On Love and Outreach

If I speak human or angelic languages but do not have love, I am a sounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 

If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. 

And if I donate all my goods to feed the poor, and if I give my body in order to boast but do not have love, I gain nothing. 

Love is patient, love is kind. Love does not envy, is not boastful, is not conceited, does not act improperly, is not selfish, is not provoked, and does not keep a record of wrongs. Love finds no joy in unrighteousness but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.

But as for prophecies, they will come to an end;

as for languages, they will cease;

as for knowledge, it will come to an end.

For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when the perfect comes, the partial will come to an end.

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man [or woman], I put aside childish things. For now we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully, as I am fully known. 

Now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.

-1 Corinthians 13

But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart will rejoice in your salvation.

-Psalm 13:5

Blessed be the Lord, who has not left you this day without a redeemer.

-Ruth 14:4

I've learned a few cool things today. And it's only 2:30 so far. I have so much more to learn. Today and in the next 5 months. These are some key truths that pierced my heart today: 

1. I am fully known (by God) even though I don't know all of Him or all of His ways.

2. Without love, nothing would matter. Nothing would exist. 

3. I am completely inadequate when it comes to my ability to love...If I put my name in the place where the word "love" shows up in 1 Corinthians 13, it would all be a lie. I've hardly ever been patient, kind, etc....

4. Someday I will get to see the meaning of true love and the extent of God's glory in full, not just in part like I do now on earth. 

5. God's love is steadfast. It doesn't change. IT. DOESN'T. CHANGE. 

6. God's love is enough to for him to sit and watch the blood of his own Son pour out...so that it may redeem the rest of us. He has not left us without a redeemer. 

7. God's covenant with us (after sending Jesus) is a serious, intense matter. Along the same lines or moreso than a bond of marriage.

8. The bond/covenant of marriage is something I can't fully understand. I know last year at this time I had no regard for what marriage really is. Lord, forgive me for my ignorance to the beauty of your covenant. 

9. There is no situation that He cannot redeem.

Aside from learning a lot about love in the past few days in class, I've been praying pretty hardcore about the country God wants me to go on Outreach. I'll tell you the official decision in a few days, but I want to share with you the scriptures He showed me when pursuing this decision:

A voice says, "Cry!"

And I said, "What shall I cry?"

All flesh is grass, and all beauty is like the flower of the field. 

The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the Lord blows in it; 

Surely the people are grass.

The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever. 

Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news; 

Lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good news; 

Lift it up, fear not;

-Isaiah 40:6-9

God said,

"Do not say, 'I am only a youth'; for to all to whom I send you, you shall go, and whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you."

-Jeremiah 1:7-8

I'm going to need a voice of strength. I'll need to put aside my fear of being "too young" to share God's love with the people I meet. I'll get the chance to proclaim God's glory as on a mountain high. Ahh, I love the Isaiah verse so much. And I love when he says, "Lift it up, fear not." So that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to lift up my voice, and say whatever he commands me to say, without fear. Instead of fear, I will have love. What I'm doing, who I am, where I'm going would all be worthless without love. God, help me love the people of the country you're sending me to...

Start the drumroll, people. I'm so excited to share my Outreach destination with you! Wait patiently. The time is coming...

Peace.

School of His Eternal Glory

I'm HERE. 

The huge, blue Texas sky is full of sunshine, and the temperature is a warm (but not sticky!) 88 degrees. (sidenote: they say everything's bigger in Texas, and so far I agree with that when I look at the sky at night...man how the sky glitters and shines in every direction with those stars.)

Well, if you're wondering how travels went, look at Brittany's blog! She posted on the smoothness of our travels and how God has had His hand in all we've done to get here so far. I'm still a little speechless about it. (here's her blog, check it out! http://brittanyschwantz.blogspot.com/2011/09/texas.html?spref=fb)

So, I had hoped to take lots of pictures the first couple of days to have them on my first blog post, but we've been so stinkin' busy I haven't even thought about the fact that I have a camera--aside from random pictures with my phone that I've uploaded straight to Facebook. I'm hoping I'll have some pics up in here for y'all next time. (the y'all was a joke, people. a joke.) Brittany doesn't have a camera, so I'll get you some pictures she wants to share with you guys too.

I am currently sitting in a little cafe/lounge called The Substation drinking probably the best chocolate-banana smoothie I've ever dreamed of having. YUMM! I'm gonna savor it as much as I can, though, because starting tomorrow at this time instead of blogging and junk-fooding, I'm going to be working out in the weight-room we have here on campus. I'm really excited about that. It's definitely one of MANY prayers God answered in me coming here, so I'm going to try to honor Him in utilizing it as much as possible. At this moment most of my new friends/classmates are on their "work duty." We are each assigned special work projects to take care of every day here on campus (so that we don't have to pay someone on the outside to do it, and to build up our servant's hearts). My work duty is to clean the main office building with 5 others. We dust desks and vacuum floors and windex windows in the offices of the full-time staff who bless us every day by doing the behind the scenes office work. None of this would be here without them, so I'm grateful for the chance to bless the people in places like Accounting, even if only for an hour, by cleaning their office. My work duty is at 6pm every day, unlike most who start at 1pm.
Our daily schedule has been packed full of new information and crazy adjustment, but today I'm finally starting to feel like this is an adjustment I CAN make. Praise God.

I'm going to be honest with you: I wasn't really excited about this whole thing when I got here. I was so stinkin' excited in the days leading up to last Sunday, and on the plane/bus ride here I couldn't contain my anticipation giggles. But once I got my stuff unpacked into my tiny room, I was completely overwhelmed and very unsure of this whole thing for the next 24 hours or so. I didn't feel like I could belong and that everyone else was supposed to be here but me. And with perfect timing, of course, Anna (who is in D.C. right now and will come back to Tyler in a week!) texted me and asked me how I was doing and what I was thinking. "I kinda just wanna hide under a rock and dig my way home to MN," I replied. Then she assured me that everyone around me probably feels the same. And I'm coming to realize that's true. So I'm beginning to open up and be myself with the people around me now and am really excited about the friendships God is fusing together already.

There are  47 of us in my DTS class. That's a lot of names, faces, and personalities! I was incredibly overwhelmed on Sunday and Monday. But we're starting to get the hang of each other's names and are beginning to recognize some staff members as well. Today we got put into Small Groups, and I'm very excited about mine. There are 8 of us; Brittany and I are in the same group! I'm incredibly excited to see what God has in store for my friendship with her...she and Trent have blessed me in countless ways in the past 3 days, I can only imagine what else they can teach me in the next 5 months. I'm so honored that God has allowed me to be part of this time in their lives.

Gah, there is just so much to share!
I want some feedback: what do you guys want me to write about? Because I could either write about the physical and technical aspects of what I'm doing here on a daily basis, or I could just dive in deep and get into what I'm learning and what's going on in my heart. You guys are the ones who read this, so what would you like to hear? I desire to share both with you as best I can...but you know how long-winded I can be.... :) I'm going to try my best to have a balance of both. I'm just wondering if you'd like one more than the other? Let me know!

So, if you'd like to physically get a hold of me instead of just reading my silly blogs, here's my contact info!
Calling me: I have my "free time" (which I will usually be spending in the weight room) from 1pm-3:30pm, so if you'd like to chat, try calling me then! Otherwise, I have pretty open Saturdays and evenings during the week.
Texting me: Do it any time, all the time! I may or may not respond right away, but I usually catch them when they come. I'd love to see that notification from you. :)
My address: SEND ME STUFF :) I like it. My US Mail address (it's different for FedEx/UPS) is

Kelsey Rieland YWAM DTS

P.O. Box 3000

Garden Valley, TX 75771

I'd love to hear from you! I miss Minnesota and the people in it. And I'd love to share with you personally what God is doing here and how He's working in my heart.

My specific DTS has a class "name" or theme; we're called the School of His Eternal Glory. The staff has felt like our class was meant for the purpose of God's eternal glory and that we have something untouchable and heavenly to be a part of here. God's doing some really, really cool things guys. The Spirit is stirring and I'm speechless. I'll try to describe it in words to the best of my ability when I get more clarity soon. 

Be in prayer for us as we decide where each of us are going on Outreach this Friday. (We leave for Outreach Jan.2.) Trust me...I'll let you know where I'm going as soon as I find out... :)

Peace.

Listen With Your Heart

I love Disney. It's a simple fact. I don't think I'll ever get sick of those Disney classics.
When I was younger, my 2 favorite classics were The Lion King and Pocahontas. I think the thing I mostly enjoyed about Pocahontas as a child was the music. The musical scenes are enchanting and gripping. An obvious example is The Colors of The Wind. But I particularly have always enjoyed this short musical scene:

I always wanted a Grandmother Willow in my back yard... :)
Anyway, I don't believe in spirits in the way Native Americans do; just to make it clear, I believe in the One True God of the Bible and in His Son Jesus Christ. But I love this scene. Pocahontas is asking how she'll ever find her path. Maybe even at age 6, I knew I could relate to Pocahontas in that. Because now at age 20, I still ask God, "What is my path? How am I ever going to find it?" I've been asking God that for a long time.

Making life decisions makes me wish I had a Grandmother Willow. Whenever I had a decision to make, I would just go sit beneath her wilted branches and ask; then she would sing me a song or give me a compass and I would know what I needed to do. (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSu4hOLYrXk&feature=related from 2:20 on...!).

The leap of faith I'm taking in going to Texas (in 13 days!) for YWAM is huge. And I have confidence and peace about it. So don't think I'm second-guessing that particular life decision. But there have been life-changers in the past that I've not been so confident about.

Relationships are...everything. God is a relational God. We have a relationship with Him, and we have relationships with the people around us.
Relationships are...hard work. Like a garden, they need constant attention, nurture, and care. And I firmly believe that when my relationship with God isn't being properly nurtured, my relationships with people begin to dry up as well. In the past, I have fully relied on my own strength to maintain relationships. And when my own strength failed (with more than one relationship), I gave up. I ran. Oh, what would have happened if I had been fully relied upon God's strength?
But now is not the time for what-ifs and regrets. All I have now is what I'm doing in the present and how I'm going to impact my future.

So for guidance, since there is a limited supply of Grandmother Willow Trees in the world, I turn pages in God's Word. And in my journal.
Before I share a few key Bible verses with you, I want to share something I wrote from one of my journals. My heart was in a beautiful place at the ages of 14 and 15. My 2006 journal is dear to my heart. I read it often to inspire myself...the wisdom and purity on the pages shocks me sometimes. At the end of this journal is an interesting page. Untitled, it just begins, almost like a poem:

"I need a place where I can go to make my world complete. 

I need nothing, though, with the eyes of the Lord. 

I truly believe I have the eyes of a Godly heart. 

Eyes are a powerful tool often misused and taken for granted. 

Eyes, technically, are connected to your brain, which is connected to your heart. This is the function of a worldly body. 

A body of Christ, however, sees first with its heart, then mind, then eyes. -January 1, 2007"

It seemed so simple and natural to me back then. My heart, if it was accurately connected with God's desires, would make all the decisions that my brain wants to make on its own. So I sought to align my heart with God's.
Almost 5 years have passed since I wrote that. I'm working to align my heart with God's again. My eyes and brain have taken over in the past few years. I've strayed away from my heart. I've given my heart away so many times to so many things...now all I want is to hand it over to God.

I know He's the only one who can truly protect my heart. Proverbs 4:23 says: "Guard your heart above all else, for it is the source [wellspring] of life" (CSB). I know now that I can't listen to, follow, or guard my heart without God's help. Life simply isn't able to be lived without first guarding our hearts and aligning them with God's. Eva Liu said, "Some foods will naturally go bad if they aren't preserved; if we need to preserve our resources for later use, we must set them aside intentionally or else they will be used up. Likewise, our hearts have a natural tendency to be given away. Guarding one's heart means to save it for Whom it is meant to be given."  Our hearts are meant for God. Only when He has our heart can it truly be used to its full potential in every other relationship and aspect of our lives.

Proverbs 4 continues, "Let our eyes look forward; fix your gaze straight ahead. Carefully consider the path for your feet, and all your ways will be established" (CSB).
Psalm 37:4-5 says, "Take delight in the Lord, and He will give you your heart's desires. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in Him, and He will act" (CSB).

So as I continue to run after God's heart, I'll be praying David's prayer...

The Lord is my portion.

I have promised to keep Your words. 

I have sought Your favor with all my heart; 

be gracious to me according to Your promise.

I thought about my ways and have turned my steps back to Your decrees. 

I hurried, not hesitating to keep Your commands.

Lord, the earth is filled with Your faithful love; 

teach me your statutes.

-Psalm 119:57-60, 64

Peace.