Missions, connection and providence: REVIVE OUR HEARTS!

This week I wrote of my rebellious episode due my "delay" in my long time planned outreach in Mongolia. For more details you can check previous posts.

And as the Lord is unchanging, faithful, merciful and abounding in steadfast love, one  purpose in His overall plan started to unfold.

This weekend my beloved local church International Baptist Church (La IBI) in Dominican Republic and a group of sister churches are hosting the event Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss as main speaker. And it is streamed live online, so I get to participate.

I remember when a small group of us were planning to go to the first conference back in 2008. Shortly before the event I had to cancel my assistance but a group of more than 100 women ended up going that first year. Little imagined or knew my beloved accountability, counselor, adoptive mom (she is too young!) and friend Laura imagined that God was just starting something that three and a little more years later would be happening in my beloved Dominican Republic.

This weekend more than 3,000 women are meeting, praying , worshiping and seeking God to revive their hearts. And here is where the connection starts: Our hearts.

I needed this time more than ever. Many people think of us missionaries as super-extraterrestrial christians. But we grow weary. We lose focus. We sin. We are human. Crossing geographical barriers doesn't change the sinful nature, the heart or flesh, however you want to call it. Only Jesus redeems us. Only through the process of sanctification, daily closeness to the Father makes us closer to that. To his image but very far of being perfect and irreproachable. Only when we find ourselves glorified, face to face to Him, in awe, we will be the finished product.

In the meanwhile this "deviation" in my planned schedule has given me the opportunity to be connected with the beloved sisters in the DR. Through phone calls. Through prayer and intersession. Even small long  distance service opportunities. But most important, God has brought me to a place of stillness, not anymore in the kitchen but at His feet.

Although I am still serving here in Taiwan and hopefully next week I will finally get to Mongolia, right now I am ready for Him and together and connected to my sisters, I want , desire for Him to also Revive my Heart! Our hearts! And He will!

I waited patiently for the LORD; 
   he inclined to me and heard my cry. 
He drew me up from the pit of destruction, 
   out of the miry bog, 
and set my feet upon a rock, 
   making my steps secure. 
He put a new song in my mouth, 
   a song of praise to our God. 
Many will see and fear, 
   and put their trust in the LORD
Psalm 40:1-3 (ESV)