I Am Faithful.

I sit in my room during dry season, and listen in wonder as the rain pours from the sky above me. It is so odd for it to be raining at all during this time of the year, let alone pouring. I sit here thinking about the rain, and all that has to happen in order for the miracle of water showering from the sky to even be possible. Everything in this world is so perfectly fine-tuned, that something as simple as a raindrop has left me breathless at the wonder that is God.

It's been a long time since I've felt moved to write. Kaylie's sister Amy came to El Salvador to help lead our team in early March, and since she's been here I've talked about God more than I have in my entire life. It feels so good just to share about Him and learn about Him and get excited about Him! Because of this, I've left my writing untouched. I don't know what's so different about tonight. Maybe it's the rain, or maybe there's something supernatural in the air that God is stirring up...regardless, He has completely captured my attention tonight and He has moved me to share.

Giving my everything to God all day every day is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I get tired. I get moody. I get bored. I get all the emotions that a simple human being experiences, and they all seem determined to keep me from being excited about my savior. The more I get down, the more I am forced to give my everything to God to lift myself back up into His arms. I've realized that the more I give to Him, the easier it is every time. I'm sure you're thinking, well duh Taylor. It's not that simple, though. The Bible lays it out perfectly for us, but at the end of the day as with all things in life...it's so much easier said than done. Despite it being the hardest path to follow, for the first time in my life, I am completely content in my relationship with God. Of course I struggle with day to day things and being consumed by the distractions of the world, but with God it's like everything has this beautiful shining haze over it. God's touch is evident in everything. He has taught me so much about who I am and my purpose in this world.

 Before I knew about GAP Year I had decided that UGA was going to be my saving grace. God took that option away, and put El Salvador in my path. I came, and have become completely reliant on the Lord. During my time here I decided that I would go to KSU and then transfer to UGA later, but yet again God closed that door. This time not because I don't have what it takes to get into the school, but because he laid out a better option. I keep making decisions based on what I think is right for my future instead of asking God what truly is right for my future according to Him. One night Amy was telling me all about the school she went to, North Greenville University, and as she was talking I become overcome with emotion. I knew in my heart that the Lord wanted me to pursue a Christian education to prepare myself for a life full of missions.

God blessed us with free will because He wants us to come to know Him on our own. What good would  a bunch of booty-kissing robots be to Him? How would that glorify Him at all? It's a hard lesson to learn: His ways are higher than our ways. (Isaiah 55:9). So often we try to get things done with our own power. If I just work here long enough, then I'll have enough money saved up to do this later. If I go to school here, then I'll be able to do this in the future. If I marry this person, then I'll have a better life. We try to plan our future according to our culture and what will make life the easiest. Life does not work according to an "if then" statement. It does not work like a mathematical equation. What happened to Jesus saying "if anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me"? (Luke 9:23). What happened to "do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth...but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven...for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also". (Matthew 7:19-21).  If heaven is truly a reality for me, then what job I have, or where I go to school, or who I marry means nothing to me if those decisions are not made based off of God's will.

The Lord has drastically changed my life. I refuse to sit back and let life take me where it will, because life is saturated with the influence of the enemy. If I let it, life would drag me down until there was no getting up. No, that is not my fate. My fate rests in the hands of an almighty, all knowing, merciful and loving God. He is my everything, and I know that His plan for my life will glorify Him in ways that I cannot begin to imagine at this stage in my life. Being here in El Salvador has opened my mind to a whole new ballgame. Same game, just bigger and badder players. I can never win if I try to do anything ahead of God's timing, or against His will. He loves me so much that He came to earth in the flesh in the form of His only son and died for me. How else can I honor that sacrifice than by doing nothing less than giving everything I have in me to spreading His name?

Philippians 3:7-14 says, "...whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ - the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,  press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."

What am I, or any of us, if we do not give everything to the one who promises us an eternity in heaven? I for one cannot continue to be so bold as to deny Him anything, when it all belongs to Him in the first place. I want to give Him everything, because I love Him. "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life".  (John 3:16)

All For His Glory,
Taylor