SOW Suomi is OVER!!!!!!

Merry Christmas Everyone! 

It's hard to believe but outreach is over and I am now back in Finland! So crazy! We got back to the base at 5am on the 23rd and then debriefed all day and then straight away James, Mary, Mirjami and I packed up and drove another 5 hours north to Kemi, Finland to spend christmas with Mirjami's family.

This is my first christmas away from home so it doesn't really feel like christmas but I have been blessed to spend it with my good friends and Mirjami's family. They have been such a blessing by welcoming us into their home during this holiday. 

I am also a year older now! 22! woohoo!! The team did an awesome job of making me feel so loved on my birthday. That was also my first birthday away from home so they made it so super special. I really was blessed to have such great students.

Speaking of the students, I couldn't be a prouder outreach leader! They kicked butt on this outreach! Yes, I had to kick their butts a few times but they got it and the transformations I saw in each one of them was so amazing! 

One student in particular I am terribly proud of. Since the beginning of the school he really struggled with time management and being addicted to his computer/internet. He knew it was a problem and said he was doing things to try to spend more time away from his computer. But he couldn't seem to do this on his own. It got to a point where his computer was taking the place of God. He wasn't having quiet times at all. So I had a talk with him about what I saw and that I felt that it would be best if he gave up his computer for the rest of outreach. I said I would hold onto it for him so that it wouldn't be a temptation or distraction but I wasn't going to make him give it to me. I told him to pray about it. So he went away and I didn't mention it again, but the very next day I saw him back on his computer again. I felt so discouraged b/c there was really nothing more I could do. This student and I are very good friends and he is so much fun, but this was coming between our friendship too and I really hated it. Finally when we made the move to Torshavn, Mary had left a note for him. In it she again addressed the issue, and then someone else we met gave him a word. So that first night in Torshavn, he brought me his computer. I couldn't believe it so i asked him if he was for real. He said yes. I know it was super hard for him and words cannot say how proud I am that he did it! After giving up his computer, he began to read and study the Bible and listen to teachings and spend so much time with God! He was seriously like a whole different person! Me and him began to have long talks about God and miracles and it was just so amazing! He is learning so much now and I'm so excited to see what God continues to do in him as he presses in for more! That was seriously the most impacting thing for me to see on this outreach.

We prayed and worshiped so much on this outreach and we know for a fact that God is moving through our prayers and worship! We were told that there were two girls on the first island that we had spent time praying on and they were drinking and partying when the Holy Spirit just showed up and they realized what they were doing and gave their lives to Christ!!!!! PTL! Prayer is a powerful thing and I think that too often we take it too lightly. It's so cool to see results from our prayers. It really does take so much faith to press in and pray and pray and pray just believing that God is hearing and saying ok, since you asked I'm gonna do that. He loves us so much and He loves it when we take the time to bring people, countries and situations before Him! He is so good! We also saw 3 people healed and prayed for so many more! And we are believing that all those we prayed for will be healed as well! It has been such a great outreach and I have learned so very much! God is faithful and Ive seen that on a new level during this school! It's been so good and I'm so glad I've been able to be a part of it!

For those of you who don't know, I am planning to return to the states January 17th. But I have yet to book a flight because I do not have the money to do so. If you feel that you would like to give towards my flight home please send me an email and I will let you know how you can do that. I would appreciate it so much. :)

My email is seaubel@gmail.com. 

Thank you all for your prayers and support on this journey of mine. It has been such an awesome and life changing experience and I couldn't do it without you! Well until next time! (Just b/c the school is over doesn't mean the learning is!)  :D

There's light at the end of the tunnel, cause He's faithful till the end!

We were driving to another island here to hold a prayer meeting. It was just over an hour away from the capital where we are staying so I got to see quite a bit of the absolutely breathtaking scenery of this country. That alone impacted me so much. Every time I get the privilege of seeing another country, I discover a side of God that I haven't seen before. even though we've been here for over 2 weeks now, I still saw a part of God today that left me in awe. Words cant describe how awesome He really is. I really think that stunned silence is the most appropriate response when having a revelation of who God is because words just never seem to do Him justice. So that was very special.

But something else happened on that drive as well. Sometimes to get to a different island here you have to go through a tunnel. Well we did today. The other night as I was in bed due to a fever, I was listening to a podcast and Bill Johnson made this statement. "Theres light at the end of the tunnel and its not an oncoming train!"  So today as we were driving through the tunnel I heard God say again "Theres light at the end of this tunnel". Then a few minutes later, Mary leaned over and said to me, "I feel like the Lord wants me to tell you that theres light at the end of the tunnel". Obviously God wanted me to remember this. So I asked Him which tunnel? I feel like I'm going through so many tunnels at the same time! But He simply said, "All of them". Then a little later as we were listening to a cd, the song "Faithful to the End" by Cory Asbury started playing. The words hit me so hard.
"He's faithful to the end!" God isn't just faithful halfway, He's faithful to the end! He makes the light at the end of the tunnel! And he's not only faithful to the end, but he's faithful to my heart as well! He doesn't just get me to the light at the end of the tunnel but He takes the desires of my heart and is faithful to them as well! I was blinking back tears! How amazing is He!!!! If thats his song for me, than this is my song for him....

"I wanna be found faithful, I wanna be found steady, I wanna be found faithful to the end."

I have no more words for my love for Him. I just pray that my life is a reflection of that love. If I learn all this but never learn how to love, then I've missed it completely.

In my weakness, He is strong!

Last night was so good! But it definitely did not start out that way. We had a team meeting right before we were about to leave to go to the Woman's Aglow Christmas party were we would be doing ministry. During the meeting, the enemy tried to attack our unity as a team. It was hard and unfortunately, we didn't have the time to properly work through it before we left. As I was in the car on the way there I could do nothing but pray and ask God to help us make it through the night. I did NOT want the enemy to steal this night from us. God had given us such a heart for this meeting and the enemy was not happy about it at all. God just kept reminding me, that it's in our weakness that He is strong.

I must say, I am extremely proud of my team. Even though we were not as unified as we could have been, we all made the decision to set aside what happened and work together to accomplish what God wanted to do. Jessie did an amazing job sharing last night! She wrote out a story from a book she's currently reading and Petri, James and I acted it out as she read it to the group. It was really fun! She also shared some of her personal story to which a lady came up to her afterwards and told her that she felt like Jessie was sharing her personal life! I'm so proud of Jessie! She did so well! She really sought God's heart for last night and followed His leading. 

Jessie also asked me to sing "Arms Wide Open". It's a song I know well, but not on guitar. I normally play it on piano but God gave me the grace to do this. The words touched the heart of the people. It was a beautiful night! We were able to share the love of God with them! 

Then we followed up all our talk about God's love by showing them. We offered prayer to anyone who wanted it. We stuck a chair up front and people would come up and tell us their request! It was SOOOOO great! One lady had been at a meeting we led last thursday and prayed for her knee. She had pain and wasnt able to bend it well. She showed us now how she can bend it and said that it is feeling much better! Yay God! 

We prayed for another lady's knee last night. As we were praying, I had placed my hand on her knee and I could feel heat pulsing out of my hand. It was the weirdest thing! When she got up from the chair, I looked at Jessie and began to tell her what I had been feeling. At the same time, the lady was telling Sanna that she was feeling heat in her knee while we were praying! God was on a roll!!!

We prayed for many people last night, and my team did so well. We prayed for hearts, shoulders, knees, eyes and hips! And the whole time, they pressed through and listened for God's voice even as it got later and later. I know we were all tired but still we fought. Last night went really well! I know people left changed and touched by God. 

It was a good night! God really proved to me that when I'm weak, He is so faithful to be my strength! 

He is good, ALL the time. I am so thankful that He is with me all the time. I cannot imagine living this life without Him. Thank you God for your faithfulness!

Because I chose to stay...

Mirjami and Mary advised me to take a day off while Mary is visiting the team so today is my day off. I woke up this morning and immediately my mind went into work mode and thought of everything that needed to get done. But then I had a talk over skype with Mirjami and she told me I had to listen to this song b/c she wants us to play it together sometime. So I listened to it while we were talking and it's great! Then we ended our conversation and I decided to listen to it again. All the while thinking about the emails I need to write, how I need to take a shower, get information ect. The song is called "A Little Longer" by Jenn Johnson. This time around the words really hit me. And as I listened to the song with tears streaming down my face as I let go of my agenda, this is what God began to speak to me.....

"Do you realize just how much I love to just sit with you? My favorite times with you are when we just sit together. I love helping you through the hard things and helping you talk through things, but my absolute favorite is when you simply just sit with me. Normally when we talk you just come and get what you need, but if you would only just stay for a minute longer than you "need" you would see how much more I can give. I am not limited by time and can give you more than enough love than you need in simply just a minute. All it takes is your decision to linger. 

Do you know how much I love when you allow this time! Do you know that it takes everything in me to not just whisk you away and keep you with me all the time! Sometimes I get annoyed that I put you were you are now b/c it takes away from us. You have no idea how much I just want to keep you with me all the time. I love you so much. You are so precious to me. My heart is so in love with you just b/c of who you are. You don't have to do anything to make me love you anymore. I'm infatuated with you! Everything about you! Do you realize how absolutely incredible you are?!  I'm so in love. And nothing you do will make me love you any more or any less. Though when you decide to just stay here with me, you melt my heart. When you chose me over the million and two things that are waiting for you, it makes me feel so amazing. I just want to jump up and dance around and yell "SHE CHOSE ME!!!!!" I love you. I love you. I love you."

It's my pride that tells me that the world needs me more than God wants me. It's a lie that I too often believe and then miss out on these beautiful times with the one I'm so in love with. I love him so very much. 

Uh-Mazing! Thats what this is!

Well I know I had said that the last blog was it for Iceland but God totally caught me off guard today. But seriously, He can surprise me with this kind of stuff anytime!

So today we went back the the nursing home we sang at last tuesday. This time we sang on both the 4th floor and the 3rd floor. Last time we only sang on the 3rd floor. Last week when we went, after we had finished singing, Mirjami and I had the chance to pray for one of the ladies. She told us she was having a lot of back pain and also pain in her eye. So we prayed for her and she was very blessed by it. We left that day feeling good knowing that our prayer blessed her. Little did we know what our prayer really did!!
This time when we went to sing, Mirjami was not with us but I saw the same lady again. Straight away after we finished singing, I went to say hi and she pulled me close and said to me, "After you girls prayed for me last week, I have not had any pain in my back and my eye is feeling better as well." Not only did she believe that she was healed but the director that I have been in contact with to set up our time there said that after we left, the lady had asked for less pain medication. She went on to say that it is indeed a miracle! This coming from her was absolutely amazing! We had been able to have coffee with her and talk with her after last week and when we asked if we could pray for her, she told us that we could but she's not a christian and does not believe in God. But today, she believes in miracles! It's my prayer that she will find the God behind the miracle!

What a way to end our time here in Iceland! God is so good. It makes me super excited for all that He has for us in the Faroe Islands!
Thank you God for your goodness! You seriously just blow me away!

"the spirit of the Lord is upon me to...."

So we leave for the Faroe Islands on wednesday!! What?!?!?! We have been here in Iceland for 2 weeks now and what a 2 weeks it has been. God has been teaching us so much and pushing us to step outside of our comfort zones so that we can better learn the things He is teaching us. 

One of the things God has been speaking to me since the beginning of the school is about healing. It's cool b/c Petri who was the leader of the week last week really has a heart to see people healed and God do miracles. Something that God's really been trying to cram into my head lately though is that in order to see a miracle, you have to have a situation that requires a miracle! But i've noticed that I try to avoid those situations b/c of course they require so much faith and are always uncomfortable!

There was a time last week where I was walking to the YWAM cafe for dinner and saw an older man walking with a cane and a very visible limp. My first initial thought was, pray for him. But immediately following that thought came another thought, why should you pray for him b/c he's old and canes and limps come with old age. It's just life. WHAT A LIE!!! And unfortunately I believed it and continued to walk to the cafe. But as I was walking, I remembered that earlier that day when we sang at the nursing home, Mirjami and I prayed for an older lady, for her back pain and eyes. Now why did I think that God would heal that lady but not the man? It's ridiculous to think that I actually thought that my prayers would work for one person but not the other. I was so upset with myself!

So the next day, I was walking with Petri and Jessie to go to breakfast and saw a girl with a broken arm. Instead of stopping to pray for her, I kept walking and told Petri that I saw a girl with a broken arm! Good for me, I saw her. But what good does it do for me to see her if i'm not going to do anything about it!

By this point I was beyond irritated with myself and decided to set aside time for us as a team to just go out on the streets and pray for people who need healing. So we did! We prayed as a team and then went out. After walking around for quite some time and prayer walking, we still had not seen even 1 person that needed physical healing that we could see!! Crazy since I kept seeing people all the time and now there was not even 1. So we were terribly frustrated that we still had not prayed for anyone so we decided to just go for it. We just wanted to pray for someone. So we saw this woman walking toward us and Mirjami felt like she needed to pray for someone with back pain. She stopped the woman and asked her if she had any back pain. The woman answered yes so we asked if we could pray for her. She allowed us and so we did. We ended the prayer and she hugged each of us and thanked us and then rushed off. She didn't seem too comfortable with us praying for her. I don't know if anything happened or not but I trust that when I pray, God moves. So it's up to Him. We stopped quite a few other people but they didn't want us to pray for them. 

This outreach has been good. I've been learning so much and we are only a thrid of the way through it! So more learning is inevitable! It's good but not always fun. I've learned that God has to always be my priority, if He's not, then what's the point. I can't very well give if I don't have anything to give. And the only way I can get what I need is if I run to my Father. My first response to crisis has to be to go to God. And my first response to success has to be to go to God. I'm learning this. But I'm also learning that I don't want it any other way. Well enough rambling. My next post will most likely be from the Faroe Islands! Woohoo!

North, South, East and West

So yesterday went really well! It was our first official day of ministry and we did some really great stuff! We started out the day with worship and prayer. We asked God what He wanted us to do with the day. When I asked God, I felt like we needed to walk around the city and speak truth. But I also felt like we needed to go the the North, South, East and West. As I kept thinking about this, the verse about where 2 or 3 are gathered there Jesus is popped into my mind and the fact that we are such a small team already, shouldn't we stick together? Theres power in unity right? Then God reminded me of a quote for a book by Bill Johnson. "You + God is always the majority". Yes there is power in numbers but when God tells you to do something, it's more important to be obedient. I must admit though I was still not too sure about what I heard when I asked the others what they got. Petri started sharing what he heard from God. He felt like we needed to walk around the city and speak truth! But not only that, he felt like we needed to split up and go to the North, South, East and West!!!! Bahahhahaa!!! I just started laughing and they are looked at me like, thats what you got too. So I shared what I got and it was very clear what God wanted us to do. So we went back to God and asked Him to give us scriptures to pray out as well as which direction we should each go. Well I shouldn't be surprised but God to Jessie to go North, Petri to go South, James to go East, and me to go West!! So with our Bibles in hand we set out to speak truth over Iceland!

While we were praying, I also felt like I was supposed to go to a church. So I looked at my map of Iceland and found a church on the West coast. Then off I went to find this church. When I got there, I began to pace back in forth in front of the church praying out the scripture that God had given me. At one point I looked up at the doorway and and saw a carving of Jesus with His arms stretched out. I immediately got the song "Arms Wide Open" in my head and began to sing it out.



I was outside for about a half hour and then decided to go inside the church. I walked in the building and it was completely silent. It was so quiet that even just my footsteps echoed through the whole building. I was looking around when I noticed 3 framed pictures on the wall. One was simply the word "Silence", the second one was a picture of a woman with her finger in front of her mouth and the third one was the verse Habakkuk 2:20 which says to be silent in the presence of the Lord. Then it hit me. Churches are supposed to be a place to worship God and sing His praises.

They are not supposed to be places where you sit quietly and just look around! The enemy was totally using scripture to steal the purpose of this church! Of course he wants people to be quiet and not praise God! So what was I gonna do about it? Well I walked up to the first pew sat down and began to read scripture. OUT LOUD! As I sat there, I looked up and this time saw an image of Jesus on the cross with "Arms Wide Open". So again I began to sing. I hardly had to sing out at all. Just even a whisper filled the entire church but that didn't keep me from singing with my whole heart. I sat there and sang out my love to God for about an hour.

God spoke so much to me during my time in that church. I loved my time there. We had planned before going our separate ways to sing the song "Our God" at noon so that we would be declaring who God is to the North, South, East and West of Iceland! So at noon, I went outside and began singing

"Our God is greater!

 Our God is stronger!

God you are higher than any other!

Our God is healer!

He's awesome in power!

Our God, Our God!"

Iceland is said to be a christian nation. It is my prayer that the churches of Iceland will realize who they claim to serve and run into His arm's wide open. I will not be silent no, I will not be quiet anymore!

Dun, dun, dunnnnnnn.......

My outreach team!! Me, Jessie, Petri & James!! What a great group!!!

Well, here I am yet again attempting to tackle the thing I loathe most in life.......packing. I'm sitting here surrounded by all my belongings and it's always inevitable! Packing ALWAYS makes my mind go into memory mode. So here I am, thinking back on the past 3 months.
It was such a shock that God brought me here. I seriously never saw it coming but I can honestly say that I'm so grateful that He gave me this opportunity. It has for sure been a huge learning experience with plenty of ups and downs but seriously they've been great ups and downs. It's seems kinda strange to say that i've had great downs, but those low times for me always pushed me to God. I've learned so much more of what it looks like to depend on Him completely! I know I have so much more to learn about that though but I trust God to continue to teach me. Especially as I lead this outreach with just Him. I know in my own strength I cannot handle this, but I got Him. He will give me exactly what I need.

I'm so grateful that I've had Mary and Mirjami in my life these past 3 months. God has blessed me with 2 new amazing friends that I love so much. I've so much enjoyed getting to know them and lead this school with them. They have been so much fun to share a room with. I'm gonna miss all our craziness so much!
Mary has been such an example for me. She's encouraged me so much in my personal leadership skills and the fact that she trust me enough to ask me to lead this outreach speaks volumes to me. I really am honored. It's also been such an encouragement to seek God with her because we seem to always hear the same stuff! She's also taught me so much in the kitchen. I know i've for sure grown in my cooking skills! :)
Mirjami is like a sister to me. Were so much alike it's kinda scary but at the same time I've learned so much from her. She's so solid in God. She's an amazing leader and the best pianist EVER! I don't care what she says, she's super talented and by far my favorite person to listen to play the piano. She's helped to keep me going even if just by praying for me when she see's I'm not ok. I love our talks that we have whenever we go for a walk. I'm gonna have a hard time living without PTSCT and also playing music with her. She's an amazing person and i'm so glad I can call her my PTS. :)

I live a crazy life. People come and go all the time and it's super hard on me. I've been searching for one person who could be with me all the time and i'd never have to say goodbye to, but the reality of it is, there is NO ONE that can be that for me.There is only one constant in my life and that is Him. Wherever I go, whatever I do, I always have Him. I never have to say goodbye to Him or leave Him even for a second. He is my everything, I am never alone. It's taken me so long to get to this place, but I'm so happy I finally see it. I love Him.

Well I should probably get back to packing. My side of the room looks like a volcano of clothes erupted!! Haha!

Answered prayers and chocolate from Holland!

Our teacher Corrie who brought us chocolate from Holland that spelled SOW! So sweet!!!

"I don't understand your ways, oh but i will give you my song, I'll give you ALL of my praise…"

I found myself singing that song yesterday. I was very stressed out because it had been 2 weeks since I had heard from my contacts in Iceland and the Faroe Islands. We are leaving for Iceland in just over a week and I still didn't have a place for us to stay. So yesterday, I got so stressed out just by everything and decided to skip lunch to pray and fast for the outreach. I began to sing out those words, crying out to God b/c i just couldn't understand why it was taking so long for them to get back to me!  Earlier that morning in my quiet time i was reading in Psalms. I always learn so much from David and how he would talk to God and yesterday was no exception. I was meditating on Psalm 141:1 which says, "Oh Lord, I call upon You; hasten to me! Give ear to my voice when I call you!". I first just breezed over it but then something brought me back to it. The word "Hasten". Then i thought, ok what does that word me. When you hasten something you make it go faster. He was telling God to hurry up b/c he needed Him NOW! David spoke so directly to God. He didn't beat around the bush. As I was meditating on that verse, my eyes wandered to the other page to chapter 143 verse 7 which says " Answer me quickly, O Lord, my spirit fails. Do not hide your face from me or i will become as those who go down to the pit." I imagined Him taking God's face in both of His hands and turning it towards his and saying "GOD LOOK AT ME!!! Look at my situation! I need HELP!". So during my time of prayer, worship and fasting, that was my goal. To take God's face in both of my hands and tell Him exactly what was going on and what I needed from Him. I felt so helpless. I felt like David. If i didn't have God right then, I wouldn't have been able to make it. I wish i could say i left that time feeling at peace and trusting that God had everything under control but I didn't. I was still stressed. 

Thursday is the day that Petri and I go into town to do the grocery shopping, so we went and did that. I had it planned out in my mind that i would get home and there would be an email waiting for me. Well this was not the case, so i sat on my bed with my Bible reading those verses over and over and i just cried. I didn't know what to do. 

Later that evening, Mirjami and I got the phone number for the base in Iceland and decided to call them. The first couple of times nobody answered. We were about to give up but Mirjami decided to try once more. Thank God for her perseverance when I don't have any b/c it was that time that somebody answered! We were able to get all the information we needed!! Praise the Lord! Then today after a long day of recording and working with the Kings Kids in Kuopio, I got home and checked my email and there was a message from my contact in the Faroe Islands!!! I now have all the information i needed!!! God is good, ALL the time! Just b/c things dont happen the way I think they should or when I'd like them to, doesn't make Him any less good. I trust Him. I honestly do b/c He is so trustworthy. He's a great God.

Fastest week EVER!

Youth Group from Tornio, Finland

Wow, what a week. Seriously I'm not even sure I know how to completely explain this week very well. But I will do my best.

First I will start off by talking about last weekend. We had a youth group from Tornio which is where two very good friends of mine are from. I must say, it was a good weekend but it was also very hard. I had to take last weeks teacher to the airport at 4:30am so I was pretty exhausted for the weekend. I've also found the language barrier kinda hard lately. There was one time we were having a time of worship and since of course we are in Finland and we were working with a Finnish youth group we sang songs in Finnish! Now I have learned a few songs in finnish but I really have a hard time not checking out because I don't understand. Now it really frustrated me because I've really been trying to worship God no matter what. So I started asking God how the heck I was supposed to worship Him when I had no idea what was going on. He reminded me that He looks at my heart. If I'm trying my best to sing even though I don't understand, it doesn't matter if my pronunciation is wrong or if I really have to focus on what I'm saying because God is not limited to english! He can speak to me through finnish if He wants to but I have to be open to that. So once again, I learned something new. But you can for sure be praying for me in this area. The language barrier has been something I'm having a hard time with lately.

Next I will talk about this week's teaching. Our teacher Jon has been speaking on the prophetic in worship. Honestly as much stuff happened this week, it's almost impossible to actually put into words. I've learned that I'm very prophetic. Stuff that I thought was just my imagination is way more real than I think. It's time for me to realize what God is doing instead of just pass it off as daydreaming or being visual. I've been really learning the importance of meditating on scripture. It's crazy how I can take just one verse in the Bible and be stuck on it for an hour and God just shows me SOOOOOO much!! I love it! I kinda got stuck in a mindset of having to really read a lot of scripture rather than just take one and really really really understand it before I move on. When you sit down and really think about what God is saying in that one particular scripture it changes your perception of reading the Bible. God put every verse in there for a reason. He didn't just mindlessly say oh lets stick this story in there so that it will be thicker. No way jose! Thats so not God. I'm so grateful that He gave us the Bible. It really is so helpful. Smart thinking God! :)
Ok well, this doesn't even come close to how impacting this week was but I really don't even have any words. I just really thank God for this week. It's been a very hard week but it's been a very good week. That seems to be how they all go.

Peek-a-Boo! I See YOU!

Our teacher for the week, Mike Payne

The phrase I can't seem to get away from this week is, "I See You". It's like God's trying to cram it into my head. "I see you. I see your heart. I see your thoughts. I see every word you think but choose not to say. You see all the bad things that you think about, but I see that you chose to not think about them. You choose not to say them. I see your heart!"

It's so easy for us to fall into condemnation and guilt when it comes to our thoughts because we know what we think about and we are the only ones who know what we think about. Other than God of course. So even though we may not say those things out loud we are still thinking them. Those thoughts are still there and at times we get really frustrated because we know we shouldn't be thinking those thoughts. I had a of couple days this week where I kept having negative thoughts. It was so frustrating because I was like ah! where is this coming from! And I found myself apologizing to God a lot for thinking those thoughts. But you know what God says to me? Sarah, I'm proud of you! What?!?!?! He's proud of me??? My thoughts were totally not lining up with His thoughts and He's proud of that? Thats when He reminded me that not all thoughts are my own. I have an enemy that likes to whisper lies in my ear. It's my choice to listen to them, dwell on them, and accept them; or to say, NO! I refuse to listen to this or dwell on it! It's all about our heart.

Snowball Fight!!! 10/15/10

God went on to explain to me that He sees my heart. My heart is not to think negative thoughts. My heart is to run from those negative thoughts and learn to think only what He is thinking. That's what He sees and that's what He's so proud of! Now if I chose to continue to dwell on those negative thoughts and allow them to take up residence in my mind, then that's when it becomes wrong. But still, He is so gracious because He knows I'm still learning how to renew my mind. He will continue to help me in this process which shows so much patience on His part because He's going into it knowing that it's going to take a lifetime! Ah! He's a great God!
When we realize what God focus' on, condemnation and guilt don't have a chance! God doesn't see our mistakes. He see's our heart in the matter. He loves us way to much to focus on how much we mess up. He cares more about our hearts. If our hearts are for righteousness, He sees that!
Condemnation and guilt keep us from true repentance. Repentance is not sitting right where we fell and staying there screaming out "God I'm so sorry!!!". No it's running into His arms saying "God I'm sorry that I messed up. I've learned my lesson and I never want to go back there again." Our response comes from our heart. A condemned heart doesn't feel worthy of being in God's presence because of their sin. Which is false humility (aka pride). A repentant heart loves God way too much to allow sin to get in the way (this is humility). God knows the difference between a condemned heart and a repentant heart. He sees our heart!

So that was my lesson of the week. And trust me, it didn't just come in one quiet time. This was learned over many hours of just sitting in his presence, asking Him what the heck is wrong with me and allowing Him to speak. His presence is my favorite. It's the safest place I know.

I'm Alive to Learn

Two days in a row! Go me! This week has been quite difficult emotionally for me. I'm thankful for it though because I have learned so much.
Since sunday night, the enemy has been trying to throw my past in my face, but right when I started to feel really condemned and depressed, I found a note that one of my best friends wrote me. It had scriptures on it saying how I'm redeemed and set free. It also said that God doesn't remember my past. He chooses to forget! How great is that! So if He chooses to forget, then why do I chose to remember? So then when the enemy tried to throw my past at me again, I simply thought "I did what? No way. I don't remember that". :)
It sounds like denial, but thats not what it is. I know what I've done, and if God wants to use my past to help others then I'll talk about it. But I refuse to dwell on something that God chooses to forget. What good does it do for me to dwell on my past sin and shame. It doesn't. So there. Haha sucka! You tried to take me down but really just made me confident in who I am.
Then!!! I tell you this week it was never ending!!! Ok so the other day during class, our teacher (Fernando) told us to 1.) go outside and find something that inspires us to worship God and then 2.) to ask God if there is something He wants us to give to someone else as an act of worship as well. So I closed my eyes and was like "Ok God, what do I have that I can give away?". Well I'm expecting Him to tell me to give away something like my ipod or some money or idk something that I feel like would be hard for me. I mean I use my ipod to fall asleep so that would be really tough. But anyway, God brought to my mind not my ipod but this little box that I have. It was given to me by someone that I love a lot and it means so much to me! Well as soon as that came to my mind I felt so sick. I thought, you have got to be kidding me. I fought with God and was like no one is even gonna appreciate this the way I do. And God told me that's exactly why I needed to give it away. I was emotionally attached to a box!! Oh goodness. So with tears, I gave it away. Joyful obedience is something I'm still working on.
The last story from this week I will tell is from my quiet time this morning. It's gonna sound really lame of me but I didn't feel like putting much effort into spending time with God, (don't judge me) so I decided to finish listening to a podcast I had started. Heidi Baker was the one speaking and I love to listen to her because no matter what mood I'm in, her joy is so contagious that it makes me laugh. One of the stories she told was about God mulitplying food. Which apparently He does for them all the time. It made me think that so often we dream of having money and good jobs so that we don't have to worry about food and stuff but then we ask God to do miracles! We don't need miracles if we never have situations that require miracles. We have a serious problem with contradicting ourselves. But then something else hit me! God likes to BAKE!! Lately I've been baking a TON! I think it's actually my way of coping with things but I really enjoy baking. I love when I discover something that me and God have in common. It makes us closer! Now when I bake, I can invite Him to bake with me because it's something we both enjoy! Oh how fun. I love my friendship with God. It's the most valuable one I have. I wouldn't trade it for the world.
Ok well I'm done for now. What a great week. Hard but do I really wanna go through life without ever growing? How boring is that.

Worship is worth dying for....right?

The freedom to worship God is something that I as an American have, but unfortunately it's taken just about 22 years for me to appreciate it. I was homeschooled from 2nd - 12th grade and my mom used a christian based curriculum for most of our schoolwork. History being one of those subjects, I spent so much of my life learning about not only american and world history but the history of christianity as well. I have so much knowledge about how much persecution people went through to give me what I have today but have never really understood exactly how costly worship is.

Our teacher this week is Fernando Dantes. He said something today that almost brought me to tears. He told a story about how he went to the Colosseum in Italy and they had a worship time outside the stadium. It was during that time God spoke to him that he had that freedom to worship because people died in that very stadium. Fernando went on to say that there are times when we have the nerve to decide that we don't feel like worshiping because we are tired! Bleh!! He is so right!!! I can't even count how many times i've sat down during a worship service because I was tired or just did not feel like worshiping God. Yet had I been alive during a different era of history, I would have to fight possibly even to death for the very freedom that I'm choosing to reject! Ugh, how sick is that! Not only did people throughout history die for my freedom of worship, but God's only Son even died! By my decision to sit down during worship or even just decide I don't feel like worshiping is the greatest disrespect I can show to the all of those who gave up literally everything. Are we really that self-centered?

If I had been alive during a time when worshiping God was life threatening, would I still worship God? If someone came to me right now and put a gun to my head and told me if to stop worshiping God, would I stop? Is my love for God so shallow that I'm even asking these questions? Why do I worship God? Just because I can? Worship has to be more than something I just do without thinking about it. If it's something I do mindlessly, then it's not something worth dying for and all of those who died for this have died in vain. They knew God in a way that not even death could make them stop worshiping Him. That's true worship. I want that.

God I pray that the next time I don't "feel" like worshiping you that you will remind me of this revelation.

Were following the leader the leader the....oh wait, I'm the leader! AHHH!

Our teacher for the week, Jan Honningdal!

God is full of surprises. I never really know just what I'm getting into when He tells me to do something. He always leaves out parts, which is probably very smart on His part because I may not do what He wants me to then. Ha! That being said, I got a pretty big surprise this week. At the beginning of the week, Mary, Mirjami and I were in our room getting ready for bed and Mary says to me, "Sarah, theres something I'd like you to pray about". Last time she said that, I moved to Finland. Well this time wasn't much different. She asked me to pray about leading the outreach for the school.
Now anyone who knows me really well knows that it takes me quite some time to calm my mind down to go to sleep. And thats just on any normal night, but add something like this!! Ha! Sleep can pretty much be considered impossible. So I told her I would pray about it. Everything within me was freaking out. Staffing the school is one thing. It's easy to just help out where needed, but to lead something you've never led before. Yikes! So I escaped to the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my face and freak out to God. Well I got in the bathroom, locked the door and went to open my mouth to give God every excuse in the book as to why I am not fit to lead this outreach when I clearly heard Him say, "Sarah, you know you're supposed to do this so don't even start speaking out excuses". How can you argue with that??? Well you can't. So I was able to go to bed with an answer which I gave to Mary the next day.

Our outreach will be to Iceland and the Faroe Islands. God has been speaking so much to me already. During one of my quiet times, God started speaking a ton of things to me about outreach. He's giving me such a heart and passion for this time in these countries. I'm really excited about it. Nervous but excited. We are a small team (me and 3 students), but God has really challenged me to not think about our numbers. God + us is always the majority! I know it's going to be so great. I look forward to how much I myself am going to learn during this time. God also really put it on my heart to start writing songs based on scripture so I can sing out His word! I told Him to give me scriptures so that I could do this, and since then, two people have emailed me with verses that God gave them for me! He's so freakin faithful! I know that He will be with me on every step of this outreach. Every decision He will make with me. He will be my guide and give me wisdom for every situation. I trust Him.

This is the verse God gave me to remember whenever I feel like I can't do this:

"No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you.

 ⁶ "Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to their forefathers to give them. ⁷ Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go. ⁸ Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful. ⁹ Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go." Joshua 1:5-9

What can I say. He's good and I love Him.

Love's Definition Was Looking At Me

"What does LOVE look like, is the question, i've been pondering...."

I dont think any song could better describe my thoughts and feelings lately. We just got back from Sweden yesterday at 3am. It was a long week. Very good, but I personally found it to be quite challenging.
This past week I was confronted with the question of how to love someone you dont really love. What does love look like when you dont really love the person? But then again, how do you love someone you dont even know? Ive heard it said that you can only love God as much as you love the person you love the least, but how is that possible? I LOVE God. Theres no doubt in my mind about that. I love Him with everything in me but I cant say that about some of the people that are in my life. So does that mean I dont love God as much as I think I do?

How did Jesus do it? How could He love everybody especially when there were people who hated him, said hurtful things to him, rejected him and even killed him! Even as he hung on the cross in a ton of pain and people laughing at him, carrying all our sins and shame, He could still look us in the eyes and say that He LOVED us. And He meant it!!! There was nothing even in the back of His mind that was like, but I dont know if I can love you because you did this. No! He just loved. I know that God is love, and Jesus was fully God but also fully man. He went through everything we go through, so why do we have such a hard time loving each other? Why do I have such a hard time knowing how to love people that I just feel like I cant?

I guess it comes down to Love is a choice. It's not a feeling and it's not conditional. Maybe that's what I'm forgetting.

"...Then I saw him there, hanging on a tree, looking at me. He had arms wide open, a heart exposed. Loves' definition was looking at me..."

"Greater Love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." John 15:13

Love is not selfish and that means that love has nothing to do with me. Love is sacrifice, and Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice making Him the ultimate example of Love. So I guess I've found my answer. I need to suck it up and forget my own personal hurt and just love. No conditions, just love. Even if i get hurt over and over because it's not my job to choose who deserves my love and who doesn't. Jesus just loved.

"...if anyone is looking for LOVE in all the wrong places, if you've been searching for LOVE come to Me, come to Me, take up your cross, deny yourself, forget your fathers house and run, run to me, cause you were made for abandoned and whole-heartedness...."

"...You'll come alive when you learn to die...."



*all quotes from the song "Arms Wide Open" by Misty Edwards

God's Goodness In My Life

Seriously, I dont think I've ever been more certain of God's love for me. He has just been so faithful to continue to prove it over and over. And really He doesnt even need to! I know He loves me, but I love that He's showing me just how much. I must say, I've never felt more loved in my life!
There have been several times that He's proved it to me just in the past week. One time was during our 48 hour prayer. I was up from 3:30am - 6am and I heard God tell me make tea so we could have a tea party!!! It was so nice, I sat there sipping my tea and talking to God. He knows I like tea parties so He wanted to do something with me that I enjoy! How great is that.
Then the other night, I was going to bed and I always listen to my ipod to go to sleep. Well I put my playlist on and set it to shuffle the songs. Well even when I put it on shuffle I end up getting picky about what I want to listen to, but I was also didnt feel like changing it. So I asked God if He would be my dj. He said "Sure! What would you like to listen to next?". So I told Him the song "Arms Wide Open". Well the song I was currently listening to ended and what song do you think came on next???? Yup, thats right! ARMS WIDE OPEN!! I immediately just started half laughing half crying! Then I heard Him say "You didnt think I would really do it did you?". He's right, I didnt really think He would and I told Him that. He went on to tell me that He loves me that much that He wanted to do what I asked Him to. Even if it was as simple as playing the song I wanted to hear next to fall asleep. He's amazing and I love Him a ton.
BUT THATS NOT ALL!!! For the next story I first have to rewind to when I was 15. When I was in youth group at my church, my youth pastor introduced us to something called "Listening Prayers". It's a way to learn how to practice hearing the voice of God. So we sat in a circle and my youth pastor told us to ask God to give us an object that He see's us as. So we did that and God told me 2 things but i'll only mention the one for now. God told me that I was a pineapple! So we went around and shared what God had given us. After that, we went back to God and asked Him why He thinks of us as that object. When I asked God that question He told me it was b/c I have a sweet inside but I had some rough edges that I needed to cut off before people could access it! I've always really remembered that time. It really impacted me! I treasure that conversation with God so much!
So the other day after our teacher (who was with us over skype due to the fact that he was in India) asked his team to pray for us after he was finished teaching. The first girl stuck her face in the camera and pointed me out and said she got a picture of me with a PINEAPPLE! I went on to cut up the pineapple and I was just super excited about it and I had pineapple all over my face and I was surrounded by pineapples and was just loveing it!!! Last time I was the pineapple, but this time God was the pineapple. It was so cool. :)

I could really go on and on about how good God has been to me lately. I know He's always good but lately He's been like exceptionally good!!! I'm loving it!!!  So much!!

48 Hours of Worship and Prayer

Well I know it's taken me a while to put out another update but i'm pretty sure this one is worth the wait. Here is a link for a short documentary that sums up this past week better than anything I could write here. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhGYeZeDPAI

Change of Scenery

The current DTS here at Ruurikkala, the SOW and our teacher Bas!

Well, we have come to the end of another week! Time is flying! We left on sunday afternoon for Ruurikkala to have our teaching with the DTS that is going on here and have been here for the week. Our teaching has been on Destiny by Design. We have been discovering what our destiny is and why God created us. It has been so good!
The students got plenty of chances to practice leading worship this week and they have done really well! Its great to see them apply what they have learned so far. I'm excited to see how much they grow!
It's also been a tough week for me personally. I haven't gotten much sleep and it really started to wear me down. But God is so faithful to meet me right where I'm at. I would wake up so tired that I knew if I had my quiet time in my room, I would for sure fall back to sleep. So I would walk every morning. I established my own little route and it was absolutely GORGEOUS! Finland is so pretty. I also realized yesterday why I loved my walks so much here. There is this one area that looks exactly like where I walk at home.  I love home, but I love here also.
We also did a 24 hour prayer this week. My time slot was from 1-2am. My alarm went off and I got up and walked outside to go to the prayer room and I looked up. OMG!! There were so many freaking stars!!! It was so incredibly GORGEOUS!!! That is one thing about living in the forest and not the city. So beautiful. Well my time in the prayer room was so great. God showed me some strongholds of Finland that I had begun to take on myself and as He showed them to me, I prayed against them over myself and Finland. It was such a great time. Mirjami came at 2 and I didnt want to let her in! I could have stayed there all night. Being with Him is so much better than sleep!
I've learned a lot this week. Especially about myself. God has showed me so much! I cant wait to see what else He is going to show me! He is so good and I love Him very much. Well we head home today after lunch. Thank God it's the weekend! I'm so ready for it!

Releasing the Power of Jesus!

So I was just reading my current book by Bill Johnson "Release the Power of Jesus" and he was talking about the importance of testimony. Now mind you, I am all ready for bed and snuggled up in my favorite blanket but God said I needed to share this stuff.
This week has been pretty incredible for the first week. God has done so many visible things in each one of our lives but I mostly just want to share an awesome story that occurred during lunch yesterday. My friend Mary had been having shooting pain in her hand and arm for a couple days. She had mentioned it before but we really didnt think much of it. We were all sitting at the table eating our lunch when she just dropped her fork and squeezed her eyes shut. When we asked her what was wrong, she said that the pain was so severe that she could not even move her hand. So we immediately began to pray for healing. This is something God has put on our hearts for this school so we might as well start seeing it in our own lives! So we were praying and singing out the song "Healer" and within a couple minutes the pain was completely gone and she hasn't had any pain since! PTL!!!
I've also seen God begin to work in the students lives. God has also used a lot of my life's struggles and situations to speak into the students lives. It's been so good. Even though there have been some pretty crappy things that I've had to go through, God is using them to help other people find the same freedom that I have. In that case, it's worth it.
God is good, and He just keeps getting better and better!

I want to look on the face of the one that I LOVE!

So today was pretty intense for me. This week has been really great! Our first week of teaching has been with Lisa Cuellar. She has been speaking on things like passivity, worship leading, and the importance of praise. Today we did an exercise where we took Psalm 103, blasted some worship music and just prayed out our praise to God. We didnt ask God for anything, we just thanked Him for whatever He's done in our lives and praised Him just for who He is! She encouraged us to just keep praying even if we didnt have words. Just pray in the spirit! So that's what we did for 15 minutes! Just praised and thanked God. It had nothing to do with us, it was ALL about HIM!
I cant even begin to describe what this time was like for me. I started off praying out the scripture and then just went off into my own prayers. Thanking God for everything He's ever done for me. It's so crazy when i actually spend the time just thanking Him for everything and contemplating just how great He is, I'm stupid for EVER not trusting Him or doubting Him. Blah, He seriously is just so freaking good. He's never failed me, never given up on me. I mean seriously He's had every right to. He's given up so much for me and i've rejected Him so many times and yet He's always there with arms wide open ready for me to come running back into them! Ugh! He's so amazing.
The other thing that really impacted me today was Lisa encouraged us when we ran out of words to just pray in tongues. Now i'll admit, i've had a very hard time with this over the years. Growing up in an Assemblies of God church where i've seen it faked so often, I never trusted God enough to believe that it was possible. It always just seemed really fake and i'm just not about that. But today I did run out of words and it felt so weird so I just said, "God what the heck" and started speaking in tongues. Um, I cant even explain what was going on. I wanted to just burst into tears! I felt so close to Him. Something in my spirit just totally connected with Him. I have never felt that in my life and that's how I knew that whatever I was praying meant something. It was connecting with the very heart of God and I was so overwhelmed. We finished and went to lunch but my heart was still with His. It was hard to move back into my daily responsibilities. I love Him. I cant say it enough.
Being here has given me an unexplainable passion and love for God that I dont think I would have ever experienced in america. At home where im so dependent on people. Ive had to break away from everything I know so that i literally only have Him. He know's me so well, i gotta give Him that one.

My New Reality on HEALING

Well our first week of SOW is officially over! Wow what a week! It's been a good time of us getting to know each other, eat a lot and worship together! We also got some teaching on songwriting this week. I know I've already been through this school and had teachings like the ones we will have, but they are different teachers so I'm excited to be able to learn even more! I'm so excited to get to sit in on all the classes. It's gonna be great!

God has really been teaching me a lot here. I was thinking the other day about healing. Last year when I was going through my SOW, about 2 weeks into the school my entire body broke out into a rash and I had no idea where it came from! We prayed for it countless times and it would get better but it didnt seem to want to go away completely! I did everything I knew to do for it but it would not leave me! It was so entirely frustrating. I couldnt understand why God wouldnt heal me. But as I sit here right now there is nowhere on my body that has that rash anymore. It hit me this week. Who's to say that God didnt heal me? I was listening to a podcast from Bethel Church in Redding CA and Bill Johnson shared a testimony from a kid. He had broken a bone in his body and he told the congregation that after just 5 months (i think) his bone was completely healed!! Now how many of us would just dismiss that as, well thats how long it normally takes for a broken bone to heal and take the credit completely away from God! God is good, all the time! He WANTS to heal every sickness, disease, broken bone and rash that will ever try to plague our bodies! But He never puts a time restraint on the way He does things. So why is it that when we dont see results in OUR timing, that the credit gets taken away from Him. We have to remember that HE created our bodies and it was HIS idea for the body to heal itself. So ultimately ALL healing is His doing, whether it takes 1 second or 10 years! It's in those times when we dont see instantaneous healing that we have to remember to say "I dont understand your ways, oh but i will give you my song, i'll give you ALL of my praise". My mind has been exposed to a new reality, and it makes me love God even more than before!

Well that's all for this little tangent. Until my next revelation!!  :)

Though I sleep, my heart is awake

Well, today was the very first day of SOW Finland! YAY! I'm so glad to be able to be a part of something new God is doing here in Finland. It's such an honor. I spent most of the day in my room with a guitar. Unfortunately it's the first time I've really gotten to play guitar since I've arrived in Finland so my poor fingers dont look so great right now. Each one has a blister. But thats the price of being a musician. I'll take blisters anyday! Anyway, I was playing guitar and asking God which songs to pick to lead worship tonight. Man, it was not easy! I have not led worship in such a long time. I was a bit worried. But God in His faithfulness doesn't need me to feel comfortable or even prepared. He can use me right where I'm at. I mean its not like I dont practice every chance I get! I just don't get those opportunities as much as I would like.
So tonight was my first time ever leading worship with a guitar. Its a good thing that we do worship more acoustically here b/c I've found that I somewhat pace when I play guitar! HA! I just cant stand still. But it was great. I wasnt nervous at all and it's crazy b/c normally i would have felt sick to my stomach and gotten all uptight inside but i was able to just completely lose myself in worship! It was just so wonderful! I just LOVE His presence. I was created to worship Him and that is where I feel most at home. Man, if we really will be spending all of eternity in His presence just worshiping Him, I am COMPLETELY ok with that! Nothing will make me happier.
My passion for God has gotten uncontainable. I really cant even describe it. Every day when bedtime rolls around i'm SOOO ready for sleep. But i've gotten into the habit of reading before bed, and im currently reading "The Supernatural Power of a Transformed Mind". And EVERY night, God shows up! It's not fair b/c I need  rest but I so badly just want to spend time with Him! He's such a tease! But then when I get up in the morning, it's like i'm so anxious to be with Him. Blah!!! I LOVE HIM SO MUCH!
I've come to the conclusion that no one will ever be able to come close to understanding the life I live until they begin to pursue their own closeness to the One I live for. He is my favorite. I love Him more than life.
This trip has already impacted me way more than I can even put into words. I'm pretty sure I could write forever and a day about how in awe of Him I am. I've never been so blown away by nature in my life! It really does just radiate His glory!
Ok seriously I have to get to bed. Six thirty is going to come way sooner than I will want it too.

Peace out world!

I'm falling in love!

So I must say, God knows me so very well! It's so true that you cannot follow the leading of the Holy Spirit and NOT be happy! I mean, I know the winter has yet to come but still. Oh my freaking gosh! This place is amazing! We have been working a lot today on preparation for the school (which i have some cool stuff to say about) and after so many hours of being cooped up inside, we decided to go for a walk to the lake. Can you say absolutely GORGEOUS! Finland is such a beautiful country. The lake reminded me a lot of home in PA. It felt so nice. The air here is probably the best air I've every breathed in my life! If I could somehow get my air from here and take it home with me, I so would. It's so clean feeling and the smells are just amazing! I have been in such awe of nature here. I've been noticing the Glory of God through His creation of this county. God ya did good thats all I have to say. Seriously, next summer you should take your vacation to Finland. Not Helsinki or city places, but get out into the forest. It's breathtaking!

Well now that I have convinced you all that Finland needs to be on your places to visit list, let me tell you something cool that happened today. Well I must say, God is seriously the coolest EVER! I mean, think about it, He's the God of the universe, who created Finland I might add, and He likes to talk to ME!!! Um, yes please. Today we spent the morning praying for the students in the school. We asked God for encouragement and what He wants to do in them during their time in the school. As we started praying for one of the students God immediately told me that He wanted to show this student more of His Father's heart. At first I was like, wow how typical and I somewhat dismissed it. So I kept listening for something else and got a scripture. It didnt completely go with what I had heard previously but for some reason the Father's heart just kept nagging at me. It wouldnt leave my mind. So I told Mary and Mirjami what I had heard and they asked me if I knew anything about this students backround. I said no, and they went on to tell me that he doesnt have a good relationship with his father but he is in the process of healing from that. WOW WOW WOW! Seriously, hearing from God is such a privilege that I do not take for granted one bit! I LOVE hearing from Him. I LOVE when He speaks. It's always so good. I love Him SOOOOO much!!

Ok well I'm gonna go talk to Him now. I'm so in love with Him!

I MADE IT!!! YAY!!

Well I'm here in Finland! It has been so great so far! I got into Helsinki Sunday evening and met Mary and Mirjami, the other two staff for the School of Worship. We spent the monday afternoon in downtown Helsinki so I could see what it's like. It's very beautiful! The buildings are so pretty! LOVE IT! Then that night we had some staff training.
I have been quite jetlagged. Not fun at all! The other night i was up until 4am! Oh how i just wanted to sleep. So Mary and Mirjami let me sleep the morning away. Very nice of them! Then we had a time of prayer and worship for the school. It's so cool to see what God is speaking for this school! He has been saying alot about healing and miracles which gets me so very excited b/c its something God has really been speaking to me personally about. I cant wait to see what He does! Then we had another time of staff training and after that, MORE SLEEP! It seems as though i cannot get enough of it!
This morning we made the 4ish hour drive from Helsinki to Koivumaki. I bet you cant guess what i did the whole way!! Yup, SLEEP! I'm still not 100% recovered from the jet lag but I'm praying that it wont be too much longer.
Tomorrow we will be getting things ready for the school which starts on Monday! Cant believe it! It's gonna be great!
Well, theres lots to do before next week and I need to make sure I am all ready to go! So I bet you cant guess what I'm gonna go do!!!


goodnight :)

My Opinion On Packing

So I have started the long agonizing process of packing. Bleh. Need I really say more? Probably not but im going to anyway. I did all my laundry (did i mention how much i dislike doing laundry?) and then started packing up all the stuff in my room. Thats always hard for me b/c i get super distracted by reading all the encouraging notes and looking at pictures. I must say, i have the most AMAZING friends in the whole entire freaking world!! They never stop encouraging me and loving me. They are the best! I love them a whole heck of a lot. Not to mention, i am so grateful that people hear God on my behalf and share those things with me. Oh i just love how God LOVES me!! Ya, He's pretty freakin awesome too.

The other night i was driving around with my friend Jennah, and i just realized how amazing my life is. Yeah, i have for sure put up with my fair share of crap but look where i'm at now! I'm getting the opportunity to travel the world doing what i love, helping other people through missions and music. I also get to bless the heart of the Father through worship. So great! So freakin great! Then i have the two best sisters in the world and i already said how amazing my besties are! And just when i think my life cant get any better, God tops it! I am so thankful for the life that i have, and even more thankful for God's favor over my life. I am so grateful that He has and will NEVER give up on me. He trust me, loves me, believes in me more than anyone else in the world. Ahhh!!! I LOVE LIFE! Yes, i am going to be sad to leave everyone here. I have made more friendships in this past year and im thankful for each and every one of them. It really has been a great time being home. I'm happy i got this opportunity. Thanks God. :) The statement that you cant follow the leading of the Holy Spirit and not be happy is so true. I cant testify to it! It doesnt mean that life will never be hard, but you can still be happy even when life is rough.

Well, enough procrastinating. I need to get back to packing. I really dont want to though. Anyone wanna come pack for me???

God is super duper faithful!

So this morning was AMAZING! My residence permit has officially been APPROVED!!! It is on its way to me at this very moment! I also booked my plane ticket today for August 7th which is next saturday! What a crazy thought! I really cant believe i have just over a week left here at home! I cant believe i have been home for just about a year too. God really does know what he's doing though.

I was able to get a cheaper plane ticket then i originally thought i would be able to. I was looking at some that were going to cost over 1000 dollars! But my God is so freaking faithful and loves me SOOOO much that He got me one for only $800! I love Him. He's like way smart. Why i ever think i can do things better is beyond me. I must be out of my mind.

I am no longer working at Brown's. I'm glad i took the time off to rest and get ready for this trip. It's been nice to have nothing to do and just relax before i have no idea what my schedule will look like. Though i do know that the day after i arrive in the country we will be having a staff meeting. No time to waste thats for sure! But i know that God is my strength and He has so much in store for me. I think excitement alone will keep me going! Im not really worried.

Well life is good. Im learning so much and just loving God with all my heart.

Well the cd has officially been released! It is out now and available for purchase! If you'd like more info on how to get yourself a copy, leave a comment or send me an email! seaubel@gmail.com

The cd release concert was a blast! It went really well. We had a good turnout at the event and online as well! If you didnt get to see it you still can by going to ustream.tv/channel/cd-release-concert. The cd's are going fast! Its so cool to see how much people are willing to support our music. It's a cool thing.

I have also raised half of what i need a month for Finland! YAY GOD!! Cant wait to see how God brings the rest in! Its gonna be amazing!! He's so good!

This coming week will be my last week working at Brown's. Its bittersweet. Im excited to be leaving so soon, but im going to miss working there as well. I really have enjoyed my time there.

This whole experience has been so good. Being home this past year has taught me so much. It's been stretching but also relaxing. God has been so faithful and so good. He really does know exactly what i need. Its been good, but i really cannot wait to get back into missions! Ive missed it! It's where my heart truely is. I love to minister to people, build relationships and walk in the calling that God has placed on my life. I really do enjoy life. It's such a great gift! Though i cannot imagine ever living for anything other than God! He is my life! I love Him so very much!

Hey all! I received an email from the SOW leader the other day. We now officially have 2 students!! PTL!! We also received 2 more applications!! Were going to continue to pray that God will send more students (hopefully some female ones as well) and also that their application processes will go smoothly. Speaking of applications, I also received an email from the base director in Finland as well. He called the immigration office there and got the information on my residence permit. We are looking at me getting my residence permit around the end of July/beginning of August. So i have yet to book a plane ticket b/c im not sure when i can leave. I think it would be really great if God could tell me when He sees me getting my residence permit. That would be nice to know. 

I still have quite a bit of support to raise but im trust God that it will come. I realized last week that where im at is absolutely nothing new, and actually i should be used to this. Two years ago at this time, i was trusting God to provide for me to go on my School of Ministry and Evangelism outreach. And last year at this time, i was trusting God to go to the Dominican Republic. God was faithful and i went on both outreaches, though i didnt know i was until the very last minute. And when i say last minute i mean like 3 days before leaving the country. So here we go again! God gets to do a miracle! Lets see how he works it out this time. :) 

CD Release concert is this sunday! Super excited! It's gonna be great!

Well i think thats pretty much it!

Yes, No, or Wait....

I of course love when God says Yes, and No can be either good or bad depending on the situation, but wait is just agonizing....It's super duper hard ever single time!

Why is it that when we need an answer from God and He gives it to us but it's not the one we want do we keep asking Him for more confirmation? It's easy to know if something is God or not when it's taking action b/c then you see the end result. But when He just tells you to wait, you dont know if your making the right decision until He eventually answers you. Yes, I trust that God has perfect timing but seriously sometimes i think my timing is better. From past experiences thats for sure NOT true but i'd like to think that it is sometimes. It's even harder when your asking God for something you want and He's said He wants to give it to you and you see an opportunity but He tells you to wait! UGH! Oh I dont know. All I know is that God honors obedience, and if your heart is to obey Him and you screw up, He makes ALL things good (Romans 8:28)! Ok, I have nothing to worry about.  Not to mention, He gave me this promise at the beginning of the year b/c He just loves me....

"I will go before you and make the rough places smooth. I will shatter the gates of bronze and cut through their iron bars. I will give you the treasures of darkness and the hidden wealth of secret places so that you will know that it is I, the Lord, the God of Isreal who calls you by your name."  Isaiah 45:2&3

Wow, He's so good. I really LOVE Him! :)

Well the album is officially complete! We have even placed the order for the cd's and they should be here before the end of the month! We will be releasing it July 11, 2010 and to kick it off, there will be a cd release concert! Feel free to come out and join us! It will be held at City View Community Church 1655 Roosevelt Ave, York PA 17408 at 6pm on July 11, 2010! You will get to hear songs from the album, drink coffee, and get to be one of the first to purchase the album! I'm really excited about it. It's gonna be great!

I also got a chance to go to Orlando last weekend to visit my bestest friends in the entire world! They are amazing and I love them to pieces. I'm so blessed that I got to see them before we all go our separate ways for the summer. Oh the life of missionaries, it's a blessing but sure isn't easy.

My support raising for Finland is slow going. I have gotten some support (PTL) but I'm still in need of quite a bit. But I'm trusting God. I actually realized something today while i was at work sorting through an endless amount of strawberries, two years ago at this time i was trusting God for finances to be able to go on my School of Ministry and Evangelism outreach. Then last year at this time, I was trusting God for finances to be able to go to the Dominican Republic for my School of Worship outreach. And now here i am, waiting on God to provide for this trip to Finland. The common denominator....I went on both of those outreaches b/c God proved himself to be beyond faithful. It never happened the way I thought it would have but none the less, I have the pictures to prove it! It was also always last minute and that's always terribly agonizing and what got me through was my times with God, pouring out my frustrations and standing on the promises that He was always faithful to give me. So all that to say, I think it's time for me to go spend some time with the person who believes in me more than anyone else in the world and can give me the peace that I need to keep trusting that this is what He wants and He is going to give me everything I need to accomplish this. I love that He is completely trustworthy ALL the time.