Fearfully and Wonderfully Made

24 years ago no one know who I would become or what I would do with my life. I didn't even know I existed.  But God did.

Psalm 139:13-19
"For you formed my inward parts;
   you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works;
   my soul knows it very well.
¹⁵My frame was not hidden from you,when I was being made in secret,
   intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶Your eyes saw my unformed substance;in your book were written, every one of them,
   the days that were formed for me,
   when as yet there was none of them.
 ¹⁷How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!
   How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸If I would count them, they are more than the sand.
   I awake, and I am still with you."

How can we ever cease to praise God for His good gifts?
This is my prayer today.

Dear Lord,

                I just want to thank you for the wonderful gift of life that you have given me.  You alone saw me and knew me before anyone else did.  You blessed me with a wonderful family you taught me to love You.  You have given me great and wonderful gifts all of my life.  You saw me on the day of my birth and all the days of my childhood and preserved my life.  You knew the hardships I would face and gave me the strength to carry on, even when things seemed desperate.   You have truly never left my side.  And I can never praise You enough for that.  Everything good in my life has come from You, nothing that I do on my own matters.  

                My life has changed in unimaginable ways over the past year.  One year ago, I didn’t know what Southern Seminary was, I had never heard of Ninth and O Baptist Church or the Gardner School, and I didn’t know my little room in Mullins hall existed.  Yet all of these have become a major part of my life.  Even more so, I had never met some of the best friends and mentors that I now have.  I am amazed at the good gifts that you have given me.  I have done nothing to deserve them, yet You continue to bless me. 

                Thank you Lord, for blessing me with 24 years of life.  I pray that you will continue to bless me with many more years and that you will guide my ways so that I will never stray from the plan that You have for my life.  I know that true life comes from You alone.  All that I can offer you in return is my life, so I pray that You would take it and use the rest of my years in whatever way it pleases You. 

Thank you Lord, Amen.

Some the best things from the past year of my life:

My new nephew Truitt!

Living close enough to my sister to have my nephew over for the day

Having the ability to study and learn no matter how difficult it is.

New Friends!

More new friends!

My amazing family!

The ability to be a student at SBTS and grow closet to God everyday!

In Memory of Amanda and Matt

Dear Amanda,

You don’t know it, but I think of you often.  I think that I will always remember best the last day that we saw each other.  It was Halloween and Alisha and I were dressed up as Indians.  Before long the plot was set and you were the mommy and I was the baby.  We ran and laughed and played until it was time to leave.  I wonder if the day would have been any different if we’d known it was our last chance to play together.   The next morning I didn’t understand why you were gone.  I thank God that I didn’t understand because I was only 7 and no child should have to understand what happened to you.   But I did understand that you were gone and that I missed you.  Many years have gone by now and I have moved on and grown up.  Over the years, God revealed to me that I was going to work children.  I would have never imagined that I would work with kids but here I am.  There are so many kids out there that need to be loved and cared for.  I have to keep fighting for them because they are important and they deserve to know that they are important.  I don’t know why God choose to let me live today while you remain forever 12 years old.  But I want you to know that your life was not unimportant.  When my work is too hard and I am filled with despair I remember you.  It’s not fair that you never got to grow up.  It makes me mad that someone would hurt you but unfortunately, there is nothing that I can do to change the past.  I can do something, though I may not always know what, to change what will happen in the future.  So when I’m teaching a child English, rocking a baby to sleep, or loving an orphaned child I am thinking of you.  You don’t know it, but you are my inspiration.  I won’t let evil win.  I won’t forget about you or let indifference reside.  I will fight for the ones who can’t fight for themselves and through this I pray that your short life will be the inspiration that gives life to many others.

Honored to have known you,

Brittany

Please God Let It Be

God has truly given me a beautiful day.  As always, I wonder why God decided to bless me so.  I finally finished writing my 15 page paper on the Brahman of India.  I also finally was able to get away from the seminary and spend some time at the park enjoying the beautiful fall colors and some good company.  Then, this evening I got to go to a Reformation Service on campus.  Once again, God has blessed me when I didn’t deserve to be blessed.  But with this blessing, he also reminded me that not everyone has a beautiful day like me.  There are still millions of orphans in the world who need to be loved.   Most days I wish I was finished at Seminary so I could go to them, but I know the time isn’t right yet.  There is still a famine in West Africa.  There are thousands of Hindus, Muslims and Buddhists who will die today without every coming to know God.  But anyway I was thinking today about how cool it would be if every person in the world knew God and his never-ending love.  Can you picture it?  I don’t know if it is even possible for all of the people in the world to hear and accept the gospel in my lifetime but I am going to pray that God would let it happen. 

Please God let it be

I’m picturing a world

And praying that God will let it be

From the fields of sweet Ohio

To the clear blue South China Sea

A world filled with nothing but believers

The Buddhist priest bowing down at noon

And praising our God instead

Please God let it be soon

I’m picturing a world

Turning golden as God is praised

Each orphan cry answered

God let our world be saved

Please God let it be

Human trafficking ends in India

The hungry in West Africa are fed

Please God consider this idea

I’m picturing a world

Where your name is spoken freely

And the whole world knows your love

Please God let it be

This is from Cherokee Park in Louisville.  Isn't it beautiful?

Things That Make Me Happy

Hello friends,

What a week! I feel like I've done nothing but write research papers all week, but still have so much more work to do.  The weather has been cold and rainy, which means the kids at work are crazy!  You all know how kids get when they can't go outside and play all day.  So somewhere over the course of this week I decided to make a list of little, everyday things that make me happy.  You should try it sometime.  It's theraputic. 

1. Doing laundry and knowing for next couple of hours that all of my clothing is clean.
2. The hilarious things that kids at the preschool say.
3. Listening to A Capella.
4. Talking to friends on the other side of the world.
5. Finding notes in my Bible that I forgot I had.
6. Reading the news from my hometown.
7. Drinking a cup of coffee that is exceptionally good.
8. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming.

Ok, that's all I have for now!  I guess I'll continue my research paper now.  I'm writing a people group profile on the Brahman of India.  They are one of the largest groups in India and hold a priestly status within the caste system.  They are a very difficult group to reach because many of them are Hindu priests.  There are few if any believers among this people group.  There are approximately 57,835,000 Brahmans.  Please pray for the Brahman of India this week!  Pray that they would be open to the gospel and for the missionaries who are sent to share the gospel with them.  And if it's not too much to ask, pray for me as I write this research paper!  Pray that I would have the knowledge and motivation to write it.  Thank you!!!

Remember the words of  1 Peter 1:8, "Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory." 

This picture really has nothing to do with nothing, but it makes me happy because my dog is in it and you can see my bright yellow walls in the background!

Beautiful, Bright, Blue

I was out on the playground today with the kids when I noticed one little boy staring at the sky.  I looked up but I didn't anything so I said, "What do you see?"  He answered' "The sky," then added, "it's neat."  I agree with him, the sky was neat today.  No clouds at all, just beautiful, bright, blue. 
Kids always notice things like that.  That's one of the reasons why I think kids are so neat.  I was too busy to notice the sky until he pointed it out to me.  And I thought I was the teacher!

It's fall break this week at the Seminary and I've really enjoyed the extra sleep!  Please continue praying for me as I still have two months of school before winter break and many papers to write and books to read.  Praise God for the opportunity to study here and learn so much! 

I recently came across some beautiful scripture in Deuteronomy that I would like to share with you.

"For the LORD your God has blessed you in all the work of your hands. He knows your going through this great wilderness. These forty years the LORD your God has been with you. You have lacked nothing."'
Deuteronomy 2:7

What a wonderful promise! In this passage Moses is recounting all the Isrealites have been through in their exodus from Egypt.  God was with the Isrealites and blessed all the work of their hands because they were His people.  Aren't we also God's people?  I love how the verse ends as well, "You have lacked nothing."  God didn't promise the Isrealites an easy life, but he did ensure that they lacked nothing.  It's a wonderful thing to think that God also knows where I have been.  He has never left my side and I can truly say I have lacked nothing. It's even more amazing to consider that God knows my future as well and that He is going to be there every step of the way! 

How Wonderful

Who is this God

Who numbered the hairs on my head

And how does he know

When I rise and go to bed?

Who is this God

Who even cares to know my name

Knows my wandering thoughts

And loves me just the same

How wonderful, how wonderful

This being called God must be

And to think one such as he

Loves a sinner such as me

Who is this God

Who cares to know my fears

Yet walks with every man

On all distant frontiers

Who is this God

And how can I know him more

There is nothing like Him

That I’ve ever known before

How wonderful, how wonderful

This being called God must be

And to think one such as he

Loves a sinner such as me

Who is this God

Whose glory ever abounds

However could I please Him

With these simple human sounds

Who is this God

Who can touch my very heart

I know I’ll always praise Him

and never wish to part

Giggle Breaks

Today just seems like a good day for a laugh.  Maybe it’s because my kids at work made me laugh today, or maybe it’s the early onset of a three day weekend with family and all things good but it just seems like a good day for a laugh. 

What a strange experience it is to go every day from graduate level seminary classes to the 2 year old world of potty training.  My professors do a pretty good job of being entertaining however it’s the random, unexpected comments from my daycare kids that really get me going.  So here are some of the things that they tell me:

Little girl at naptime:  Did your brother paint your fingernails?

While waiting for parents to arrive at the end of the day:

Boy: what are we doing?

Me: we’re cleaning our classroom, then your dad’s going to come and pick you up, then I am going to go home.

Boy: (laughing) you can’t go home, you stay here!

Me: No, I go home at the end of the day too.  I have to go home and see my mommy too.

Boy: (laughing more) You don’t have a mommy!

Little girl in the lunch line: Are you a girl?

Little girls at potty time:

Girl 1: I have pink princess underwear, what do you have?

Girl 2: I have tink-owr-belle!

Girl 1: Miss Brittany do you have Tinkerbelle underwear?

And my fave…

Little boy at snack time eating a popsicle:

Boy: (starts crying hysterically) My popsicle is up-side-down!!!

(I take the popsicle from him and turn it around and give it back.)

Boy: thank you!

That’s all I can remember right now but I’ll post more as the kids say them.  I think it’s so important to always be looking for the things in life to be happy about.  Sometimes working with 2 and 3 year olds can be no fun at all, but when I remember that I am doing things for God and not I it’s a lot easier.  When I first started working at my job at the preschool, I just couldn’t understand why God would want me there.  I really feel lead to work with children in need and these kids are definitely not needy.  But they do need Jesus all the same. 

There is a teacher that I work with during naptime that I really enjoy talking to.  And believe it or not, she is not a Christian, but kinda, sorta interested in the subject.  She asks me about seminary and my church sometimes and I get to share a little about what God is teaching me.  Naptime can be pretty crazy and we only work together for an hour or two each day so sometime we don’t get to talk at all. But I am always praying for opportunities.  Please pray for this new relationship!  Also, there is another girl who is on lunch break with me that I am praying for opportunities to share the gospel with.  This girl is so negative that most days I would prefer to eat in my car than in our break room.   I’m serious, everyday it’s something.  But God didn’t put here there by accident, so pray for her, and me. 

Keep in mind that today is a wonderful day that God has given you! Don’t like opportunities to share Christ pass you by. 

"Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an Inexpressible and Glorious Joy." 1 Peter 1:8