Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Home Sweet Home

Yes. I am back in California. Hallelujah! Praise the LORD and all that good stuff. Actually I've been home for a little over 3 weeks and didn't even think to write on this thing. Oops. So here's my update for you.
Really, all I can say is... wow. God is SO good. So faithful. So radical. So amazing. I've had the amazing opportunity to experience God in ways I never thought possible over these past 6 months. And what I've come to know and experience is that God is our healer, comforter, solid rock. Our refuge, our strength, and above all, He is our Father who yearns for a personal relationship with us. I never realized how desperately I needed God in my life. Yes, I was always a "Christian". But to be honest, I never really lived like one. Six months ago, I would have classified myself as a lukewarm Christian. (revelation 3:15-16). And I came to the conclusion that under no circumstances did I want to be spit out of God's mouth. With that in mind, I began running, sprinting towards God. And what I thought would be a boring relationship turned out to be the most life-changing one that I will ever have. I don't know how I survived a day without reading His Word. It fills you daily- why not read it? Gosh. I'm so pumped about this.
I am fully aware that it wasn't YWAM that changed me- ALL glory goes to God for that one. But I did learn so much about His character, and how FUN and EXCITING it is to be a follower of Christ. Experiencing God like this made my faith and my desire to be in His will so much stronger. The scariest place I could ever be is outside of God's will for my life. I don't know all the details... but I do know that whatever I'm doing, wherever I am, I will be proclaiming the greatness of God.
"So Hannah, what are you doing with your life now?" seems to be a very popular question for me. Well, let me tell you. For the next month, I will be here. Home. California. After that month I'll be heading back to my favorite land that calls itself Guatemala. Sooooo excited to be reunited with my little friends there, and to see God at work yet again. After that, until God tells me otherwise, I'll be going to COS (local community college).
So at this point, I'm doing just fantastic. It was extremely difficult for me to adjust back to being home at first, because I miss my YWAM family so stinkin much. But it's getting better day by day. Welp, if you have ANY questions, please don't hesitate to ask. I would LOVE to tell you awesome stories and testimonies about how God moved in Europe and Africa, and how He is still at work although I'm here in California. (Yes, this God I experienced in Europe and Africa is the SAME GOD that you and I serve here in the States, and He would LOVE to use you in ways you can't even imagine.) Love you all, and I can't thank you enough for all of your prayers and support while I was gone! You're amazing.

Monday, March 5, 2012

Finally, the Final Month!

   Praise the Lord, hallelujah, it's my last month abroad for a while. Yes I'm sad to be leaving all of these wonderful people I have met, but I'm beyond ready to be home for a bit. Honestly, I miss everybody so much that it hurts. Not to mention, this cold weather is killing me, especially after living in Africa for the past couple months.
   So these past two weeks were amazing... Immediately after Africa, our DTS met up in Amsterdam at the ywam base there. I was in Amsterdam for a week, and I LOVED it. It was so beautiful and it was good to just be back in civilization... (although I still haven't had a Starbucks- very out of character for me). After one week in amsterdam, I got the opportunity to leave Amsterdam and go to a little village about an hour away called Heerde, where a married couple from my DTS live. It was great to be there- Mary and I stayed with a precious little old lady named Jetty. She was hilarious, and it was good because it felt like I was staying at one of my grandmas' house. We did some street evangelism there, spoke at their church, youth groups, and led some Bible studies. It was really a great time.
   Now I'm back in Germany, in a town called Ludenscheid with some of my DTS, and we're on (what ywam calls) a "trumpet tour", where we go around and tell people about our experiences on outreach. This week should be pretty great- we have the opportunity to talk with drug addicts, the youth of the town, kids, and we're even planning on doing a bar ministry. Stoked for that.
   Next week, we are having a "Faith Week", where basically our leaders say "ready... set... go!" and we pray and ask God where He wants us to go for a week. So, I could end up somewhere in Germany, Poland, Czech Republic... only God knows. Oh ya, we also don't have any money or food or place to stay... we rely on God for all that good stuff. We'll see if maybe my mad hitchhiking skills will come in handy again :)
   So like I said, it's the last month... and honestly I'm struggling. It's so hard to be HERE when my mind and my heart are already back home. Also, so many things about Africa are running through my head, of what I could have done differently, and it's hard to process all of these things by myself. If you would pray for me, that would be glorious. Pray that I would continue to have this fire and passion for Christ, and it wouldn't die out here or when I get home. I want to remain strong until the end. Thanks a million.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Africa Outreach

   I'm back to civilization! Thank you JESUS! These past 9 weeks have been the craziest, hardest, most life changing 9 weeks this 18-year old girl has ever experienced. Regardless of various sicknesses and whatnot,  I absolutely don't regret a minute of outreach. I'll try my best to explain with words how my time was- but my words aren't good enough to really tell you how Africa was for me.
   So the first 4 weeks of outreach were spent in Yei, South Sudan. It was awesome spending Christmas and New Years there, because it was South Sudan's first ever Christmas and New Years, seeing as they're a brand new country and all. We stayed at the YWAM base, which might sound luxurious, but it was a very African ywam base- meaning we pumped our own water for showers, showered out of a bucket, had a hole in the ground for a toilet, and were greeted by lots of lovely spiders and other various wildlife in our cement rooms. Good stuff.
   The main ministries I did in Yei were orphanage ministry in the morning, and village ministry in the afternoons. I absolutely loved the orphanage. Immediately I made friends with a brother and a sister named Daniel (7) and Grace (9). They were seriously the cutest kids I have ever seen! It was great to just go there and love on all of those kids, and watch their faces light up when I showed them a picture I took of them. Village ministry was extremely hot (in the afternoons it was around 110 degrees and humid) but so rad. I would sometimes have to just stop and remind myself that I was walking in a village in Africa, walking between huts and naked children, telling people about the goodness of God- and I might not ever have an opportunity like this again. I also did ministry one Sunday at the prison, where I got to give my brother Jason's testimony of how God radically changed his life. That was definitely a highlight of the whole trip for me.
   The last 4 weeks of outreach were spent in Arua, Uganda. There was also a village ministry here, and it was mainly in a Muslim village. That was really cool to experience. We would seriously just walk through the village, and TONS of kids would end up following us, yelling "Mizungu Mizungu!" (white people). It was so cute. But the main thing I did in Arua was work in the kitchen and get to know the people at the base. It was so great to get to know people like Milka, the main cook who was 24, and Rose, her friend who was 22 and had the cutest baby EVER named Gift. They were such a blessing to me. I also learned how to make some awesome African food, (like chapattis!!) AND I learned how to cut onions and tomatoes, a huge accomplishment for me. :)
   There are some great stories of how God moved in Africa, and I can't wait to tell you once I get home. Thank you so much for all of your prayers! xoxo- Hannah
  

Sunday, December 18, 2011

This Time for AFRICA


So 11 weeks have already flown by, which is hard to believe. And after 11 weeks of lecture and being filled up with God, it’s time to go out and practice what we learned. Where? AFRICA! The place I’ve wanted to go since as long as I can remember. God knows the desires of my heart, and made sure it was possible for me to go. He is so good.
My team of 17 people (15 students, 2 leaders, 8 different countries represented  in our team- crazy!) leaves tomorrow from the base in Herrnhut, Germany. My flight is tomorrow night from Frankfurt to Dubai, from Dubai to right outside of Kampala, Uganda and then we drive by bus up to Yei, South Sudan where we will spend Christmas, and the first 5-ish weeks of our outreach.  The next 4 weeks will be spent in Arua, Uganda. If you want to see our team newsletter, you can e mail me at hannah_mustgo@yahoo.com and I’ll send it to you (if I can… internet is not guaranteed in Africa).
            I’ve come to know that YWAM is very unpredictable and spontaneous because we base most of our plans on what the holy spirit tells us to do. So as of this moment, we aren’t really sure what exactly we will be doing. All I know is that I get to work in orphanages (YAY!!!) and stay in villages and refugee camps. SO sick. Like I said, we don’t know our plans, but God sure does. And with a God like ours behind us, these plans are bound to be rad.
            I’ve decided not to get on Facebook for the whole 9 weeks, so if you want to keep in contact with me, you can e mail me at the above address and I’ll try to get back to you. J God is SO good! Can’t wait to get home and tell you all amazing stories of how God moved in Africa! Prayers please! Love you all. <3 

Sunday, November 27, 2011

The Holy Spirit is so rad

   So this weeks teaching was on the holy spirit- being FILLED with the holy spirit. I could go on for days about every little thing I learned and all the scriptures to back it up, but I won't do that. I'll just give you some stories that happened this week personally to me- my testimony if you will :)
   We practiced praying over people this week- a lot. So many times in the Bible it talks about laying hands on people, so we put that into practice. On Tuesday, our speaker Bart told us to just sit in our chairs and allow the holy spirit to come fill us. We had our "glasses" ready to be filled with Him- and I was definitely filled. Later that night, I found out that my house (at home in Tulare) sold, which means that I will not be returning to the house I have pretty much grown up in. It seriously tore me up inside and this whole past week has been really difficult, knowing I'm not going home to my home. But that night, I felt an overwhelming sense of comfort and peace flood through me. Even if it was just for half an hour, it was a great reminder that God was with me and my family through this whole process.
    Wednesday during lecture, we prayed for healing- if anyone needed healing for anything, we received prayer from other students in the DTS. I had the urge to ask for prayer for my back. It's weird, because I had never thought of my back being healed further than my surgery. But God, being the amazing healer that he is, brought relief to my back. My back was completely numb for a full day- as if I was on painkillers at the hospital still, not able to feel anything. God showed me that He isn't bound by what the doctors say- that if we ask and have FAITH that He can and will heal us, he will!
   Friday was probably one of the craziest days for me so far. Like I said, this week was really rough for me, so it was extremely difficult to find joy at all. The 2 people praying for me didn't know anything of my home situation or of what was going on with my heart, my lack of joy. But as they were praying, one girl kept repeating "joy... joy... unexplainable joy... laughter." And then it hit me: the joy of the LORD flooded through me and I started laughing and smiling uncontrollably. I literally felt like I was drunk on God. As I was laughing, these weights were being taken off my  shoulders, as if my laughter, the joy of the Lord was healing me. It was an amazing feeling that I had never experienced before. Go God.
   It seems as though every time God does something amazing in my life, Satan comes back at me with an attack, and honestly sometimes succeeds in it. Yesterday (Saturday) was extremely rough. Certain events happened that put a huge burden on me all day, and it seemed impossible to find joy again. At one point, I became so angry- more like livid- because of the events of the day. All I know is that right when that rage hit me, I got the worst migraine I have ever experienced. I had friends praying for me for about an hour, but nothing happened. One friend said that they felt that I needed to repent of some sin in my life and forgive somebody, and then they would continue praying for me. I did, and as I forgave this person in my heart for hurting me, some of the pressure left my head. I also started loving this person- like LOVING this person. I stated out loud all the things I love about her, and I had nothing but love in my heart for her. It was a very humbling experience and very cool because I felt like I was loving her like God did. My headache was still there, though. I ended up having to go into a dark room for 2 hours, trying to shake this migraine. A leader came in with me and prayed for me, and she got the same impression as my other friend: I need to forgive people who have wronged me. Suddenly, people who hurt me 6 months, a year ago even, popped up in my head and as I forgave each person, my headache kept leaving little by little. Finally, I asked that God forgive me for harboring all these feelings of resentment over this last year and as I did, my migraine was completely gone. Praise God for being our healer! I could just feel the presence of the Holy Spirit surrounding me, and I was completely at peace for the rest of the night, as if I wasn't even really here.
   Many people have told me on this DTS that God has huge things in store for me in the future- they just get this impression that God will use me in great ways. And I believe that Satan doesn't want that to happen. Every time I get attacked, I try with everything in me to see it as a blessing- Satan feels threatened by me, and by the great almighty God who is at work behind me, so he tries to rob me of my joy. I find strength in this passage in John 16:22: "Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and NO ONE will take away your joy." Not even you Satan!
   I pray that you all had a blessed Thanksgiving! Be blessed. :) Love you all. ***Oh and just a side note: I leave for Africa in less than 3 weeks. jiofdsahjvkdshguhu. That's all. 

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Why Am I Here?

    Well... It's the end of week 7 which is CRAZY for me. I can't believe I've been here 7 weeks. Currently, I'm back in Herrnhut (which I'm not too happy about). We came here from Bautzen, Germany which is about 20 minutes by train from Herrnhut. We are here for the weekend, praying for our visas and just relaxing until our bus leaves to Zurich, Switzerland on Monday morning. We will be there for 4 weeks, then I'll be leaving mid-December for Africa!! Yay.
    So this past week was pretty rough for me. There have been so many changes happening back home in California and it's hard to be here and not there. So this past week, I have been questioning why I'm here. I'm cold, I miss home, I'm 18 years old, my heart isn't in Europe, and did I mention I'm freezing? Then God gently reminded me in His gentle Godly ways that I'm here because He called me here. My whole purpose in life is to glorify God and do what He has called me to do, and in Mark 16:15 Jesus tells us straight forward what we're supposed to do: "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation." Why am I complaining about wanting to go home, when this isn't my life to live anyways? God reminded me of some verses to help me with what I'm dealing with at the moment... "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." -Galatians 2:20, "I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will always have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain." -Philippians 1:20-21.
     So my question of why I'm here has a simple answer: I'm here because I have decided to follow Jesus. I'm here because I have dedicated my life to serving the One who made the universe. I'm here because God called me to this freezing continent for a reason. And I'm excited to find out that reason. My heart may still be in Guatemala, and maybe God had me come to Europe to realize how much I love Guatemala... but I'm here now. And I need to take advantage of this opportunity that I have to tell this lost continent about God and His unfailing love.

Sunday, November 6, 2011

Street Ministry

Alrighty, another post. :) Friday our group went to St. Georg, the other part of the Red Light District, the part where prostitution is illegal (but it still happens) and where most of the girls are trafficked, or not there willingly. I was looking forward to going all day, because I really have a heart for the Red Light District, as you could probably tell from my last blog entry. But when we got there, we had the option of either staying, or going to minister to drug addicts at the Hauptbahnhof (Central Station) and I really felt that God was telling me to go there instead of staying. I was very confused and kind of disappointed at first, because I REALLY wanted to minister to the prostitutes and worship on the street with the rest of my DTS. But instead, I was walking back to Central Station with 4 other people (2 were from my dts... Jonah, a lovely German lad and Jade, the raddest Canadian girl person alive).
So we arrived back at Central Station and we found out that we wouldn't really be ministering to drug addicts, just whoever we felt God was leading us to talk to. I was very mad at this point. When Jade, Jonah and I prayed, I prayed something like "Well God, you sent me here and I haven't witnessed anything SUPER spectacular yet on these outreaches and I'm kinda getting impatient, so it would be LOVELY if you would give us someone to talk to." I so regretted my attitude later, after God DID do something amazing. 
After getting blown off by a crippled man who told us something very rude, I was feeling deflated and rejected. But then we walked over to these two men just hanging out drinking a beer and smoking a cigarette. Jonah started by asking if we could just pray for them, and they said no. But then after talking to one of the guys with Jade for a couple minutes, we asked if we could pray for him. And he said yes. We prayed for his health, for his job, and for revelation of God's love for him. After we prayed, he had such joy in his eyes, and he asked us "Do you like orange?" We were like "uuuummmmmm... yes??" and he said "I'll be right back" and scurried away for a couple minutes and came back with orange flavored capri suns and a Mars bar for us. He said "By praying for me, you gave me energy, so I want to give you energy back." And he told Jonah later that he is so thankful for Jade and I praying for him because it showed him that we were genuinely interested in him and cared about him.
I can't even count how many times he said thank you. He was SO blessed by a simple prayer. We found out later that Jonah was talking to the other guy about God and he was taking a serious interest in Him. We also prayed for him, that he would be able to FEEL God and not just read about him on a paper we gave to him (he asked us to pray that over him). After the prayer, he said he could feel something stirring in his soul. Praise God. 
So ya, God definitely answered my prayer, even if I didn't ask Him in the nicest way possible. God seriously loves us and longs for a relationship with us and I'm realizing that more and more every day here at Youth With a Mission. Thanks for reading, and for your support for me. Love you all!