strength in weakness

This week I have been so overwhelmed with the brokeness in my own life and the lives around me. You start looking at original design, and what everything was supposed to be like, and you realize how much of our lives and actions and ideas are based off of lies from the beginning. You realize how deep the roots are. How addictions, fears, pain... they all have such deeper beginnings than just one day deciding to fear what other people percieve you as. Evreywhere I look, there are broken families, broken hearts, broken relationships. Gender confusion, breakups, sexual addictions, abuse, and the list goes on.

and yet, when I come to the realization of our bareness and brokeness, the Lord comes, he lifts up my head, and I see the cross. And oh, it's so much more beautiful than when I first saw it. Or maybe it's just that I realize our need for it now. Our need for a savior. Maybe the problem in the first place is that we don't allow ourselves to see the reality of humanity. Completely broken and bruised. Hopeless and lost. Feeding off of poison time and time again, just to keep the reality at a great distance.

So I'm realizing the state of our humanity, and starting to feel hopeless, and the Lord gives me a dream.

*Im in a car and a man is driving me in a parking lot. It's raining and very dark and gloomy. He parks the car and gets out. I slowly get out and start walking the way he went. And all of a sudden a man is by my side, and his presence alone is peaceful and understanding. Like he understood the deepest parts of my heart without even talking. And he had his elbow out, as if inviting me to wrap my arm around his. And so I do. And I felt such strength and protection coming from him as we walked together in the rain.

I was then watching him from a distance, and he was around a family, with a little boy in front of him. The boy was bandaged all over, and had many broken bones. He had such a broken body. And the man wailed and bent over, his body bent over and weighed down by the grief of the boys broken body. I just stood and watched, and wondered if they were related. And someone told me it was his brother. And I watched as he mourned, staying close to the broken body.*

And so I woke up and got a revelation of Jesus. How he is more burdened by our brokeness than we are. It breaks his heart to see how far we have fallen from what he originally intended. And so in this dream I felt the strength of his presence as we walked together, and yet also saw how he shares in our weakness and suffering as he cried over the broken body of a little boy. He understands the depths of our pain and suffering. He's so closely aquainted with it. It's so beautiful. And he suffered it so he could rescue us. He beared our sin and brokeness and shame so we could be ressurected with him. So we could hold tightly to hope. A hope to someday be whole. A hope to be completely restored. And even now, he restores our heart, bringing us back to our original identity.

ahhhh. Lord give us a greater revelation of the cross. of your love. of your heart to bring us back to you.

rainbows from Jesus

Last moment Friday I decided to hitch a ride with some friends to Iowa for a graduation at Northwestern College and a Graduation party for our friend Brittney.

On our way up to Iowa, for no reason really, I asked God for a rainbow. Quickly I forgot that I asked, and gazed out the window for a while. Then out of the corner of my eye I started to see a chunk of a rainbow start to form. I laughed and told everyone that I had prayed for it, and we all laughed and watched it. As it dissappeared and we drove further, we saw another piece of a rainbow. and a couple minutes later, another one! and then another! about 15 minutes and 5 partial rainbows. haha it was so amazing. Nick, the guy up front, mentioned that he had never seen a full rainbow. So quietly again, and laughing, I pray for a full rainbow, not believing that we'd have that much favor. And guess what? about 3 minutes later, ANOTHER piece of rainbow catches our eyes, and as they laugh in the front and I scream out of pure delight in the back, we watch it grow before our eyes to be the largest and most complete rainbow I have ever seen in my life. You couldn't catch the whole rainbow in one glance. You had to move your eyes from one side of the sky to the other it was so big, with strong colors.

It's times like these where my heart is just taken back by how God doesn't just do the bare minumum. He loves to lavish his goodness on me until I can't bear it. Far beyond what I deserve or even need. He not only likes to provide for my needs, but he loves to give me the desires of my heart, big and small :) Like just the other day I asked him for a coffee, and someone randomly bought me one the next minute. He LOVES us. He LOVES to give us good gifts. But we have to ASK. And BELIEVE that he will reward those who seek him.

So... Iowa was good. It was a sweet time to just relax and pray with friends from college. It was exciting to run into friends that I haven't seen since last semester there, especially friends that I would pray with all the time for revival on Northwestern's campus. We spent lots of time just sitting in a circle with a guitar and worshiping and praying.

I will be going back to Iowa during my visit home in Sioux Falls for two weeks. I have a wedding this Saturday and my sisters' graduations the last week of May. Pray for God to move while I'm at home.

New seasons! gardens, babies, and deep heart stuff :)

It's now official. I'm full-time staff at the International House of Prayer :) However, these first 3-6 months will be mainly focused on building financial partnerships and becoming fully funded so I can be in full-time ministry here on base. So my schedule will consist of connecting with people and traveling to South Dakota and Iowa.

I also just had my first night of co-leading a Pureheart small group. It was amazing! Pureheart is an inner-healing seminar that goes through the beatitudes, helping people go back to roots of pain that have caused more pain, addictions, and broken relationships. It's such a beautiful process- to watch how the Lord loves to mend the brokenhearted. It is a 7 week program.

This month has also been a big community building season :) We have just planted 5 mini gardens, each box is 16 square feet. Each box has one of our names on it, so it makes it more personal. I planted strawberries, watermelon, bell peppers, jalapenos, rosemary, oregano, and peanuts! I'm suuuuper excited to watch them grow. It's like my own little baby!

and speaking of babies....

Linsey and Mat (I live with them) just had their first baby boy!!! Croy Joshua Lujan. He is a gem! He was born May 4th, so he's experiencing his first week in the big world. It's been so fun watching them become momma and pappa :) It's so beautiful how a baby forms 9 months in the belly, and then it comes out and you get to see what was created with patience and joy by the best Father!

Hmm... what else. Fun facts:
*Our community family has watched Avatar 3 times so far
*I pretty much live at Dun Bros Coffee. It's like my office. I get more accomplished when I have coffee in my hands and free internet.
*I want to have babies. soon. but I think I need to get married first ;)
*I'm going home in a week for my friends wedding! and then to raise finances for full-time ministry.

Pray for:
*trip home that God would raise up financial partners
*this season of less "production" and more "being"... letting the LOrd heal my heart and break all things in my life that hinder his love.
*Some blood work to be done on May 12th.