Three weeks til take-off!

Today is exactly THREE WEEKS til I leave for Oman, so I'm starting to feel that buzz of anticipation, excitement, & nerves that I always get before a big trip. The longest I've ever been out of the country was last summer in Africa for three weeks, so being gone nine weeks is HUGE for me!

I keep telling people I'm going to blog my travels, so here goes! I, Sooz, do solemnly vow to try really hard to keep up with it. Last year I intended to blog about Africa and climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro but that only lasted for three entries and is probably the most boring, deflated attempt ever recorded on Blogspot. If you'd like to read it, go to http://www.sooz2kili.blogspot.com/. Cool name, lame blog.

Many of you have asked about my itinerary. Here it is:

Jan. 19-31 - Oman
Jan. 31-Feb. 10 - undisclosed location
Feb. 10-25 - Ethiopia
Feb. 25-Mar. 10 - Egypt
Mar. 10-21 - India

CRAZY, HUH? I can't believe it even as I type it. Many have also asked how I came up with this itinerary, and why I quit my job to do this, with seemingly no safety net or guarantees of what lies ahead for me beyond this trip. There may not be a way to fully communicate how one deciphers a calling but here's my best attempt at describing mine to you...pull up a chair b/c you'll be here a while............

On the evening of July 15, 2007 at an outdoor service at Gateway Church where I've been going regularly for the past three years, I had come to the end of my rope with certain things about myself and my life, right about the same time I was also coming to rest on some issues with God that I had struggled with for my entire adult life. Something in the scripture we meditated on that night, Zephaniah 3:17, broke through for me in a new way. The Lord you God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing. On that night all those beautiful things promised in the Bible so many years ago happened for me. I stopped struggling, as my mom would say I "went like a lamb," and prayed a prayer of surrender that went something like this, "God, I finally trust fully that you really are Mighty to Save even the most hardened of hearts, including mine, because you created and love me, and I believe that you offer the only true life there is through personally knowing the love of Jesus. I finally get it that you really are stronger than my biggest weakness and your grace is greater than my biggest need. There's nothing I can do to save myself from myself or from fear or from death, and I don't want to live another day MY way. This isn't about anyone but you and me, and I will go where you want me to go and do what you want me to do. I'm yours."

Moments later I got re-baptized in a pool Gateway had rented and set up on the grass. It was the most amazing moment of my life. The sun was shining and I felt like a new person, like years of fear and pain and doubts and angst had come to a conclusion and been resolved and forgiven. I finally felt at peace with God, like we were on the same side. I felt like I had finally come home. I felt like I had a second chance at life and had the freedom to sing a new song.

The next morning during my quiet time I prayed, "Ok so now what? What do I need to do differently, like today??? What do you want me to do? I don't know how to do this! Please give me direction." I plopped open the Bible and God led me directly to Psalm 105: 1-6. It's a pretty simple game plan for life. Verse 1 says Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done. That was the official start of me taking serious this calling towards international relief and mission work that I've felt since college. I could tell you all the subtle ways I've felt the calling over the years but that would be a whole other blog. Anyway, it's taken me 15 years to decipher it, to trust God enough to say yes, and to have the guts to risk disappointing loved ones in order to take the first step on the journey.

Cut to a few days later. I went to http://www.e3partners.org/ to check out the mission trips they had available for fall '07. In Kenya last year I met a missionary girl from Austin who was about my age who leads trips for e3. So I figured I'd start there. Guess what their front page mission verse is? Psalm 105: 1. HELLO!!! God had my attention.

After a few weeks of prayer, and reading the Bible, and journaling of my fears and questions I decided to take the first step toward this calling and committed to going on an "extreme" trip to the jungles of Panama with e3. You guys have already heard about that, since it was Oct. 26 - Nov. 3. Being there confirmed that I was on the path God had set for me. Living in the utter simplicity of the jungle and being filled with love for the people there felt very natural and healing for me. Being used by God to reach others who yearn to know him more was an indescribeable blessing.

So backing way up, because I get really off track when I blog (try it, you'll be the same way!)...the itinerary for my above trip came to me one day in early August sitting in my cube at KVUE. Literally it felt like a thought God planted, not completely my own. It hit me in an odd way that it could be something I could do to further discern this calling, puddle-jumping with aunts and uncles who live and work in the field, and then with different organizations I am familiar with like e3 and The Miracle Foundation. I started Googling maps of the region and looking at time frames and boop-boop-boop the dots connected really naturally. I started praying about that journey, asking God if it was his will that I go, realizing that I'd have to quit my job in order to do it.

Around the same time God started leading me over and over (like four days in a row opening to the exact same page in the Bible) to Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 6, the passage on Money and Possessions and trusting God for our every comfort and need, also to the Parable of the Hidden Treasure and the Pearl in Matthew 13. Over and over I was forced to re-evaluate my love of the material possessions and earlthy things I had been using to provide me with pleasure and comfort.

Then a visit to a my friend Vicki's church in East Austin led me to an encounter with a sermon that I couldn't shake from my mind, on Luke 5: 1-11, the story of the calling of the first disciples. The concept of our feeble excuses and fears followed by simple surrender and obedience was introduced to me in a new way. I took a long walk around Town Lake saying out loud all of my fears and obligations and reasons for not going and then saying "nevertheless, I will follow you" like Simon-Peter said to Jesus so many years ago. Just saying it out loud made it a real possibility.

Missions and net-dropping and stories of great faith were coming at me from every direction, in emails, sermons, classes, conversations with friends, even a lecture at a work industry seminar tied into the theme. Everything seemed to be pointing me to missions and to stories of real people who have lived by faith and who have "dropped their nets" to follow Jesus, regardless of their circumstances. God really had my attention.

About that time I began a 12-week study of Daniel, which brought to life the similarities between our comfortable, self-serving, increasingly indulgent, post-modern culture and that of the Babylonians in Daniel's time. I had been praying about the question of missions, so I added to the list prayers about whether or not I should pull back from material possessions and possibly even my career in advertising, for a season at least.

But how does one drop their net when it's tied to big commission checks, a new condo mortgage, and plenty of good old American credit card debt? Surely God doesn't call people who have obligations? Surely he wouldn't call an average person who hasn't trusted him much over the years, who has messy financial entanglements, and who has no experience in doing what he is asking? Or does he. Look at every person God ever called to lead the Israelites or who Jesus ever hung out with or called to follow Him and you'll see they are kinda a bunch of screw ups with a fatal flaw -- the last person you'd expect him to call -- and at best average people, like me and you. But that's the point, God's strength and the fact that He is God is magnified and in the face of my weakness and circumstances. I don't have to have it all figured out because He knows the beginning and the end. He knew me at the beginning of creation, way before he gave life to me in my mother's womb. He has all the answers because He is the answer, to every question of the human heart and to every human need. That's what I've learned from my journey -- that He is my safety net, and all I have to do is trust him. Whether God intends for me to stay in missions long-term or if he's using missions to get my attention (or yours) does not matter to me. He's in control, thank God.

So on Sept. 5th I said a giant YES to God and put in six weeks notice at work in order to make the time for this journey possible. Since then I have taken one small step at a time in faith. To date I've sold a bunch of my jewerly, my flat screen TV, and my SUV. The condo is up for sale/rent/sublet. Pinch me, this is really happening! And call me if you know someone looking for a condo. :-)

This trip will undoubtedly change my life and the possibly the lives of the people I will encounter overseas in ways that I can't possibly yet know. What I do know and can tell you is how this feels now! It feels exhiliarating and peaceful and scary and joyful and totally uncomfortable and yet completely natural all at once!!

It's the honeymoon of my love affair with God, an exploration of God's love for his people around the world, the living out of second chances, and the story of one woman finding the freedom and courage to sing a new song. I owe blessings of peace, faith, and joy to Jesus Christ, my personal savior, whose love for me and all God's people is alive and real and transforms hearts and lives, and who brings hope to the hopeless and freedom to the oppressed. Luke 4:18

Please join me for the ride by staying tuned to http://www.sooz-news.blogspot.com/! Most likely the average post won't be this long or deep! :-)

Love,
Sooz