The prophets of Baal
Another week down. It's hard to believe I've already been here for 5 weeks. It's going quickly. Which is a good and a bad thing. I have moments where I really love it and moments where I really hate it here. Part of that is just dealing with culture shock, homesickness and language barriers. But the days are going quickly by.
This week has been a vacation week for all of the Project New Hope staff. Today is Independence day in Peru and here they celebrate the whole week. And so everyone enjoys time off to do nothing. This week I have spent a lot of time reading, watching movies and working on my online scrapbook. It has been good for me to rest and do things I enjoy to help me not get super overwhelmed by life here. I also celebrated Nicole's birthday. She is the youngest daughter of my mentor, Dani. We spent the whole day shopping, eating food and watching Harry Potter part 2. It was a pretty good day.
This week has been a time for me to rest before I start work with the team full-time, day in and day out in the barrios. For the month of August I am going to be working with 7 members of our team in 4 barrios. It's going to be tough I know because of the language barrier. But I am excited to get to see the every day work of the Project and get a real taste of what missions life is like. Also, I am soon going to be starting my Spanish lessons with Nicole and Skylar. They are going to work with me to help improve my Spanish and maybe by December I will be able to converse with people more than I can now. Fingers crossed!
One of the commitments I made in preparing for my internship and getting my learning covenant set up was that I would spend at least 30 minutes a day in the Scriptures and journaling. So far I have done a pretty good job of sticking to that. When the gringos are here it's a bit harder. But I'm finding a good groove with it all. I am currently reading Psalms, Proverbs and 1 Kings along with a couple of devotion books (one is called Ruthless Trust which I'm reading with Spencer. and the other is Experiencing God which I am reading with the team and barrio leaders here). Last night I read chapter 27 in Psalms and Proverbs and chapter 18 in 1 Kings. 1 Kings 18 is the story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal. We all know that story. It's one that we have heard, told and acted out since the age of 5. But how often do we really pay attention to the story. To the message within it? In the past when I have read the story I have always listened and focused on how Elijah defeated the prophets of Baal and proved them wrong. But that's not the key thing in the story. Elijah didn't defeat and disprove them. GOD DID. God proved Himself to be the true God. God proved Himself to be greater than Baal. He just used Elijah to do it. We so often forget that it's GOD who did the amazing feat. It was GOD who proved to the Israelite people that He was the only God. Not Elijah. Not man. God. And only God. I know that I often forget that fact and I believe in the power of man more than the power of God. When it should be the other way around. May we all remember who proved the prophets of Baal wrong. May I remember that GOD is GOD and man is not. Not even a great man like Elijah.
This week has been a vacation week for all of the Project New Hope staff. Today is Independence day in Peru and here they celebrate the whole week. And so everyone enjoys time off to do nothing. This week I have spent a lot of time reading, watching movies and working on my online scrapbook. It has been good for me to rest and do things I enjoy to help me not get super overwhelmed by life here. I also celebrated Nicole's birthday. She is the youngest daughter of my mentor, Dani. We spent the whole day shopping, eating food and watching Harry Potter part 2. It was a pretty good day.
This week has been a time for me to rest before I start work with the team full-time, day in and day out in the barrios. For the month of August I am going to be working with 7 members of our team in 4 barrios. It's going to be tough I know because of the language barrier. But I am excited to get to see the every day work of the Project and get a real taste of what missions life is like. Also, I am soon going to be starting my Spanish lessons with Nicole and Skylar. They are going to work with me to help improve my Spanish and maybe by December I will be able to converse with people more than I can now. Fingers crossed!
One of the commitments I made in preparing for my internship and getting my learning covenant set up was that I would spend at least 30 minutes a day in the Scriptures and journaling. So far I have done a pretty good job of sticking to that. When the gringos are here it's a bit harder. But I'm finding a good groove with it all. I am currently reading Psalms, Proverbs and 1 Kings along with a couple of devotion books (one is called Ruthless Trust which I'm reading with Spencer. and the other is Experiencing God which I am reading with the team and barrio leaders here). Last night I read chapter 27 in Psalms and Proverbs and chapter 18 in 1 Kings. 1 Kings 18 is the story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal. We all know that story. It's one that we have heard, told and acted out since the age of 5. But how often do we really pay attention to the story. To the message within it? In the past when I have read the story I have always listened and focused on how Elijah defeated the prophets of Baal and proved them wrong. But that's not the key thing in the story. Elijah didn't defeat and disprove them. GOD DID. God proved Himself to be the true God. God proved Himself to be greater than Baal. He just used Elijah to do it. We so often forget that it's GOD who did the amazing feat. It was GOD who proved to the Israelite people that He was the only God. Not Elijah. Not man. God. And only God. I know that I often forget that fact and I believe in the power of man more than the power of God. When it should be the other way around. May we all remember who proved the prophets of Baal wrong. May I remember that GOD is GOD and man is not. Not even a great man like Elijah.
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