This Journey Comes to a Close but Mine is Just Beginning

Tomorrow is the last day I'll have access to a computer so this will be my last entry. It has been a life changing trip, which I wish wasn't quite over. The next few days, I'm playing tourist again as I stay in a hotel, on the gorgeous sandy beaches in Mt. Lavinia.

I think it is truly the people we meet in life that change are perspective that change who we are and how we think, what we believe and the morals we live for. This adventure coming to a close, brings with it the thought of time lingering the gavel of incomplete closure, but not without the new insight of how I should live my life. I've been surrounded this month by people of sickness and disease, of extreme poverty with no hope of escape, and Pastor's swamped with a mission much larger than themselves. The experience and wisdom acquired, no textbook could ever explain, since pictures of 3rd world countries in books merely seem as a far away fairyland. I travel back to America with tears streaming down my face as I finally understand God's unconditional love. Every heartache and pain is merely a testament of strength in this temporal world, which is merely the intermission between birth and eternity. I think about all my friends back in America, and how they live their lives, how I lived my life. Always with the American dream in my main thoughts, and the thoughts of Christ buried in some dark hole in the back of my head.

I've sinned. I am not perfect. Judgment will be upon me. I have no rest without Him. I live for myself. I am selfish. I wish I didn't need to reach out and touch the hole's in his hand to believe in his holiness. I beat him. I spit on him. I was the one that crucified him.

Falling on my knees in humble submission, for my king that took my place upon a cross, which I was so deserving. He died, so that I can live, so that I can show others his glorious face. I am burdened with my only relief coming from my Father, and living as he would have me live. I pray I find the strength to help those I would normally detest, and to look beyond an exterior of sin as my Father overlooks my own.

Thank You Lord for saving me from this world of destruction. Help me to live for you and not myself. Help me bare my cross and follow you and help me be like your son and truly live as I am made in your image.