Buckle up!! This is a long one, but this month was full of wonderful things! 

Over the last several weeks, the Lord has revealed to me how much I crave mindlessness. In my  position, I often experience decision fatigue, overstimulation, and both mental and physical exhaustion. So when I have free time, all I want to do is something that doesn’t require any thought – scrolling social media, playing games on my phone, sleeping all day, etc. 

If you’ve followed my blogs, you may remember me mentioning that I have found myself in a season of spiritual dryness lately. For me, that means I have been without a genuine longing for time in the Word and in prayer and if I do force myself to spend the time, I have an extremely difficult time concentrating as any pending tasks tend to overtake my mind. Going to mindless things when I’m feeling overwhelmed has only led to me being more exhausted and overwhelmed and less connected to my Creator. This is something I have been working through and praying about with my mentor and some trusted friends lately and would love for you to join me in prayer about this. 

Along with bringing awareness of the power that mindlessness has on me, the Lord has also put Sabbath heavily on my heart and is lovingly correcting me about what it actually is. 

When I was younger, I used to think the Sabbath was simply not missing church on Sundays and doing nothing the rest of that day. As I grew older, I realized this wasn’t necessarily the case, but I guess I didn’t see Sabbath for what it actually is or really see a huge importance on it. As I’ve grown in my faith, I’ve realized that it is a command given by God not to earn favor or to legalistically comply with a set of rules, but it is a command given to us as a gift. 

You see, the heart of Sabbath is to be filled. It is to be filled with the fullness of the presence of God and His Word. It is an invitation into an intimate relationship with the Lord where you can rest in Him rather than relying on your own strength. 

In diving into what the bible says about the Sabbath, I have found that simply put, it is a time of rest and worship. The Israelites originally observed it by resting from their work, honoring God, and reflecting on His covenant with His people. Reflecting on the covenant the Lord made with His people ultimately points us to Jesus, who is Lord of the Sabbath as we see in Mark 2:23-28. And praise the Lord for Jesus who has redeemed us to walk in the calling that the Lord originally created us for – to be intimately connected to Him. 

When it comes to rest, I think back to Adam and Eve. They were created on the 6th day of creation. So their first full day on earth was a day of rest in perfect communion with God. If God designed Adam and Eve’s bodies (which resided in a perfect world, knew no ailments, and physically communed with God) to need rest, then how much more important is it that my body (which resides in a broken world, knows many ailments, and can’t physically commune with God in the same way Adam and Eve did) gets rest! And I don’t believe this is just physical rest we’re talking about, but a spiritual rest – a giving up of the burdens that we cling to and entering full reliance on the Lord and His strength. 

If you’ve read my prayer requests over the last several months, you have seen that I am continuously praying for both spiritual and physical rest. That’s what I need and want and mindlessness isn’t getting me anywhere. 

God commands us to remember the Sabbath by keeping it holy. Holiness doesn’t exist outside of the One who is perfectly and completely holy. You can do all the “right” things on the outside while completely missing the entire point if communing with the Lord isn’t the focus. Jesus referred to the Pharisees as “whitewashed tombs” – righteous on the outside and dead on the inside. The Sabbath is a command, but the goal isn’t legalism. It’s a relationship. 

So, I am currently learning to consistently take a Sabbath each week and to protect it at all costs. I will admit that it’s extremely hard to be consistent. However, I strive to take a day each week of intentional time in the Word, in prayer, and in worship while also giving my body physical rest. Since I started doing this about 2 months ago, I have seen how the streams of Living Water have begun to quench my thirst. I have grown in my longing to relish in God’s Word and spend time with Him. When mindlessness tempts me, the Holy Spirit tugs on my heart to open God’s Word. I have seen the Lord working so much in me through this and I pray that He continually uses it to strengthen me and grow me in Him! 

If you’re in a season of spiritual dryness, I encourage you to regularly take intentional time in the Word even if you don’t feel like it. Keep filling your mind the the Truth and pray that the Lord would give you a renewed longing for Him and His presence!

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March Updates:

It has honestly been such a great month for me full of sweet, intentional time with people (which is something I’ve really been craving)! 

I started the month off by spending time with Adia and Monchy at their campo house. I helped Adia cook campo style and helped Monchy paint a room! It was nice to be able to spend time with them and just be out in the country for a bit! 

Dolly has taken 2 trips to the capital this month – once for bloodwork and an ultrasound and once for another surgery (bless her soul). Turns out that when she was fixed, the surgeon left an entire ovary and it got infected. So I took her to the capital to have it removed. She is still healing, but it’s been harder to keep her still this time. She’s going a little stir crazy and ended up opening her incision site a bit. So I’m keeping that wound clean and putting on a cream to help it heal from the inside out. 

We have been able to do a lot this month to celebrate Sarah’s time here in San Juan. We took a beach trip for Sarah with some of her closest friends here and roasted hotdogs on the beach! The pastors at our church recognized her for her service and prayed for her. And we had a farewell party that turned out so beautifully where Hector, Pastor Sobe, and Alejandro spoke and prayed for her and she was able to spend lots of time with people who became family here. 

My Bible study group has started a new study on 1 Peter written by Kyle Idleman and so far it has been so good! I have really loved getting closer with some of the girls who come and our group is growing which is such a blessing! Please continue to pray for this to be an edifying time full of personal spiritual growth for each of us and for us to grow as the body of Christ. 

Sarah, Kelsi, and I have sought out some opportunities to be poured into lately which has been great. First, Adam Keesling (one of our board members) and his wife, Rebecca, have begun to meet with us virtually to just check in, be in the Word, and pray with us. We are also going through the book of 1 Peter together! Second, Tiffany and Chrystal from Pine Hills have been doing a spiritual gifts study with us called Unique Calling and it has been so good! Time with each of them has been such a blessing and I’m so thankful that they are willing to do this with us! 

This month, two very special teams were here and I loved getting to spend time with them. 

First we had a team from University of Indiana. Maria and Kristen are such intentional people and I loved having them here! It was fun to talk about memories from last year – when Kristen hit behind the trash shed and popped out and scared Maria as she was taking out the trash! Maria, if you’re reading this, I have a confession… Someone left us a rubber snake last month and I was going to put it in your bed, but Kristen said you might actually have a heart attack, so I didn’t. 😂 The students with this team were all awesome and we even had one returner! I really enjoyed getting to know them, too! 

Next we hosted a team from Concord, NC, which is an extremely special team for me. I met Pastor Earl on my first trip to the DR and then came down with this team in October of 2022 to help Kamanda with student sponsorship, which didn’t actually happen because someone’s passport got stolen and I stayed in the capital with them to help translate and navigate the situation. Even though that’s not what I had planned, the Lord’s plans were better. It allowed me to get to know the team a lot more. On that same trip, Pastor Earl had asked me if I ever saw myself moving down here to work in ministry and told him that that was actually what I was praying for (little did he know that that was already in the works). This team was then one of the first teams that came when I moved down here and arrived last year on the day that my grandpa passed. So in summary, they have been with me through a lot and hold a very special place in my heart. They even host a get together every time I’m home which is more special than they will ever know. 

This past week, Brayden (who will be interning with us this summer) and Kim stayed back with me one day to help me around the guest house. What would have normally taken me the entire day to get done by myself only took us about 3.5 hours to conquer. Many hands really do make light work. It was such a blessing to be able to get things done and have a little time to rest and relax before the team got back from the workday. I’m excited to have Brayden and Lizzie (from my home church) here with me this summer to make sure everything runs smoothly! I know they will both be a huge help! 

I went with the Concord team back to the capital and spent some time with them in the colonial zone at one of my favorite museums which was so fun! One of the workers recognized me since I’ve been there various times and told me that they should hire me! Haha I told them that once my time with Solid Rock comes to an end, I might just call them! 

Anywho.. It was so fun to get to see lots of familiar faces this month and get to know new ones! It’s incredible how you can spend one week a year with people and they can feel like family. And what a blessing that is to experience that feeling! 

Hazel found a home!! We had a new ministry assistant working last week and he came up to me on Wednesday and said, “You have a lot of dogs. Can I have one?” Mind you, Sarah’s dogs were also at the guesthouse last week so there were 5 in total. Haha but he left with Hazel on his moto on Thursday. I really hope they end up being a good fit for each other! 

Thanks for sticking with me through this really long blog post! I’m just very excited about how the Lord is moving in my life!

Prayer requests: 

• Praise that the Lord has renewed in me a longing for time with Him in His Word (please pray for continued growth in this)
• Consistency in keeping the Sabbath 
• Kelsi, Hector, and I adjusting to not having Sarah here 
• The search to add to our team – that the Lord would bring someone who is a good fit for our team