I haven't blogged in awhile. Fail on my part!
I'm still planning on going to Ethiopia in November with Emily. I am very excited because Linda Giroux is hopping on board with me to help plan my trip back. Linda works at Lakeside as the Queen of Kidsfest but she also works for an organization called Fifty5Five. It is a Non Profit Christian missions organization designed to help children's teachers in the developing world share the Gospel of Jesus Christ amongst children of every tribe, nation, people, and language. She's helping me organize mine and Emily's trip back to Ethiopia so that we can effectively put in place a Vacation Bible School program for the children of Acheber.
While I am ecstatic and eager to get back Ethiopia, I am also a little overwhelmed. When I went to Ethiopia last, I had Sean and Jaime pointing me in the right direction and giving me tasks to complete in order to go to Ethiopia. Now I'm the one that has to organize and designate tasks. I'm guilty of letting the devil plant a seed of doubt while he takes a vacation and I finish the sermon (Thanks Jaime and Andre!)
Through all of this chaos. I have Emily. Emily Selby is a wonderful friend and beautiful Daughter of a King. Months ago, she agreed to take this trip to Ethiopia with me because she also has a love for serving our Father and she loves to love children. She encouraged me to read "Kisses for Katie." I had read about Katie Davis before. She is living what I feel like is supposed to be my life. Quick background, Katie Davis is a young woman (younger than myself!) with a passion to serve. She currently lives in Uganda where she adopted 13 little girls and is the founder and director of Amazima, a ministry that reaches hundreds of other children in Uganda. What I love about Katie is how she always says YES to God. She gets nervous, she has doubts, she gets homesick, etc. but she ALWAYS says Yes. Although she now lives in Uganda, this trip was only intended to be a year long trip. God opened her eyes to the need in Uganda. Once he opens your eyes to something, how do you tell him no? If you don't do something...who will? Katie talks about Peter being the worst disciple ever and how she is Peter and I am Peter. I constantly make mistakes. God knows I will make a mess but his plan for me is great. So I need to go...and feed his sheep. Have no idea what I'm talking about? Read John 21!
As if that's not enough, Katie throws this at me (yes directly at me!) There are 143 million orphans, 11 million who starve to death or die from preventable diseases, 8.5 million who work as child slaves, and 2.3 million who live with HIV which adds up to 164.8 million needy children (dagger in heart). At first glance, that looks like a big number. 2.1 billion people on this earth proclaim to be Christians. The truth is that if only 8% of the Christians would care for one more child, there would not be any statistics left. I DIE.
The beauty in all of this is that Katie isn't telling me anything that I don't already know. So what am I doing?! Writing support letters and planning fundraisers BECAUSE I'm going to Ethiopia to feed Gods sheep and to love on nuggets.
Thank you Emily for constantly harassing me to read this book. Thank you for your patience on this crazy journey of planning. I am so excited to continue on this journey and share it with all of you :) O and I promise to be better at blogging.
"I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you." John 14:18
Check out Fifty5Five & Katie Davis' blog!
http://fifty5five.moonfruit.com/
http://www.kissesfromkatie.blogspot.com/
