justin-GA

It is funny how God works. If you have kept up with my blog (however sporadic it may have been) then you know that at the beginning of this internship God caused me to become keenly aware of my need for relationship with other people. Well at this point, I feel like he is removing from me the desire for any other relationship besides my relationship with Him. That is not to say that I am becoming anti-social or anything, but for the first time in my life, my relationship with God is truly the most important thing to me. I spend more time talking and hanging out with Him than anyone else and I like it that way. I really feel peace and love and all the other fruits of the Spirit beginning to grow within me as I spend time in the presence of God. The Word says that when Moses came down from the mountain of God his face literally glowed. I think I am beginning to experience that. 

I am doing well right now. I have decided to not let my surroundings affect me. I am gonna be the type of beleiver that draws my joy from my relationship with God and nothing else. I have been terribly inconsistent while I have been on my internship. I have had a tough time letting anyone in on my struggles so they just got worse. But from here on out, I want only to be in LOVE with JESUS. My prayer life is excellent right now and just half an hour ago, I felt my Father God tell me that I am a strong and valiant warrior for His Kingdom and His people. That my friends is Joy. 

I went to Pascagoula again this weekend except there was ten of us this time instead of four. Last time, I wasn't very willing to get out there and try to communicate with the Spanish speaking immigrants that live there in the Eastwood Apartment complex. But this time I did alot more talking even though I might have sounded dumb. We went down thursday and worked friday and did the cookout/bible study saturday. We went to church on Sunday and then left for Townsend. I really put more into it this time around. For instance, I was asked to do a couple of songs for worship Sunday morning, and I almost said no but I decided to do it. A hispanic lady approached me afterward and said that the Spirit really touched her through the song that we sang. It was really great. I really just had to make a decision to do everything whole-heartedly on this trip and it was great.

I have had a very cool thing happen to me this morning. It all started last night with the Youth Group Bible study. You see, I didn't do as well as I had hoped when I was speaking last night. I also feel like the Youth aren't  responding the way I want them to. And as I thought about that, I began to ask myself "How was the disciples ministry so effective? For that matter how was Jesus ministry so effective?" God answered me promptly by telling me that it was because the disciples knew Jesus very well. They wanted to know him and to be more like him and their ministry is just a result of that. I desire the Spirit to be so strong in me that people never really even see me. They only see Christ in all his love, compassion, and holiness shining through me. This whole thing sparked within me a desire to know God more intimately and to be more like Christ so that people will be affected and the "ministry" will not be dry and crusty and dead. 

I got to go this weekend down to Pascagoula, MS to a church plant that Church of the Cove is working on down there. In the Eastwood Apartment Complex, well over 95% of tenants are from Central America. A large percentage of those are only in the States temporarily, working and earning money to send back home to there families. They have no real luxuries  and most don't even have a means of transportation because they don't spend or keep any of the money that they earn for themselves.  As my friend Greg put it, "The fields are white for the harvest". God has given the Church a burden for the people of this housing and so they are starting a church there. We went down friday and grilled burgers for the men and women and had a bible study directly after. It was a good experience. I got to excercise my Spanish there because a lot of the guys there don't speak English. It was kind of funny, us being rednecks from the South-East and trying to communicae with Hispanic people.  I will get to go down once more because they take a trip down to MS twice a month. It is cool to see a church doing what God lays on their hearts despite financial concerns and things like that.