Gift, disappointment, lesson?

As I was sitting in a restaurant today, someone told me the following story......

There was a lady once that asked God for a flower and a butterfly. A couple of days later, she got a cactus and a caterpillar. She was very disappointed and slightly angry at God.

"Why did you gave me these ugly things?" she asked.

God never answered her, He stayed quiet......

 

It wasn't till a couple of days later that the caterpillar grew into a big beautiful butterfly and the cactus started blossoming the most precious flowers she's ever seen.

I'm not sure if this story is famous or not but it was the first time that I heard it. And I believe that there's a lot to learn from this story. So I would like to challenge you to think for yourself what you can learn from this story, as well as how to apply this lesson to your life at the moment.

I would really love to hear what it is....if you're willing to share.

The thorn in my flesh

In the short time I have spend here on earth so far, I have heard many people use the expression "thorn in my flesh" in many different ways. The truth is nobody really knows what Paul was talking about in 2 Cor 12 when he said "there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me". Yet personally there where times in my life when I felt I had a thorn in my flesh.

My definition of this expression would be, "something very annoying that you do not really know how to deal with yet you can not do anything about it". That is exactly what I feel these days concerning waiting. Being back home and trying to figure out what to do with my time is an annoying thought process. But the thing that I dislike the most about it is waiting on God.

Every day I wake up with all these "brilliant" ideas in my head that I want to crystallize. Ideas on how to make money, connect with people and even invent something. The only problem with these things is that they are my ideas and things that I want to do. When I pray and ask God for His guidance, He usually tells me to wait and He will direct me.

There has been many instances in the past that I felt God was showing me to wait on Him. And you would think that by now I have mastered this technique. But the truth is I still have a lot to learn. While I was in Montana a fellow once said "let time be time and not force the process". That is exactly what I need to learn. For the Bible promises that:

Those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint

 

The Transition - Newsletter Sept. '10

As promised, here is my newsletter for this month. It took me a while to publish it, but I hope you enjoy it. If you have any question feel free to ask.

If you would like to read the Papiamentu version click here.

Eng_Newsletter Sept 2010_The Transition

Back in Curacao! The reason behind my sudden return

Two days ago my plane from Kingston landed in Curacao. I came on a one way ticket, without any plans to return. Yes, I have chosen to leave YWAM.

When I arrived in Montana I was supposed to get a Jamaican visa in my passport to conclude my work permit process. Nonetheless due to the lack of timing and finances I was unable to do so. After that, my only option was to completely restart the process. So I started praying and asking God the reason why and if He is trying to say something through all of that. It was not until I was about to leave Cambodia that I got the confirmation that what God was really saying is that my time with YWAM Jamaica was over.

So after School of Dance Studies I returned back to Jamaica, where I met with the leaders. As I explained everything to them, they released me and this is the reason I am back home at the moment.

It was not an easy decision for me, seeing that I really loved being a part of the team in Jamaica. I already miss my friends there, but I know that God will work everything out for good. My newsletter with more explanation about my future plans will soon be released so you can be better informed. In the mean time please keep on praying for me as I transition back into living in Curacao.

Cambodia report

Praying and dancing in a park

It was three weeks ago that the days when I used to lie on my bed, in my small Cambodian room where over. Looking back, it was an exciting yet unfamiliar time in my life. The Kingdom of Cambodia is different than anything I have ever experienced before. It is a Buddhist country that only 13 years ago experienced rest after 30 years of wars. As you can imagine, the country is still rebuilding after these horrifying years of terror. Due to their recent past, Cambodia is a very young country with over 80% of the population being under the age of 30. The country is hungering for a sense of direction and many times looking for it in the wrong places.

Teaching dance to Cambodians

During our time in Cambodia, we had the opportunity to teach dance to some young Cambodians in Battambang. These students heard about us through the Youth Center that YWAM Battambang has there where they get the opportunity to learn English and other skills for free. I was in the team that taught Modern dance to about 10 girls. These girls were hungry to learn, not only dance but also more about God. For me it was the first time that I encountered people that were so hungry for God. So after classes and when they had English class breaks, we spoke to them about the love of the Lord.

One of these students in particular really touched my heart. She was the last student to join our class, so she asked us for some extra classes to learn all that she missed. One afternoon after her extra class me and my teammate started asking her about her belief. She willingly shared with us that she grew up Buddhist, but at the Youth Center she learned about Jesus. So she started to pray to Jesus at home, nevertheless she did not really know anything about Him neither did she own a Bible. A couple of days later we were able to buy her a Bible and connect her with one of the YWAM staff that spoke Khmer so that she could learn more about Jesus. When we left, she still did not dedicate her life to the Lord but I am praying that she soon will.

Sanding a door before painting it

Aside from teaching classes, we also helped clean and paint a new building that YWAM just acquired, perform a couple of times at the YWAM base, pray over a new café that they are about to open and minister twice in a church through dance and preaching.

Thank you so much for believing, praying, and supporting me financially. It was a blessed outreach, where I really saw the goodness and faithfulness of God. I fell in love with Cambodia and would love to go back some day. I urge you to continue praying for this country; for I believe that greater things will happen in Cambodia.

Cambodia: Quick Update

Sitting here at an internet cafe around the corner, hearing cars zooming by, people speaking in an unkown language and using a very old computer. This is just a little glimpse of what I am experiencing. To describe Cambodia, I will need a lot of words. I will soon write all about it. For now, I am alright. It is an interesting country, full of things I have not experienced before. Continue to keep me in your prayers and I will do the same.
Sheedia

Here's a collection of pictures taken during our concert series two weeks ago. Enjoy!

A longing fulfilled

"Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life"

-Proverbs 13:12

I have found this verse to be true last week as I walked into the YWAM office and paid the rest of the money for this school. This school has been a testing of my faith in every area possible. Today I can say I that I have passed the test. The best part about it though is that you are a part of it as well. Your prayers, encouragements and financial support has all been a part of it. Thank you for standing and believing with me, it means a lot to me.

In about 11 days (July 9) me and my team will start our journey to Cambodia to minister through dance and any other way the Lord leads us to. My heart jumps with excitement to be a light in a dark place. As I go I hope you will continue to support me in prayer.

A glimse in the life of SODS '10

Here's fun a video of our time here in Montana so far. Enjoy!

Finishing the race

As I write this there are 22 days left before we start our journey to Cambodia. I can't wait for that day! Nevertheless a couple of days ago I realized that looking forward to Cambodia sometimes makes me miss the enjoyment it is to be here.

This is the week of our final concert. As our lecture time is coming to an end I look back and see how much I learned throughout these months here. I went from someone who can move to music to a well rounded dancer. That is a huge accomplishment. The greatest thing about it is that you have a part in it as well. All the encouraging words, prayers, financial support and gifts I received has made it possible for me to stay here.

So for the next 22 days I will follow the advice of my school leader to "finish strong" and make 1 Corinthians 9:26-27 my theme verse:

"Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize."

At the moment I still need $770 before June 25th to be able to go to Cambodia. It would be great if you could continue to help me pray and pay for this.

He is faithful

I can't even believe it. Two days ago I asked you all to start praying for me and I was needing $1500. As of today I only need $1030. God has provided again! Most of it I don't even know where it came from.

I must agree with David when He said:

"Your faithfulness stretches to the skies" - Ps. 36:5

Thank you for your prayers so far!

25 Day Prayer

In my time here in Montana, the Lord has been teaching me continually about how great He really is.

We all know the verse: "With God all things are possible" but to what extent do we really believe it? For me it is still a struggle to believe this completely, even though I know it is true sometimes I struggle to believe it.

My last newsletter mentioned that I still needed $3600 by April 30th and that I was asking God for a miracle. Well, they extended the due date to May 21st for our 2nd quarter and outreach ticket to be paid. The morning of May 21st I still did not know where my money was coming from but when I arrived in class that afternoon I was informed that one of my classmates gave me more than half of what I needed and later someone else paid the rest. What a miracle!

Something I believe God is teaching me over and over is the power of prayer. He says: "Ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened." He also says that where two or three are gathered together in His name, there I am with them."
So I would like to ask you to stand in prayer with me for the next 25 days. By June 25th I need $1500 which will be my last payment for this entire school. Please help me pray for:

• The $1500 that is due
• Our outreach in Cambodia

During these 25 days I will keep updates on this blog. Also, I would love for you to let me know what God is placing on your heart during these prayer times. You can do this by e-mailing me personally or leaving comments here.

Thank you for believing with me!

Settling for less

Flipping through a girl's Facebook pictures of Cambodia I really came to my senses of how foolish I can be sometimes. In the afternoon the Lord convicted me of something. In my previous post you can read of how God has promised me that He will provide for me. Nevertheless deep down I have been making my plan B, just in case I never make it to Cambodia.

My plan B was that if I don't make it I will just go back to Jamaica, work on staff and enjoy life. What a small/selfish plan compared to Cambodia! My teammates, supporters, family and friends are believing for me to go to Cambodia and here I am not believing it myself at times. So I made a desicion to trust God fully to make it! Not maybe making it and ending up in Jamaica but REALLY making it all the way to Cambodia.

My encouragement for you is, don't settle for less. God has great big plans for each of us. Sometimes all it takes is some faith.

A cloud is rising...

In worship this morning while I was just enjoying myself in the Lord's presence, a story was brought to mind. I didn't remember much of this story but I knew immediately that God was speaking of His provision for me.

The story was that of Elijah and his servant (1 Kings 18:41-46). It started out with Elijah telling Ahab that "there is the sound of heavy rain". Then Elijah went on top of mount Carmel and cried out to the Lord. Six times he stopped praying to ask his servant to go look towards the sea if rain was coming, but it wasn't until the seventh time that the servant actually saw "a cloud as small as a man's hand rising from the sea."

There is a lot of parallel's between this story and my situation. Since the beginning of this school I have been telling my classmates that "I am believing God for a miracle". So far many miracles has happened. My 1st quarter was payed off, I had an awesome spring break, God spoke to me through a Dutch clog....just to name a few.
During the last week I saw God's provision twice. The first one was when I entered my room and found $25 in an envelope with my name on it (just when I was about to run out of spending money). The second one is that someone send $10 for my school fees. Both I have no idea who it is.
So in a way I am seeing the little cloud coming, and I am believing for the rest of my money ($4680) to arrive before May 14 so I we can buy our tickets for Cambodia. Does it sound crazy? Of course it does, but since I've been walking with God that's how my life has been....CRAZY

The power of teamwork - Newsletter April '10

"Time flies when you're having fun" is a saying that really is true in my life at the moment. I can't even believe that I haven't written on this blog for almost a month. Sorry for the lack of update. With this post you will find my newsletter for the month of April. This one really testifies of the greatness of God. Enjoy!

Newsletter April 2010 - The Power of Teamwork

Concert poster

Comotion/Emotion is the name of the concert we are going to perform last week. It will be 2 days of performance. On Tuesday all of us will perform our solo and on Friday is the big concert when we will perform all our pieces so far.

If you are in the area, please stop by to see us perform.


Concert Poster SODS10

Kindness is contagious

My hardest day....

Today was what I will call my hardest day since being here so far. But it might not be what you would think of as the hardest day.

If you know me, you know that from since I can remember I have struggled with recurring headaches. Most of the time including most of this school I ignore it and act as if nothing happened. This way I don't have to hear "I'm sorry and hope you feel better soon" all throughout my day because this only make me feel inadequate.

In the past week though it has gotten to the point that I couldn't ignore it anymore. I pretty much was in some kind of pain all of last week and by Friday I decided to stop taking so much medicine and actually accept the fact that I am in pain. This was so hard for me to do. Nevertheless I did it. And my classmates and staff were so nice to me, really taking good care of me.

But the hardest day was today. I woke up with an headache again and it was so frustrating. By the time I was getting ready for ballet my head was pounding and I knew I couldn't participate. After one of my classmates prayed for me I went to class (wearing my ballet attire) to tell my staff how I feel. Her response was so loving yet extremely hard for me to take in. She told me that she has seen how hard I have been working and that she wants me to "slack off" a little bit until I feel better.

Slacking off? Sheedia? That is THE hardest thing for me to do. I am a person that always try to perform at the best of my ability. But sometimes I take it too far and end up stressing out and actually having to stop for a moment.

It made me think a lot though. Do we serve a God that makes us work and feel so stressed that we get sick? From my experience the answer to this question is "NO".

And if you are not sure how to answer that question, just check out Ps. 127:1-2 & Matt. 6:25-34.

The last thing I learned through this experience is that God did not make me to be inadequate. He will not ask of us more that we can bear. We just need to seek Him and ask Him for help on how to deal with what He has given us.

Look at me!

My previous post said that God can do anything. This has been especially true this past week. We had a guest artist to teach us for the full week. And if you know me well you know that I do not posses a lot of stamina. So this week was extremely challenging for me.

Our guest artist Lotte, is a German who has received her dance degree in the Netherlands and has danced all over the world with many different dance companies. She also used to be the leader of the school I am doing here in Montana.

It was an amazing blessing to be taught by a woman of God who has so much experience. But after weeks of getting used the same dance teachers it was a challenge to follow someone else choreography. I found myself many times asking God for just a little bit more of energy to make it through the class. And God came through every time, I made it through the week. Here is the video of the performance we did at the end of the week. Look at me!

Meditation scripture

I just woke up and was having my time with God. And as I lay still before Him, this verse came to mind. So I just wanted to use it as an encouragement.

God can do anything, you know - far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams!

- Eph 3:20 (The Message) -

Hope this can be of some kind of encouragement to you today. No matter where you are in your life.

With love,

Sheedia

Surprise!

They say that no news is good news. In my case that is exactly true at the moment. I haven't written on this blog for a while and I know some of you have been asking for it. The truth is I don't have much excuse for not doing it. It is just the result of procrastination. But I'll work on it so it doesn't happen anymore.

One thing that I would really like to share about is how God surprises us. My first week here was really hard for me to adjust to the cold and just living away from the Caribbean and warm culture. And seriously I was ready to pack my stuff and go back home.....seriously. But by the end of the first week my classmate told me that she has a gift for me that God showed her to give to me. And knowing YWAMers I thought it's probably something to eat or something really small. I wasn't wrong, it was really small. Yet the significance of it made the difference in my staying or leaving.
She gave me some dutch "klompen" which is something I always sectretly wanted. Since a lot of Curacaoans have it in their house as decoration.


I just want to use this story as an encouragement. Sometimes we feel like we can't go on. But most of the time we just need to hold on just a little bit more and it will make all the difference. Right now I can't even believe I was ready to leave. Because I totally love this school. Finally I am able to follow the choreography and I am excited for the total growth experienced by the end of the school. And also I am more used to the cold now, which makes everything a lot easier.

The challenge (newsletter Jan-Feb)

When you scroll down you will find my newsletter for Jan-Feb. This time it is written a little bit different. I wrote each part like an individual story instead of having the whole newsletter written in a full story.

Recently someone who read this newsletter told me that I sound very down in this newsletter. But though my situation might seem kind of down or unpleasant I am having the time of my life. I am really loving being here in spite of the hardships. It is such a joy to be walking out where God has directed me to be. Presently I feel like I am understanding Paul more and more when he wrote in Philipians 4:11-13:

“I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”

So when you read my newsletter rejoice with me because I know God is going to come through for me in a marvelous way. And let me know what you think about the newsletter.

*Newsletter in Papiamentu

Eng Sheedia Newsletter the Challenge

Love

Lately the Lord has been speaking to me a lot about His love for me and His love for all of us. He is a God who is willing to have a personal relationship with each one of us. I know that sounds a little bit cliche but it is more than that.

He is a God that wants to hang out with us. Be a part of our lives. Whether we're just having fun with friends, reading a book, working at our hectic job, having a time alone and even dancing. He wants to be a part of it. Not to point fingers at us and say "Hey, you just had a wrong thought there" or "Remember yesterday when you lied to a friend"? But He wants to be there just to spend time with us. Like a friend, brother or the perfect father.

That is the God we serve. The question is are you willing to let Him love you?

Here is a video we recently watched in class that speaks about the woman at the well. Enjoy!

Beginning of a new adventure

Alright, for everyone who is wondering if I made it to Montana or not as you can see on the picture I DID. I am safely here and this is an incredible journey the Lord has me on.

As most of you are aware of it started with a faith challenge. There were/are many reasons for me not to be here yet I'm here because I'm sure that this is where God wants me to be.
But since I got here it has not only been a faith challenge but also a physical challenge. At the moment my body is completely soar and don't feel like I can take a second more of dancing. Yet I am applying what the Lord taught me in the beginning to give Him what I have in my hands.
Also I still need to get used to the weather here in Lakeside. As I am writing it is -10 degrees Celsius outside and it is covered in snow everywhere. It is my first time seeing snow sow I need a lot of getting used to.

I added some pictures for you to see a little of what I see everyday. I will soon add some dancing pictures as well.

Once more thank you for all your support. Without your help I couldn't be here.