Sunday, June 17, 2007

The Wake Up Call!

Friday, June 1st, we received a wake up call in our hotel room in Johannesburg, South Africa just around 6:30 am. It was my mother in law (Mom) calling us all the way from Connecticut in the states to make sure we were awake so we’d be on time for our 10:40 am flight to Pemba, Mozambique later that morning. We had spoken to her the day before and had told her we might want to check out of the hotel around 7:30 am to be at the airport in time to check in and look around the shops before our flight. Moments after the phone call, God told me the next blog entry was to be entitled: the WAKE UP CALL! And here’s what the Lord has been sharing with me since then concerning the wake up call:
Many of you at home were shocked and some of you, admittedly, a little amazed at what God was calling our family to and some just couldn’t quite believe that we were doing the right thing. Since we’ve been here in Pemba, God has shown me just what a small, teeny tiny, light little thing we did that had some of you so amazed…and what a huge, great and awesome plan He has for us just because we took this small little step in coming to Mozambique. The whole kingdom of God has been opened before us because of this small step. On Thursday, May 31st as we were worshipping together in the hotel room, the Lord told me to read Isaiah 43:16 -21 and He said not to remember the former miracles , signs and wonders of old because “I’m now doing a new thing which you cannot even comprehend. Now you have entered into My joy…and NOW I will be your strength. The JOY of the Lord is YOUR strength.” We’ve entered into His joy and therefore have entered into a whole new realm of His glory…A realm where His love is absolutely everything, where nothing else matters. He’s opened up His love before us and we’ve walked right into it and the only thing left for us to do is to accept it and let it wash over and through us!
Let me share a story with you. Last Monday we went into town with one of our housemates to buy food and supplies for our house. After spending way too much time trying to exchange money at the bank and buy a Mozambican SIM card for our phone, we finally headed off to try to purchase the items we needed. We only had about an hour to get everything because stores are closed between 12 and 2 pm and it was just about 11 am when we finished with the SIM card business. We decided to trek down to the one store in town that would have mostly everything on our list, including groceries, but at a more expensive price than the markets along the street, since we were short on time. We purchased some food and household items at this “one stop shop”, and then headed next door to the electronics store which was owned by the same person. Tyren went inside while the kids and I along with our housemate, Nancy, tried to find some shaded spot just outside the door to rest. A man sitting behind a desk just inside the store called out to me to come and sit down inside on the other side of the desk where there was a nice comfortable cushioned chair. I hesitated for just a moment, and then went to sit down with the kids. After we were comfortably seated, he told me to call Nancy inside to sit in another comfortable chair nearby. I began to chat a little with this man, who I figured must be kind of important because he was just sitting behind this nice big desk while others were working behind the counters and helping customers. He asked where we were from and what we were doing in Pemba and we told him. At some point he told us his name, which happened to be the same name as the store. He was the owner. When he found out we were at Iris’ Holy Given School for Missions, he told us that the property we were staying on was some of the choicest land in Pemba -he knew this because he was the one who had sold it to Heidi and Rolland Baker who he considered to be his friends. The school is right across the street from the beach and one of the nicest hotels in town. I remembered that we would need to catch a taxi from his store back to the school, so I asked him if it would be easy to catch a taxi from that end of town. (We had walked from the center of town where the first taxi had dropped us off to the other end where his store was located and I didn’t see too many taxis around there.) He said, “Don’t worry about a taxi. When your husband finishes making his purchases, I’ll take care of you.” He then handed Nancy and I his business card with the store’s phone number and his cell phone number and told us if we ever need anything or ever get stranded somewhere to give him a call. He also mentioned to Tyren that he had given us his card and that we could call him if we ever needed anything. A few minutes later, Amerel and Isaiah began to complain that they were hungry because we had missed lunch being in town for so long. Mr. “O” said something to one of his employees and a minute later, the employee came back and handed a package of cookies to my kids. Shortly afterwards, Tyren finished up and Mr. “O” spoke to another of his employees who proceeded to carry out all of our purchases that we had made that day and put them into the trunk of a black BMW SUV. He then ushered us into the nice clean, cushioned seats inside and drove us all the way back to the school! Let me just mention quickly here that the man who did these things for us is a Muslim Indian whose family has been living in Mozambique for 5 generations. I know some of you are wondering why in the world a rich Muslim would show this kind of generosity to a few Christians who are learning about evangelizing the world for Christ at a missions school! I wondered myself, but God told me it’s just part of His WAKE UP CALL!
Wednesday, June 6th, Bill Johnson was the speaker for our morning session. He taught out of Ephesians 3:10, 19 to show us that when we walk in the calling that God has called us to, God’s wisdom is revealed to the heavenly realms…the angels and demons alike begin to understand God’s wisdom in sending His only Son to die for us that we might have eternal life with Him. They begin to see us being conformed into the image of Christ as we walk according to His plan for our lives. Bill said whenever we do exactly what God told us to do, God’s wisdom is made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms (Ephesians 3:10). In Ephesians 3:19, it says that we are to be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. How can we even begin to imagine being filled with all the fullness of God Who has the whole earth as His footstool? He Who can span the heavens with one hand, how can we contain His fullness within us? This is the WAKE UP CALL! The WAKE UP CALL is this: Begin to see God in HIS fullness and you will walk out the plan of God for your life and you will begin to walk in the realm of miracles…Begin to allow His fullness to fill YOU and you will never again know lack OF ANYTHING-NOT love, NOT joy, NOT prosperity, NOT even a taxi to get back to school from town-NOT ANYTHING! Begin to see Christ in YOU…the hope of glory (Colossians 1:27)…this is the WAKE UP CALL! God has just begun to wake me up since we stepped out into this next thing that God has for us …I hope you are now beginning to WAKE UP!!

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