When I first joined Global I thought I was just going to be going on a trip around the world. I thought I was just going to see cool places, meet amazing people, have the adventure of a lifetime and the pictures to prove it. All of this has happened, of course, but God had much bigger plans for me than I could have imagined. I went into this journey expecting to change the lives of others but I ended up having my life changed instead. It started in training. From Survivor to guest speakers, Veritas, Luke 10, prophecy, Bible study and learning so many truths about God, it would have been nearly impossible not to change in a positive way. And I did change quite a bit during those two months. Enough to think I had learned enough to get by, that no more big changes were needed in my life. I was wrong. The year started off great. We were praying for people, showing them the love of Christ, experiencing favour, seeing God move in powerful ways. I was having the time of my life. We were changing the world but God was interested in changing my heart. One of the most dangerous places you can be is in a constant state of joy and contentment. When everything is going well why should you change? Do you really need God if all your emotional and physical needs are met? Why complicate things by taking steps of faith out of your comfort zone and possibly compromising your happiness? Why bother changing if things are working the way they are? I was in this place for the first part of our journey, though I wasn’t aware of it. And I didn’t realize that you’re in a constant state of change, though it may be almost unnoticeable, and if we’re not constantly surrendering and allowing God to change us for the better then we’re allowing the Devil to change us for the worse. It started on Luke 10 I think. I was expecting God to test me during that time on my faith in his provision and protection. What I didn’t realize is that faith is a whole. The Bible says to have faith, full stop. If you have faith in Him then faith for everything else will fall into place. If you start anywhere else then it’s all just going to crumble and you’ll be left with nothing. So I was expecting God to grow my faith in one direction but He wanted to work in a completely different way which confused me terribly. The next few months were very hard. I had let my guard down and the Devil came after me with no less than the intent to destroy me. He tried many different ways from throwing the past into my face, to causing me to doubt my salvation and the love of God. Throughout it all though I felt God telling me to just trust Him, to stop resisting Him and simply come to Him saying “I can’t do this but I’m trusting you to get me through this time.” But those who know me know how stubborn I can be so I resisted and tried to fight the Devil other ways. At first I started to rely on people but when they failed me I tried trusting in myself to get me through but that made things worse. Finally I hit rock bottom. I couldn’t go on the way I was anymore, I couldn’t get past this wall in my life. The only way was to let go, to give it all to God and trust that He would take care of it. So with His help [because I couldn’t have made that choice on my own] I decided to do what my flesh and everything in me screamed not to do, to put all my trust in Someone I had never seen but only heard about and experienced. It was terrifying and exhilarating at the same time. Things have been so much better since that decision but I’m not going to pretend that everything is fine now. In fact I’m more aware than ever about everything that’s wrong in my life. But now that I’m aware of it I can continually place it in God’s hands and trust Him to transform me into something different, something new, something beautiful. Romans 12:2 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.