My name is Kaci. I am 21 years old. I am a girl.

This is Thaban. He is five years old. He loves to be held and to play. His eyes sparkle when he smiles, and so many of us on our team have fallen completely in love with him. Thaban can't speak. We are told that he does not swallow properly. Because of this, Thaban constantly has a tremendous amount of drool dripping out of his mouth and caked all over his clothes. Thaban teaches me how incredibly selfish I can be. It's often so hard to pick Thaban up when you are hot, soaked with sweat, and the last thing you want to do is have drool all over your clothes, hands, and hair. I have to say that God is definitely using this sweet little boy to show me what it means to die to myself daily. He constantly reminds me of what I must look like in comparison to God. If I could only see how I really look in relation to God, I would see so many similarities that I share with Thaban. How many times do I run to God with open arms, filthy and smelly in my humanity, and every single time God bends down, lifts me up, craddles me in his arms, and cleans me off? No matter how disgusting I am, God is never afraid that my uncleanliness will diminish his righteousness. I am so thankful for Thaban, and it is my prayer that i will no longer be too selfish to bend down, lift him up, craddle him in my arms, and clean him off.

Your Love is Extravagant

I was listening to this song during our down time the other day and this one line really struck me. I have found in my short time in Swazi that it is virtually impossible to get my hands and feet clean. No matter how many times I make an attempt to wash them, my nails seem to be caked with dirt and there is a stickiness that appears to be permanent. It would seem that our living conditions here are anything BUT extravagant. However, I have recently discovered the real meaning of extravagance. It appears that every time we pray over our day as a team, we ask God to let us be his hands and his feet to minister to his people. I am almost certain that while Jesus was on earth, he must have had filthy hands and feet. He went to the lowliest places and spent time with the dirtiest of people, and yet, he was never offended by their uncleanliness. Here was the very son of God. He was the light of the world, the hope for all of humanity, and he chose to share his extravagance with the most helpless of people. He became unclean so that we could be made pure. During our short time in Swaziland we have had the opportunity to come into contact with so many orphans. They are covered in dust, some have snot and left over food caked on their faces, some are smelly, but all are the beloved children of God. If we really want to be like Jesus, if we want to be his hands and feet, we must be willing to meet the children in their dirtiness. We must be willing to be caked with dust, snot, and odor in order to show them love. So now when I look down at my hands and feet, I don't look at them in disgust. I look at them with awe and wonder that God would use them to bring him glory. By earthly standards my hands and feet may seem to be soiled, but I believe whole heartedly that when God looks at them he smiles. He smiles because they are covered with the extravagance of his love.

Passion

So, it’s been almost an entire year since I’ve last written. It’s one in the morning, I can’t sleep, and maybe some of these thoughts floating around in my head might be worth putting out into the world…

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about Passion. In looking up the definition of the word, I came across its origin…

1125–75; ME (< class="ital-inline">passiōn- (s. of passiō ) Christ's sufferings on the cross, any of the Biblical accounts of these (> late OE passiōn ), special use of LL passiō suffering, submission, deriv. of L passus, ptp. of patī to suffer, submit; see -ion.

How incredible?!

What I’ve come to believe is that God created each one of us to be passionate about something, meaning that there is something on this earth that we were MADE for. There is something that when the sheer thought of it makes it way to our minds, makes our hearts go wild.

How often do people go through life without ever having a moment where they can stand before some thing and know, without a shadow of a doubt, that God engraved this thing deep into their hearts, long before they were born? How tragic to miss it.

What an incredible honor and privilege it is that the maker and sustainer of the universe would let us in on the miraculous things he is doing. Even more so, how silly it is that He would use us in all of our brokenness to make beautiful things happen for his Kingdom?

Look back at the origin of the word Passion. Christ’s sufferings on the cross. Sufferings? This means that our Passion is going to cost us something. Perhaps it is our comfort, our security, or even our very lives. However, I think it is safe to say, that the pursuer of the passion would say that the costs to him are nothing compared to the JOY that comes from standing face to face with his passion…to realize his part in this thing that he was created for.

Please believe that you were created to do BIG, BEAUTIFUL, CRAZY things in this world. The very same power that raised Christ from the dead is in you.

"You make beautiful things out of the dust. You make beautiful things out of us."