Equal. Dignity. Perfect Love.

                                                   Open your eyes...


We went to Modesto this past week to work with the YWAM base located there.
Painful.
Real.
Eyes=opened.
Stretching.
Exhausting.
Relaxing.
Intense.
Beautiful.
Ugly.

Words that describe the past week of my life. It was an amazing week. Completely different than average schedule for us. The YWAM base there focuses on homeless ministry, their focus being justice. We worked along side them all week long, mostly focusing on a certain area of Modesto, south 9th street. Also known as no-man's land, the place of the forgotten, the rug where all problems are swept under...etc. This certain section of Modesto is where people go to be forgotten. When you fly past rock bottom... you land on South 9th street. It's a sad, disheartening place. But the YWAM base is bringing hope, food, and most importantly love to these people. They create friendships and they are beautiful friendships to see.

The worst part of seeing these people who have gone beyond rock bottom was not that they don't want to change. Their lack of clothing in some cases. Their bitterness towards anyone who wants to help them. Their anger. No. It was the fact that I can easily cut myself off emotionally from it. I can just stand there...and not see their pain. Feel their pain. Hear their pain. That I am capable of being so...cold towards someone in such need of just someone to treat them with dignity. Love. Respect. What is wrong with my heart? That I can just look away and pretend i didn't see the woman who just got her 6th hotdog because she hasn't eaten in days? Maybe a week? I am just human. Saved by grace. I do not understand why God has grace for things like this. I am CALLED to love these people. And all i could think while i was serving hotdogs one night was "Jesus. I don't think i'm cut out for this. I can't do this..."

We are all humans, saved by grace. If you know Jesus, you know this. But why does He have grace towards our cold, walled off hearts? Perfect, unconditional love. It's just unreal how much He loves us. I will never, EVER comprehend it. But i hope to be pursuing that comprehension for the rest of my life.

To say the least, I am learning. This past week has taught me a lot, not a lot of it dealing with Modesto. I'm realizing more and more of how incapable i am of doing anything without Jesus. I can't have grace with his grace first. I only love because He first loved us.

We are equal before God's eyes.

Just.

I need to be real in these posts. I know I do. That's always been a struggle for me, to answer honestly when people ask me how i am. People want to hear the real answer, not the standard crap answer that has no substance at all. It's exhausting. To be honest, vulnerable, open. But that's what makes a powerful testimony. It's those testimonies that change people's lives. WHAT did God do in your life? WHAT is He doing now? That's what affects people. But being vulnerable is so hard. You set yourself up for pain, rejection, criticism. No one wants that. Which is why we put walls around our hearts. And I think it's good to be smart about who you're vulnerable with. But if it makes a powerful testimony and brings glory to God then do it!

On that note. God's been doing ridiculous things. Like not necessarily things that affect ME personally, but how I, as a person, can affect how this world works. I'm starting to realize how much the way my life is impacts others. I'm actually here, leaving my mark behind. And all I can do is do the best i can to make sure that mark is beneficial to others. An encouragement. A help. How do i do this?! Someone told me today (our speaker this week actually) that i'm here to learn how to have a gentle spirit. To understand what others go through. That i'm already strong and will be an encouragement to others in that way, but i need to learn how to be gentle in that strength. Which is so true. I'm often brutally honest, and i don't realize that it hurts people. I don't want that to be my mark left behind! I want to leave behind truth, but not pain. I want to leave behind encouragement, not harsh words. So if any of you feel like spending an extra minute talking to Jesus today, maybe lift that up to Him.

I think that's really all i had to say today. I'm just learning how to speak actual wisdom into other people. And i don't want to screw it up. Thanks for listening guys. I love you all so much! So so much. :)
~allie a.~

I've been thinking this past week. That I honestly can't say that I know who I am, really. But, I'm learning more and more. Troy, our speaker last week, was saying that every single person is called to disciple the nations. So if we don't know what specifically God is calling to us to do with our lives, then that's what we do. Because no matter what your calling is, God has called everyone to go and disciple the nations. We get so caught up in asking God what we should do, what he wants us to do, what our calling is..etc. That we lose the big picture of what living as a christian is truly about. And that, according to my small opinion is this:
To love God, others and self. To disciple. To serve others around you. To be humble. To LOVE. We are called to LOVE.

I've heard that my entire life. To love your neighbor as yourself. But it has never really hit me as hard as it has this week. We are called to love murderers. People who have hurt us deeply. Rapists. Really? Jesus wants us love these people. With his perfect love. It sounds so simple. In theory, it is so simple. Love. That's all. But when you think about it in the big picture sense, it's so hard. How are we supposed to love people with bitterness in their hearts? With pain and anger towards the world? So hurt that they hurt others? These are the people that we're called to love with God's perfect love. And it's only with Jesus living inside of us that we can do that. I know this sounds like baby christian stuff. But it has never hit me so hard until today. It is honestly all about love! Yeesh. I love revelations like this.

Just a little view from Silence and Solitude day

We had silence and solitude yesterday. Such a good day. We went to a near by state park called Montana De Oro. I walked along the bluffs the whole time. Every once in awhile i'd find a cool place to stop and just write in my journal and read my bible. But most of the time it was just walking along, hanging out with Jesus. I never take the time to do this in my normal life. It was an incredible time. It was so BEAUTIFUL too.

So anyway. That's a little peek into my head this week. I love you all! 
~allie~

So many questions

             

fun times on fun day

I'm really not good at this am i? Sorry guys. I guess it honestly only has been like 2 weeks since i last posted but it feels like centuries in my world!
Today is monday. Beginning of my fourth week.  Second week with Troy Sherman as our speaker. A little summary of lectures so far:
I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING.
That's how i feel about life right now. and myself. and Jesus. and anything that i've been taught about my faith until this point. My world has been rocked.
Just a few questions that are constantly roaming through my brain now (and probably will go through yours too):
Where do we honestly get our belief system?
Why do we close our eyes when we pray? It never said ONCE in the Bible to please bow your heads and close your eyes when you pray.
Why is a church service so programmed?
If Jesus said that, even if I served Him my entire life with my entire heart, I wouldn't get into heaven, would I continue to follow Him?
Just some things to ponder. I am now constantly haunted by these questions. and plenty more.
This upcoming weekend is Bible weekend. We're not entirely sure what that means yet, but i'm thinking we're gonna be reading a rather large section of the Bible! I think it'll be fun actually. I'm a nerd when it comes to reading though. haha!
I cannot believe how fast time is going here. This is already my FOURTH week! It feels like i've been here forever on some levels but also like i literally just got here.
I've figured out that i'm AWFUL at taking pictures. But thankfully there's a photography track here that will just take a million pictures in place of the ones that i'm not taking! haha!

Pismo pier

We found out an average of what the plane tkts will cost for outreach. 1,584. Incredibly cheap for going to TWO countries.  However, i still don't have the money. haha. i know that God's got it. i'll be sending out support letters soon just to give everyone a new update of what's going on. Please comment or message me on Facebook with your address if you want to recieve one!

Alrighty, i'm gonna sign out friends! thanks for all the prayers and support!

~Allie~

Africa Bound!

Newest update! 

This past week we as a school prayed about where God wants to send us on outreach. It was decided that there'd be 3 different teams, (Philip, Audrey and Paula as leaders). So we all prayed. Some of us got some super random stuff from God. Like a toaster. Baha!. As the week went on the anticipation rose among us, trying to figure out what teams we'd be on and where we'd be going. On friday the staff prayed together and finally announced to us that 2 teams would be off to East Africa and one team would be going to Nicaragua. We all went off on our own and prayed about where to go and which team to be on.

I know the suspense is killing you all.

To finish my story off, I went off and prayed. Really just danced around like a maniac and told God that I really wanted to go to Africa but wherever He sent me was where I would go.

...

God told me Africa. :)

I am super super excited. I have felt such a draw to Africa ever since I knew i was going to do a DTS and even before that. There's even more! The school leaders really feel like we all need to meet up in Nicaragua at some point, so i'll actually get to go to Africa AND Nicaragua! Ha! So cool!!

   Now that the exciting news has been said, i'll move onto other happenings. Tomorrow lectures start for real! This next week the theme of our week is Discipleship. I'm so excited to experience my first real week. Tomorrow morning is Monday so we'll have worship and intercession at a church that lets us use their space. I've only had one other Monday here but so far i'm loving the Mondays! Which a nice change, usually Mondays are not the greatest. 

That's all i've got for now. I love you all!

*Psalm 100

Just a little chapter i especially love this week. Audrey gave a very thought provoking message on worship this week and that chapter stood out to me.

~allie~

Day 3: only day 3?!

Alright. So here's just a little gist of what's going on in my life right now. I am currently going through a Discipleship Training School (from now referenced to at DTS), through Youth With A Mission (aka, YWAM). This school will prepare me to go out into the mission field and disciple the nations. Yay :) I'm at the DTS in Pismo Beach, CA. The breakdown of the school: There's a lecture phase (3 months) and an outreach phase (2 months). The lecture phase is 12 weeks of different speakers coming through and speaking into our lives about different subjects. Some examples would be Hearing God's voice, Grace, Discipleship...etc. The outreach phase will be putting what we learned into practice by going to a third world country and basically, telling people about Jesus. So my school is a bit different than usual because it's a Boarding and Arts school. What this means is we each came to this school with something specific in mind to focus on while we're here. So, for example, my track is music, which falls under the Arts category. In the boarding category there's surfing and skateboarding. It's so cool to be a part of this. :)
      Enough of the boring deets though. So since this is the first week, it's all orientation stuff. I just finished up day 3. I CAN'T believe that this is only day 3. It feels like i've been here so much longer. Along with learning about what we'll be doing this school, today we got to pray about our outreach! So thrilling. :) There's not a decision made by any means yet. But it was super cool to hear about what God's speaking to everyone about. I, personally, feel called to Rwanda, Africa. But God may have completely different plans for me. My heart is already there, but i'm really working on having an open mind and heart about where we're going.
    I know that you all will want to see pictures soon. Please have patience with me and my old computer. She really doesn't like doing anything at this point, so it will take a bit to get pictures downloaded. I will get some posted as soon as i can though. Please continue praying for me as i go through this amazing journey! I know this time will be stretching and sometimes super hard. But i'm so meant to be here. Thanks so much for your support!
Till next time!
Allie.