prepared to experience all of the hardships of withdrawal and fully aware of the possibilities of how hard it may be. We came prepared with our battle armor, with prayer, with faith, Christopher, had a very smooth month, he slept a lot the first few days but after that you started seeing life come back into him.

            So many had spoken death over him for so long, saying there is no hope for him, he needs to be in a clinic, why are you still wasting your efforts with him? With God's grace and perfect timing, we saw that death get crushed and Christopher, who refused to go back to school, after dropping out in 2^nd grade level, began inquiring about finishing school and graduating. God is so much bigger; God strength is made perfect in our weaknesses. Christopher has a testimony and I pray that He continues to have faith that there is better and God is holding it in His hands.

That is just the story of one boy, there are many more and God plans on raising up this neighborhood, He plans on redeeming and raising up leaders for his snowball effect to begin. His Kingdom cannot be stopped, His will cannot be delayed.

Christopher in front after his baptism and Tony on the right.

The boys of Los Pinos and our teammates

Henry and me (Henry has been adopted into Tony's family and has lived with them for 3 months, such a sweet kid with a sweet heart and a great example of how Tony's pursuance of him has eternally changed his life.)