One Family in Christ

I have been back from Sierra Leone one week today. I guess it is about time to give you all an update. Thank you for your patience as I soak in the goodness of God while settling back into American life.

I am sitting on my porch having a Treasure time with Jesus :)

I just re-watched a video for about the 10th time of one of my African sons singing a worship song while we were at Macondi visiting his university.



I am so proud of my African family. Since He has connected our hearts and lives I have experienced so much of His love! I have known He has loved me since I gave my life to Him, but I know in increasing measure now. I see through their lives, through their worship, through their commitment and devotion to God and people, through their love and service, their sacrifice, that His love is greater than what my mind had conceived.


He rescued them, took care of them, provided for them, loved them, and I see their response to that love being full surrender to Him. They are like the one leper that came back and thanked Jesus for healing his life. Just as I am like Mary, who followed Jesus everywhere He went, sat at his feet in worship just to be near Him after He healed her life.

I feel so close to God. Even while I am back here in America, I am getting up while it is still dark and spending 3 to 4 hours every morning singing worship songs to Him, praying, reading the bible. I am playing worship music all day, singing songs of praise in my heart, pouring out my worship to Him. He rarely leaves my thoughts. My mind is full of thoughts of thankfulness and His faithfulness. My heart is full of love for Him. So much of this is a result of the great amount of love and kindness I was shown while in Sierra Leone...by the kids, the Pastors, the staff and the community. It is also because I have seen the great struggles that everyone is facing and faces regularly there, yet how they each press into God, thanking Him, praising Him, trusting Him, seeking His face despite the great opposition they daily face.

I see that it is their pleasure, their joy, to be with me when I am there...to love and serve me as though I have always been a part of their family. I have been shown such kindness, such love and it is healing my life in ways that I never imagined. Because of the love I have been shown, I am drawn so close to the ONE I love the very most, the ONE who rescued me, took away my shame, made me new, placed His Spirit on the inside of me and called me His own, while the world rejected me and others used me for their own gain.


I just cannot begin to tell you how grateful I am for this precious part of the body of Christ in Sierra Leone. I understand more of what it means to be one family in Christ because they have grafted me into theirs. His love is the commonality that binds us together beyond space, time and culture. It is the universal language that He speaks. If we have ears to hear, we will hear His voice speaking to us through each others' lives. I will forever praise Him for giving me ears to hear and eyes to see Him through the lives of the believers in Sierra Leone. I see His beauty when I look at their lives...I see His faithfulness when I hear them sing worship songs to Him...I see His strength when I see them serving Him despite great spiritual opposition...I see Him in their smile, in their laughter, in their hard work, in their sacrifice. I see Him more clearly than I ever have through their lives.

My prayer for them, for me, for you who are reading this is to please, please, please keep seeking Him above all else. I am begging for Him to increase our love and worship for Him even more as one body...our desire to daily feed from His word, to let His Spirit ever be our Living Water. Apart from Him we can do nothing...all of our worth is in Him and Him alone! He doesn't need us to accomplish His purposes on this earth, yet when we seek Him He uses us so we might know and understand more of His heart...His heart for the weak, the oppressed, the poor and the needy...because at our core, this is what we all are. We are all in desperate need of Him...some of us just don't realize it, we become deceived and chase after idols that will never truly satisfy, or in pride we try to be the master of our own lives. But we are all poor and needy at our core...we were only made for Him. My African family gets this more than most Christians I know, including me.

He is the blessed Controller of all things, sovereign and in control. He alone reigns throughout the earth. One day we will see that we are but dust and He is Ruler and Judge over all…judging righteously with grace and mercy towards those fully devoted to Him.


I am so thankful that He gives us intimate relationships here on the earth to help us know His love more and draw us near. Those in Sierra Leone will never fully know how thankful I am for them. May I ever live to love and serve them the way they have me. May I use my voice to speak up for their rights and to implore others to judge them fairly. (Proverbs 31:8-9) They are more precious to me than any earthly treasure. They are my gift from GOD!


Those of you here in America who give of your time, money and resources to make a way for me to return to Africa again and again are a gift to me from the Lord. Those of you who give towards the needs of these precious people have become a great source of my joy in the Lord. You have become so endeared to me. May I ever live to love and serve you the way you all have me. You are more precious to me than any earthly treasure. You are my gift from GOD!

I will ever praise Him for making us all one family in Christ. May we lift high His name together across the earth for His glory and our joy!

I love you all!
Shanna

If you would like to look at pictures from my recent trip, here are a few links: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2065196&id=1139719726&l=860c697af7
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2065202&id=1139719726&l=41c1c3dfd2

Here is a link to a few videos of two different boys singing worship songs:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/video/video.php?v=1475976856288
http://www.facebook.com/#!/video/video.php?v=427561706263&subj=1139719726