Psalm 16

Psalm 16 Keep me safe, O God, for in you I take refuge. I said to the Lord, "You are my Lord; apart from you I have no good thing." As for the saints who are in the land, they are the glorious ones in whom is all my delight. The sorrows of those will increase who run after other gods. I will not pour out their libations of blood or take up their names on my lips. Lord, you have assigned me my portion and my cup; you have made my lot secure. The boundry lines have fallen in pleasant places; surely I have a delightful inheritance. I will praise the Lord, who counsels me; even at night my heart instructs me. I have set the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand. I will not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad and my tonuge rejoices; my body also will rest secure, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.

Joy

The past couple of weeks, better yet the past 2 months have brought some circumstances that have been very difficult for me, and for those I love. We had our woman's retreat almost a week ago, and I am slowly starting to see how my joy is not to be found in my circumstance, or how I feel but that ALL MY JOY is found in knowing the one and only true God (duh, Kathy). I think quickly back to the girls in Haiti that found their joy in the Gospel, and not in what they did not have or their circumstances. Please pray that I will surrender all of my circumstances, my trials to Him. I sometimes will say here Lord you can have this, but refuse to give Him everything else because I want to be in control. I want to know what the outcome is going to be, and He has called me to lay everything at the foot of the Cross. That all my joy will be "found, rest and abounds in Him." I will pray that your joy too will be found in the Gospel and not in your circumstances. May these words be the cry of our heart.... "All my joy." Your glory is what I am longing for Your splendor is filling my gaze Your love so great is what I am thirsting for I live for sight of your beautiful face All my joy is found in you How my joy abounds you And all hope it rests on you To live is Christ To die is gain In the end only one things remain All my joy is found in you Your beauty is drawing my heart to you Your spirit is teaching me truth Your word so sweet is more than a feast o Lord I live to bring pleasure and honor to you

Our Haiti team

I thought you would enjoy seeing the picture of our group! Just click on the picture to enlarge it so you can see everyone. Yes, I know I look horrible that was the day I was really sick and had no energy to run upstairs and make myself look better, besides we were on a missions trip :)

Haiti download....

Here is my trip to Haiti, though this is the very, very short version. If you want more stories, you will just have to find out from me :o) ENJOY! It was defiantly a trip that I will never forget for many reasons. There are no words that could describe what I saw. I thought I seen all of it in Mexico, but I was beyond words when we drove through Port Au Prince. After getting through Customs (which I believe they ended up taking around $75,000 dollars worth of medical supplies-very sad) What was suppose to be a 3-4 hour bus ride to Jacmal, turned into a almost 6 hour drive. In our first 30 minutes I saw major poverty, guns everywhere and a truck taxi that turned to quick in front of our van and tipped over and crushed the people inside of (including children). We had to get out of there right away because it was very dangerous for us inside the city of Port Au Prince. We had to turn around and had to go completely outside the city which is why it took so long. Then we made the very difficult ride up/down the mountain. It was very dangerous with the turns, small streets and a guardrail that looked like it could barely handle a fly. It was scary, but it was gorgeous too. It was so crazy how some streets would be completely paved, and then all of a sudden it's rocks and holes in the next street. We made it. The Orphanage could not host us, and it was obvious why once we saw it. So we stayed at a hotel right down the street that was on the beach and then on the other side of the streets were the mountains. Pretty amazing. Though nothing went the way it was suppose to, God met all of us in different ways. There was a construction team, medical, orphanage. Construction team worked on building a girls house on the property. They are renting a building and it is not a good situation. Medical team was able to see over 810 people throughout the week (orphanage children/workers, people from the community and then they did 2 trips to villages in the mountains) It was amazing to see how the few medical supplies that we had (that were dispersed throughout our luggage) made it to the very last person. God was SOOO good to provide! The big orphanage team worked in the morning on clearing land to make a basketball court for them, painting rooms, organizing and preparing for the afternoon in playing with the kids. I had the opportunity to do crafts. Though out of 14 planned crafts only 5 got done, but it was fun to even be able to do those special things with them and now they have the opportunity to do more of them later. It was hard to surrender control and realized that He had it all planned out that I need not to worry about getting it all done. The cool part about all the crafts that except for a few minor things and Polaroid film everything, EVERYTHING was donated and I have some detailed, involved crafts. All the children even got to make there own t-shirts which were donated. Pretty awesome! So afternoons were spent playing with them, and then we would always end the day with songs, bible teaching. I will never be able to hear the songs "Give Thanks," "There is none like You," and "The glories of Calvary," again without crying. They truly had a heart to worship God. Some of those girls having nothing else but a relationship with Jesus. I realized how much of my day is filled with other things because I have so much and it made me realized how truly blessed I am. I am sad that it has taken me until I was 26 to figure that out. On Friday night I got REALLY sick (some stomach virus made it through our group-yuck) and I got up Saturday very weak. I just sat in the chair pretty much all day. Not able to do much (which is something I do NOT like to do if you know me. I have to be constantly moving, and hate not being in control....It was hard time). On Sunday I went to a church about 30 minutes away from where we were staying with 7 other people (everyone else went to the Orphanage). It was an amazing experience. Driving with the beach on one side, the mountains on the other. Going through lots of cities, seeing a parade of children (because it was National Children's day in Haiti), going through a market of some sort, through a river, a creek, down a mini-hill, seeing things I never want to see again :) and we were there. Though the church service was VERY different than any church I had been too, but I enjoyed worshipping with them. Then Sunday afternoon we took all the children from the Orphanage to the BEACH! Though if you are thinking white sand/blue water think again. It was pretty gross. There was lots of trash, people begging you to buy things from them, seeing stuff you don't want to see, and EXTREMELY salty water. But the memories of running around with squirt guns, splashing each other, having a mini beach ball fight and smiles that will be forever placed on my heart. A beautiful, beautiful trip it was. We ended our last night at the hotel sharing stories, thanking and blessing the people that took care of us, and then singing a song that has been evidence of God's grace and glory on this trip. "Not to us, but to your name, oh Lord, be all the glory, the glory, forever. For your faithfulness, and steadfast love, receive the glory, the glory, that belongs to you. " We woke up early Monday morning, to have a crazy day before us. Someone lost their passport (but it was found after much searching and prayer), the buses were an hour late. Then the bus that was carrying all the luggage and a few people decided twice to breakdown on the MOUNTAINSIDE....pretty scary. We fixed it, barely made it there only by God's grace to find out that our plane was delayed. To make it better instead of the almost 6 hour bus ride we made it in 4 despite all the problems we ran into. How good is He. This trip taught me how blessed I am, that I am not in control, that He is Sovereign and that I need to embrace my time of being single because I have the opportunity spend quality, daily time with Him, and to serve the families around me. I have recognized it, now it is putting it into practice. Though I might have been one of the older people on the team (a majority of them were 15-21) I was able to learn a lot from the younger people because of their attitudes, their desire to serve and how they glorified our Father. I can't believe it is over. I am sad. I miss the girls. I miss the friendships I made, but most of all I am thankful that God gave me this opportunity. GOD IS GOOD! Thanks for being apart of it, for your love, support and prayers. I will post more pictures as I am able too. Love you all!

Haiti pictures

Here are just SOME of my favorite Haiti pictures. But I had to throw in the hair getting done :) No it did not hurt like I thought it would, but my neck was sore the next day. The 2nd one was of a dear sweet girl that I met from Jacksonville. Her name was Annesiley. I think I just destroyed the spelling of her name. The next picture is by far my favorite one and will be blown up and put in a frame when I have the money. Sweet memories. I want to cry everytime I look at them. The picture of the mountins, clouds was on our way home and I was holding on to dear life for my camera and my safety. Pretty scary drive :) The picture of the little girl was when I went to a church about 30 minutes away from where we were staying with 7 other people. I thought it was precious and because it was an amazing experience. Driving with the beach on oneside, the mountains on the other. Going through lots of citys, seeing a parade of children, going through a market of some sort, through a river, a creek, down a mini-hill, seeing things I never want to see again :) and we were there. This church out in the middle of no where. I will post a picture later :) Please continue to pray for the transition. Now that everything has calmed down, and no more womans retreat, no more craziness, it's going to be diffcult because I have nothing to distract myself with. It's only been a few hours and I am already struggling. UGH! Well until next time....

I'm back

Hi everyone! I just wanted to let you know that we have made it safely home. There are no words to describe what I expreienced, felt and saw this week. Please pray for me as I have a lot to process through, and trying to get back into the swing of things is going to be diffcult. I already had a VERY diffcult time in just the hour that I have been in my own home. But God's grace is bigger than all of this. Please also pray for my health, my stomach is still bothering me at sometimes and I got bitten by something on my neck and the rash around it will not go away :) I will try to update with pictures, but can't promise anything :) I did get my hair in little braids by the orphange girls. It looks awesome. I might have to get it done again. Well thank-you again for all your love, support and prayers. It was a blessing knowing that you all were supporting us. Love you! kp :o)

My Haiti Update!!

Hey everyone! This is Jennifer again, posting at Kathy's request! She asked me to let y'all know what's going on...so check out my blog here and see what Kathy (aka Laffy Kathy) is up to!! :o)

I'm going to Haiti

So it is FINALLY here, I cannot wait to see all that the Lord has in store. A friend from church is going to be updated it on a blog, you can try it but no promise that it will work :) It is thesoteriafoundation.org Here are some of the prayer requests.... Here are some of the things that I would ask that you be praying for while we are down there: *For our safety (we leave June 4th @ 6 am (which means we have to be at the airport at 4....YIKES) and return the following Monday late that night) *For our health *That God would be glorified through the medical, construction and orphanage team whatever we might be doing, because we are still not completely sure :o) For me personally I would ask that you pray *That I would surrender all my daily plans and desires for this trip *I think it is going to be challenging for me in many ways it's going to be (hot, Hot, HOT :), there is going to be a desire for me to want to do something because I see all the poverty, & sadness, please pray instead of becoming angry/shutting down that I would PRAY for them and continue to serving them, also for the fact that I have lived with by myself for the past 3 years, living with someone, let alone being with people all day, everyday is going to break me in ways that I could have never been prepared for, but I also am LEARNING that God's grace is bigger than all of this. Pray that I would go to foot of the cross instead of allowing my feelings and emotions to take control *That I would grow deeper in my time with God, that I would make it my number one priority and desire to be with him *Please pray for my family (and for others who have lost loved ones) that this would be an opportunity to share the Gospel I can't believe that is happening in less 13 hours. How exicting and amazing is He! Thanks again for your prayers, support and love. Till next time....