Isaiah 2:3b - "He'll show us the way he works so we can live the way we're made" (The Message) Doesn't that sum it up right there? That's why daily spending time with Jesus is so important.
I grew up in church, went to a christian college and memorized a LOT of Bible verses growing up. So sometimes I feel like I know the Bible and I don't need to spend time with Jesus EVERY day. I just recently found myself at the bottom of a slippery slope and now that I'm back up on my feet I'm wondering how I got there to begin with.
It starts with compromise.
Just when I was opening up my Bible I was thinking about how sometimes you hear pastors say if the last thing you want to do is read your Bible that should be the first thing you do. Well, that is true, I think I take my hunger for the word for granted. I decide that something else is more important and I'll still be hungry later so I'll wait. Well, it seems that hunger for the Word is like hunger for food. If you wait long enough you'll stop feeling hungry - at least for a while. When I started nursing school I knew Jesus was the only way I'd make it through. I was consistent and passionate about team each morning with Jesus. Then one morning I was tired so I decided to do it after class and sleep in. Well, after class there was homework and before I knew it I was climbing into bed never having STOPPED to talk to Jesus, sure I talked to him all day long, but I never stopped to listen to what he had to say aback. I never stopped to look to see how He wanted me to live today. I think Jesus changes us in such subtle ways sometimes it's hard to see him changing us at all. I like to see results and when I don't, what I'm doing feels futile.
It ends with determination.
Now that I'm seeing what can happen to my heart when left unchecked I am reminded that Jesus constantly adjusting my path back onto His is vital. But now I have bad habits to break. I have gotten used to my "my-way" routine. It's hard to stop and choose Jesus especially because I'm not in an extreme position where I KNOW I can't go on without Jesus. Instead, I know I can make it through life on this earth by myself, but if I choose to let Jesus in I can LIVE the way I was made. It starts back up just like it stopped only in reverse. EVERY SINGLE DAY I mush choose to spend time in the Word. I must stop to listen to Jesus and I always need to pray that He makes me more like Him. If you're not getting stronger and pushing for a deeper relationship, you're getting weaker. There's no staying stagnant.
So I am saying yes to God, I'm choosing His path, and I will not waver. My God is good.
Friday, March 23, 2012
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Support letter 2012
I've sent out about a billion support letters, if I missed you, here you go:
If you keep up on facebook you already know, I am going back to Africa this summer. I’ve never been more excited. This trip is like the beginning of my future ministry. I’m going to Uganda for 2 weeks by myself to learn more about ministry in Uganda. I’ll be staying at an orphanage recently opened by a nurse from Texas, Sara. Someone I can well relate to. Then, I have a team that’s still growing and shaping that will join me in Uganda for a week. I will be able to show this team what makes me passionate about Uganda. I look forward to showing them the hand of God in action in obviously tangible ways in the lives of the kids there. Then we’ll be traveling to Tanzania to spend time with the Forrest Family who recently moved there to be missionaries with YWAM.
They were the pastors in charge of the internship I did last year. The purpose of this part is to love and encourage them, but also to help with their ministry in any way we can. This whole trip is a little different then trips I’ve done before because instead of having a list of objectives we will complete, I know generalities of where God is calling me but I don’t really know what I’ll be doing, but I trust that there are needs I will be able to meet that God already knows about.
PRAISE THE LORD! 24 of you have already committed to support me in prayer for this trip, breaking the record for any of my previous trips. That alone gives me confidence that God is moving here. If you haven’t jumped on board with this prayer movement, don’t worry it’s not too late, either shoot me an email or send back the prayer response paper and let me know you are standing with me as I go ready to serve as the Lord leads.
I still need financial support. I am so grateful right now to have a great job that will significantly help in gathering funds but I still feel it’s just as important to have you, supporting me because it gives me confidence I am not alone. It also gives you an opportunity to not just say you are supporting me in this by praying but making it YOUR ministry by taking ownership in it and supporting financially. I am not sure I ever shared this but my goal for every trip is to earn 1/3 through work or some personal effort of my own, 1/3 through my amazing team of supporters, and 1/3 through fundraisers. I thought rather than the same old “please send me money” plea you may be used to from support letters I would instead challenge you. Go look in your closet and count the number of shoes you have. For each pair you have, send me a dollar. If everyone does this I will have easily covered a 1/3 of my costs. The grand total of costs is $3600. That equates to a lot of opportunities to join me in Africa this summer through your financial support.
I’ve re-written this letter about 4 times now, because stuff keeps changing. So I’m putting my foot down and mailing it out, but please check in on the blog for updates.
Hit reply and let me know how you want to be involved
- You can pray, I’ll send you monthly updates
- You can pray and I’ll add you to my list to be updated while I’m gone by text or email
- Or just let me know you’ll pray
- You can give a one-time gift and send a check made out to Rafiki Africa Ministries to 659 Gehr St. Wenatchee, WA 98801
- You can give a couple of gifts over the coming months
- You can ask me to check in with you later because you want to give but can’t right now.
If you keep up on facebook you already know, I am going back to Africa this summer. I’ve never been more excited. This trip is like the beginning of my future ministry. I’m going to Uganda for 2 weeks by myself to learn more about ministry in Uganda. I’ll be staying at an orphanage recently opened by a nurse from Texas, Sara. Someone I can well relate to. Then, I have a team that’s still growing and shaping that will join me in Uganda for a week. I will be able to show this team what makes me passionate about Uganda. I look forward to showing them the hand of God in action in obviously tangible ways in the lives of the kids there. Then we’ll be traveling to Tanzania to spend time with the Forrest Family who recently moved there to be missionaries with YWAM.
They were the pastors in charge of the internship I did last year. The purpose of this part is to love and encourage them, but also to help with their ministry in any way we can. This whole trip is a little different then trips I’ve done before because instead of having a list of objectives we will complete, I know generalities of where God is calling me but I don’t really know what I’ll be doing, but I trust that there are needs I will be able to meet that God already knows about.
PRAISE THE LORD! 24 of you have already committed to support me in prayer for this trip, breaking the record for any of my previous trips. That alone gives me confidence that God is moving here. If you haven’t jumped on board with this prayer movement, don’t worry it’s not too late, either shoot me an email or send back the prayer response paper and let me know you are standing with me as I go ready to serve as the Lord leads.
I still need financial support. I am so grateful right now to have a great job that will significantly help in gathering funds but I still feel it’s just as important to have you, supporting me because it gives me confidence I am not alone. It also gives you an opportunity to not just say you are supporting me in this by praying but making it YOUR ministry by taking ownership in it and supporting financially. I am not sure I ever shared this but my goal for every trip is to earn 1/3 through work or some personal effort of my own, 1/3 through my amazing team of supporters, and 1/3 through fundraisers. I thought rather than the same old “please send me money” plea you may be used to from support letters I would instead challenge you. Go look in your closet and count the number of shoes you have. For each pair you have, send me a dollar. If everyone does this I will have easily covered a 1/3 of my costs. The grand total of costs is $3600. That equates to a lot of opportunities to join me in Africa this summer through your financial support.
I’ve re-written this letter about 4 times now, because stuff keeps changing. So I’m putting my foot down and mailing it out, but please check in on the blog for updates.
Hit reply and let me know how you want to be involved
- You can pray, I’ll send you monthly updates
- You can pray and I’ll add you to my list to be updated while I’m gone by text or email
- Or just let me know you’ll pray
- You can give a one-time gift and send a check made out to Rafiki Africa Ministries to 659 Gehr St. Wenatchee, WA 98801
- You can give a couple of gifts over the coming months
- You can ask me to check in with you later because you want to give but can’t right now.
Saturday, March 17, 2012
I want to say Yes! Sometimes I say No.
I've been thinking about missions a lot lately. God's been doing some spring cleaning in my heart this week and there are a few lessons I want to share with you.
First I've been learning about the curse of money. Money can bring freedom, but not in the way our society says. Just turn on the TV with people hoarding everything from cats to canned food society says keep everything you can get your hands on and hold on to it. You might need it tomorrow. That sounds like fear not freedom to me. Sometimes society says to put it in a savings account, but what happens when the stock market crashes and that's gone - looks like fear not freedom to me.
I see freedom in the person that recklessly gives it all away trusting that God will provide for tomorrow. This is biblical. As much as don't want it to be in our comfy american homes with air conditioning and clean running water. When the Israelites lived on manna did God allow them to keep more then what they needed for the day? No. When they did the result was much like the show hoarders: buried alive, with maggots and gross icky things invading their homes. God has always asked his people to trust Him and to live on what He gives them and to generously give trusting He will supply more.
So when God asks me to go, to give, to do, I wish I always said yes, sometimes I do. But sometimes I don't. I was broken today when as God was showing me this dicotamy about money I remembered I went to lunch with a friend a few weeks ago. We were walking from our cars to the restaurant and were stopped by a man who let us know that the soup kitchen had stopped serving already. My response to this was not to hear his honest need for food but I was offended that he thought I looked homeless and I carried on with my friend. I didn't see that right in front of me God had placed a man who needed to see the love of Jesus made real in someone willing to buy him lunch that day. In our culture it's easy to make the excuse that we don't give to the homeless because scams are too common or that they'll just use it for drugs, or this isn't a safe part of town to stop in... Arn't all those "reasons" just evidence of living in fear. Jesus didn't say that we're blessed when we do it to the least of these if we feel like it. He just said we are blessed when we do it because we do it for him. Honestly if it was Jesus... you would give. Jesus says it's the same thing. All that aside. I didn't even have that excuse with this man. I could have asked him to join us and I could have bought him lunch and been blessed to hear how God is moving in his life. maybe. Or maybe he would have turned my offer down, but I would have said yes to God, but that day I said no. I wish I could go back and say yes. To be honest any time I've ever said yes to God, I've never wanted to go back and say no.
Same day, same car drive through town, different conversation with God. I found out a few days ago of a missionary opportunity to work part time in Uganda and part time in the US. I can do this position while I'm in school and grow in some skill sets that will always be needed working in missions. I will be eligible to raise support through the ministry so I can do this missionary work like a job I would just have to ask people to pay my paycheck, which I may as well get used to doing anyway. So I've thought and prayed and asked others to pray and I wasn't seeing much of a downside but I wanted to be sure. So as I was driving I heard God ask me why I shouldn't take that position. "Well God, I'm not good enough, It's going to be hard, and what if you aren't faithful to provide my needs... Oh. I guess I have my answer then, Lord." Plain as day God showed me my heart. So I have a choice, live in fear and say no to God, or recklessly abandon this life that's not my own and say yes. Do I have to tell you what I chose?
First I've been learning about the curse of money. Money can bring freedom, but not in the way our society says. Just turn on the TV with people hoarding everything from cats to canned food society says keep everything you can get your hands on and hold on to it. You might need it tomorrow. That sounds like fear not freedom to me. Sometimes society says to put it in a savings account, but what happens when the stock market crashes and that's gone - looks like fear not freedom to me.
I see freedom in the person that recklessly gives it all away trusting that God will provide for tomorrow. This is biblical. As much as don't want it to be in our comfy american homes with air conditioning and clean running water. When the Israelites lived on manna did God allow them to keep more then what they needed for the day? No. When they did the result was much like the show hoarders: buried alive, with maggots and gross icky things invading their homes. God has always asked his people to trust Him and to live on what He gives them and to generously give trusting He will supply more.
So when God asks me to go, to give, to do, I wish I always said yes, sometimes I do. But sometimes I don't. I was broken today when as God was showing me this dicotamy about money I remembered I went to lunch with a friend a few weeks ago. We were walking from our cars to the restaurant and were stopped by a man who let us know that the soup kitchen had stopped serving already. My response to this was not to hear his honest need for food but I was offended that he thought I looked homeless and I carried on with my friend. I didn't see that right in front of me God had placed a man who needed to see the love of Jesus made real in someone willing to buy him lunch that day. In our culture it's easy to make the excuse that we don't give to the homeless because scams are too common or that they'll just use it for drugs, or this isn't a safe part of town to stop in... Arn't all those "reasons" just evidence of living in fear. Jesus didn't say that we're blessed when we do it to the least of these if we feel like it. He just said we are blessed when we do it because we do it for him. Honestly if it was Jesus... you would give. Jesus says it's the same thing. All that aside. I didn't even have that excuse with this man. I could have asked him to join us and I could have bought him lunch and been blessed to hear how God is moving in his life. maybe. Or maybe he would have turned my offer down, but I would have said yes to God, but that day I said no. I wish I could go back and say yes. To be honest any time I've ever said yes to God, I've never wanted to go back and say no.
Same day, same car drive through town, different conversation with God. I found out a few days ago of a missionary opportunity to work part time in Uganda and part time in the US. I can do this position while I'm in school and grow in some skill sets that will always be needed working in missions. I will be eligible to raise support through the ministry so I can do this missionary work like a job I would just have to ask people to pay my paycheck, which I may as well get used to doing anyway. So I've thought and prayed and asked others to pray and I wasn't seeing much of a downside but I wanted to be sure. So as I was driving I heard God ask me why I shouldn't take that position. "Well God, I'm not good enough, It's going to be hard, and what if you aren't faithful to provide my needs... Oh. I guess I have my answer then, Lord." Plain as day God showed me my heart. So I have a choice, live in fear and say no to God, or recklessly abandon this life that's not my own and say yes. Do I have to tell you what I chose?
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Life is nothing but change
It's been a while so allow me to update you. School has been been an amazing learning opportunity and I'm currently taking a detour. I failed my pharmacology class by 0.8% I can't progress to the second quarter of the nursing program without passing that class. So I am doing the Medical Assistant program to keep my skills up and I will graduate in June of this year! Next fall I will take the pharmacology course again, now knowing how to study for that class (It's way different then normal classes) I am confident I will pass and I will then reenter the nursing program in January 2013.
This only slightly changes my trip to Africa, ok, actually a lot changes the plans for Africa. I will now be going for 4 weeks. 2 weeks in Uganda alone, learning about ministry and life in Uganda to prepare for the future move there. Then a team (unknown who or how big) will join me and we will spend a week in Uganda working in orphanages maybe doing some street ministry and just extending the hand of God's love to the unlovable.
Finally for the 4th week we will take a bus to Tanzania and spend a week with the Forrest Family, missionaries who were launched from my church. There are no real ministry plans but we are going to love on and encourage them. We are intentionally not planning ministry because it's $550 for a work visa, but if we are going just to visit the Forrests it's $50.
I'm excited to just be in Africa again. I'm excited to have more of an independent and leadership roll this time. I'm really excited to see how God will use me.
You have several opportunities to be involved in this trip at varying levels. You can join us. If you feel God is calling you to spend some time in Africa loving His people there, contact me at enlighten.05@gmail.com and let me know. You can also invest in this trip. I mean invest in every sense of the word because your tax free donations mean the world of difference for the lives that will be touched. It means that how ever God uses us while we are there, he's using you too. You become the hands and feet of Jesus through me. Finally you can pray. Let me know that you are consistently lifting me up in prayer about this trip and I'll keep you updated with more details especially as the trip gets closer.
To donate go to valleypraisecenter.com click on "Give Online" then as you enter in where you want your donation to go, in the other box, type "Nicole Card's mission fund" Thank you so much for your investments.
This only slightly changes my trip to Africa, ok, actually a lot changes the plans for Africa. I will now be going for 4 weeks. 2 weeks in Uganda alone, learning about ministry and life in Uganda to prepare for the future move there. Then a team (unknown who or how big) will join me and we will spend a week in Uganda working in orphanages maybe doing some street ministry and just extending the hand of God's love to the unlovable.
Finally for the 4th week we will take a bus to Tanzania and spend a week with the Forrest Family, missionaries who were launched from my church. There are no real ministry plans but we are going to love on and encourage them. We are intentionally not planning ministry because it's $550 for a work visa, but if we are going just to visit the Forrests it's $50.
I'm excited to just be in Africa again. I'm excited to have more of an independent and leadership roll this time. I'm really excited to see how God will use me.
You have several opportunities to be involved in this trip at varying levels. You can join us. If you feel God is calling you to spend some time in Africa loving His people there, contact me at enlighten.05@gmail.com and let me know. You can also invest in this trip. I mean invest in every sense of the word because your tax free donations mean the world of difference for the lives that will be touched. It means that how ever God uses us while we are there, he's using you too. You become the hands and feet of Jesus through me. Finally you can pray. Let me know that you are consistently lifting me up in prayer about this trip and I'll keep you updated with more details especially as the trip gets closer.
To donate go to valleypraisecenter.com click on "Give Online" then as you enter in where you want your donation to go, in the other box, type "Nicole Card's mission fund" Thank you so much for your investments.
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Going Back!
I have been called back to my children in Uganda. I am so excited. I’m officially going. First I officially have to go to nursing school. :) I’m feeling overwhelmed and nervous at this new junction in my life. I know it’ll be ok though and I just need to keep my focus on God. That’s HARD when everything around you is telling you to focus on the homework. I know God is good though and if I make him my priority then I will do well. MY first major act of obedience in this is, no homework on Sunday. This will be a constant challenge but will also allow me to do well in AWANA, I won’t feel pulled in different directions when I need to do AWANA stuff.
Pray for me as I make this transition to nursing school. I feel like not being around the church all the time that I’m not getting prayed for like I was when I was an intern and I need more prayer now.
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Re-discover
I feel scared to cry out to be rededicated in my heart. I’m scared o fully commit because what if my grades suffer? I have it so backwards. Jesus I surrender these fears I want to lose myself in You. I want to be completely Yours and I want to find you deeper then ever before. Re-enlighten me and let me rediscover you as I let go of me. Help me to let go of me.
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Africa please!
In order to graduate from the nursing program we have to do a community service project. Well, I am working on trying to go to Africa and do an immunization clinic. Please be praying about this and that it will come together. My heart is aching to do this, and I’m really excited about the possibility.
Later...
I just got encouragement from the nursing director too!
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