The Final Countdown

      Well, this is my final week at home.  These next 4 days are my last days with my family. Early Friday morning, Mama and I will be heading to Texas, where I will check in for training on the 11 and 12, and Wednesday morning I will be on my way to Africa!

       As I write, I am listening to the laughter that comes so easy to my family, and thinking about how much I will miss that sound and the people that make it! Yet, I know that I will hear a laughter of a different kind; the laughter of children who previously did not know how to laugh. These will be the lives the Lord will touch through us this summer. That thought alone, is enough to make my heart glad that I am giving up one laughter for the other!

        Though my heart aches at the thought of going so far from my family, that fear  and apprehension is immediately replaced with all the joy and excitement that this heart can contain! It is truly my joy to honor and glorify my Lord, even if that means stepping out in faith and going so far away while I am still  this young and immature. Though I am naïve in the things of this world, I know that the Great Shepherd is guiding me through this life, daily bringing me to a greater sense of spiritual wisdom. What more could a creature of this world want, than to know that her Creator is giving her eternal riches beyond her greatest imagination? 

      It is with thoughts like this that my fears are put to rest, and my tears are dried up before they can run over. His invisible  hand has wiped those tears and settled those fears, so that they have no place in my life at such a time as this. God has truly captured my heart, taken control of my emotions, and once more ignited a holy flame within my being !! I am His and He is mine! Let His will be done with my life!!

“’For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you. To give you hope and a future!’”

Jeremiah 29:11