Every nation, tribe and tongue

My husband and I had the amazing privilege of serving in India for almost two weeks. We served with Children's Fellowship of India, the orphanage with whom Never Forsaken has partnered with in ministry. CFI is home to 179 orphan boys in central India and the work they do there is incredible. These boys are fed the Word of God continually and poured into by men & women who love the Lord and love them. CFI is a bright beacon of light in the middle of a very spiritually dark land. These boys have literally been rescued in every sense of the word!

I could go into detail about exactly what we did while we were there but I think it is  more profits to share what I learned while there. It's amazing to me how you go on a missions trip to serve and be a blessing and yet end up walking away with so much! 

So I want to share the two biggest things that impacted me during our time there. First, American Christians as a whole lack something that the Indian people possess much of! It is a heart of service and hospitality. They have so little and yet they freely open their homes and serve others. You don't go into an Indian home without being served. You are immediately offered tea or soda and often food. This is true even in the majority of  Indian stores as well. It continually made me think of how Jesus has called us to be hospitable and serve others. We are often so busy with our own lives and don't really take the time to give of ourselves to others, even in a simple thing like opening our home at a moments notice. We could take a lesson in service & hospitality from the Indian people. To them, it's their culture, to us as believers it should be a calling! 

Secondly, I was reminded of how big our God is and what a small part of His kingdom I am! I would sit in a worship time with the staff of CFI and just soak in what was happening. There we were, the Indians singing and praying in their native tongue and the American team doing the same in ours. And while we may have needed a translator to understand each other, God did not! He heard and understood us all equally. He was glorified equally by the worship of every individual there. I would listen to the Hindi singing and while I could not understand the words I could feel the worship! It was an awesome reminder of the fact that we are all one in Christ! As believers we are brothers and sisters in Him, regardless of language barriers and cultural differences. And God is glorified immensely by that unity! 

So I came back challenged to take God out of my "American box". To take a look at my busy life and see how I can better serve others. To remember that God is big enough to hear every prayer and every song in every language and yet still personal enough to know me by name. 

Standing Firm

"How firm, our foundation. How sure, our salvation. And we will not be shaken. Jesus, firm foundation." These words, written by the musician Mike Donehey, sum up the thoughts of my heart right now. I've stepped into a new building stage in my Christian life and it has caused me to remember again the crucial nature of standing on a firm foundation. Without a foundation, a building is nothing. In the same way, as a child of the Most High, I am nothing without my Foundation! I need to increase in my knowledge of who I'm standing on if I want to continue to grow! 

As a builder, it's important to know your foundation. Build something on the wrong foundation and you are sure to watch it come crumbling down. Can the foundation support what you are about to build? Can it withstand the test of time? Is it easily shaken? When you build on a foundation, you need to have confidence in that foundation. Throughout Scripture, God had proven Himself to be that foundation in which we can place our total confidence. 

God made us a promise, that when we become His child He will give us "all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us to His own glory and excellence" (2 Peter 1:3) Does that sound like a foundation that can support us? Absolutely! In Him, we have no lack of anything. We have all that we need to build lives of faith & godliness. God even gives us a blueprint of how to continue the building process! After starting with Him as our foundation, He goes on with instruction: "make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with alive. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." (2 Peter 1:5-8) 

Our God can also withstand the test of time. In the words of the prophet Isaiah, "Trust in The Lord forever, for The Lord God is an everlasting rock." (Isaiah 26:4) The very words of our God are eternal and unchanging. Jesus Himself said that heaven and earth will pass way but His words will not. He stands as our firm foundation, from before the beginning of time and throughout all of eternity. 

My favorite characteristic of our Foundation is His unshakeable and unchanging nature.  Time changes, culture changes, other foundations will begin to shift and fall but our God never will! "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever" (Hebrews 13:8) When everything around us fails, He will not! He will be our peace and our security and in Him we can be unshakeable!! "I have set the Lord always before me, because He is at my right hand I shall not be shaken." (Psalm 16:8) 

So as believers, if we desire to build lives of godliness and faith, lives that will matter for eternity, we must stand firm on our one foundation, Jesus Christ! 

Back to the grind.

So its a new year, and after a long holiday we are back on the grind. We tested our live video rig and it worked good. Some minor codec changes have to be done, but overall it worked as envisioned. Now we just have to get more content to go with it. We want to cover our entire show with video, kinetic typography and other elements that will give our live performance a little something to make it awesome.