The Greatest Trend ever started (its not twitter).

The Engine roared louder and louder it seemed, the earth was getting closer, my heart was beating faster, faster, faster...this was it, i could see it now, the plane shook as hit it the ground the sun relentlessly pounding on the metal, attempting to cook each person without mercy. the engine began to slow down and become a dull hum, but still my heart beat, faster, faster, faster. this was it... i was finally home!

as i stepped off the plane into the airport i took a deep breath, my lungs were attacked violently by the smell of BO, i just smiled and said to myself, “TIA, this is africa”

i will never forget the traveling i have done, when i close my eyes at night i am reminded of the beauty i have witnessed in brokenness, in hopelessness, in poverty.

i took a bus from Burundi to Uganda, and as the sun went down and gave way to the cold Ugandan evening the stars erupted in the sky like little fire flies, as if to say they would hold back the darkness from completely taking the night. i sat in the chair i had occupied more then 8 hours now looking out i could see the savannah of Southern Uganda. the moon painted everything in a beautiful glow. my heart wouldn’t slow down it knew it was home, as i looked out the site of the mountains turning into hills and then flat lands and then god knows what my heart grew with the anticipation, only a few more hours and i would get to greet my old friends, i would begin a new life.

One night as i walked home from church i saw off in the distance a thunderstorm brewing, i heard the clap like a kick drum but it didn’t stop it carried on the whole ten minute walk home (and you think I'm exaggerating..) when i got home the power was out so i did one of my favorite things to do. i grabbed some corn off the charcoal stove, i went to the front yard of my pastors house and lay on his trampoline. listening to music i just laid there and looked at the stars still visible, i watched as fire flies ignited the sky and the storm came closer, breaking the sky in beautiful colors of blue, over taking the stars.

so why all these memories? when i went to bed tonight i couldn’t sleep...laying there all i could think was that i needed to write, i needed to bring life to my thoughts. i needed to give them emotions, names, reason. maybe that doesn’t make sense, but to me it makes perfect sense.

over the last 14 months god has talked to me in a thousand ways. he has spoke through fire flies, threw mountain ranges, through people, through enemies, through words and music, through the stillness of a night, through the dying breaths of another human being.

lately god has been speaking to me about Love, i don’t understand love, i don’t understand it on a spiritual or human level. its a strange thing to me. one it doesn’t make sense because our world has so devalued the word, we say we love that movie or this song or that book, we say we love the way this feels or the way someone speaks, we say we love each over. but what is love? how can we use the same word to talk about loving a piece of paper with words on it and then turn around and use that word to talk about a living human being. now don’t get me wrong, I'm no fool, i realize we don’t actually love a book, that would be ludicrous but we do say it. heres another one: when did the only way we could show someone love become a physical thing? i mean sure its normal for us to kiss the girl (or guy) we like, but i heard it said once, god doesn’t want to climb in bed with you. so if love is something physical how do we show it to god? because i wouldn’t even know how to begin going about planting one on gods lips, let alone i really don’t think he wants me to kiss him.

God really convicted me of this in the South African winter (this would be summer for anyone north of the equador) he started talking to me about intimacy and what love really was. hes still teaching me just so you know, i still have ALOT to learn, but this is what i have been learning.

God DOESN”T want to kiss you but he does want to romance you, he does want an intimate relationship with you, but he doesn’t want to climb in bed with us. so what does that mean? honestly i think a higher form of intimacy is honesty. its being open, its saying the things you never thought you would tell anyone. its about holding nothing back. now i know god is God and he knows all blah blah blah, but think about it this way. say you knew someone did something really bad, someone you really cared for and you would be there for them no matter what. but you knew they did something bad, isn’t it so much better when they come and tell you what they did. when they are open with you, doesn’t that build your trust? doesn’t it show you that they trust you?

I know God knows what goes on in my head and in my heart, but i think he truly desires for me to tell it to him, he desires for me to go on a walk with him and tell him what’s hurting me. what is confusing me.

God Loves you so much that he DOESN”T want harm to come to you, BUT God also loves you so much he would NEVER take the choice away from you. to me this is amazing, because so many times we have blamed god for the things we have done or the harm that has come to us, when really its not his fault, yes he could stand in he is god he can do everything and anything, BUT would it really be love if it didn’t allow for us to make the choice to love him back? to trust in him?

I will never understand why i am alive today when i wanted to kill myself and there are so many people around me that i know or know of in one way or another that are dying younger then they should. there are people with cancer, people that get hit by drunk drivers, or reckless drivers, doesn’t god love them to? this is the one part of love i don’t understand, and i’m not sure i have an answer, at least not a good one, but i think that the only way we can look at these kind of things is that one Sin made us all dirty, and God seems to love cleaning dirty things. i guess that answers why he never gave up on me. i think that harm comes to people not because god is an evil god, not because they did something wrong (though some things DO have consequences) but rather i think its just life, i think that when humans took the bite of the apple we made a choice, a choice God in his LOVE gave us, he warned us that harm would befall those that ate of the apple. we choice a world ruled not by Gods love but rather by the devils hate. but god still loves us so much instead of turning away from this horrible dirty world that we took over, he choose to continue to love us, to continue to pursue us day in and day out.


this brings me to something I'm just starting to understand.
I find the song How he loves to be an incredibly amazing song. and i’m still just learning how amazing it is. the song uses such amazing words to describe a love thats really impossible to explain.

one part in particular always brings a shock to my heart. “if his grace is an ocean, we’re all sinking” think about it. if gods grace were to be compared to an ocean, there would be so much depth, so much length to that ocean that you would be drowning no matter how good a swimmer you where. this is grace. it covers us to the point that if it were a body of water you would drown! talk about amazing!

jesus started one of the craziest trends the world has ever seen, he choose to love a world that choose to deny him. he went not to the perfect people (or at least they thought they were) but rather he went to what the bible says is the poor, the tax collector, the prostitute, but lets but that in terms for our world: Jesus came not for the perfect but rather for everyone that was considered dirty, the prostitute, that kid that sits in church quietly and struggles with homosexually, the girl that cuts her self, the alcoholic, the druggy, the guy that cut you off in traffic, the teller at the bank that just can’t do what you want her to do for you, the person that stole your car, am i hitting a nerve yet? lets try it this way, Osama bin laden, Joseph Kony, Hitler. now i have your attention don’t i? yah, jesus came for them. so many times we take the greatest commandment, the greatest trend ever started: LOVE. and we only apply it to 1/8 of the people around us. its easy to love your family, your stuck with them, but what about that guy that robbed you? what about your wife that cheated on you? what about the guy that murdered a child or raped someone? i know what i’m saying no one wants to hear, even i struggle with it, but the fact of the matter is Jesus came to earth to LOVE EVERYONE, not just those of us that turned to the cross for salvation, he loves those that don’t love him back, i think when hitler died, or osama i truly think god wept. i wouldn’t be surprised if when people get to heaven god doesn’t feel a bit sad sending them to hell. now maybe your thinking but he loves so why not let them in. and thats your answer, because he loves us so much he gave us the choice to choose him or choose something else. and if you have ever bought anything you will understand, once you make a choice to buy something you can’t get a refund (ok yes you can, and god gives us many choices to change our minds, but there comes a point were you have to decide once and for all.)

i saw on facebook the other day a picture a friend had shared it was of a man hugging another man at the gay pride. one man was a christian man who went out to say sorry for the way the church had treated homosexuals. to me this is amazing. that instead of making fun of someone he made the choice to love instead.

don’t get me wrong i’m still learning, there are so many times in my life i haven’t loved people the right way, and i have so far to go, but i think that its time we as christians as CHRIST FOLLOWERS begin to follow in his footsteps instead of walking beside them stepping in a foot print once and awhile and saying oh thats nice. its time we talk a path thats not easy, a path, a trend, that could change the very way we live, that could challenge the very way we think.



i don’t love africa because its better then the world over here. i love africa because it teaches me so much about God, every time i spend time in africa with friends i witness RAW Christ. i love africa, because i see a world that is in need of gods love so much, but also has so much of gods love to offer. and i want to be a part of cracking open the lid on that one. i don’t want to go in and do the white missionary thing where i say i’m better then the Africans, now i want to go in and learn, i want to go in and share in growth together. and build a better africa and one day a better world. a world where, “True progress means, matching the world to the vision in our heads...” not a world where we “always chance the vision instead” and the vision is LOVE i know it sounds like a Beetles song but its the truth, Love is the answer, love is what we need, and love means loving everyone! it means we stop posting angry posts on facebook about someone that ticked us off, it means we start talking to each other in love not anger. it means standing up when everyone else sits down.


"Following Jesus is simple but not easy. Love til it hurts and then continue to love” ~Mother Theresa.