Posted in General Posts by Katie Gossard on 9/22/2009
Things I am scared of right now
God forgetting about me
Gods favor, what does that even mean, who has it,
who doesn't, or does it ever work that way
Feeling alone in a moment and wondering if I will always feel like this
The doubt that sometime consumes my thoughts, maybe a little fear
My own thoughts and assumptions
Looking forward to things
Foundational truths that I know
God loves me
God wants to be my friend
I can trust God no matter what
God has a plan, a good plan for my life
My obedience is necessary
I need community, I can no longer live without it
God has not given me a spirit of fear, but of power and love and a sound mind
The Holy Spirit lives inside me
My God is a good God
So the truth always wins over the lies.
The lies only last a moment, feeling down only lasts so long.
God really does bless His people with an unspeakable JOY.
So if you have been following my blog you know that I should have left for Mexico yesterday and be there now. Well things don't always work out the way you think they should and support for me is one of those things. I know God is calling me to mission, and specifically here with AIM and in Real Life, but for now I am still in Georgia waiting on the Lord.
Waiting for the Lord is not easy.
Support, to be really honest, sucks.
And to be even more honest I don't really want to even raise support, but God calls us to a life of obedience, a full life is promised to us when we are obedient.
So with the departure of the rest of the leadership team I was on and the Novas Project kids on there way to Mexico, I sit here in Georgia and wait for the Lord.
What am I waiting for you ask, maybe new motivation, new direction, or maybe, just maybe waiting on Gods timing. I can be a little impatient with God. (And I know some of you that just read that are laughing a little)
How can you pray you ask?....I'm so glad you asked :)
Peace Patience
Financial support, that God would really make it clear to those He already has in mind.
That my heart would change and not long for this, if this mission thing is not what God wants
That the truth of God's Word would be so much louder than the doubt and lies I am currently hearing and feeling.
So this is my heart right now, its hard for me to put it all into words, this is the best I can do for now. I don't really let myself get excited for things, and this was something that I was ready and excited for, I know God is calling me to something, and I am really sure this is it, so if in your prayers you get a word for me or anything, please pass it along to me :)
Posted in General Posts by Katie Gossard on 9/6/2009
This is what i miss...
Saturday morning, well all day really,
when we had nothing to do.
Those lazy days when we would make french toast at 10 and watch cooking shows on PBS.
When we would fight over what movie to watch and you would inevitably say,
"We are NOT watching Liar Liar or Get Shorty!"
Shopping all day for shoes,
or whatever we felt like.
Convincing her that she was just as beautiful as I thought she was!
Random ice cream runs.
Random Pizza ordering cuz no one wanted to cook.
Random runs to Good Times....
Setting up the house at Christmas,
the tree, the lights,
ALL the ordiments going back years.
Laughing and arguing over Elvis Christmas music,
and then what movie to watch, White Christmas,
or Its a Wonderful Life.
Never really setteling the argument
but I think The Grinch ended being on,
with much objection might I add :)
Staying up way to late watching silly re-runs like MASH, Fraiser, Everybodys loves Ray, I could go on..
Coming home and knowing that she was there, she would ask how I was and really want to know.
Watching her play silly games on the computer and hit the buttons so much that we thought for sure the keyboard would break.
Licorice
Sunflower seeds
Wondering where I had left all my shoes and realizing they were all in the hall closet, she had put them there.
Driving to our vacation destination and her reading to the whole car, but the books were too funny, and she would just laugh and laugh, so hard in fact that we could not understand her.
Puzzles
When she is so tired she laughs really hard at really random things like "what is this a joke?"
Mom I love you a lot, and I want you to know that you mean a whole lot to me!
Posted in General Posts by Katie Gossard on 8/31/2009
Well its been a few months since I have sent an update, and with school right around the corner and fall knocking on the door I thought it was time to let you know what it going on in my life. Summer flew by faster than I knew what to do with. Working with AIM (adventures in Missions) has been such a huge blessing to me this summer. I worked a lot of training camps this summer. And to clarify, training camp is a week of teaching and team building that the 1 to 3 month mission trip participants go through. One of my camp highlights was being able to be the segregate leader for a Real Life team. With this team I got the opportunity to serve eight girls before they left for their two month trip to the Amazon Jungle. Not exactly a place my heart longs to go, but they felt such a calling there. It was a time for me to just pour my life into these girls and show them how much God loved them, and help them to believe that God had a plan for each one of them on this trip. It ended up that I did not lead any trips of my own, but I was very blessed to be part of so many training camps and so many lives.
I feel like this summer was a waiting game for me and a lesson in faith from God. I really had my heart set on leading trips and doing all these big things for the Kingdom. God had another thing in mind. One of the things that goes on at training camps is an activity on giving up your rights and expectations. I have been around while others have done this several times, I know you sit and write down all the things you think you have a right to, and all the expectations you think you get to have. After that you give them to the Lord and try and "die" to them. Well at this Real Life camp that I mentioned above I really felt the Lord asking me to do this as well. So I wrote, and wrote, and kept writing. I never realized there were all these things that I thought I had a right to. Things like good food, you don't really get that everywhere-and that's OK. Also the right to have a comfortable place to sleep, nope we really don't have a right to that either. Other things like the right to be respected were a little harder for me to just "die" to. Now I am not saying this to make you think that I am living like some sort of martyr. I am just saying that God challenged me on a lot of things that I thought were normal, it changed me somehow. It also made me realize how much I still needed to grow up. So although I did not get to lead any trips, God did so much more in me because I stayed here! I know that I am not done growing and learning, but I know that God is faithful, and loving, and always knows what best.
So in my last update I was asking you to pray for my future here at AIM. I have been patiently waiting on God for a clear direction and a clear vision of what, if anything, I am supposed to be doing at AIM. I am please to tell you that I feel like God had given that to me. I am signing on for two years with AIM, under Real Life. Real Life is a part of AIM that takes eighteen to twenty four year olds on short term mission trips around the world.
These trips range from one to three months. I am excited to start this new journey, and for you to come along with me. I will be leading trips for two years and will have to support raise full time. In order for this to happen I need your help. I have to raise just over $1300 a month. I hope you will prayerfully consider joining me on this journey!
I will be in Mexico for two months with some 31 young adults.
They will learn how to do all kinds of things, garden, teach, build, and create-just to name a few.
What I am most excited for is to be able to see God change their lives and then have them go out and show others how God can change them as well!
I'm excited about going somewhere new.
After the two months in Mexico, I will be heading out for 30 days to one of 4 places,
Uganda
South Africa
Swaziland
or
Nicaragua
I wont know where i am going for a while, but i will let you know when i know.
After this who knows.....:)
Here is a blog from one of the Novas participants about training camp. We finished camp about a week ago, and the participants went back home till Sep. 21 till we all meet up in MX.
ENJOY
The title pretty much explains it all. Radically committed. "AIM is called to raise up a generation of radically committed disciples." This past week in Gainesville, Georgia I got to meet part of that generation! It was just such an awesome sight: Boys and girls who are on fire for God and know the right balance of fun and seriousness. Everyone is hilarious, crazy, unique, loving, and part of my family from now on. I feel so blessed to be spending the next 9 months with them!
After flying into the Atlanta airport, we went on a journey to find the church we were meeting at. This consisted of taking a couple different trains, a bus, and walking several blocks. We spent 10 hrs evangelizing and "sleeping" on the streets of Atlanta, Georgia. We did some interesting team builders, such as having the 40 or so of us hold hands in a circle and run to the 2nd stop sign we could see and back, obstacle courses, and throwing around filled nalgenes! We prophesized, healed a teammate's throat and re-discovered who God is to us! There was only one hospital run the whole week, 2 swollen eyes, hundreds of bug bites and stings, and only 30 calls to the local police department on us for naively jumping off a bridge! But overall, it was a totally moving week.
Before coming into training camp, I was in a bit of a dry spot with Jesus...but everything I learned there brought a monsoon to my faith! I suppose that could be taken literally because I cried more than I ever have in 5 days time! Things I thought I had already given to God were finally gotten rid of and surrendered. All I can really say is praise God!
While in Georgia on AIM's base, my teammates and I found out where we will spending our outreach period! My team (Myles Long, Garret Berkley, Jenny Christensen, and Rebecca Florke) and I will be heading to South Africa in late November, early December! Words cannot explain how excited I am for this! A lot of you know that I was expecting to go to Swaziland, but God didn't need me there. While I was at camp, I came to this conclusion: God put Swaziland on my heart so I could give it up. I needed to put my faith in Him that he would take me where He wanted me, not where silly old me wanted to be! After being assigned to South Africa, I really am starting to fall in love with the country. Although the country has modern cities, South Africa is in dyer need of Jesus.
My teammate, Rebecca, found this interesting fact: The world's first heart transplant was done in South Africa in 1967 by Dr. Chris Barnard. Myles, another one of my teammates had this to say about that: We're totally going to be doing heart transplants if you know what I mean.
So, in conclusion traing camp was fantastic, awesome, enjoyable, crazy, lively, amazing, and exciting (Yes, I did look up a lot of these words in a thessarus). Even though I was able to straighten things up with The Big Guy in the sky, the Enemy is still trying to break me down- key word, TRYING! Some of the lies he is feeding me are: Swaziland is where you should be, your teammates don't love you, and your friends at home have moved on since you are spending the next 8 months out of the country. Luckily, I have weapons against him. But, nevertheless, please be praying that I can stay aware to what are lies and what are truth.
"And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to His purpose" Romans 8:28
Cait
And to clarify, training camp is a week of teaching and team building that the 1 to 3 month mission trip participants go through. One of my camp highlights was being able to be the segregate leader for a Real Life team. With this team I got the opportunity to serve eight girls before they left for their two month trip to the Amazon Jungle. Not exactly a place my heart longs to go, but they felt such a calling there. It was a time for me to just pour my life into these girls and show them how much God loved them, and help them to believe that God had a plan for each one of them on this trip. It ended up that I did not lead any trips of my own, but I was very blessed to be part of so many training camps and so many lives.
write down all the things you think you have a right to, and all the expectations you think you get to have. After that you give them to the Lord and try and "die" to them. Well at this Real Life camp that I mentioned above I really felt the Lord asking me to do this as well. So I wrote, and wrote, and kept writing. I never realized there were all these things that I thought I had a right to. Things like good food, you don't really get that everywhere-and that's OK. Also the right to have a comfortable place to sleep, nope we really don't have a right to that either. Other things like the right to be respected were a little harder for me to just "die" to. Now I am not saying this to make you think that I am living like some sort of martyr. I am just saying that God challenged me on a lot of things that I thought were normal, it changed me somehow. It also made me realize how much I still needed to grow up. So although I did not get to lead any trips, God did so much more in me because I stayed here! I know that I am not done growing and learning, but I know that God is faithful, and loving, and always knows what best.
