Describe your sister.

Beautiful. identical to me. Stunning. Lovely.

Ask me anything

Thoughts.

Thoughts. I seriously have the craziest thought/thinking process ever. I think about the craziest and most random things. It's pretty insane. Lately, one thought has been, "Who am I?" I have 10 billion different lives planned for me... I have 4 different favorite colors... My favorite food changes all the time... My "style" changes all the time.. I can't seem to make up my mind on what in the world I'm going to do with my life.. I love change.. I love different cultures and countries.. Yet I absolutely LOVE being at home.. It's kind of like I'm just a big mess of Everything.
Which thankfully Terre Jasper just reaffirmed me that it's okay to be a mess, because I am His, with a capital H, mess. His as in the Savior or the Universe. He made me just like I am for a specific purpose. He knows exactly why I have 4 different favorite colors and he enjoys showing them to me in His creation. I really like how He brings out these different wacky things in me. It shows me how broad He is. Because I know there are people that are way different than me. So just think of how creative He is!
Pretty crazy huh. I really enjoy serving the God I serve. And I'm learning to love myself including my querky thought process.

.....just a thought ;)

Recap and Reentry.

I confess, I am a horrible blogger! It's been too long since I have updated. Forgive me! So lets begin!

I am now home and in the USA after 5 months in Panama, Central America; I successfully completed and graduated from my Discipleship Training School with Youth With A Mission. I spent the 5 months all over Panama and in Costa Rica for 2 weeks as well. I was stretched and pushed in every part of my life during that time.

When we began our outreach I decided that each day I would write down at least one thing that I learned. Some are simple, some are big, some are silly, and some are "serious". I thought I would share these things that I learned.

Outreach Lessons... November Lessons.
1. Invest in people, listen to their stories, and learn from them. Focus on the good and not the bad in people.
2. Work with your entire heart, don't half do it. God wants your best, even if you don't like what you are doing.
3. Be open to different ways of minstering. God can give you a heart for the people you are serving and that style of serving.
4. We live for an Audience of One. We work for God! Even if we don't see the entire picture, God wants and desires our best, in every part of our life.
5. Remember Mary and Martha... sometimes you have to stop working and spend time and invest in other people.
6. Share. Trust that god will take care of everything, especially finances. (On this day- God provided me with 40 extra dollars :))
7. Take every opportunity to share the Lord.. it may be there only time to hear about the Lord.. even if they are drunk. (I gave my testimony to a gym full of drunk people that yelled the entire time.)
8. Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord. Don't settle. Just wait- God will reveal His plan. There is beauty in the waiting.
9. Be thankful for those around you.. take time to uplift and encourage them. James 3. Accept people's differences.. that is how god made them and made us.
10. Be flexible... sometimes it's good to just go with the flow.
11. Do you remember that evangelism is a lifestyle? It's not something that you go and do.
12. Love people for where they are and who they are. See them in God's eyes. Are your actions causing others to stumble, sin or become frustrated? Deal with the root of any problems.
13. Don't underestimate yourself. God can use you even just the way you are.
14. Take time to enjoy life and to spend tiem with people. Trust that God will meet your wants along with your needs.
15. Step out of your comfort zone. Let God use you where He wants you.
16. Enjoy life.. even the little things, like getting McDonalds.
17. You can learn something from every person- it all depends on your perspective.
18. Listen to the Holy Spirit- don't take every "bad" feeling as something wrong- ask the Lord what He desires in the situation, it may just require you to be uncomfortable and to stretch yourself.
19. There is no seperation of spiritual and physical. It's yep- both. (Everything is Spiritual by Rob Bell.)
20. The Lord provides big and small, even bacon.
21. Laughter is a gift from God- enjoy life. Proverbs 17:21 We have a lot of plans in our hearts, but it is the Lord's PURPOSE which prevails.
22. Everyone has something to share, everyone shares differently- be open to their methods.
23. God is to us as we were to the Mother Theresa patients. They depended compeltely on us and the nurses to feed them and keep them clean, to love and spend time with them. Be grateful for the health and well being you have.
24. Be where you are today. Let tomorrow worry about itself. Be where you are 100%. Sing, clap, dance, enjoy life.
25. Family isn't just those whoa re blood related it's the ones who have been there the ones that support you and love you.
26. It's hard to look for the good everyday- it's easy to get sucked into self-pity. But be thankful for what you do have and look for the good.


These are the lessons from November.. my ones from the other 2 months are in a different journal. These are things that I wanted myself to remember after I got home and got back into my normal things and habits. Which I am praying will not happen. :)

My time in Panama was such a blessing, I learned many things. I was blessed by my time with my team and with the people that we reached. We did many different types of ministry during our Outreach. I had the opportunity to experience many different types of evangelism. I am very happy to be back at home and be with my family. I miss Panama and my group but I know that God has plans for me in the future. I am currently praying about where God wants me in the "job field". I prayed about going to college this semester and really felt like God was telling me that I did not need to go to college yet. I appreciate prayers for me as I search and pray for a job. And also and prayers concerning re-entering in to the United States. That in itself is a process and a job. It is more difficult that I thought it would be.

Thank you for your prayer and financial support while I was in Panama. I am forever grateful for you all. Love each of you. I'd be happy to talk or answer any questions that anyone has about my journey. Love.
Bren

Thanksgiving in Panama

So Thanksgiving in Panama is not as bad as I thought it was gonna be... yet it is still hard. I am so unbelievably thankful for my family. They are so awesome.. which makes it extra hard to be away from them. They are so supportive in everything that I have chosen to do and am praying about doing. They are the source of many smiles and laughter while in a different country. Being in a different country is totally different than I thought it would be. It's hard and good all at the same time. This DTS in a whole has been very hard but also very good. I am so thankful that I decided to do this.. and that God provided the way for me to come. He has stretched me in many different ways. With just 2 weeks left in this DTS I am reminded how much I have learned, how much I have changed, and how awesome God is. Despite the fact that I miss home and my family like crazy, God is still good. He has provided me with my "YWAM family" and last night we had an awesome Thanksgiving meal. I had probably one of the best turkeys ever, followed with all sorts of awesomeness. I was very thankful for my skirt that has ajustable buttons so it could grow with my belly last night after my 4 or 5 platefuls. Anyways, this blog is a bunch of ramblings, but needless to say I am thankful.

My Top 10 Thankful List:
1. Awesome parents that support me in everything.
2. A beautiful twin sister who somehow allowed me to be away for 5 months.
3. My awesome brother who I miss so much.
4. My entire family!
5. My YWAM family, who has been here for me this past 5 months in each situation that I have come to face.
6. New friendships that are lifelong and ones that I will never forget.
7. The beautiful sceneary I am surrounded with.
8. My DTS group.. I love each of you more than you know and am so thankful to be able to spend a season of our lives together.
9. Laughter- how would I get through life without it?
10. My amazing, awesome, wonderful, faithful and mind blowing Savior! He provided my every need, He is constant, He is the best thing that has happened to me.

Happy Thanksgiving from Panama!
B

Outreach Update :)

Oh wow, so much to catch everyone up on! Our outreach is going awesome, we continue to see the Lord working in many different ways. We have been to 5 different cities doing a variety of ministry. The first city we went to after our Costa Rica trip was to Boquete which is in Chiriqui. We were supposed to go somewhere else but they canceled on us, so we began praying about where we should go.. there had been a lot of flooding and mudslides in Chiriqui, so that is where we went! I was able to have two weeks of nice cool weather! Praise the Lord! We helped the town by cleaning out trenches from the mudslides. After digging a trench in Costa Rica as well we considered renaming Discipleship Training School to Digging Trenches Siempre (Always in Spanish). Haha. ☺ We stayed in a big gymnasium where one night they played soccer until 1230 and didn’t leave the gym until 1! We were able to do a drama inbetween a soccer game and I was able to give a short testimony.
After Boquete, we traveled to Parita then to Los Santos, followed by Las Tablas, and ending in Aguadulce. We did a lot of house to house ministry and programs in the park. I got the opportunity to be a preacher and I preached at a church one Sunday morning. The Lord is teaching us all sorts of things and stretching us and using us in ways we never thought we would be used. We are discovering gifts and passions that we haven’t experienced or felt before as well.
We came back to base on Saturday the 21st where a nice comfortable bed awaited us, after sleeping on the floor for several weeks it was a nice “homecoming”. We have been working in Colon these past few days visiting the Mother Theresa Home and the Salvation Army. I have been so super blessed by these two places. The Mother Theresa Home- I fed 2 blind men and a cute 4 year old boy that hit me and threw cornflakes at me. :) And was able to help the sisters out by feeding and playing with the kids. Life is so precious and we are so blessed by the abilities that we have. God works with us the same way that we were working with them. They relied on us for their food, their smiles, their communication. They trust that the sisters will feed them, clothe them, bathe them. In the same way- God does the same for us. He puts time and effort into us, he desires our attention, even when we throw fits and ignore him. He still desires us. It was such a humbling experience to help someone out with daily things that I take for granted.
Yesterday, we went to Salvation Army where I met an awesome blind gentleman named, Mr. Bennet. He was such a blessing to me, I was able to read some of his favorite passages to him from the Bible. Even though I didn’t get through half a verse at a time because he wanted to make sure I understood. ☺ So cute and precious. He sang songs for me, took pictures with me, taught me many things, and prayed for me.
I am learning so much on this outreach and on this “adventure” here in Panama. We leave Friday to go to the jungle for a week. Please be praying for my sleep, I am nervous about that aspect of being in the jungle for that extended period of time. We are going to 2 villages to work with both the Kuna and the Embera indigenous Indians. Be praying for language barriers and for the superstitious indigenous customs they have set in place. After our week in the jungle I will have one more week of debrief and then I will be home! Thank you for your prayers.. I will be updating again as soon as I can after the jungle. Love you all. B.

Updates and Pictures!

here are some pictures of my past two weeks.... that is my little buddy alejo, walking for one of his first times... and the first picture is of me digging a ditch at a school in san jose, costa rica....

I am absolutely loving this time I get to spend serving the Lord.. Thank you for all of your prayers- we leave tomorrow to go back to Panama to help in some provinces that are suffering from flash floods, we feel that the Lord has really guided us to help with the floods, so be praying for the lives that we will come into contact with that have lost homes and family members due to these floods. Besos!

Alejos.

Wow! What an awesome week we had in Bocas Del Torro. We began our trip there on a 9 hour bus ride to Bocas in the middle of the night, followed by 2 water taxis to the island where we spent the rest of the week. We stayed at a YWAM base that was a solar house. So our electricity and water came from the sun and rain... we were off the grid. Which is pretty cool, but then also not so cool when we ran really low on water. So I got the pleasure of bathing in a small creek down the hill. The house is right on the water, so beautiful. And it is also just a small island about 12 miles long I think. We did various things throughout the week on this island... one of my focuses was on a little boy named Alejos.
Alejos is the 2 and a half year old son of an indigenous woman, and her husband is the only father that Alejos knows. He is very sick, malnourished and scared. He just sat most of the time while we were there. He had never taken a step without someone holding his hand and his belly pouched out and his legs were very thin. After building his trust he let me hold him and do some physical therapy with his legs. We fed him and just loved on him. By the end of the week he was walking holding one hand, taking a few steps on his own, and we found a place where he can go and stay to get nourished back to health.
This little guy really touched my heart, he is such a blessing in my life. I have found one of the things in ministry that I absolutely love to do. God taught me so much through this little guy. How many times do we do the same thing with God? He wants to help us get stronger but we cry and we don´t let him hold us and love us... this week I have learned to sit in my Heavenly Father´s lap and trust him to help me get stronger... even if I´m sore after or it hurts during the process...

We are now in San Jose, Costa Rica staying at a YWAM base in Heredia (you can goodle YWAM Herdia and they have a website) and this awesome base has washing machines, hot water, internet and it´s cold here! How awesome is that! My hair looks pretty for the first time in 3.5 months! Haha... I am so blessed to be on this journey with the Lord. I should be updating again soon, maybe even posting a few picture of Alejos and me! Thank you for your prayers... I love you all!