N Seoul Tower

Ok so today was awesome, and I've taken a lot of pictures off of Google to attempt to show you how awesome it was. We left the hotel this morning and took a subway and bus (quite an experience with a 4 year old, but we made it smoothly through) to get to the Seoul Observatory Tower. Its up on a mountain and then as you can see very high up itself, so you are able to see the entire city of Seoul and its surrounding areas. And its a very big city. So I'm just going to walk you through this experience :) When we first got up the mountain, the sight is already breathtaking before you even go into the tower. There is a fence wrapping around part of the property. Couples bring locks to the fence and lock it on and throw the key. Its like a romantic thing people do, and it looks really cool. Hello honeymoon idea. I for sure want to get a lock on there someday. Its really awesome. Ok so then when you go into the tower, you get into the most epic elevator ever. As you can see, the elevator ride takes a little bit of time, but moves pretty fast. And while you're going up, there is a screen on the ceiling that shows a view of going up the tower, past the tower, into space, past planets, etc etc. Trent got a kick out of it :) ...so did I haha. On the way down, the movie is played in reverse. Whatever it was cool - don't judge. So the next two picture are what it looks like for the most part on the inside (there are random shops and coffee stands set up) and a view looking out. Even more breathtaking. My team spent some time walking around and praying for the city. This coming up week, we will be traveling around to very influential areas and praying for them and for the people. As we prayed, we asked God to show us His heart for the city and for the people here. We just spent some time, one on one, listening to what God wanted to tell us about the work He has for us here. We want to the feel the burden for these people's hearts like He does. The time was really good. Trent even said a prayer while walking with me - thanking God for all the people he has met here and asking for more friends.
Tomorrow we are heading to a place outside the city called the "boarderless street." I think I heard it was called that because there are a lot of nationalities represented there. They come to do some kind of labor. I'll have more information tomorrow. We will be with a small branch that the church we are now staying with just planted. Trent will not be going. It is going to be colder tomorrow than it was today, with no inside time. Most of what we will be doing will be happening on the streets. So way too cold for Trent. I also may be staying behind, but I'm not sure yet. If I go, one of the leaders would have to stay behind to be with Trent. We'll see what happens I guess. Go with the flow seems to be the theme of outreach haha.
So this week is a big change from last week. We are also going to be teaching English to the pastors and leaders of the church we are staying with: The Overflowing Church. We have people on the team who have been assigned to come up with lessons. The rest of us will just be helping during discussion time. So that should be interesting.
And I think that's all the news I have :) Awkward ending because I can't think of anything creative to say haha...

Lunar Weekend

Ok so it is 11:00 A.M. Monday. Which means its 8:00 P.M. Sunday night for everyone back home and it is 7:30 A.M. Monday morning for my beautiful Kelsey who is now at her outreach location! Please pray for her and her team! Stateside was rough, and I think they are a little nervous about the difficulty of where they are now. I like knowing the times of where everyone is. It helps me feel more grounded haha.

Alright so last week was amazing. Basically. Very difficult. Very awesome. I feel like a year went by with what I learned about myself and God and with what I've seen. I kinda feel like a new person again. Last week we worked a lot on healing. A lot of the students were able to forgive people who had done horrible things to them in their past, and were able to forgive themselves and God for what has happened. It was very powerful. My life has been hard, but their lives have just been a whole different kind of hard. There are Bible verses have come more alive to me after knowing these amazing people. If you feel like there a parts of the Bible that maybe just symbolically relate to you, they are very real for other people around the world and we all need to be praying for those people. Please say a prayer for North Korea, for the people living there and for the people ruling over them and for unification of the North and South to happen soon! My girls were not among the students who had big break throughs. Last week was like the first time they even allowed themselves to think about their past sense they began their new life. And they felt so guilty for being sad. It was so tragic. It was like they felt that now that they are where they are, they have to be happy. Being sad made them feel weak and like none of what they went through was worth it. I spoke alot of truth over them. Hopefully soon they will be able to break through the lie that if they don't think about it, they don't have to deal with it. They will always be in my prayers. The seeds have been planted. God, you have said you will make them grow. Make the seeds grow, Father. Let everything they learned that is good and true sink deep and take root. Love intensely and tangibly on them.

God gave me such a good spirit for this camp. I feel like He really protected my mind. There were so many times I could have been discouraged or wanted to just give up. He constantly was reminding me that He was the one doing the work, and I was called to love Him and love the girls. So that's what I did. I loved on them like crazy. I spoke beauty and value and truth over them. As you think of them, please say a quick prayer for them. God has such huge plans for these students.

After typing those last couple blogs, and remembering that prayer I prayed about wanting to be as awesome and beautiful as the sky where I don't have to even say anything and people will see God's glory, I feel close to tears. My Father is so cool. He really does give the best gifts. On the last day we were there, I felt led to pray for my translator, who had been participating in an exercise during a teaching along with the students. After praying for her, she started praying for me and started crying. When she was done, she told me about how she hasn't prayed for two years, and now she is praying all the time. She said she prays for Trent and I every night, and said that Trent has such a gift to bring people happiness. She said that the words I spoke for her to translate and my life in general inspired her. Praise God. Father, look at where I've come from - and now just me living does bring You glory. You are a redeemer. I can't believe what You've done with my life. And now I just want to keep running after You so that You'll keep pouring out of me onto everyone around me. My God is just so cool!

Now we are celebrating the Lunar New Year. Everyone turns a year older (in addition to already being a year older, I am now 23 and Trent is 6 lol), and nothing happens in Korea for 3 days so we get to stay in a Hotel and relax with our team. The other half of our team joined us over the weekend, so once again we are all together. They all came back with amazing stories of what God did as well. Man, He is doing a lot of work. Trent and I have been blessed with the most amazing room. I screamed like a little girl. The other people on my team are sleeping 4 to a room. They get their own bathroom to share with just the 4 people and a T.V. and really comfy mats to sleep on. But I walked into my room and like lost my breath. There were 2 BEDS! Like actual beds! For 3 days Trent and I get to sleep on our beds and have our own bathroom! Oh life is good haha :)

And as I wrap up this blog I have my goal of getting my blogs posted accomplished. I think I'll be able to get internet pretty easily from now on. For the rest of the break I'm hoping to do laundry lol and find some postcards to send back home...or maybe just bring home and send from America lol. I just feel so incredibly blessed. Again, thank you so much to everyone who supported us. I wish there was more I could do than just say thank you. I can't believe how much people came around us to help us get here. God, bless them 10 times more than they blessed me. In Jesus's name, Amen.

Monday Morning of the Second Week of Mini DTS

Its Monday morning (or Sunday evening for everyone at home haha…weird). We are on the bus heading up to the mountains again for one more week of the mini discipleship training school. The weekend was really nice. We all got to stay in a really cute apartment close to where most of our students live. We were finally able to get some money exchanged. We relaxed and watched a couple movies. That was so nice. I forget how much I really really love watching movies. Saturday was CRAZY! Most of my team went out with some of the translators we worked with last week. Trent and I stayed behind with the leaders and couple of guys from School of Worship: Mateo and Scott. Sense there wasn’t very many of us we ordered pizza – American Pizza!!! Oh so good. I'm loving the Korean food - but man that was nice :) Then, sense everyone in the room besides me has been to Korea before, they started talking about things they did last year in Korea. A thing called a "jimjilbang" came up…which is basically a Korean Naked Spa…and they were talking about how awesome it was and they got really excited and before I know it, Nate is staying behind to watch a sleeping Trent and Baby Gabe, and I’m being pulled out the door and into a cab on the way to a naked spa. Oh man…it was an experience haha. The guys went to one side and Lauren, Meganne, and I went to the other. As soon as you walk in there are naked Korean ladies everywhere. It’s like a family outing they do. And we were the ones being looked at weird because we had clothes on. It took a small panic attack and about 10 minutes to get used to it, but I ended up having a really good time lol (although I’m glad I went with only my leaders. I don’t think I would have like it as much with students.) There were showers and baths and saunas and hot tubs and cold tubs and a place to get a massage and a small shopping area (where people looked at stuff naked lol). It was pretty nice actually – I’ve never felt so clean in my life! After we were done we got dressed and went to meet the guys in the “common area” which was HUGE. There was like a place you could buy food and a lot of open floor space where families laid out mats and just hung out. There were lots of different types of sauna rooms and an internet café and a movie theater where you sat in lazy boys haha. It was really cool J I slept good that night lol.

But I’m looking forward to getting back to work. I know God has a lot planned for this week, and I am so ready to be a part of it. I know God is breaking through hearts, but my main prayer is that He will break through the hearts of my small group girls in a real and everlasting way. Glory to You, God!! I am so blessed to be a part of Your plan. Bless Trent, my leaders, and my team as we step back into the heat of the battlefield. Amen!

Wed of 1st Week of Mini DTS

The school is going great! I have five beautiful girls I get to disciple and one awesome translator. I would literally and seriously be nothing without her. So far, Nate has been teaching about purpose. Why are we here on this earth? He talked about how God created each one of us for a specific purpose. He talked about how God’s plan for us is eternal, not just for our time on this earth.

Yesterday morning, we went over the 5 ways to hear from God:

(1) Bible scripture

(2) Still small voice

(3) Wise council

(4) Dreams and Visions

(5) Prophecy

I then actually got to teach my girls how to have a quite time…well still in the process of it. My girls are so new to Christianity that God is teaching them a lot through me. I’m really praying that by the end of the camp they learn how to hear God’s voice.

There was one thing that Nate said during one of his teachings that was really cool. He said that when you look at a painting, you don’t give glory to the painting. You give the glory to the artist. We read Psalm 19:1-4 “The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship. Day after day they continue to speak; night after night they make him known. They speak without sound or word; their voice is never heard. Yet their message has gone throughout the earth, and their words to all the world.” I just think that is so beautiful. I want to be as beautiful and amazing as the sky. I want to spread God’s glory throughout the earth without even having to say anything. We also read Isaiah 43:7 “Bring all who claim me as their God, for I have made them for my glory. It was I who created them.” We bring glory to God when we fulfill our purpose. Like a painting reflects glory to the artist, we reflect the glory of our Creator. Our number one purpose is to live in relationship with God.

Last night my team got to perform the “Everything” drama. My girls were really impressed. I pray it touched a lot of people. I think it did, because many people in the camp prayed with us last night to give their lives to Christ and confessed Him as their Lord and Savior. I think the final count was 20 students. Praise God. I just feel like this was what I was made to do. Never in a million years could I have guessed, ever hoped, that by acting in a drama, God would be able to touch people and bring them to Him. I am so blessed to be his daughter.

Trent told me last night he wanted to stay in Korea. With the attention hog that he is, this culture is perfect for him. Everyone is in his face and wanting to take him with them all the time. I don’t know how he does it. Everyone here knows his name, and it seems like he knows almost everyone here. He has been a great ice breaker haha. Today and for the rest of the week, we are teaching on healing. Please be praying for the students. Their pasts are extremely dark. I pray a lot of healing, a supernatural amount that is incomprendable, happens for these people.

More from Week 1 of Mini DTS

Day One of Mini DTS

We are up in the mountains about to begin our mini discipleship training school. This place is insanely beautiful. I don't even know how to begin describing it. I wish I had a camera. Although, I think this would be one of those times when a camera would not be able to capture the beauty. When you walk in, the cafeteria is right there. Up on the second floor is where our guys are staying. There is a huge balcony off the second floor. There is a basketball hoop and a tennis court and another little building that is like a tiny church. The third floor is more rooms and bathrooms. The forth floor is where our girls are staying. In the girls' room there is a small flight of stairs that goes up to the "rooftop house" which is a small room with the most amazing view. That's where Trent and I are staying :) down side: no heat and no heated floors...they gave me small heater through that I just plugged in. Hopefully that will heat it up. A little nervous about that haha. I'm more nervous about starting the school though. I am going to be a leader of a small group full of people with ugly dark pasts that even I won't be really be able to relate to and who don't speak English. I have a translator though. I ate with her at lunch. So far I love her :) I'm looking forward to getting closer to her.

So as we get started please pray for us every time you think of us. I got here and just got this huge sense of being overwhelmed. I'm a little nervous and scared.

Please pray for Trent. He has really been acting up. I'm thinking he is just also feeling overwhelmed at all the newness and is over tired. But he's getting into the habit of screaming and hitting me. Please pray that Jesus just holds him close. Please pray that God gives me patience and wisdom in how to deal with this. Also any advice from parents would be greatly appreciated :)

Please pray for my leaders: Nate, Lauren, Zac, and Meganne. Pray that they continue to hear God clearly and that He gives them strength.

And most importantly, please pray that the hearts of these students are so ready to receive the love of our Savior. Pray that language barriers do not get in the way of us showering Christ's love on them.

Here we go! :)

KOREA!!

Trent and I are wrapping up our first weekend in Korea! How crazy is that?! I feel so honored and blessed and excited that God has called me and my son here. The traveling here went super smooth. We enjoyed a 15 hour flight on the most amazing airline ever - Koreanair. Seriously. Best. Airline. Ever. Trentie entertained himself by watching "Winnie the Pooh" over and over on his own personal screen. I enjoyed watching our plane route as we went. We actually traveled north up into Canada, went across the bottom of Alaska, and came down through Russia. We arrived around 4:30 P.M. Korea time. Jet leg hasn't really been too bad. As I am writing this it is 5:15 P.M here on Sunday and it is 2:15 A.M. Sunday morning at home. Its weird being so far ahead in time. I hear jet leg is really bad going back to America. Its like traveling back in time, making it seem like the plane ride only lasts like an hour. Weird.

We are staying at the most amazing church. Its huge. You can not even imagine. Trent and I get our own room. We haven't even used our sleeping bag yet, because it is Hot in here! Heated floors plus heat coming through the vent. I was sweating. Its hot haha. We've spent the weekend resting and getting used to the time change and culture. Something I'll probably never get used to: we can't throw our toilet paper into the toilet. It would clog their systems...so everything goes in the garbage...its taking some getting used to haha. My team and I have enjoyed exploring a little bit. We found a coffee shop that we have fallen in love with and have spent a lot of time there. Internet access :) I have fallen in love with the food! Spicy yes please :) Trent has had a little harder time, but he's finding things he likes as well. Not spicy lol.

This morning we went to the morning service here. We got to wear headphones where someone translated the message for us. It was pretty sweet :) Soon we will be going to an international service - which I hear will be delivered in English. I would like to sing along haha.

Tomorrow we get to start our ministry. I'm very excited to get busy with the plans God has for us. Half of our team is already gone. They get to head into Seoul today and begin the very first SST in Korea. My half of the team is heading out early tomorrow morning. We will be running a mini discipleship training school. We are picking the students up tomorrow and then we are all heading up into the mountains for the next two weeks. Yes. I am super excited :) Trent is excited to get up there and see snow. Its been unusually warm here this year too. Everyday has been in the 30s. Not too unbearable. ...as long as we don't have to walk to far...

I won't have internet access in the mountains, but I'm going to try to keep notes so that I can post some blogs when we come back. I know God is going to do crazy stuff up there. My team is really going to be stretched. Please pray for us!

I just feel so blessed to be here. I can't believe where my life has gone these past few months. I had a very mini freak out as we were boarding the plane. I would have never guessed ever that I would be taking my 4 year old to South Korea for 2 months. I want to sincerely say thank you to everyone who has supported us. I want to say thank you to my family for helping us get the things we needed for this outreach. This morning in church we looked at Philippians 4:10-20. There is a verse where Paul talks about how he wished he could repay everything the church had done for him. He prays that God showers down blessings upon them, having complete faith that God will repay them for what they gave to Paul so that he could spread God's word. That is how I feel about everyone who supported me. I pray that God blesses you 10 times the amount you blessed Trent and I. We are so thankful. I can't believe that I get to be the one who gets to share some of God's amazing love to people who have never experienced it. I can't wait to be part of making God as real to the people I meet here as He has become to me over these past few months. God is so so good. All I want to do is bring Glory to His Name. Glory to God in Korea!