Pieces of the puzzle..

     We just finished our fifth week, and I am feeling the homesickness I was warned of for the second month. This week I was able to Skype/FaceTime with quite a few people for the first time, which was awesome and sad all at the same time. Among that list was Sammy, Brit and my brother, all of whom I love and miss very much. Adding to the homesickness of month two is the fact that I am missing three of my closest friends birthdays all in one month (Jess, Kayla and Sammy). Even though its been tough this past week, I don't regret my decision to come here one bit. I keep reminding myself that I only have 20 weeks left with this wonderful little family that God has blessed me with. There will be tough weeks, but I am surrounded by an extremely supportive group here and also many supportive friends and family back home that continue to give me so much love and encouragement.

      This past week was not as mentally challenging as past weeks, but it was a lot of useful and practical information. The first half of the week was about discipleship, which reminded me a lot of what we teach our students back home. The second half of the week was focused on social justice, mainly human trafficking. I was so thankful for the practical information Margrit Thompson gave us about how to work with women whether on the streets or in the brothels, and that night we put it to practice! It was international women's day, so we took gifts out to the women. Two groups took the streets, and the other group took two brothels a little outside of town. I was in the streets, and I can't do the stories justice of how it went. It was a difficult but amazing night. Watching how the women reacted to just simple gifts and gestures of love and care really was heartbreaking, but it made me so thankful that God is using me for this ministry. His timing is so perfect. My favorite story from the night wasn't from prostitutes but two women that are alcoholics. We saw them a ways down the road outside of an alcohol shop. When we approached and gave them the gifts, they told us that 10 minutes before we got there they had just said, "It's international women's day, and no one gave us a gift!" Yeah... go God. The one woman immediately cried tears of joy, and before we knew it the conversation opened up and give one of our students the chance to speak a little about our great God that loves all, even them. The conversation ended in big hugs and saying they would be at our Thursday community night next week! I really hope we get to see them again. 

     I love looking back on the past few years and realizing how God has been preparing me for this. Four years ago after my first Passion conference I felt a pull in my heart to work with women who were in human trafficking, but I didn't know if it would ever happen. But God new the desires of my heart - to get to really know Him better, to work with these women, and my dreams to travel. Little did I know, He was planning to trump every dream I ever had with plans far bigger than I ever expected. So here I am now in the Czech Republic, realizing God spent the last 3-4 years preparing me to be here. My appetite for more "adventurous" foods changed a lot (thank goodness!), I went to 3 more Passion conferences, I took 2 levels of multicultural education, and then an entire semester of human services and counseling. Looking back and realizing that they were all just pieces to the puzzle is so exciting. I know that this DTS is just another piece of the puzzle, and its definitely a big piece! 

     I'm long winded today, sorry! I guess I'm making up for how little I spoke last weekend.

Lastly, we spoke about outreach this week! Our whole group will be in Eastern Europe, but we will be in two groups. We first chose regions, and this coming week we will have more definite teams and locations. The two regions are split according to the sea they border Adriatic (Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, and Albania) and Black (Romania, Moldova, Bulgaria, and Turkey). So next time I post, it will most likely be to announce where I will be from the end of April to the end of June!

Thanks for taking the time to read this super long post!  :)