The Journey of a Family Striving to Live Dangerously Surrendered!


"Surrendering means that we have come to the end of our independence from him, our reliance on self-sufficiency, and our insistence that we don’t need him. Surrender to God changes everything! Why add the word dangerous to surrender? Because we don’t surrender to a benevolent but impotent grandfatherly figure; we surrender to Almighty God —the Creator and Sustainer of the universe. C. S. Lewis’s character Aslan in the Chronicles of Narnia depicts God as a magnificent lion —good, but certainly not safe. Surrendering your life to God is the boldest and riskiest step you can take. Being dangerously surrendered to God allows you to know him in increasingly deeper ways and to participate fully in his will. " ~Kay Warren

Sunday, January 25, 2009

Missing Words


I am amazed that I have not posted since Dec.5th! Our experience in Ethiopia and the weeks following have been so intense that words have escaped me. Very slowly with time and adjustment and the touch of my Heavenly Father, words are returning. I thought I would step out and start 'speaking'.


I had so many hopes for Ethiopia. I was going to experience everything I could from the wonderful people, to the market, the culture, the children. I hoped to get into the streets and bless people who were in need, to take pictures of the beautiful faces of the land I have felt called to and the land my two youngest were born in. I bought a large, pretty journal I hoped to pour into, talking of everything I experienced and felt and all that God was showing me.


None of that happened. We arrived in Ethiopia late Sunday night and the very next morning, I was horribly sick. I was stuck in my room with both flu like symptoms and respiratory distress the entire trip and remained sick for weeks after returning. I left Ethiopia having seen almost nothing, giving to almost no one, purchasing only two crosses the last day from our guest house, but no keepsakes for my children. I was completely disillusioned.


As God has opened my inner word bank gradually to the descriptions and feelings of this journey, I have begun to be able to talk about it. I still have yet to view the video we took or to think back much and I have no earthly idea why the trip had to be as it was, however, I am trusting God for revelation about my experience. I hope to be able to begin to share our experiences as they were in the raw and what I can look back and 'see' as revelation as God enables me.


You have all been such a part of this process. We have not intentionally kept you from the finale, we've just been silenced by the sheer intensity of it all. Thank you for your patience and for how you prayed us through to this point. To God be the Glory!!


Here is a picture of all six of our kids. As I chronicle the experience I will go back to the beginning with pictures and video.


Much Love,

JoLynn
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