Jesus, Bring The Rain

“Bring me joy, bring me peace
Bring the chance to be free
Bring me anything that brings You glory
And I know there’ll be days
When this life brings me pain
But if that’s what it takes to praise You
Jesus bring the rain”
-MercyMe, Bring the Rain


One of the things Jim gave Melissa for Christmas was the new MercyMe CD. Specifically, he highlighted this song (above) as his favorite and played it for us, as I had never head of it before. Ironically, the next day the basement flooded (mainly in the room where I live). Melissa called me to tell me while I was out babysitting. She was especially concerned because I had a mound of stuff on the floor of my room/in suitcases that I was getting around to packing. So pretty much my "most important" possessions at this point were on the floor, sitting in standing water. As Cossette, thier one and a half year old, would say, "uh-oh!"


As I was feeding the kids I was babysitting dinner, I started praying about the situation. It went something like this, "Jesus, you brought me this far. If I literally have nothing left but what I'm wearing, I'll be okay..." Did I mention that what I was wearing was damp as well??---I'd gotten rained on pretty well a few times earlier in the day! "You've provided before. You've gotten me 92% of my support. You can handle making sure I have clothes." It occurred to me later that this was a reaction of trust, more so than fear. That's a pretty big deal for me!

A few minutes later Melissa called back and I found out that it was only an inch or so of water (I was thinking it was a lot more than that!). Additionally, somehow the bottom of the suitcases had gotten wet and had sat in standing water, but NOTHING inside the suitcases had gotten went at all!

That night when I reflected on all that had happened, I identified TWENTY ways that God had revealed himself through the flood. For example, I had the bag with my laptop in it in my car, which is usually sitting on the floor right where the water came into my room. Also, just a few days ago I had a bag of Christmas presents sitting on the floor right next to the watery-est part of the room---a bunch of them were books (check out the Jesus Storybook Bible: Every Story Whispers His Name by Sally Lloyd-Jones....that was my favorite gift to give this year!). Several other books were in a pile on the floor, along with my journal. The other books were soaked through, but my journal was not wet at all. This journal was a gift from one of my kindergarten students as well as a record of all that God has been teaching me during support-raising, definitely the one "book" I would want to save of all the books near by it. That's just a small taste of how God used location (the car), timing (after Christmas), and His knowledge of what is most important to me to provide for me during "the flood."


When I got home from babysitting everything was all cleaned up from "the flood," thanks to some serious work on Jim and Melissa's part. As I entered the basement, I immediately saw a rectangular vase with many stones in it. It was the VERY FIRST thing that I saw. Usually it is inside of my room on a bookshelf next to my closet, but it had been moved into the hallway during the cleaning process. Later I told Jim and Melissa that it was an altar, that each stone represented one miracle that God had done in my life. Just like the Israelites made altars or piles of stones commemorating huge things God had done in their lives in the Old Testament days, I made an altar last Spring to remind me of all that God was doing in my life. The first thing Noah did after the flood was construct an altar and praise God and construct an altar. So, Jim suggested that I add another stone for all the miracles we saw God do during the flood. I looked around and added the closest thing to a stone shape as I could find...it happened to be an orange!



"But if that's what it takes to praise You, Jesus bring the rain...." ---MercyMe

Praise God for everything that causes us to praise Him, for any situations that highlight His work in our lives!

You're a Lifesaver!

You're a life saver---literally! Jim, the dad of the family I live with in St. Louis, just recently graduated from EMT school! We're so proud of him! Melissa, his wife (shown in the picture), decorated a cookie cake and invited several of his friends over for a surprise graduation party! The symbol on the cake is the official EMT symbol and looks even cooler in person/close up! She did a great job coordinating (and surprising) him and it was fun to celebrate all his hard work!

On Christmas Day Melissa and I performed a song I wrote for him to extend the celebration and reiterate our excitement for him....all based on things I've learned about being an EMT from his excited conversation about the skills he's been acquiring over the last few months. Try acting it out/singing it! Songs with hand motions are guaranteed to prompt smiling!!!

EMTB---Emergency Medical Technician, Basic (To the Tune of “YMCA”)

Verse 1

Young man, take that black tag off me (rip tag off chest)
I said young man, death is far from me (push hands away from body)
I said young man, there’s still hope left for me (praying hands)
Nothings obstructing my airway (point to neck 2 times, both fingers)

Young man, it’s extrication time
I said young man, you’ll be covered in grime (both hands go from shoulders to hips)
I said young man, get that car off of mine (point to left, point to self)
Nothing’s going to stop you (clamp jaws of life 2 times)

Chorus:
I’m so glad that you’re my EMTB
I’m so glad that you’re my EMTB
You know everything about my vital signs (check wrist pulse)
When you talk to me, you calm my mind (wipe hand across head in relief)

I’m so glad that you’re my EMTB
I’m so glad that you’re my EMTB
Whether I am a stay and play or load and go (dance, jog)
There is nothing you don’t know (point to brain)

Verse 2:
Young man, now when the sirens sound (point finger, circle above head)
I said young man, reporting all you found (write on hand like clipboard)
I said young man, what do you need from me? (shrug)
I’ll try not to move my c-spine (hands perpendicular to shoulders two times)

No man does it by himself (wag finger)
I said young man, you work with a team well (hug other performer)
As we go there, to the E.R. (point finger, sweeping motion)
I’m sure that you can help me more (wave/come with me)

Sing Chorus Again.

My Favorite Roommate

Well, it's actually hard to choose who my favorite roommate is... I guess that's a good problem to have! A couple from my church is letting me live in their basement for free while I am support-raising and this is their little girl. She's about one and a half and is very quick, so it's hard to capture her on film. It's like she went straight from barely walking to running!

Keep in mind that I'm practicing taking pictures of myself with people. I think a few of those snow pictures with Amy were pretty impressive in that respect (i.e. I'm holding the camera AND I'm in the picture AND my arm does not appear to be abnormally large in the picture). I think this picture of us is pretty cool for the same reason. I decided to lay down next to her to take her picture from ground-level, and she climbed on my back; I happened to catch us both in the same frame!

Here she is dancing! She loves to dance and smile and laugh and repeat sounds and words! Her favorites are "no" for nose, "shoe," "mow" for cat, "do" for dog, "mama" for mom and whenever she wants something, and "dada." I was trying to teach her to say "Joanne," but that's pretty hard, so I'm going for "Jo Jo" now, since she likes to repeat words. She's catching on, though sometimes it sounds more like "Do Do," which I think is kind of funny :0)

Unbelievable, that's what You are!

As of this exact moment, God has raised up 84% of my support! WOW! There are so many cool stories of Him absolutely amazing me in how He's done that! 15% of that support came in the last week and a half! Craziness! He's moving so quickly in these last days! Not too long until I find out my "official" move-back-to-Florida date, though I anticipate it will be in early January.

There are 52 churches that are having missions meetings this month that have already received my brochure, prayer letter, etc. Will you pray for their wisdom and discernment as they allocate funds? That God will lead those to support me that He wants to support me (whether individuals or churches)? That they would be obedient to His leading? Praise God that He is trustworthy! Praise God that He provides! Praise God that He is good! Praise God that He is loving! As Jacki J says, "Yeah, God!!!"

"Many, O Lord, my God,

are the wonders you have done.

The things you planned for us

no one can recount to you;

were I to speak and tell of them,

they would be too many to declare!"

-Psalm 40:5