We really learned so...... much from and about God through His servants in Jamaica. We could never forget the people that we met in Jamaica and we will definitely always associate our Jamaican experience with a lot of kids and young people!
[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQH6QOV2URs&list=UU3A8KS5f6WFU3zG2OSxVV_A&index=2&feature=plcp 400x300]
We had the opportunity to see other Jamaicans experiencing some of God’s heart and love for children at a memorial event where they commemorate all the children that has died tragic deaths in Jamaica.
Having done so many children's ministry in Jamaica, really taught us all a lot about God's heart for children. Some of the members in our team are great with kids and they love to work with them, but for other members in the team, working with kids has always been a challenge. Some of us are not very comfortable with children and usually find it difficult to know how to act around them and how to interact with them. So for many of us, Jamaica felt like God throwing us into the deep end, with all the children's ministry. We learned very quickly to rely on God to help us in knowing what to do and say, so that the children will understand God.
The great thing about our salvation, is it’s not dependant on us doing anything for God, but Him doing everything for us through His grace, is that anyone can be saved as long as you believe in Jesus Christ. You don’t have to know and understand the whole Bible, you just need to understand the Gospel (which really is not rocket science) and believe that Jesus died for you. As it is written: "It is by grace we have been saved, through faith" so it is actually very simple and easy to get saved. This is why a little child can be saved and understands God better and have a deeper relationship with Him, than some adults. A child's faith is usually so much stronger, because children usually do not have pride or ideas from the world that contaminates their way of thinking and keeps them blind and deaf to the word of God. Children find it easier to believe in God and thus to understand Him, because they do not think as rationally as a grown-up does. Children will believe without seeing, where adults want to see before they will believe. The thing is that faith works by believing first and then you will see. The more you believe/the stronger your faith is, the more you will understand God and His ways and His will.
Jesus said it in the best words in Matthew 11:25 and Luke 10:21:
At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, "I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because You have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, "I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because You have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was Your good pleasure."
Now we can honestly say that we have learned a lot, not just about children, but also about God's heart for them. If you work with children you need to ask God to open your eyes so that you can see what He sees. Then you will feel God's heart aching and breaking for that child sitting in front of you and it will be so easy for you to love him/her, because it will be God's love flowing through you. You also need to remember that the same Holy Spirit that lives in you, also lives in that child, if the child accepts Jesus as saviour and Lord and then it is easy to speak and explain the things of God to that child, because then the Spirit in you is speaking to the Spirit in the child and that Spirit is one and the same Spirit. It is the Spirit of God and it will work in and through you and in and through the child. God also uses children to work in our lives. You might think you are there so that God can use you to impact that child's life, but a lot of times God is actually working through that child to impact you.
After working with so many kids/children/young people and feeling the way that God feels about them, gave us a new understanding and revelation of Matthew 18:1-9 that speaks about: "The greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven". Especially verse 3 & 4 where Jesus says:
"I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven."
We as a team spoke about the street evangelism and admitted to each other that we still have a lot to learn about how to go about doing this, because most of us still feel very uncomfortable and awkward to just speak to strangers that are actually busy with their own lives. We still need to learn how to keep the conversation going and how to lead the conversation to be about the Gospel and about Jesus, without scaring/putting the person off. We said that it is especially difficult to say to someone who is living on the street with no place to stay or job or food to eat, that God is your provider and He will meet all your needs. There is hope. We know it, because we believe it and thus we see it. But for someone who has suffered for so long and who feels like they have nothing to live for, because every day is just a struggle to survive, it is difficult to believe that there is hope and that there is a God who loves and cares for them. People who only know pain, sickness and suffering, usually finds it difficult to know and understand that the Almighty God cares. They will often say to you: if He is really in control of everything and He really loves and cares for everyone, then why is He not helping me?
We don’t know what happened in that person’s life and why God allowed it. All that we can do is love people and speak truth into their lives. The kind of love that is necessary when working with complete strangers with difficult circumstances cannot come from you. It has to be the love of God that flows through you, because no human is able to love anyone as fully, unconditionally and sincerely as God. God’s love is like a raging, burning, urgent fire that will never burn out and that will never decrease. Nothing that any person does can ever make God love that person more or less. God’s love is perfect. His love is in a whole other league. We can’t even begin to understand or comprehend God’s love.
God does not expect us to convince people and to keep arguing with them to try and prove to them that Jesus really is the only Way, Truth and Life and that the only way to the Father is through Him. Jesus never said to His disciples go and convince the people; He just said that we have to go and tell the people about Him. It is only God Himself who can convict and convince people through His Holy Spirit, and He will do that when He sees fit to do so.
Paul explains this in Romans. It is quite confusing and difficult to understand and we believe each person needs to pray for full revelation on this. But so far, from what we have learned and experienced, this is one of our views on this subject:
In Romans 9:15-18 Paul writes that it is not really us who decides that we choose God. God decides beforehand who He wants to follow Him and who He will harden. In Romans 10 Paul again describes the difference between law and grace. So it is only by grace that I believe and that someone else does not believe, which means that being saved it really more undeserving than we think. So it is not I who choose to believe, but God who makes me capable of believing in Him. This is so confusing!
This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t spread the Gospel, because in Romans 10:14-17 Paul asks: “How can they believe if they have not heard?” In verse 20 it is written: “I was found by those who did not seek me; I revealed Myself to those who did not ask for Me.” So God chooses anyone. In Romans 11 it says that God reserved a remnant of His people who will believe and who will be saved. So once again it shows that it is only by grace that we are saved, because it really is not something that we can do. It is God who decides, and so He does it for us. Why would God choose to harden some people ands as it says in Romans 11:8: “give them a spirit of stupor, with eyes that could not see and ears that could not hear.” We will not understand everything in this lifetime, but all we can be certain of is that God has a plan and that everything will in the end glorify Him.
This takes all the pressure off of us, because we don’t have to know enough to convince anyone. We just have to tell people the truth and then God will decide if they will believe or not. God has already chosen His people. We also don’t have to feel inferior and unable, unequipped or incapable to do His will, because as it says in 1 Corinthians 1:18-31 – “Christ the Wisdom and Power of God” God uses simple people and works through them. You don’t have to be the smartest person with a rocket scientist brain to figure out and memorize the whole Bible if you want to serve people and do God’s will. You just need God’s Holy Spirit to work in and through you. As it goes on to say in 1 Corinthians 2:1-16 – “Wisdom from the Spirit” the only way that you can know and understand the thoughts of God is if you have the Spirit of God within you to help you.
As you can see we do not have all the answers, but we will boast in our weaknesses because when we are weak, God’s strength is more evident through us and He gets all the glory as it says in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10.
As a team we are all growing stronger together and learning more about each other and ourselves. We can see how each team member has a different part to play or specific role to fulfil and it is inspiring to us to see how each one of us are stepping up to do what God expects of us, and to be who and what He created us to be. We all have different strengths and weaknesses, and it is great to see how God planned and put us together so we can work together and come together to form one great functioning body of unity. At each ministry point we are learning more and each time we are functioning better in our individual roles to in the end be a well functioning church of God, wherever we go.
All in all, Jamaica was an amazing learning experience and a lot of fun!
We had so fun making a "wanna bee" "Cool Runnings" Bob Sledding-video, which was a great team building experience. On that note we would just like to thank God and praise Him for putting this team together. We all get along so well and we really love and enjoy each other. We feel like a little family who is acting like a travelling house church. We give God all the glory and praise for our team dynamics, because we know that it is Him who chose the members of this team and it is He who decided that we would spend this year together and learn and grow together.
Pastor Neville blessed us so many times with amazing food like KFC, Jerk Chicken and Pork, Meat patties (a patty is what Jamaica and Cayman Islands call pies) and even Chinese food. He also blessed us with tickets to go to Jamaica International which is a huge international Athletics event where we got to see Usain Bolt run the 100m in the record time of 9.82 seconds! Seeing him run was so symbolic of the one sermon that Gerrie gave one Sunday in the church in Kingston about running the race for Jesus, going full out and finishing strong without slowing down as the race progresses.
All the team members has had the great privilege to preach/share with a group of people, and each time that we do, we learn so much from each other. God uses each and every one of us to not only work in the people that we meet along the way’s lives, but also to work and build into each other’s lives as a team. Whenever we have devotions or just have fellowship or just spend time together and share our thoughts with one another, we learn so much! One thing that we as a team are certain of and love proclaiming, especially when we sometimes feel confused about the challenging questions that we pose to one another and discuss, is that JESUS IS LORD! We actually have so much more to say, but this has already been a lot of reading work, so we will share more in our next blog.
Support
We would really love to thank everyone who has been supporting us, whether through prayer or finances, we really appreciate it so much. Your support means more to us than you could ever know/understand and we wish we had better words than just "thank you" to show our gratitude. Please continue to pray for us. Pray for that we will fall even more in love with Jesus, so that His love can increase in us and that He may work and flow through us more and more. Also, please pray for our health and protection, our safety and finances and that God will prepare the way for us and set up divine appointments for us. Most importantly pray that we will walk in His will by knowing and following His voice and that all that we do may be pleasing to our Heavenly Father.
& nbsp;
If you would like to contribute and help us by giving some financial support, we would really appreciate it. Here are the banking account details:
Account name: GCX-One Year 9206958383
ABSA
Branch: 31 Da Gamma road, Jeffreys Bay, 6330, South Africa
Branch code: 334515
Reference: DISTANT ISLANDS
Swift Code (for international payments): ABSAZAJJ
As Distant Islands team we would really like to thank you so much for following our whereabouts and for supporting us in prayer. Thank you for reading our blogs. We would like to greet you with the following:
1 Thessalonians 3:12-13 – “May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you. May He strengthen your hearts so that you will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father when our Lord Jesus comes with all His holy ones.”
We pray that God will bless you with His love and peace. All our love!
Distant Islands Team