04.10.08.

As I am expecting all of to know already, I am back home now.

These last few weeks have been a great time for me. Just as I predicted, I never did truly realize, or even really barely start to grasp, the impact of everything that happened until I came back here. Places and memories and people still linger in my memory, and it can be hard to imagine everything going on without me. But on we must go, and thankfully now I can see more clearly that I ever could before.

Looking back I've realized just how change has gone through me. I really feel as though God has restored me, and brought life and hope and strength back to my heart again. For that I praise Him. And I think that even just being taken out of all the familiarities of life here and put in a place where I was completely foreign to everything (I practically was a child again), that God just really brought me back to the basics - to become a child again in His arms.

And as I've been telling people, as I have been considering all these things and everything I witnessed and everything I do and we are here, something struck me and I realized just how simple Christianity is. We really have worked to make things so complex all the time--with events and deadlines and worries and everything. But Jesus stopped everyone and simplified everything for us: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." Love God and love others. Can it be this easy? I really do believe it.

They always say that trips like these change a person. And I must say that this one changed me in ways I definitely wasn't expecting. In fact, there have been a lot of things I have expected which turned out upsidedown. But it never was a bad thing. And to tell you what, I sure am excited for life again. There is just so much out there, and God has more for you and me than both of us could ever imagine! So in the meantime, I hope that we find ourselves holding onto Him and the promises spoken over us, as we learn to live to love God more and more and in turn find ourselves pouring that love out onto others.

Thank you all so much for your prayers and support. You have blessed me and the body of Christ in more ways than you know. May The Lord bless you and keep you; may He make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; and may He turn his face toward you and give you peace. Amen.