Choosing To Love When Its Hard

Hi Everyone,

Sometimes we have to choose to love even when its hard. My birdie Faith's personality has changed--now he hates being held and bites me if I try to hold him. :( Maybe it is because of breeding season, or because I have been busy the past months. Thankfully he still sings beautifully and even says "pretty bird" now

I choose to love him anyway even when he responds in ways that aren't so nice. I miss the sweet bird, that used to cuddle and beg me to scratch his neck, that he used to be.

To changing the subject, to a much deeper and more important matter, sometimes love isn't easy with people either. Its hard for example when you love someone that maybe makes choices that you don't understand. Sometimes love has to do things that are hard and it is difficult to know how to go about certain situations that come up. Loves bears all things, always hopes, and always perseveres. Love trusts that God is working out things for the good, living by faith and not by sight.

And then we think of God who loved us first---and chose to love is when we were trapped in sin and far from Him. Maybe we weren't that easy to love but He loved us so much and paid the price by sending His one and only Son to die for us taking our sin upon himself when He had never sinned. He pursued us with a love that persevered, filled with hope that never gave up and had a perfect plan to draw us to Himself at the right time.

So as we follow in His footsteps, we keep choosing to love even when its hard because He first loved us.

An Update From My Neglected Blog

Hi Everyone!

It's been a month since I wrote on here--time flies when you are busy!

Today I got a little blessing! A less than $1 dollar formal dress from someone's "garage" sale! Very cool! I guess I will be wearing it to church since I rarely have opportunities to go to formal events.

 

So you are probably all wondering how the youth missions conference went. About 670 youth attended and there were people represented from at least 14 different countries. I got to share a room with a lady named Angelica that was there representing a different missions agency, so it was fun to both be "older than the youth age-wise" as this meant we were in agreement about things such as when we went to bed and what time we got up each day.  It was fun to swap stories about our jobs and hear what God was doing through another ministry and agency. Very cool!

Each afternoon from 12-6 pm, I, along with various members of my team each day, helped represent our missions agency and talked to various people regarding their interest in missions. At the end of the week we had 42 people that signed the paper asking for more information, and I was in charge of following up those 42 individuals with a letter written by my leaders and some other information as well. The conference was a good change in routine for me, which I really needed.I also had a few opportunities to share my testimony with a few people, which was neat, because opportunities to share do not come as often as I would like.

    So after the conference, I've been busy with some administrative things related to the short-term ministry and such. Amanda, who came to Mexico in mid-January, leaves for the States in a little over a week from now. She really has been a blessing and will be missed.

   Hopefully I'll be able to get back to my posts about the walk of grace soon. I just wanted to give a brief update from the conference. Thank you for your prayers.