All about Alive

Wow, what a week! The festival officially started on Wednesday and what better to bring in the festivities but a downpour of rain, haha, but despite all the wind and stinky mud (praise God for rainboots!), it was the volunteers that blew me away. When we offered them a choice to stay out of the rain instead of going into the crowd to encourage child sponsorship, not one of them chose to stay!! They were willing to brave the storm (both physically and emotionally because the crowd was not always so receptive) just to speak out on behalf of kids and families that have no voice. Amazing! Then each day we would invite the audience to come to the tent to pray for Mozambique and the prayers of these spiritually focused teens were such a blessing to hear. It was really great to see that these teens coming up are actually interested in making a difference; in fact, we had quite a few teenage boys team up to sponsor a child! I think the coolest thing during this prayer time, though, was when we were praying in a circle and a family had come to join. Then, out of nowhere their little boy starts praying for "clean water for the kids in Africa"! Once again, AMAZING!


This is the sister and the mom of the little boy who prayed learning about rice-super cute side note, she stacked the pins on the table in the background just for fun, it was so funny to watch!


So that was the fun part...the not so exciting part was trying to demonstrate the deep complexities of poverty and social justice in just a few words or even a few days. People were constantly averting their eyes and their hearts. Deep down I know that the sponsorships we got will be eternally significant so I am thankful for those. I also feel I should work on trusting in God's plan instead of mine. I mean, how can I expect people to trust God when I'm not willing to do it fully myself? :) It was also a challenge staying encouraged so as not to put people off; for each person that came to the tent we had to be motivated which meant constantly relying on God to refresh and remind me of why I was out there. While it was pretty challenging, I was glad to get a chance to grow and I totally LOVED getting to talk to people about FH!! I also had a beyond awesome team of FH staff and volunteers keeping me on track and without whose support I would've straight up crashed and burned ;) Plus I got to work with WILLET (check them out at www.willetonline.com) - their music is powerful and their heart for the poor is even more inspiring. So now, I guess just be praying that the ones who did decide to sponsor will stick with it. Also for God to start opening the hearts of those coming to GodChicks next week and everyone coming to LifeLight in September!