What are you living for?

I want to dedicate this post to a very special lady named Joni.  I've been meaning to write this for a long time now and after talking about it a few times recently, with some friends of mine, I figured... no better time than the present. :)

Probably within the first month of being in Thailand, a friend from our sending church, Joni, sent me this link to a Francis Chan sermon.  As many of you know, I had a rough start to life here and have definitely had many moments of questioning whether we should be here... fighting feelings of extreme homesickness... missing all things familiar.  But little did Joni know, that this little clip would bring a WORLD of hope... proper perspective... needed refocusing for me.  And I have called it to mind, time and time and time again.

You see... whenever life over here starts to feel heavy, or I feel as though what I've "given up to be here" is too great, God has brought this sermon to mind.  And suddenly, its as if I get snapped back to the reality of what I really, truly, actually want.  And what I want is, to stand before my Father on that Final Day, and be able to say that I followed obediently and did my best to fulfill what God has called me to do.  I want to know that I lived life in light of the white part of the rope, rather than the red.  That I treated life as the brief gift that it is, and made every effort to live out and share God's truth and love with the world.

Are there still days that feel really hard?  For sure.  Do I still miss my friends and family everyday?  Absolutely.  But I also know that I get to spend the "white part of the rope" with them, and therefore, the sacrifice of the "now," is SO worth the reward at the end.

So, Joni... I cannot thank you enough... for caring enough to think of me... for caring enough to take the time to send this... and for being used in a mighty way, by our caring Father, in my life... over and over again.  Thank-you.