Good News

This week was productive - support is starting to come in! PTL! I didn't get to everything I wanted to, but I got to a lot. Still have to start follow up phone calls. One thing I'm learning is that support-raising is an awesome chance to be a great witness through your actions - through your diligence, through your gratitude, and through your humility. It's so cool talking to people and hearing all their stories and experience with other people who have served and traveled abroad. I am learning a lot about the people who are supporting me just through the conversations that this trip leads to. It's awesome.

I'm also learning a lot from others who have gone to Africa in the past - little tricks about what kind of gear to buy and what kinds of things to expect. I've been told that the best thing I could possibly bring for me and my team is garlic salt. (I hope that makes you laugh out loud!) My dear friend advised me that garlic salt is the only thing that saved her from getting bored out of her mind with eating the same things every day. She also suggested that I journal a lot while I'm there, which is something I'd been hoping to do anyway. She was telling me that there are a lot of things she wishes she had journaled about because she can't remember things as clearly now as she thought she would be able to. I think I'm going to buy myself a new journal to fill up while I'm there (because I'm a neurotic freak and can't journal about different topics in the same journal). I'm really looking forward to having that to look back on when I come home.

I still don't think I really grasp the reality of what I'm going to do this summer. Being away from home, from family, from friends, from church, from everything I've ever known hasn't really set in in my mind yet. When I do take the time to think about the magnitude of what that means, I get overwhelmed and excited at the same time. I can't wait because I know the work we're going to do in Togo will be meaningful and life changing. I know by the end of the summer I'll wish I could stay longer. But I know it's going to be hard. Hard work physically, emotionally, and mentally. I don't really know if there's any way to prepare for that kind of emotional upset. Sometimes I wonder if I should or if the beauty of going through a change as big as the one I'm heading toward is in letting Abba carry you through it. So maybe the preparation I need is not learning to anticipate and avoid the change but to trust in Him through the change. It's hard to say. I guess my biggest hope at this point is that I don't end up getting more out of this trip than the people I'm going to serve. I want to milk every moment I'm there for all it's worth - to learn and grow and change and become more of the person Abba is calling me to be. But I'm not going there for me. If my only desire was to grow and change myself I could stay here, you know? But my desire is to see the nations change - to see the Good News shared and to see people coming to know the Truth. That seems like such a lofty goal when I sit here and write it down, and it seems like a goal that in the achieving will change me just as much as it changes others. Abba's funny like that, I think. He's glorious. And He will be glorified no matter where I am or what I'm doing. If you are one who is lifting me up to our Father, please specifically ask that He would show me His glory and that He would continue teaching me to reflect His glory. That's my biggest hope and desire right now as I prepare to go and for while I am gone. Thank you!

Ready Togo,

~kl