update from dubai

well, i'm on my way! i'm in dubai international airport right now. it took about 15 hours to get here, and i've been here for 12 hours, ahhh! i'm pretty tired, and dirty, and still have a 2-day journey ahead of me before i land in Sudan. but i am spending 2 days in a hotel in a uganda, which will be more restful. i do just want to get there and get going. right now, i'm in the nervous stage because it's all so unknown. i don't know what it's like to be in Sudan, to work for Iris Ministries, i don't know the staff or their personalities, i don't even know what the mission base looks like. i'm having to trust God right now that there will be a place for me there, that i'll be a fit. i am preparing myself to encounter some culture shock, to miss the US and be sad, and to understand that this is all emotion and it will pass. i know i will need time to adjust. but there is nothing else i would rather be doing right now. i am so grateful to the Lord that i get to have this calling.

my friend said this to me in an email a while ago: "in this life we experience pain, suffering, sorrow, but this is not the place we LIVE in." i am learning to not live in the place of suffering. it's easy for me to get stuck there because of my familial situation, and the road i feel is marked out before me, but pain is NOT my portion. the struggle is NOT my portion. it is joy and Jesus. the Lord revealed to me some Father heart issues that i have over my time at home and back at ihop. i don't have an understanding of God as a good Father who loves to give good gifts. when i envision Him, i can't picture Him hurting when i am persecuted. i know He is with me, i can feel that, but i view it more as Him allowing the persecution and sitting with me, comforting me through it. but it actually hurts Him to see it, He hates when His children suffer. i don't comprehend this. so i've been praying for a revelation of the Father's love, and also asking for joy. as Jesus called us blessed to be persecuted, to suffer for His Name's sake, it means there's great joy available in this place, and i haven't been able to tap into it.

these are my prayer requests as i go to Sudan, knowing that there are real hard times ahead in ministry, but pressing in to understand the Father's heart for me, that NOTHING can separate me from Him love, and that neither good nor bad are my portion....JESUS is.