Who are you Fighting For?

          To begin to sum up the last seven weeks here, I'm just not sure that I could do it. I've been through so much, seen so much, and fought so much with God.. but He has won. I have learned how to fight for my faith. Granted, I am still trying to find new ways to fight for my freedom (and fight for my sanity) everyday. What has really helped me has been to have quiet time with God everyday. I never thought that spending time with my heavenly Creator at the start of everyday could really change the way I go about my day. 

          This may seem obvious to say, but God fascinates me. I am growing ever fascinated and intrigued with the things He has to offer me. 

          I could take up this space to tell you all about the experiences I've had and the stories I've heard and been a part of but instead, I want to ask you to pray for the following people. I will not tell you where I met them, or their stories (unless you would like to ask me personally) as a means to protect their identity. 

Alejandra

Alejandro

Beatrice

Catalina

Diana

Jessica

Kevin

Lenti

Marta

Nicole

Oscar

Rosia

Sonya

...just to name a few. 

I challenge you right now to ask yourself if you're fighting for something, or for anything. If you aren't, you should be. I will fight for these people that God has laid on my heart like He has shown me that He will fight for me. 

So, who are you fighting for?

Fight for someone.Fight for something. 

Fight for yourself!

          There are so many people in this world that don't know how to fight, or that have given up the fight. FIGHT FOR THEM. And if you are one of them? Do something about it.Don't keep sitting at home wondering why your life is happening to you. Happen to your life! Fight for your freedom. For for your faith. 

Do not lose heart, my friend.
 

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:

“For your sake we face death all day long; 

we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us."

-Romans 8:35-37

His Healing Power

On Tuesday, we had our morning worship time, and then were given very mysterious directions. As we read the first card, we realized that we were going to the Santo Tomas market and that the two people in my group that were fairly fluent Spanish speakers were muted from the time we left for the market to an hour after. We spent time in our groups and asked God to show us what He had in store for us. We asked for visions and pictures of people to talk to. Oddly enough, I had a picture of a woman with a meat cleaver.
            We went on our merry way to the market and ended up with a taxi driver that actually spoke English. We talked with him about his life and prayed for him and his family. Upon arriving at the market, one of my team members wanted to go back to certain stand owners that she had relationships with from visiting previously. We prayed for the first woman who actually led us around her part of the market asking us to pray for other people. We were in the market for about an hour when myself and my friend came upon a woman who was helping her mom during the day by charging people to use the bathroom in the market. My teammate and I prayed for her and turned around to see the rest of our team praying for another woman. When we joined their prayers, we learned that this woman was suffering severe stomach pain. She needed surgery but was scared. From what I could gather, she had severe intestinal problems and something wrong with her liver.
            We prayed over her and asked her how she was feeling. She said that she was still in pain but that it was better. So, we prayed again. This time, it felt different. My heart was totally in it, and I wanted to see this woman healed, dangit! After our time of prayer with her, we again asked how she was feeling. She then told us she had no pain. NO PAIN! We asked a few times to be sure, and she was sure. She had faith that God would heal her and He did. Oh, did I mention that this was the woman that I saw with a meat cleaver? Cool, right?
            We left Rosa and went on to a jewelry store to pray for another woman. Three of us went in to her store to pray for her, but I felt that I wasn’t supposed to be there. I turned around and saw my other teammates speaking with an elderly woman. While talking to her, we realized that she had severe back and shoulder pain. We prayed for her and prayed for healing. After our prayers of healing were over we asked her how she was feeling and she said her shoulder was feeling better (which she demonstrated with her range of motion test of her shoulder), but that her back was still in pain. She then revealed to us that she had cancer all in her back. We prayed for a good while that she would be healed and that God would bind up her sickness and we sang songs to God in Spanish so that Elyssia would understand them. When we lifted our heads and asked how she was, she told us that she had no pain. Absolutely no pain and that she knew that God was going to heal her in the market today. She knew that we would come into her path.
Two people, HEALED! Our God is GREAT! And when being honest about Guatemala and my time here, I was ready to go home until this moment in time occurred. I was so confused about why God had brought me here and said no to me going to Thailand. But I think that if He brought me here just to help heal those two women, I can be okay with that mission. 

Some more on my Life here.

Well, today marks day 24 of us being in this country. I can barely believe we have really been here this long. In some instances, I feel that we have been here for years since things are just coming so naturally (like sweating every moment of the day,  being surprised when hearing English and seeing four people cram on to the back of a moto). I now come to the point in my letters where I tell you all the lovely things we’ve done in the past week and take you on some journeys that I found to be extra special. 
        Well, last Thursday night, another teammate actually went to the hospital. Come to find out, she had parasites from either the water or something that she ate. We are all being extra careful now. She is up and back to her old self now, but it sure was a scare then. Friday night, we put on a two hour children’s program with English and Spanish songs, games and three skits. We’ve gotten pretty good at dishing out programs left and right (in English AND Spanish!). Saturday morning we went to the 7 child orphanage that I talked about a few weeks ago, and then we had all day to prepare for prostitute ministry. I spent the day in prayer and worship with God, and totally wrote 8 pages in my journal. (Most of my email will be about the prostitute ministry that we’ve done this week-go figure..) 
        We were scheduled to leave at 8 so we could get to the bars before the girls were “working” and before the men became too drunk and violent. This was the night that my teammate, Katie, had to be rushed to the hospital because the medicine that was given to her for the parasites was causing her liver to fail. Because of this, we didn’t know if we would even be able to go out because we have to have at least three guys with us, and we were down two at that point (he was at the hospital with Katie). He ended up coming back in time for us to go out into the bars. We get to the first bar (which just so happened to be the night club I told you about last week), but the owner wasn’t there, so we weren’t allowed access. Moving on to the bar next door, about half of us went inside while the other half stayed outside. While my teammates were inside, four police trucks drove up and stopped and the neighboring night club. They raided the place for anyone under 18, since it’s illegal for minors to be in bars here. It was then that we realized that none of us had ID on us to prove we were over 18. 
        We were actually only let into two places that night since we came later and most of the girls had already began “working”. We did meet one man, Julio, who works outside one of the bars as a security officer. Julio is a Christian, and could find no other job in Puerto Barrios. (Jobs are SO hard to find here, which is why so many people resort to prostitution or like Julio, being involved in some way with the bars. We prayed for him and went across the street to a drug house where we met Oscar. Oscar is a man who is drunk 6 out of the 7 days of the week, and on the 7th day, he prays to God and asks Him to be in his life. One of my teammates, Tabitha, ended up talking to him and sharing part of her testimony with him so he could understand God in a different way. While we were at that bar, the place where Julio works (another place we were not allowed in because the owner wasn’t there), got raided. Again, God protected us and allowed us to go freely from the big-mean-policemen. 
        Yesterday, we actually did prostitution ministry in the morning. We were warned that the place we were at actually is more dangerous and the men are more aggressive and it was very possible we could get groped (none of us were though). The first bar we went into there was a woman there named Beatrice. She, along with Julio, said that this was the only place she could find work. She had been working there a year, and actually had been a regular church attendee up until a year ago, when she began working at that bar. We prayed for her, and she broke down in tears. It totally broke my heart thinking that we were very possibly the only people that were going to have a real conversation with her that day. At the next place we went to, I met a girl, “Carla”, that told us how she and her sister had been there for a month, and neither of them liked it. Myself and another teammate chatted with her for a long time, and at the very end, she confessed that she tells people her name is Carla, but her real name is Sonya. At the same bar, I met another girl who was from Nicuragua and had been there four months. She is also there with her sister. After speaking to my leader about conditions I could see outside in the back, I realized that it was a brothel, and a hub for human trafficking. This is the second location we have been to where this has been true. 
        I could literally go on for pages and pages about my experiences and my feelings, but I shall spare you the long read. I ask that you pray for Nicole and Catalina (women at the Night Club from last week), Sonya and Beatrice, and for my teammates. We are bonding as a team now, but we have been getting sick and increasingly are becoming more weary. I ask that you join me in praying for strength for us all.  


Dios le Bendiga! (God bless you!)
-Emma.

Black Light Disorientation

This past week we did our first prostitute ministry. I was really excited to finally be going in to the red light district to minister to those that are so close to my heart. We made cards with encouraging verses in Spanish to give to the women we met and we also got flowers to give them so they knew they were beautiful and that someone loved them. The first place we walked into was a night club. The music was blaring and it was dimly lit with black lights everywhere. There was a dancer on stage and two waiting to go on. The Pastor we were with (who has become very close to all of our hearts), mentioned that I go talk to the dancers waiting to go on. I, along with another teammate, walked past all the men staring at us like we were crazy since we were white females in a night club. When we reached the two girls, who were at max 18, we both became frigid. Neither of us knew what to do. I barely speak any Spanish and my teammate knew some, but we both found ourselves without words. We ended up praying for them and left after some painfully long moments of awkwardness. 

We left the night club and I was left with feelings of disappointment, anger and sadness. I think part of me expected to go in to that night club and win the girls to Jesus (as ridiculous as that may sound). I was plagued with emotions that didn’t make any sense to me. I was so frustrated that God would bring me to a place where I don’t speak the language and place me in an incredibly dark situation and at the same time attempt to call out greatness in me. My attitude only got worse as the time went on. When we arrived back at our van, we were telling one of our ministry contacts about the places we went. Excitedly she told us that we were the first group ever to be allowed in the night club. She told us that they had been praying for a long time about that place, and we just walked right in.

After a day, I was still overcome with my emotions, but I was able to come to peace with the fact that we were there for a reason. By the grace of God we were accepted into that night club without question, hesitation or without having to pay.

So many times on this trip I have been confronted with a situation that I was not comfortable with. But I know that God is providing and is paving ways even when I don’t see it. 

Living Uncomfortably.

            When I began this experience, I honestly was expecting something very different. I was expecting for an almost cushy time and a warm and friendly atmosphere. Although the latter is true, the former is certainly not. I have been so crazily uncomfortable these last few days. From camping in the woods on a whim with only three personal items to sharing a cabin with 24 other girls to rationing food for over 200 people… I have been uncomfortable.

But the Spirit of God has given me so much peace.

Every time I felt that I had doubts and was going astray from what I had been called to do, I was reassured by the incredible people at training camp. Especially by my beautiful teammates that have reassured me that I am meant to be here and that God has pursed each of us to become a family and a team. I have been called out so many times, and God has spoken through so many people. I. Am. Amazed.

My heart is so full and so ready to begin this journey. 

TOMORROW!

Tomorrow is the big day! Woooooooooo! I am SO excited! I have FINALLY completed packing and will not unpack to repack again. I'm hoping that my sleeping bag stays connected to my bag... we'll see how that goes. I found out yesterday that my flight from Charlotte to Chattanooga actually has another teammate on it! I'm really excited to meet her and the rest of my team! Training starts TOMORROW! It's so weird to think that my summer is beginning tomorrow and I will be among fellow missionaries and in another state with no one that I know for the first time since moving to college my freshman year. I'm all over the place and SO stinkin' excited! Hopefully I'll be able to write some at training camp to let you all know what's going on :)

Love and Joy.

Can't Sit Still

I was asked tonight if I was glad that I stayed this semester in school ad am going on this trip now. To be totally honest, I can barely stand how excited I'm getting for this trip! Just the excitement is God showing me that He's got me in His arms, and has the whole time. I've been so worried this semester that I made the wrong decision about going back to school and not going to Asia for five months-but I know that I made the right decision.
This semester I have learned SO much about myself. I know, I know.. I say that after every semester of my life-but this one really showed me things. I ended up walking away from Spring 2011 with the best grades I've ever gotten, a lead in our school's first musical in a long, long time..I was very level headed this semester and didn't have any big freak outs. I got closer with some great friends and even made new ones!

I feel like I'm in the perfect place to be leaving the country for two months with a team of 14 girls that I don't know aside from blogs and Facebook.

God has big things this summer, and I can barely wait to find them out!