A week in SoCal, a week in NorCal. I think California is one of the hardest foreign cultures for me to handle: I get along with the people well generally, but the contradictions make it hard for me to figure out: it's a strange mix of materialism and environmentalism, diversity and racism, ignorance and intelligence, low-key chill attitudes, ambitious entrepreneurial creativity, and image consciousness. And as annoying as like, ya know, valley girl speak is, NorCal slang gets absurd pretty fast.
Anyways, I saw God in a couple things in Cali. First, my church in SoCal, Riverview EFC: they’re so missions-minded, it’s very encouraging to me. I didn’t get to share about any of my missions work in the service, but we heard from ladies working with widows in India and a couple who is on furlough from Turkey. The Mexico team was also on the schedule, but we got moved to the next week. I got to share with youth group on the beach; that was really cool, but even cooler than sharing was getting to see my friends there and to pray over them. I’m really gonna miss my SoCal peeps, you guys are so encouraging to me! I’m posting the text of what I shared as a note on facebook, so if you’re friends and you’re curious, you can read it there.
I was planning on trying to go to visit two orphanages in Ensenada and Rosarito…unfortunately, scheduling and money just made it kinda crazy, I didn’t plan enough time in SoCal. However, this turned out to be one of the coolest things in Cali, because when I went to college group in NorCal, one of the girls had just been to the orphanage in Rosarito a couple weeks prior. So I got to “visit” the place in a different way. God is awesome!
Seeing my brothers and sisters was amazing! They’re so cool, more grown-up than me, and I’m really excited to see how God continues to work in their lives.
Sierra Grace is also an awesome church, college and youth were really cool. I got to talk to two of the lead elders, and their advice was amusingly opposite, but very challenging and inspiring. I came away from the first conversation mulling over my limitations and convicted about maintaining a Sabbath. The second elder left me contemplating and plotting to start a global missions organization and thinking of how I could work on and in the areas I’m limited in.
So at any rate, I think I’m gonna follow through on the call I got in Mexico and start putting together a ministry to street kids and orphans, but even beyond that, a ministry focused on equipping the poor and ignored for their own ministry and life in God’s kingdom. Phase one will be research and I think supporting other ministries…phase two will be visioning, fundraising and contact work. Phase three will be getting out there and starting projects! So if you want to be a part of any part of that, let me know. Right now I’m looking for information about where in the world agencies and churches are working, what they’re doing, how we can learn from them, help them, and also where they’re not working. For myself, I want to live somewhere poor where kids have nobody involved in their lives for the right reasons, and to be family for kids with no family.
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