Meeting Mitu

So for those who are reading this that don't know who Mitu is, she was a child that i started sponsoring when i was 15 and from the day i started sponsoring her i said i had always wanted to go to Bangladesh to meet her. well sadly just a few short years after i started sponsoring her she sadly drowned along with a few other girls from her village. They where bathing in a pond when one of the girls went out to deep then the other 3 went to help her and sadly all 4 died. So while the title might be a bit miss-leading as i did not meet Mitu i have just returned from a trip to Bangladesh and some amazing things happened there.

Even after she passed away there was still this heart that i had to go to her country i might not have been able to meet her but i could at least get an glimpse into her culture and in that know her a bit better. It might not make sense but this was how i wanted to honor her life and even though i only knew her though letter we wrote back and forth maybe 4-5 a year for 3.5 years. She was the first person i ever called my little sister and she was the first person to ever call me big sister.

so when i got this opportunity to go to her county to visit some friends as well as meet and spend time with some locals i was very excited i really wanted to experience her culture. from when i first arrived i loved every second of it from talking about cricket with those in immigration to seeing the traffic and lack of traffic on the roads over the first few days to eating with my hand which i have always loved so that was awesome to eating rice 2 sometimes 3 times a day not wearing shoes to seeing a city which has way to many people to visiting the villages. i just loved the country and the people. I got the opportunity to tell Mitu's story and tell them why i had always wanted to see this country with some of people i met and this resulted in the best thing that came out of my trip.

When i was getting ready to go home on my last day there i was talking to the locals that i had spent the 2 weeks and they were telling me about how i had been a blessing to them, which is hard to see as they were so hospitable and i feel they blessed me more then i blessed them but that  is how it goes you always feel the other side is more of a blessing but then they feel the same. But then 2 of the guy said something that i was not expecting at all.








This is a potato cake that i had it was delicious but it was also one of the least yellow foods i ate.

They said that where were most blessed by my story and by the fact that i sponsored a child from Bangladesh as they both grew up being sponsored and they never got to meet or even write letters to the person who sponsored them so in us meeting this was in a way i got to meet a child who was sponsored and they got to meet someone who sponsored a child and this was a true blessing for both of us as they told me just how much that sponsorship change their lives and the lives of all the children they grew up with which was really amazing.  i was never expecting this and i was blessed beyond words to have this opportunity.

Since the day i found out that Mitu had died i have had a bracelet with her name engraved on it. She has been on my heart since the day i started sponsoring her and now i have been to her county and seen her people and in a way met her.

It's not meant to be hard

i have one of the greatest jobs in the world, i have the privilege of helping other understand the bible and how to read it. this week in Mauritius, Africa we have been done 3 bible studies and in one of them one of the locals at the end turned to me and said "wow this is so easy i never thought it could be so easy to study the bible" to which i replied "its not meant to be hard". I have found that this is a very common belief that Christians have, the bible is complicated and hard to understand and you need to have a degree in theology to even be able to read it. this is not remotely true!

before i did my bible school this was my thought to that i could not understand the bible its too hard and complicated but after i started studying it i realised just how easy it really is. in saying this i am not saying that it does not take work it does but there are ways you can read the bible without having to spend year in a bible collage.

you might think this is easy for me to say as i have spent time time in a bible collage but those who we were doing bible study with this week have not and for them the simple steps we gave helped them to understand the bible and so many comments were made about how easy it was. so for those who are wondering the simple steps we use are Pray, Observe, Interpret and Apply. Making sure to read the whole passage, story or book to ensure that you are not taking the verses out of context.

(this is some of the students of the last school dressing up like the staff)










This reality is everyone can read and study the bible as the relations come from God and he knows everyone's heart and mind and how he can speak to them so its the most impactful. if your doing a bible study with a group of friends and even though you are reading the same passage different things stand out to different people. don't let the fact you have never been to bible school stop you from reading the bible. you don't need to be a theologian all you need is the bible and God. He is the one who wrote it so he will explain it to you ITS NOT MEANT TO BE HARD! Don't let this lie that you cant study the word of God cause you don't know how God has given you all the tools you need.

What teaching, taught me.

When you go into a place to teach you will always leave having learnt more, this is one of the biggest things that i have taken away from my time teaching in Samoa. When i was planning on doing this teaching outreach heading back to Aus and going to one of the islands was not what i has planned but it was exactly where i needed to go. While i was there i met some amazing people and got to teach the word of God to 100s of people.


If you had told me that before i would go that i would be teaching to a packed church that had people overflowing into the street and that people walking by would stop to hear me teach i would not have believed you. I would have said something like "that cant be possible, i don't have anything that important to say" and the reality is i am right. i do not have anything to say but God does all i have to do is speak his words. I have done some amazing these of the past 4 years and i am constantly asking myself if this is real life this is due to the fact that there is no way any of this should be possible. I don't have the
expertise of the experience to warrant teaching so many but God does.

I got some amazing experiences on this trip and met some amazing people who changed my life. This trip showed me just how much God will use the pain of the past to shine his glory. I got the opportunity to teach the book of Job in a bible school teaching them just how good God is even when everything is falling apart and knowing that I can say that no matter what God is always good. actually the word good is no where near close enough to describe it. If we use to the word good to discribe God then it cant be used to discribe anything else not a house, a car, not even friends and family. Nothing can even compare to God and yet he gives us so much, so much that we take for granted.

This is the reality there is nothing that we can do, nothing that we can give up that can even come close to what God has done for us. He gave up his own life so that we can did and all he asks for us is everything. To me that is not that much giving up death for life is not a hard choice to make. But what about the smaller things its easier to give up the big things we can easily count the cost when choosing to follow God, for example i know that being a missionary means leaving my family and i will miss so much because of it. If you truly want to follow God then you have been called to live no longer in the world that the fleeting joys that this world can give us are nothing compared to God so why do we keep chasing them.

Traveling the world i have seen many different countries met 1000s of people and 1 things is always the same they all have love their part of the world more then others. Its only natural right? To love the place you grow up to be proud of where you come from? Yes you should be very proud of where you came from but the reality is that you don't come from where your passport says, we come from God. heaven is our home and there is nothing and nowhere on the planet that even comes close to that so why do we keep giving up heaven to have earth? During this trip i asked a group of 20 young people i was teaching what is the cost of following Christ? For some the cost is high for some it is life for some it is family and friends, money but here is the real question. What is the cost for not following Christ? There is nothing we can give up no cost we can pay that will even come close to the cost of not following him. This is the closet to hell that us as Christians will ever get, but this is closest to heaven that non Christians will ever get. That is why i do what i do, no matter how hard it gets i know that this life is so short compared to eternity so what ever suffering we feel here does not even come close to the eternal glory.

God deserves everything that we have to offer all we have to do is say yes and be willing to pay the cost and while it will be hard God is with us so it will always be worth it. I honestly don't know if this makes any sense i kinda just started typing and this is what came out so i hope it makes sense. This is what i do know, God is so much better then anything of this world and there is nothing on this planet that can ever compare to God, so why do we keep chasing the fleeting pleasures of this world? God knows us and he knows our hearts and he does not leave us, chase him and there is nothing that will compare to what he will give you and even if all we get out of it is out salvation then that is way more then we deserve.

I'm always leaving.

The adventures when you follow God are the best you will ever have, no matter what dreams you have, the plans you have made when you live for God His plans, His way will always be better. This is the life i have chosen and to chose it all i had to do was say yes, say yes to living his way not mine but what does this mean?  

These days it seems i am always leaving somewhere and no matter how much i want to be in the place i am going, i never want to leave. Saying goodbye is always so hard leaving is always going to suck because the reality is you never know if it will be the last. This is what happens when you travel when the term "Home" can be many difference places. 

I know where my home is and right now there are people i love very much waiting for me there but for now i am here on earth and while i know my home is in heaven that does not mean we don't get a taste of it down here. That is what i think we call home that feeling of belonging that we get when are in the presence of our Lord so the taste of it we have down here is nothing compared to what we will have. 

So what do you do when there are many places that to you feel like home? That when you go to one you are leaving the other? well in my opinion, you say yes. You follow the one who created it all the one that gave us "home". Gods plan is way better then our His ways are so much better and while this will never make leaving easy Jesus is worth of it. There is nothing we can give up no cost that there is that will ever be more then what God has done for us what he is worthy of our everything. Even if that means leaving. Leaving our old lives behind and following him wherever he send us. 

(All these pictures where taken in places that feel like home, most of which i would not have if i did not say yes)

No, i am not okay.

                                           Its been a year and i miss him more everyday. <3 

It has been 1 year since i last talked to my little brother to share my day with him, to hear about his and make silly jokes that no one but us would understand. When i lost him and his twin the storm clouds seemed like they would never end. while i still hide a lot of pain behind a smile it has been in this pain that i have learnt a lot and most of what i have learnt has still come from my little brother. 

He had a faith that changed lives everyone he met was changed and his life just screamed Jesus and that is how i want to live. While i have really struggled over the last year and still do i have never lost my faith in God, in His goodness and faithfulness. While i might be falling apart He is and always be faithful, He has never left me so why would i ever leave him. This has been one of the biggest lesson i have learnt that no matter what life can throw at us God is always bigger and he is always with us. 

These are my amazing grandfathers who have both gone to heaven in the last few years. 

We are not promised a tomorrow, so why do we put off living until later. There is this hope that i have been able to hold onto over the last year and that is that all those i have lost in the past 2 years i will see again i know exactly where they are, in the arms of our loving savouir. What about those that do not have that hope. How can they go though lose without it and how can we as a body of Christ not go out there and change that. We have the best gift that we can ever have and we need to share it with the world. 

This is the biggest lesson i have learnt out of the many many and it is in many ways i am not okay and the biggest thing I AM NOT OKAY with is that there is many people in this world that have never heard the name of Jesus and that is not okay. We can not be content with this and we need to fight with ever breathe we have we need to show the world this hope that we have because we do not know when we will be going home to the arms of Jesus. While we are hear we need to fight, fight ageist the world and what it throws at us and shout the name of Jesus. There are to many people in this world that are hurting and don't have any hope we need to show them. I can't wait to party it up with my brothers in Heaven but i want that party to be huge so until then i will tell everyone i can about the Love and salvation that come from Jesus. 

Home for the holidays

Well its that time of year again they time for family and friends and food, when we all stop to remember the day that love came down but what about those who can't make it "home". As you sit around the table on Christmas day all the foods that just make Christmas whatever that be for your family, looking around the table maybe there are some chairs that are empty as some family are to far away from "home"

This will be at all my family gathering this year and those who know me, know just how many families I have yet around the tables there will be these empty seats people who are missing because I thought Canada was far away this year I learnt that Heaven is way further.




While I am over 14,000km away from most of my I can still call them and Skype and due this gift of technology I will still see them on Christmas day which can make it feel like home is not that far away. No, I don't think that this is the same as being in the same room as them and yes I wish I could hug them all so very much, I have come to realise that the other end of phone is way better then waiting till heaven to see them again.

(My families trees)

These empty chairs don't mean that there is less love, less family or friends. While our loved ones are spending Christmas with the one who the whole holiday is about Jesus. We can remember the reason for this holiday and remember that this is not the end that because of this day 2000 odd years ago we have a hope and future that we will once again be reunited with those we miss. I know that this does not make it hurt any less or make those empty chairs any less saddening, think about the day Jesus left heaven and the empty chair that would have created the pain it caused seeing him suffer on earth tortured and killed by those he came to save yet he left and created that empty chair so that we can sit at his table when we finally go "home for the holidays".

So where ever you are spending the holidays this year cherish those who are around you. Last year I has this plan to have my first white Christmas and do all the things you see in the movie well my plans changed and because of these plans changing I got to spend so much more time with Jordan and at that time we did not know it would be his last Christmas. Here is the reality we do not know who will make it to next Christmas this time last year I most definitely did not think 17 year old Jordan and Evan or granddad who was so healthy would be spending this Christmas in heaven.




I don't care if you are spending this time with people you have only known for a few months, that what I am doing and I will enjoy it as much as I can because we are not promised a tomorrow. So today I will shine my God to the world, that's why I am here so that when I finally do go "home" the party will be huge. 

Love you all Merry Christmas!!!!

It will never be good, but God is.

I know its been a long time since I last wrote anything its been hard to think of what to say but this is something that has really been on my mind.

If there is one thing that has been said to me the most over the last 9 months it is God will make this good. This really got me think will this situation ever be good, can losing both my grandfathers and one of my closest and best friends and little brother Jordan and his twin Evan all within a year can that ever be good? Or watching close family and friends battle cancer or struggle with suicidal thoughts can this ever be good. Or feeling so alone, standing in a room 100s of miles from those you love feeling that all it would take is a soft breeze and you would completely fall apart. The answer is no. It is never good when you lose loved one. It is never good when you watch them struggle and fight for their lives especially when they are fighting themselves. But God will take these crappy situations and make do good with them but that will never make them good.

 

Do not get me wrong I 100% believe that God is using every single one of these situations and he is working ands bring good I have seen many people hear about Christ for the first time and come to know him though these events. I have see healing and breakthrough that can only come from God and strength to contained fighting even when it seems impossible. God is working and he is there but I will never looking and be like "wow its so good that this happened" but I will be like "wow God did this good with this crappy situation, God is good"

Romans 8:28 "and we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose" I have been given this verse so many times in the past year and I agree with it completely but I also think that most of the time we don't read it or think about it in the context that it was truly written. Our idea of good and Gods can be very different, we don't see the big picture we can see the complete picture of his plan so we can't always understand why things happen the way they do. Sometimes we just want the pain to end that would be "good" but God see "good" as using our pain to help strengthen other or bring them home to him. In the end isn't that better, in the end I want everyone to be at the party in heaven so if they see how amazing God is by the way I go though trials and pain then that is "good". This life was never meant to be easy and we are not called to live comfortable lives. One of the most meaningful saying I have heard in the last 2 years was "for Christians this is the closest to hell we will ever be, but this is the closest to heaven they will ever be" so which is worse us suffering a bit now then getting to spend eternity with God or living an easy life and never being in the presence of God?

I am not saying that to be a Christian means you will suffer and life will never be good I would never wish the hopelessness of your world falling apart on anyone. But we need to be willing to be used by God in the way HE wants to bring his name to all the world. Do not be afraid to speak the name of Christ which is worse you feeling a little embarrassed that God is asking you to speak his truth to a total stranger or that person spending eternity in hell cause they never knew God?

Let God use all the pain all the struggles all the storms not to make them good but so that some good can come from them cause God has a plan and it is perfect and if you believe in him or not you are apart of his plan and he wants you and loves you more then you will ever be able to understand.