Jul 22, 2019
Wow, what a year! As I reflect and look back over my time here as a GFA School of Discipleship (SD) student, I am just amazed by what the Lord did in my life. And I look forward for Him to continue breaking me, molding me, and creating me into what He wants me to be, leading me where he wants to go.
One of the biggest things I saw and experienced while being here has been the power and presence of God displayed so evidently here. He is definitely at work through this ministry! First off would be the most important and effective way – prayer. We pray a lot here. Someone once told me when I first got here, “We don’t plan prayer around our day, but we plan our day around prayer.” This is so true! And it is such and joy and encouragement to get to be a part of those (many!) prayer times, and then get to see God answer them. This year definitely grew my faith in prayer. Even in my personal prayer life and relationship with the Lord.
Another way I know God is at work with GFA is by getting to hear some of the staff’s personal testimonies and hearing how God is working in their lives personally and as they serve at GFA. And another way is through hearing stories and reports from the field. God is for sure working and saving so many people’s lives in Asia! But ultimately, I know God worked in my life so much! I know He still has so much to do, but He has also brought me so far. He broke my selfish flesh in areas I didn’t know needed broke. He taught me how to have grace for people – even when they fail. We all fail, including me. So, God has shown me to have grace on myself when I make mistakes, and to give grace to others, because He has given us such amazing grace.
God taught me how to live in a community with other people. We’re all different and unique, but we all have one thing in common: to serve Christ and advance the Kingdom of God. He showed me how to love these people for who they are – none of us are perfect – like He loves us, even if it takes a cost.
God showed me how to be fully content and joyfully serve Him, wherever He places me. To be honest, staying in the IT Department for my second vocational training assignment was hard at first. But God helped me to totally overcome that! I am so thankful for the team I got to serve alongside. I truly love those people!
God grew my trust and faith in Him so much! Not having my SD Tuition fully funded and losing my one and only monthly supporter was really hard. But I prayed a lot about it, and finally got to the point of having peace in the Lord, knowing that He was going to provide because He always does. He is so faithful! Building this faith in Him drew me into a closer relationship with Him, which has been so special.
My favorite course was probably Touching Godliness by Dr. K.P. Yohannan. It was so hard, but God taught me so much in that book! He showed me what it means to fully submit to those in authority – even when I don’t agree, or don’t feel like it is “my way” or the “best way”. He taught me that we can obey without fully submitting. Submission is all the attitude of the heart.
God grew me in the knowledge of church traditions: liturgy, founding church fathers, leadership names and meanings, and even why the leaders wear what they wear! 😉 Attending a “small-o” orthodox church this year was not the easiest at first. But I started to really enjoy it. I asked lots of questions, I saw the influence liturgy has in our faith (Satan can’t stop us from saying what is already written and right before our eyes!), and I am now fascinated by how the ancient church got established by who.
A special Scripture passage that stayed with me all year was Psalm 139 verses 7-10 “Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? If I ascend into heaven, You are there;
if I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there Your hand shall lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me.”
Moving away from home – family, friends, and familiarity – was really hard. But God gave me such a peace about it, and I had such a rest in Him, knowing He was with me the entire time, and was going to give me the joy and strength to get through this year.
So now with the year wrapping up, I am very excited to see where the Lord leads me next! SD has changed me. So, with everything that I have shared with you and so much more that the Lord has taught me and grown me in, I want to keep applying it all to my life. I can’t go home and act like nothing happened. I need to take everything I have learned, and keep growing, keep learning, and keep applying it to my life for His glory.
Read another post by a 2019 School of Discipleship class member.
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Apr 15, 2019
“He has told you, o man, what is good: and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God.”
Micah 6:8
What comes to mind when you hear the word “humility”?
For me, I always thought of embarrassment and shame. I had a picture in my mind of elementary school. I was getting ready to run my very first “track meet.” I was only in like kindergarten or first grade, so it wasn’t like I was on a team or anything. I checked in once we got to the high school track and got my bib with my number on it–I was set to go.
Considering my brothers already ran track, I was a pretty confident six-year-old. They called my age group out to the track where a bunch of little five and six-year-olds lined up at the starting mark.
*BOOM* We all took off running. I heard my brothers’ words echoing in my head: “Don’t run super fast in the beginning! Everyone else will burn out towards the end, but you will have more energy–that’s when you run super fast!” Psh I’ve got this, no problem. I’m running along, letting other kids pass me.
But all of a sudden, something happened that I had not prepared for…Never in a million years did I expect my SHOE TO FALL OFF! I felt my bare sock on the rubbery track. I looked behind me to see my pink running shoe about five feet behind me. I didn’t know what to do, but I did know that I was mortified. I could hear my brothers cheering me on in the background, telling me to keep going. I was frozen from embarrassment, which only made things worse in my mind.
I felt my face getting hot and next thing I know tears were streaming down my flushed cheeks. I just stood there staring at my shoe, crying. It felt like en eternity but the next thing I felt was someone holding my hand. I look up and see my brother, laughing and telling me to keep going and sort of pulling me forward. I eventually finished the race but you can bet I never ran again after that. I was humiliated at just six years old!
So when I felt the Lord telling me I needed to pray for humility, I panicked, thinking something as scarring as that memory was going to happen. In a moment of feeling very spiritual, I asked Him to give me humility. Then I realized what I had done and said, “Never mind–I take it back!”
Godly Humility
It took me 12 and a half years to realize there was such a thing as godly humility. In fact, it wasn’t until just a few days ago that my eyes were opened to this fact.
Our
GFA School of Discipleship class was reading
Crazy Love by Francis Chan in the beginning of February. There were so many great things in this book, but a few things stuck out to me in particular–one of which is just realizing how precious time is and how fragile our lives are. We aren’t promised next year, or tomorrow or even the next hour. So what are you doing in your life to benefit the kingdom of God? Do you want to die while watching some movie filled with cursing? Do you want Jesus to come back in the middle of a gossiping conversation? I don’t know about you, but I want to be doing something that the Lord would be proud of to call me His own.
2018-2019 School of Discipleship Class
Something else that had an impact on me wasn’t actually in the book, but in our homework questions. You see, in Crazy Love, Francis Chan goes through a whole list of characteristics that can be found in a Christian “obsessed” with Jesus. From the 13 listed, one of the homework questions asked what three were the hardest ones for us. The three I picked out were ‘friends of all’, ‘humble’, and ‘dedicated.’
Dedicated: A person who is obsessed with Jesus is more concerned with his/her character than comfort. Obsessed people know that true joy doesn’t depend on circumstances or environment; it is a gift that must be chosen and cultivated, a gift that ultimately comes from God. (James 1:2-4)
The very next question said, ” For each of these three areas, think of one person who is an example to you of being obsessed in this way.” As I began to brainstorm, I realized all three of those that I struggled with just happened to be three very prominent characteristics in one of my brothers. I felt the bitterness rising and I had an “of course” kind of attitude. All my life it’s felt like I lived in the shadows of my brothers, but mostly this one. Our relationship has always been sort of weird. We’re close, but also, low-key, always in competition with each other.
Our teacher that day told us to look up to the people that we listed and follow them as an example so that we can begin to achieve or get better at those things. I thought, “nah.” But as the day went on, I really felt the Lord telling me I needed to call him and apologize for constantly being bitter and jealous. I thought, “nah.”
Tough Conversations
A few weeks went by with that on my mind and heart pretty regularly, but after a while I started to feel that conviction slip away. Agh. I knew this was something I needed to do and I wanted to obey the Lord especially because our time is limited. So before I could overthink it, I called my brother–actually, before I could think about it at all. I had no idea what I was going to say!
He answered and I told him I was sorry for everything, and I haven’t been the best sister and I asked him to forgive me. He forgave me and apologized as well, for not making it easy for me. There was a whole lot more that went into that conversation but that’s personal for me to hold onto and treasure. It was a really super great conversation and I hung up feeling not only closer to him but closer to God, too! I felt so much joy and relief and tried to block out what else the Lord was telling me to do during that phone call.
A few weeks went by and I could still feel Him telling me to do something else. I knew what it was but I pretended I didn’t hear it. Again, after a while, that conviction started to fade. This time I didn’t care.
Heh, oh well. As I realized that, I started feeling pretty thankful that it was leaving to be honest, but in the midst of that, I heard the Holy Spirit say to me loud and clear, “Karis, how many opportunities and growth are you going to miss out on because you won’t do this simple thing for Me?”
Agh. Fine. I stepped into an empty meeting room in the
GFA office and called up my sister-in-law.
We’ve always had a weird/not the greatest relationship, as well. We don’t have the greatest past, and there was a lot of unresolved hurt. I told her that I felt like we haven’t officially closed the doors to our past and I really believed it was because I never asked for her forgiveness. There was a lot more to this conversation too, but it’s for me.
She forgave me and expressed how much it meant to her. Afterwards, I felt even closer to God than before and was feeling super refreshed, so I wanted to go tell one of our School of Discipleship leaders about it because I was just so excited. I sat in my chair deciding if I wanted to tell her at that moment or at the end of the day. Once I decided I wanted to do it right then, I kid you not: HE ASKED ME TO HAVE ANOTHER CONVERSATION WITH SOMEONE. No–That’s all I said.
But I eventually told myself I would do it since I’m already feeling good and when else would I do it? This one however, was a little more difficult for me. This conversation had to be done face-to-face with someone over me at GFA. On my way to the School of Discipleship leader’s office, I made up my mind that if this person wasn’t at their desk then it just wasn’t meant to happen. And what do you know…they weren’t! Relief blew over me. And on my way back from the leader’s office, that person still wasn’t there! As soon as I got done saying “thank goodness” in my mind, they walked around the corner. Bah! But I did it and I had that conversation–apologizing and asking for forgiveness.
Growth Through Godly Humility
Even though I had to have three really hard conversations in the span of about three weeks, I can honestly say that my relationship with the Lord feels like something completely different. It is totally different than it was a week ago. He revealed what godly humility looked like and felt like. It was scary; I definitely won’t lie or sugarcoat that. And I one hundred percent did not want to have any of those conversations. But I don’t regret any of them. In fact, I wish I had them sooner because of how much growth happened afterwards. I wish I could explain to you all the joy that fills my spirit now. I was humbled in a way that didn’t cause embarrassment or shame. It was just choosing to get off my high horse. I treasure this entire experience!
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Jun 30, 2017
A while ago I burned my finger while washing a hot frying pan. I’ve come very close several times in the past, but this time around I did actually burn my finger. After the initial “That’s hot!” and the resulting “Wow! My finger smarts!” I started looking at the blister that was rising on my finger.
First there was the interesting factor that the tip of my finger was half again it’s normal size. That was fun, especially for typing. But more seriously was the realization that the blister was there for a reason. It was a shield; protecting the smarting and sensitive skin underneath while my body healed. It was a sterile environment where my body could focus entirely on building a new patch of skin and not have to station extra security details in order to prevent germs and dirt from getting into my body. Granted that it was a burn and not a gaping wound; that would have been a completely different situation.
As I was thinking over these things, and having fun with peoples reactions to my oversized finger (Please pop it!, What is that on your finger?, That’s gross!) it also gave me a new sense of how much genius (the word doesn’t go nearly far enough) that God put into creating my body.
Then I moved on to some other injuries. Broken bones knit together, cuts heal over, food poisoning washes itself out of your digestive system, pretty much anything that doesn’t kill you will heal after a fashion. Doctors or surgeons may be required to make sure that your bones are straight after a broken leg, or to stitch a nastier than usual cut. But God has built our body to fix itself in a marvelous manner.
Psa 139:14 NKJV – 14 I will praise You, for I am fearfully [and] wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works, And [that] my soul knows very well.
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Jun 9, 2017
Psalm 46:10 “Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.”
Silence is void of noise, movement or action. To be still is to turn off the noise, stop the movement and do nothing.
“But Lord, there’s a dying world out there?!”
God: “Be still and know that I am God…”
Me: “But how will they know that you love them if I sit still?”
God: “I will be exalted among the nations…”
Me: “Okay Lord, I will be still and know you are God.”
God: “I will be exalted in the earth!”
Psalm 46:11 “The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah”
It’s been difficult for me to be still and unmoved by all that is and could be going on . The restless “Jacob” in me says I need to be out there doing things and making a visible impact in the world and in the lives of people NOW. Circumstances around me shift like waves in the ocean, yet God is the Creator of the oceans saying “be still”. To my soul He also says “be still”. It’s a sobering reminder that God is in control and very active as I am still before Him who keeps the universe in place. Yes, there is a time to be active myself but there is a time to be still.
Having a mentor to help guide my steps through this year has been challenging in ways because I’m used to running my own show and set my pace. Having to concentrate my time and energy into a set time (one year) for a specific purpose has been hard to do. Especially dying to self has become less attractive when it’s actual dying to self, the flesh. It seemed that in order for me to be still before the Lord, and to realize that He is in control, that I needed to hit the wall. First, by being gently nudged by my mentor to “settle down”, I realized that she was right, though I didn’t want to admit it. I did and still do need to settle down more, not run around here, there and every where, but rather to be intentional in this unique setting God has placed me in this year. It’s easy for me to be busy with many “good” things but I’ve been reminded that the “good” isn’t always the best and right now the best is DP. It seems that when I still don’t quite get it, along comes the blessing of a seasonal virus. Everything continues as normal even when I’m sick and in bed. All this helps me to learn a single lesson, realizing that I can be still for God is still God. I am learning what it means to be still and let God be God because things go best when I’m yielded to Him.
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Apr 21, 2017
Oh what fun the past few months have been. I’m so glad that though there are spiritual struggles and battles, we have so much to celebrate. Filling a bedroom with balloons for a welcome home surprise, decorating office desks with streamers for birthday and anniversaries are some ways to celebrate the Lord’s faithfulness in the lives of GFA family! God is so good and He gives us so much to rejoice over.
Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say rejoice! Philippians 4:4
I struggle to remember to rejoice, often, though I know that I’m saved and that the Holy Spirit dwells within me but I forget so easily that the battle is the Lord’s and He’s already won! I get caught up in areas where I fail that I forget to rejoice in the areas where I have experienced victory.
Being at GFA Canada where we celebrate continually is a blessing. Whether it is a birthday, anniversary or a Friday, there’s always something we are thanking the Lord for, through cake, decorations, or songs. In the Old Testament, the children of Israel were given feast days in which they were to remember the Lord’s mercy and deliverance. I think God knew we needed to have these days in order to rejoice, so we wouldn’t dwell on the negative and continue striving in our own strength.
Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.” Nehemiah 8:10
Written by a Discipleship Program Student
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