Justice Water with Jamie

It has been a while! I have been in Central Asia for most of the last 3 months and then got to have almost 2 weeks in Kona before flying down to Samoa to help staff another Discipleship Training School for the summer. We have the amazing opportunity of getting to train up a group of about 30 westerners and islanders in knowing God and how to make Him known! I will get around to that but first would love to get to talk about my Soviet time a bit.

During my time leading this last outreach, God showed us a lot about His consistency, about the value and necessity of prayer, about what role unity plays on a team, and about how to properly lead people. I was so blessed to lead a group of 5 students along with an amazing co-leader on a 10 week DTS outreach into a closed country in Central Asia. We had the opportunity to share who Jesus is through conversation, building projects, teaching classes, and eating a LOT of food! Our team felt like God was emphasizing joy, unity, prayer, hard-work, consistency, and compassion. It was incredible how he used these as pieces to mark our team. An example of joy was that when we first moved into the town, it seemed like everything was dull and dead to us. As we consistently lived in unity within the village and “in lowliness of mind esteemed others above ourselves,” we saw people come to smile whenever they saw us and we tangibly seemed to bring joy wherever we went. We emphasized showing love in whatever ways we could, from running a kindergarten in a different language, to digging a six meter latrine, to praying with people, to getting to cook meals for friends that we made. It was incredible to show the love of Christ in both words and actions and see how foreign of a concept. The Lord opened up many opportunities to talk about who He truly is through simply being consistent with who we were, who we said He is, and how we treated others. It was an incredible opportunity to see Him emphasize words beforehand and then to look back and see that those words were the linchpins of our impact. Once again, I got to see the power of prayer in a tangible way, with one example being the roof of a mosque that we prayed often around falling sideways, which we thought showed that Islam no longer held the absolute hold over the town. Before moving on, I want to shout out to Annie Rollins for being an absolutely incredible co-leader through consistently looking ways to serve everyone and always walking in kindness and wisdom. We were privileged to lead Westin Reynolds, Stephen Bathurst, Kolin Schinell, Gracie Carroll, and Baktaghoul Osment. They are incredible men and women of God who showed what it means to “bear with one another in love”, to champion each other, and to look for ways to bless others around them.

After this awesome outreach, I got to fly back to Kona for about 12 days of debrief time, with my team, the school, our staff team, and MY MOM! It was great to see all these people and was especially sweet to see mom after quite a while since the last time. We got to have some very enjoyable talks and spend some time just chilling together and I think that both of us really appreciated it. It was amazing to get some time with the staff team again also; they were one of the most inspirational people who I’ve ever spent time with. They love the Lord with everything, are willing to act this out daily, and see that loving God entails loving others. I was constantly called higher by them and will miss them tremendously. The Engage DTS was one of the best seasons of my life and a season where I got to see another example of what great Christian community looks like and that serving the Lord truly is the “life abundant” that is promised in scripture. I look forward to seeing these people again and seeing what the Lord has done through them to change many people’s lives.

Now I have the opportunity to be in Samoa! I briefly mentioned that I am staff for a Discipleship Training School here for the next two months. This week we got to learn about the “Father Heart of God” and I got to see many students impacted heavily by coming to see that God is truly a good father and that he does not have all the same inconsistencies as our earthly fathers inevitably have (except mine haha) but that he is consistently good, faithful, and involved with us. “He will NEVER leave nor forsake you…” I am excited to see the Lord continue to show his value, his love, and why He is truly worth all of us. We are in for a fun ride!!

In Christ,

Jamie

Check out Psalm 19