Time CrUnCHhh in Mozambique

Oh my goodness, I'm feeling it! I'm not even there, but we work together on almost everything ministry related, and the list keeps wanting to grow . Oh I am feeling the time crunch that my hubby is in while he wraps up loads of tasks before saying goodbye to Mozambique for a long while.

I wish that I had taken one more walk to the little market behind our rental house. I wish that I had taken the time to breathe in the earthy, smokey smell of the Mozambican air. I wish I had squeezed my kiddos one more time. I wish I had one more day to soak everything in, so my prayer for my husband in this ten day time crunch is that he has one full day of soaking up Mozambican sunshine, hospitality, friendship, and breath in rich Mozambican fragrances.

I love the smell of a wood burning kitchen fire, the smell of a dew damp field, fresh sun dried laundry, roasted corn on the Cobb at street corners, and sweet fruit as the vendors walk by with their round basin loaded up with pineapples, bananas or lichi. Those are my favorite Mozambican smells that tell me I'm on a leisurely stroll in my dusty little city in Mozambique. Ah, but I won't be in Mozambique for a while. Probably a year while I finish university,  and by that time the smell of my last t-shirt hand washed and sun-dried will no longer have the sweet memory invoking smell.

The smell of Mozambican sunshine lapping up the moisture from my shirt has lingered for these three weeks since I left my home in Mozambique.

I may have moved away for a season,  but my heart is always there, waiting for the next season of living in my African home with my big international family.
The funny thing about family is that weather you are near or far, the connection is unrelenting. That's a good thing. We need each other. Papa God designed us for deep loving connections. We're designed for love.

I'm thankful for the people who love me through the smooth sailing and the windy weather.
I love that talking with one of my oldest Mozambican son's after such a long time was one of the sweetest hours I spent during my brief time in Chimoio Mozambique.
The tasks are probably very important, and as long as they are evidence of our love for people we trust that each task will be accomplished in Papa God's perfect timing.

We are so perfectly loved by Him, and gently led by Holy Spirit. I'm certain that this time crunch will be a time of resting while we run, refreshing while we pour out, and rich encounters and God appointments while we trust Jesup to rule over our time.

He is the best and kindest King. He knows how to love each of us perfectly and give us the desires of our hearts at just the perfect time.

I believe that Jesus' perfection is evident in our lives as we live with Christ, and in Him. We don't achieve perfection through our efforts to love more, be sweeter, kinder, holier or more like Jesus; but as we receive his perfect love and trust Jesus with more of our hearts and lives we see His perfection, His attention to detail turning everything to our good in a way we had never imagined.

Don't be afraid to let Him love you. All the sacrifice and suffering isn't important if we don't delight in his love. It's the only way we can love at all. We love people,  places, cities, nature, activities, accomplishments and more because we stop rejecting Jesus' love for us. We breath Him in and just trust.

It's awesome to accept Jesus' love, it changes every aspect of our lives.

Lots of love,
Missionary Momma Mia

Happy Birthday Benaiah

Benaiah

The Lord has built. Someone came to me with a word for the baby that was in my belly, and even though the name they heard wasn’t my baby’s name, it was a prophetic word for me and the baby.

I had struggled with giving my baby a name to honor the ones who had been less obviously loved by me before that year. I had ‘favorites’, even though I tenderly loved other brother’s, cousins, parent figures, and in-laws – it was hard for me to demonstrate that love in the shadow of my very vibrant connection with my ‘favorites’.

Someone told me they felt like God spoke to them about the baby’s name, and they asked if we had already chosen a name for our newest addition to the family. I smiled and tilted my head to one side as I shook my head no. We had a name in mind that was not exactly what we were looking for, but our hearts were still searching for the perfect name.

The name from her was a message for me and the baby, not a name for the baby. She said a name kept popping in her head when she thought of me in prayer. It was my birth father’s name, she had no idea. She excitedly asked if I thought that God was showing her our baby’s name. I delicately let her know that it wasn’t our baby’s name, but a confirmation in the direction we were going with our baby name search. It confirmed our command to honor those we had ‘overlooked’. We were so humbled. In 2009 and 2010 we were on the path to truly deepen humility and to go lower still. We learned that it was impossible for us to continue in ministry without learning the lesson of honor. We saw a scripture verse that jumped out at us as we read the Bible. Then the same verse was a key scripture in the next message we listened to over the internet from Bethel church in Redding California. We listened to Bill Johnson preach about honor. It was crazy how the verse was exactly what God had plastered on the wall of our hearts that very week. (Matthew 10:41 – it rocked our world)

My hubby and I had a direct word from God to honor my birth father as we named our 3^rd son. It was confirmed as she whispered his name in my ear. He is a man that I have compassion for, and I am grateful for his role in my life. I have become a more compassionate person because of my relationship with him. His name was a reminder that we were on the right path to love the least of these. We have a command to love people for who they are in Christ, for the destiny that God has spoken over them and built inside them, not to see their behavior and temporary shell as their merit for blessing and honor. Wow, I could love him for his destiny, not only be compassionate for his need. This was another truth that began to apply to almost every aspect of my life in that season.

Look for what God has done, for the calling God has placed on people’s lives, and for the blessing that He is giving through them, and it is easy and light to bless the least ‘worthy’ person according to our immature standards.  Ok, the blessing in our son’s name isn’t to pass on a family legacy or to name him after my birth father, but to learn the message of his name. What was the message? We were still waiting. We knew it was about honor, strength, and destiny…..

Soon after that evening, something randomly pointed out a name in a scripture verse (yes, we are those people with kids who have Bible names- we’re missionaries, Christians and church goers. It was bound to happen) There is was a warrior, a strong man. One of the strongest, whose name was given the honor of not only being recorded as a might man, but actually the great feats of strength and victory that his valor deserved. Wow! A man of honor and strength. We felt a tug at our hearts. We wanted to call our lil pumpkin Benaiah. We asked a friend of ours to confirm the significance and root meaning of the name.

“The Lord has built” That shook us up, from our head to our toes! That was the summary of everything that God was pouring into our hearts and over our thoughts.

We had cried over the challenges of starting a ministry base from scratch with next to nothing – our faith was that small. We felt like it was almost nothing, only enough to help us survive in our poor decision to go back to the mission field and finish what we started.  We didn’t have funding for building projects, administrative loopholes, or any other high cost of starting a new ministry in a new place, but we had a word from God and a go ahead from our spiritual parents and pastors.

We had been in Chimoio for a long time, we prayed for more funding and buildings to house our beautiful Mozambican children, and our missionary family.  A dear friend of ours stayed in our house during our furlough in Colorado in 2010 while our family spent precious time in the states, and prepared for the birth of our third son. He has stayed connected to us ever since. He loves our family! Wow! He prays with us, encourages us and gives to our ministry.

We didn’t plan that. We didn’t ask him to give a donation to keep the ministry going, or to develop the center. He just gave sacrificially because of his love for this big International family! We had seen little progress in development and construction. We had requested electricity year before it was installed, we had a tiny source of water from a hand dug well. Everything was so slow going. We desperately wanted to build and develop.

We left Chimoio for our 5 month furlough that year wondering why we kept at it as missionaries. We knew it was the children and not the busy work of administration or the hope of building, but we still needed more buildings, more funding, more hep. As we just waited before the Lord in worship and prayer, he spoke to us about a spiritual foundation. He was building Iris Chimoio in a totally new way. It was different from our previous years as missionaries, and we suffered under challenging circumstances.  Yet, we had strong relationships with the tiny growing team. It was more like a family. We kept talking about family. In 2010 we knew it was a family that was growing steadily. God told us that ‘He has built’ Iris Chimoio. It’s a children’s center, a soccer pitch and a church. We didn’t have much of a children’s center. River of God was a boys house and a girl’s house that was unfinished, but livable. The kitchen was an outside kitchen that social welfare didn’t approve of, as well as the bathrooms. The soccer pitch was tiny. It was a tough time for our little International family and our bigger International family to grow. It felt more like stretching than growing, it was probably both.

When God spoke to us in the past tense, that he has built it, in reference to everything we dreamt of for our family and ministry in Chimoio, we started to see things through his lens. He has done it, it is finished. Time is not the issue, God is working on our hearts. He is building a kingdom building in our hearts. He lives in us. Everything else is a bonus….all the blessings here tell of His goodness, not of our splendid prayers or ability to organize, work and lead.

It was a shift in our thinking. Our baby’s name was and is a strong reminder that we are not building the buildings at the center, we are not building the team or growing the family – God is and he loves doing it with us. We are a part of this, but it is not about what we can do. It is about knowing what God has done in the spirit, being at peace on the path he set under our feet, and going through the door that he has opened in front of us.

Its all about him. He has built. Not only is it all about him, God challenged us to not only let go of our thinking and planning about physical building and team building, but to trust him, that he will send provision and people to build, he will send people to the team, and he will grow this family.

Since that day that we got our son’s name, we have seen many miracles of grown, building, and provision that we did nothing to attain. Literally nothing. We just love our children, and he keeps doing things for them to remind us that we love them because he loved them first. He provide, he loves and he is faithful.

God has built.

Today my husband is in Africa working on many administrative tasks, and closing out a rental house because God said it’s time. Our things are going in many different directions. Some friends and pastors have new to them furniture or housewares, while somethings that can handle storage in a shipping container are being neatly packed into the container at the center. They will be used in the missionary housing God is telling us about. Something we have seen, but never known the time to start, or who would do it. It seems that what God is doing is so unimaginable even to ministry people that we don’t know how to explain it. People are coming, helping, serving, loving us, and building without any burden on us. Its like a dream. There are building materials being brought to the center! There are workers that we are not paying to build, someone else is. Who does that?

Jesus! He loves to lavishly love us. Seriously, what person can love us that well. It was six years ago when God not only said that he has built the center up, and that he (my husband) is not going to have to build the buildings. When God told us that he has built – there was a tag line, “so you don’t have too.” I felt like he was showing me people coming and building. Ok for some of you who have staff and workers, we couldn’t afford to hire a team of builders, and we were literally out of fire to manage big building projects again.

As I prayed more about the buildings that God has built at Iris Chimoio he spoke into my heart and spirit, saying that we didn’t have to do it. The fire didn’t run out because we spent it, but because we don’t need to do it this time. I heard him say, “I’ve set these projects in other people’s hearts to come and build your dreams.” Who does that? Who comes to serve God and bless us? We’ve seen people who wanted to come and build something else, but that wasn’t the promise. We just had to wait, and right now the team is steadily building at the children’s center. They are doing it. Coordinating with our vision, and doing all the work. Who does that?

God has sent the builders. I didn’t know what that would look like. Its Amazing! Its not in my University non-profit Administration books. Its fresh and new to me. I’ve never heard of this before. I’m sure there are other testimonies like this, and MORE to come!! As people give wholeheartedly and step out in loving service to the body of Christ.

I’m thrilled to thank the people who are coming to River of God Children’s Center and pouring out love in practical and lavish ways!!!!

In Papa God’s perfect time, we are seeing this happen.

We have a beautiful family, and so many blessings. We can’t describe them all, but we can glorify a loving God who delights in giving his children good gifts.

Dream with God, follow him, and obey. He is doing a good work. Its not about what other people can measure, it is about how intimately close we are to our loving savior, and how deeply our hearts beat to the rhythm of his.

It’s good to be loved, it’s great to love others. Something about that tells the story better than anything we could ever try to say. We couldn’t plan this, we can’t make any of this happen.

We can let it unfold as we say yes to Jesus…Its our joy to be loved by him.

Lots of love,

Missionary Momma Mia

Remember to love

It’s hard to know what to write after the very serious blog that I wrote the other day. That’s where my emotions were. Now I need to figure out how to let them heal even more.

I know that I was planning on finding the first thing that I had sent as an update in 2004, but I couldn’t find it in my old emails. I might have uploaded it on myspace. And that has changed since then. Dad said that he might have it saved somewhere. Who knows.....

I ran across some paper print out of an update I emailed in 2004 that was saved inside a Bible, but it is not there now. It looks like I can’t use my earliest writings as a reference. Not today anyway.

But I can still remember, and getting things out is a big deal. I remember when there were no famous books or sermons to teach me what love looked like. I remember when there were no big famous missionary rock stars. I remember people listening.

That was a long time ago though.

I do remember that we had to back then was think and talk.

It wasn’t a lot of talking though, because we didn’t have many people to talk deep things with. Not very many people could understand. I did have my mom. She called me, and my spiritual mom called me. They both wanted to check on my and my husband and our bun in the oven. I didn't know exactly what to say. I did finally spill the beans to mom. She listened really quietly. I think I could hear her crying. I had really moved to a new place where death was one of my biggest culture shocks. I had so much to learn. I had so much to remember. I had to remember why I was there. I had to remember what my calling was, and how much God loved the people he called me to come and serve as a missionary. I had to remember so much.

I had to remember to love. I had to relearn how to love. Now just because I was a newly married wife and an expecting mother. I had to learn what love looked like in the new place we were living. I trusted missionaries who had been there longer than me, and national pastors who were are dear friends to help me understand what love typically looks like in the mew culture I found myself deeply swallowed in. Learning to love from friends is good, but it isn't perfect. It isn't the whole picture.

Learning what love looks like from anyone other than Jesus is going to produce dutiful attempts to love. Love looks like something. It really does, but it’s not only about giving food to the poor and clothes to the naked.

Love does look like something to the poor and to the rich. Love looks like someone a little bit different to each one of us. When we are too focused on ‘loving’ others we forget that love flows from an intimate relationship with someone who is the source of pure love. Jesus is love.

If we just use our connection with God and Jesus as a wish list for helping other people, then our energy will eventually dry totally up. Imagine that our love or ability to help someone in need is like water in a swimming hole in a river. When the swimming hole is cut off from the rest of the river it eventually gets shallower and shallower, until it dries up.

We do need to ask God for strength to be light and salt, but it’s pointless to ask without receiving.  

A good father knows how to give gifts. I didn’t have to ask my dad two times for money to go out to eat with my friends. How many times are we rattling off our requests? "Dad, I really need medicine for this little boy, I really need food for this widow. I really really need medicine, and food. Can you please give me what I need?" The answer is on the way. And the pause between when the medicine arrives and the food is ready isn’t always a delay I his answer. Sometimes we need a few minutes to stop and wait on his thoughts about how to give the food or medicine. Sometimes we need a few more minutes just to sit and Breath with God. We need to look at his face and see our reflection in his eyes. He loves us so much. His love is our strength. Communion with him changes the way we think. His thoughts become our thoughts, all the sudden we can see that there is something blocking the flow of his love and compassion to our swimming hole, our water well.

Sometimes it’s time to unbury the "well" by digging deeper because the dam is too strong. Maybe God is redirecting the flow for a season for us learn how to dig deeper down. Maybe God is giving us a tool to tear down a sloppily thrown up dam, or clean up some garbage that is dirtying the water and turning it into muck and mud. The answer to our prayers is different because each one of us are facing different needs, different seasons and different abilities to steward the flow of God’s river.

If a large deep river gets stopped up that’s a gigantic dam, and a huge effort to fix the flow or redirect the flow into something else. It’s going to change the environment around where a river used to flow freely. It might be the season for that environment. We don’t always know all the details or plans God has. He might actually want to see changes in a place that we don’t feel comfortable with. The flow of water is still present, but it is harnessed for a different purpose. Sometimes a gulley or a channel is being dug to join different streams together. It can be dirty work, causing the river to muck up for a while until the dirt settles back to the newly formed river bed.

We don’t always know what is happening with the flow of God’s Holy Spirit. We don’t always understand why his love is washing over us in waves or flowing through us as a hot spring that bubbles up from under the ground. It’s too difficult to say that God’s presence is only this, or only that. That his love goes this way, or only in this direction. We don’t always know his thoughts. Even though we could know more of his thoughts. We could just spend time with him and learn more about his thoughts and his ways. We could begin to see how he sees and move how he moves. Imagine so much unity that we flow with God like a seamless dance partner. 

We could begin to identify different aspects of his character that are new to us, we didn’t ever taste that kind of mercy and kindness before, or miraculous provision of finances, or multiplication of food. There are so many details that only God has taken into account and made a fabulous design. If we spend time talking with God, listening to God we spend more time delighting in his perfection. More of his perfection will be revealed in our lives.

The food is ready right on time to go and feed the kids and give the medicine, but I didn’t wait on God to hear everything that Holy Spirit was explaining or look at the details of the vision to get a better understanding of His plan. It’s important to sit with God and listen. I learned the hard way. I got what I needed to give away and ran out of enough love to follow every detail of instructions available to me. I could have been more attentive to one child’s needs and learned much more quickly how to treat malaria. I mourned the loss of our cute little neighbor. I also learned right away, and never forgot, that I needed to sit with Jesus and focus on his lovely face. I said “ok” to trying to save as many people around me from suffering as possible, that I began to suffer deeply. It is one thing to share in the suffering of Christ, but completely another to suffering needlessly out of duty.

Christ doesn’t want us to be servants tending to everyone's needs. He also doesn't want us to grieve endlessly for the loss of his little pumpkins, or pretend like it doesn't hurt. He knows that we are living in a world where we will face sorrows. He weeps with us. One of my most treasured scripture verses as a teenager was: Jesus wept. (John 11:35 shortest verse in the whole Bible) I felt so comforted by a real person with skin on and emotions, it showed me that his heart broke when he was deeply sad. I felt like a person who was understood by the creator of the universe.

I don’t think he was communicating to tell his friends, “I have a great plan here, my Dad has got this taken care of.” With his tears. No, he was genuinely sad. His friend died. Yes, He knew that his Abba Papa God would be glorified through the miracle that would follow. He also knew that his friend had suffered. I saw his compassion and his love. He doesn’t celebrate our suffering. He weeps.

My heart was mended by knowing that verse. Many times those words were like balsam over the wounds in my broken heart. I don’t literally blame myself anymore for the deaths that happened near me during my first months as a missionary. I repented so many times for not looking at the details. Papa God comforted me. I did learn incredibly valuable lessons through my experience. I did repent many times when there was a thing that I should have done differently. I did also learn to trust that God in his awesomeness knew all of my weaknesses and inabilities. His ability to save the life of a child or young mother was not hindered by my feeble attempts to love the poor around me.   

I have to trust him. I have utter hope and dependence on God because my abilities and skills are so tiny, his are infinite. That little guy isn’t suffering anymore. It is truly solace for my soul. My typical inflow of spiritual food and water was changed when I moved far from the community where I had lived for years. I had to learn how to unbury wells for dry seasons, and prepare the riverbed for a flash flood. I had to discover new sources of energy and strength to be a missionary.

It wasn’t easy but the most important thing I learned in those first few months of being a missionary was to stay thoroughly soaked in God’s river. When it was harder and harder to stay soaked I had to begin to steady my gaze on his eyes and find the details of his plan. When I was finished digging down, and he was ready to let the rain fall, I had to climb back to the surface of the riverbed, or I would be drowned in the bottom of the well. When I came up I found the clouds ready to drop buckets of rain. I knew I had a fun swimming hole to come back to anytime I needed refreshing while he was redirecting the flow of the bigger stream.

I love swimming. I had to remember to love me first. 

Take care of you. Spend more time with God than you think you can afford. Not just praying while driving and stuff like cleaning and praying; but really meditating on God’s word, his goodness and his great plan for you. That’s loving you. He might direct you to get a manicure, or discover a cure for cancer. He’s clever. He’s perfectly wise and knows how to love us, and he knows how to love other people through our lives laid down as a living sacrifice.

He’s not looking for a burnt offering. He wants a living, burning passionate lover. Then it will be difficult to NOT spend time with him. He will have to remind you to get back to cooking or cleaning and the other important stuff. He knows how to love us, and all we have to do is let ourselves be loved.

Remember to love you….as much as you love you, will be the measure that you can love somebody else.

Lots of love,

Missionary Momma Mia

The what ifs, ands, ors, & buts in the shadows

There are so many what ifs, ands, ors and buts that lurk in our shadowy futures and dimly lit pasts. We wonder what would have happened if only, or what we might face if we go in that direction.

There were so many dreams that we thought would follow some reasonable timeline. Or at least glance at our time table and consider our input. Right?

Wrong….

We are not merely managing some project, or overseeing an event. We have some kind of title of importance that basically means ‘the missionaries who want to face more haranguing’. There was a time when I was younger and thought a title would make things so much easier when we met with other important people or needed to sign important papers. Don’t get me wrong. Titles have their proper place in society, businesses and organizations. There are important reasons for titles of authority and power. I wasn’t really sure exactly what I wanted, but I knew that I wanted things to run more smoothly in our lives, our staffs’ lives, and the children to whom we were responsible guardians. So much paper work, and every single time explaining that I was an administrative director, or interim leader….I never thought that the conversations about who I was were actually building a relationship with people. I thought that I had work to just get done.

That was a character building phase in my life. Out of my experience rose up a character named…. Just kidding. I didn’t create another split personality to deal with the pressure. But I did learn to take less responsibility on my plate, even if it meant that everything we had built might crumble. We didn’t really have a typical way to build up a team and restructure organization where we were, and with the title that we held we didn’t have scary authority to brandish to irritating, irresponsible, or just naive people. There was no way to teach people the protocol and procedures that we had established and followed to build up that place. We had no connection with the western people who came to “help”. They just wanted to do things their way. They might have thought that was what we did, so in some small way maybe we should be flattered….I don’t know.

My husband and I were going to have to learn a very different style of leadership if we were going to ever do anything without big powerful titles. We would have to learn how to build connections and relationships that can withstand our absence or control.

First we had to walk away and let something nearly die. We were asked if we should just close the ministry base or not. We knew that place would probably struggle, but we believed that whatever God had in mind for that place would happen someday, and it wasn’t dependent on us being there. Now it’s thriving and full of life! We had to let it nearly die – a big ‘What if’, What if this was all some big test of character and it was mostly a waste of time? No we had to let go, not because we didn’t value the blood, sweat and tears that we poured out over that place, because we had valued our sacrifice more than Jesus’ sacrifice. We had to let go even if it meant that our sacrifice might have been in vain, and the place could become a ghost town.

Not only could we walk away, but we could possibly forget our sorrows. We had a gift from some family members that was supposed to help us purchase a little house. (Our interpretation was “walk away from being missionaries and just start a life somewhere else”.)

It never happened. We walked away from our place of pain, growing character, and blood sweat and tears and never started over as something other than missionaries. Within just a few weeks we knew that it wasn’t time to give up and run away from what we had started in February 2006 in Chimoio, Manica, Mozambique.

And much to our surprise, we didn’t really have any gift that would help us start over and buy a house. We had a reasonable gift that helped us travel to visit both of our extended families in Brazil and the United States, and head back to Mozambique to finish what we had started. We had to choose to face the shadows. We didn’t go back to live at the place that we had to let nearly die, but at the place where we had been given land for starting a new ministry base, in Chimoio, Manica, Mozambique. We had permission to do whatever we felt like God was leading us to do. We could have a fresh Start.

In the meantime, we had learned a huge lesson –among many others. Don’t build something that depends on your skills and presence to survive. We would try to build something that would become self-sustaining, and we entertained lots of other really cool ideas. We dreamed so much and had a few ideas and plans, at the same time we agreed to work on an existing big ministry project. But the big project was something that we had poured into before, and there were huge roadblocks to anything that was connected to our first place as missionaries. We were willing to work on whatever and wherever we were needed, but it just didn’t ever happen.

So many things that we imagined, planned and prayed about fell pretty flat. We had so many what ifs, ands, ors & buts. We assumed all the blame for everything falling flat, never imagining it was God asking us to completely let go of the past season.

Then one day someone left four kids in on our ministry property. These kids were abandoned by the last family that was caring for them. The term ‘caring’ is used very lightly there. The children were working in their fields with little food or comfort for recompense. They needed love. We could give them that.

These kiddos were a brand new plan for our lives. My husband and I prayed for them. We knew that we couldn’t abandon them. We felt like God spoke to us very frankly, “Are you going to reject the children that I am giving to you?

Our children? They were ours, given to us? Our hearts were totally rent in two. Talk about humbled.

My husband and I definitely couldn’t send them away, we did everything we could to make them comfortable and well fed and loved. We had energy, ability to care for them. We felt immediate love and compassion for them. How could God trust us to love them? Why did he give kiddos to us? We couldn’t even seem to get our ducks in a row for any project or program. We were pretty much cut off from anything that had happened in our ministry lives ‘before’. We could have wallowed in the past with all those thoughts and regrets, or thank God for a fresh start with these four children.

It was a big change to what we had thought about in the months coming up to our return to Mozambique from a little over a year furlough. We kinda threw a fleece before God. If this was truly his plan, and he was in fact giving us more children to love and care for, we needed clear confirmation.

I was up praying around 4 in the morning before the mosques in the city played a loud call to prayer. I had poured out my heart to God, and spoken with a dear friend who prayed for us. We needed God to show us that these kiddos were part of his plan for us. We hadn’t planned on taking care of any children without a fence around the ministry property, running water and electricity, the right buildings, and projects and programs. We were hoping to build everything first, but God had other ideas.

We had been thinking about our new think in Chimoio along the old word we had from God when we built a ministry base before. There were some projects going on as we built and built and built, but we felt like it was missing something. God kept telling us “If you build it they will come.” I thought it was funny because to this day, my husband has never seen the film, ‘Field of dreams’ I tried to explain it to him after he had a dream where he heard the phrase, but it was to no avail. I have just really never pursued renting it, or buying it because it’s a little bit Ironic that he did it. He built it. And we did have to let some things die, but someone was always there, and then they really did come. It never totally died. None of the work that we did was in vain. I digress. My bunny trails are leading somewhere though.

The new thought: It was just to trust him with whatever he gave to us, whatever or whoever God put into our hands. We were to love, steward and care for the gift that he entrusted to our care. At that point ‘Iris Chimoio’ was just a plot of land with a couple of tiny buildings, and an unfinished building, and a lot of turmoil pouring over it from the nearby Iris Churches and unsure neighbors.

We needed to have a dedicated safe place for those children, a place reserved for their care, comfort and to ensure their future. So we felt like we needed to separate the ministry land from all the past turmoil and dedicated it to God as a ministry center with a new name.

At that early morning hour when Heidi called, my husband and I had already talked about ministry names. We knew it was based on a vision that God had given us as we drove through the Manica Provence of Mozambique in 2006.

We saw a river, with a vision of a beautiful house near it. We knew it was a safe place, and a place of worship. We saw so many details about the promise that God showed us growing near his river of life that flowed from his throne. So we had the name ‘River of God’ already connected to our ministry vision. When Heidi called around 4 in the morning, it was as if we had already been talking through the night. She asked what our name for Iris Chimoio ministry base was, all the ministry bases had names like Joy village, or village of Love. That is when I told her that Joao and I already had a name in mind. We weren’t sure if it was really a village though, but she loved it!  

So the ministry land and small buildings that we steward in Chimoio were given the name ‘River of God’. ‘Children’s center’ was later tagged on as ‘Iris Chimoio – River of God’ was not quite a village. It is quite a mouthful of a name, but that made us happy because we had asked to do something small and organic after having done something big and over our heads.

We let the experience of the past be filed away for the time being, and moved forward as new parents and directors of Iris Chimoio – River of God Children’s Center. We became the legal guardians of those four children along with our other Mozambican son Seba. They are all pretty grown up now. They might not need us as parents much anymore. We don’t know exactly what we will find after having been away from November and arriving in June. We have had daily contact with our staff or children. The Iris Chimoio – River of God CC volunteers have been amazingly connected with us. It’s been totally different from before.

Still, I have to take deep breaths and trust God that this isn’t simply a repeat of the last time. This is the promise for now. We are not alone, we don’t feel isolated, we don’t feel that a title would help us promote order. We feel a bit shy going back after such a long time. What will they need our help for? Will they need us, or won’t they? Do we even want them to need us, or our guidance? Can we keep leading from a distance, or not? Will we discover something that causes huge changes? Would huge changes be good or bad? There is so much to pre-worry about, but I don’t have time for that.  Now I wonder what will happen after being away for more than a year. Things happen. I’ve heard about a lot of it. And we’ve helped guide the team from here. This promises to be interesting, and an adventurous journey.

Joao and I are still trusting in Papa God to help us care for the children that he put in our hands and our lives. We’re trusting God to help us encourage the churches, and reach out to the community. It’s time for us to get ready to go.

We can’t worry about those buts or whats, ifs, ands & ors. Its just going to have to be what it is, and we are going to have to go over there and be ourselves as we spend time with our lovely kiddos, amazing team and big International Family.

To each of you who prays, I’m thrilled that you would lift us up to the throne room of God and ask for his hand to be with us. We are desperately in need of more of God’s presence in our lives. We need his touch so deeply as our hearts question what he wants us to do as we go back for this brief time, and our own three sons stay with their grandparents and aunt and uncle. We are not super humans, we are simple people who can’t stand to let the shadow win.

Our confidence is pretty small right now. But help us shift our eyes back onto his lovely face as we go forward. Pray for us, cheer us on so we can feel his grip on our wrists when we feel like watching the waves.

I’m not good at walking on water yet….I’m confident that the one who is great at it is our greatest help! Thank you for reading this. It’s just a rough bit of my heart poured out. I hope and pray you are blessed as you face the shadows, and you remember where and who confidence comes from!

Lots of love,

Missionary Momma Mia

Introducing ROG Blog - River of God Blog

Hello dear friends, family and readers,
I've had a lovely time this month posting about our International Family. Sometimes our stories have more of a ministry focus. So I'm introducing a new blog to kinda streamline our ministry updates, and get ministry information available in one place.


http://irischimoioriverofgod.blogspot.com/2016/04/good-friends-care-about-things-that-we.html


This is what the posts looks like:

Good friends care about the things that we care about

I know it’s important to talk about because one of my dearest missionary friends was chatting with me and asking for updates about our roof in Chimoio. I looked on-line to see when I posted about the beautiful new roof being bent over and stripped off of half of one of our buildings.

I’m not excited to post about sad things, however sometimes the truth is sad. I’m not afraid to weep with those who weep. That said, it not easy to ask for friends and family to weep with me, but it isn’t fair to pretend that all is well with my heart when it’s still pretty broken. We have had beautiful friends and family rally around giving, praying, working and encouraging us to keep going! Rebuild! More precisely –Re-roof. We still have needs. If your heart is moved to be generous than shoot me an email. The link to email us is on both our Ministry webpages :

http://www.irisglobal.org/chimoio/contact-us

www.facebook.com/IrisChimoioRiverOfGodChildrensCenter/

So here it is the link to my Journal post in the Iris Chimoio Journal.

http://www.irisglobal.org/chimoio/journal/fresh-bread-from-heaven

It talks a little bit about how I faced this tragic destruction at the chidlren’s center sitting with Jesus, and even rejoicing! None of our kids were hurt when a terrible wind and rain storm ripped half of the roof up, off and over the building. I was seriously overcome with gratitude, and at the same time a tenacity to see the boys home repaired!

Our team is ‘gung ho’ to go forward. We need to purchase new heavier material. We have some of the funding in, we have a ways to go for the heavier material and new wood for the carpentry.

We’re so blessed by the sacrifices friends and family are making. We love reading the emails telling how people are moved to get involved, get connected, and give!

We are so blessed by our really big, really International family!

Lots of love from,

Missionary Momma Mia….It's still me, just more about ministry and maybe less ramblings....