closer...

i am coming nearer to my trip to panama and to be totally honest i am freaking out. my emotions seem to be all over the place and i feel that there isn't one thing that i can do to keep them grounded other than to cry out for God. i feel pulled in a hundred different directions with vague points of entry and exit. i want to go running to the hills. thankfully though where we are going in panama is in the hills. for the most part i have felt very much in control of my body, and emotions, but today it just hit me out of left field of all the things that have to get done before i leave. that this trip is definitely not like the last time i went to panama, where all i had to worry about was myself. this time i have about 20 other people that i am accountable for.
not only that though i have responsibilities of my own that have to get done before leaving. tonight though i had the privilege to speak and encourage the first time kids that are going to panama. i came home and talked with my parents before getting ready for bed. i got on facebook to check what my friends were doing and had going on. then i got on biblegateway.com because a friend of mine had posted a scripture verse and i was just curious to see what the scripture verse of the day was. the verse  talked about God being my strength in the trouble times. he is the one that gives me tread to walk another step. he is the director of my stringed life. it is in these moments when God speaks and pours into my life and all i can do is just rejoice and thank Him.
it is in my moments of feeling overwhelmed and stressed that God just sends the people that i need most to speak into my life. as i am about 6 days from my trip i only ask for prayer. that you would seriously remember our team that is going. that God would have a huge impact on our lives forever. that callings would happen and be solidified, and become a reality for some. that God would show up and be so thick and tangible. that the lives of the people of panama would never be the same again. that God would just soften their hearts to hear what they so desperately need. that we would allow God to be our strength, tread, and director of our lives. here is the verse that i found.

the sovereign LORD is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to tread on the heights. for the director of music. on my stringed instruments. Habakkuk 3.19

11 days

this is will be my second time traveling back to the beautiful country of Panama. to say the least i am extremely excited and so ready to be immersed back into that culture. it has been about 3 years since i first went and there is not a day that goes by when i don't reminisce about that trip and the way God totally shook my life.  it was the time in my life when i was beginning to doubt my calling and everything that God really had for me. i had grown up in the church most of my life and it was the same thing to me each week. i would go into service. stand for worship. listen to the pastor preach. pray and then go home. i didn't know what it truly meant to be a follower of Christ. i had lost whatever respect i had for God that summer. although on the outside you would have never known. i put on the facade that i was ok. that i had this amazing relationship with God. and i won't lie there were times when God totally broke me, but i was so burnt out that i honestly didn't know what to stand on.
i went off to college and it was like a breath of fresh air. that year i got so close to God and was beginning to find out who i was. i finished up my freshman year knowing that i was going to be ok. i went home that summer and God just gave me a lot of growing experiences. i began to feel comfortable in my own skin for a time being. i went back to school that fall still trying to figure out what it meant to be a true follower of Christ. i began to be mentored and be able to fellowship with 8 other girls who were asking the very same questions as i was. i began to let some of the things in my past go because i knew that holding on to them was doing me no good. summer came again and i was faced with even more challenges that i would have to overcome. i went back to school last fall feeling something different in myself. it was like a chapter begin to wind itself down. but i was fighting to keep it open at least for a little while longer.
around christmas i knew it was time. i transferred to a school closer to home and felt like i was myself. like i could be myself. i met some great friends this past year and was shown that it was ok to be myself and open up. during all these experiences and challenges i knew that God had something truly amazing in store. i got a phone call from my youth pastor about interning this summer at my home youth group. i accepted after prayerful consideration it has blown my mind thus far. being an intern i have the privilege to go as a leader on a missions trip. although i was praying to go to peru i knew that Panama was exactly the place where God wanted and needed me. i guess what i am trying to say is that every situation, challenge, hurdle that we come into contact with is never without a rime or a reason. i feel like i have faced more than my share, but i know that there are hurting people in Panama that need me. i am looking forward to every second i get to spend with them. to just love on them. and show them that they don't have to give up. that there is a God who loves them, and wraps them in His arms of love.