How God is working in me lately.

God has really been teaching me a lot of lessons lately and i would like to tell you all what has been put on my heart. Unless you go to school with me you probably dont know whats happening in my life, so let me fill you in. Basically everyone around me is sick or somewhere around the world doing something dangerous. and not just like cough cough sniffle sick. my aunt and uncle are living in Tanzania for ten years bringing the Bible to 6 unreached people groups. my friend is moving to Zambia for 6 months to preach to the people there. My cousin and his wife are desperately trying to have a baby but cant. my friend's dad has cancer in both his lungs and isnt reacting well to the chemo. my friend from dance [13 years old] was diagnosed with skin cancer a week ago. my 3 year old cousin abigail was diagnosed with leukemia at the beginning of this year. she will be on chemo until she is six. her hair fell out on christmas.

whew... so there it is. my life in a paragraph. well as you can imagine my trust in God was really faultering by the time all this started happening. i mean i can understand most of it the people preaching but my aunt and uncle have never been gone for ten years before. and my cousin. she is three years old. the whole family is christian and of all of them why this little girl? i just couldnt rap my mind around how God could do this to such a little girl. i couldnt believe it was all a part of his plan. i mean SHES THREE! but i was reading her moms blog [shelly] and i couldnt help but get angry because her trust in God is so incredibly strong. she's always saying, "God wouldnt give me a struggle i couldnt handle" and "if this is God's will then let it be done"

i couldnt understand. a young mother was just told her three year old daughter was diagnosed with leukemia and shes saying let it be done if its gods will. i cant help but think that if i was in that position the only thing i would be thinking is HELLO! GOD? WHERE THE HECK ARE YA? i mean i was really truly angry at God for doing this to my cousin. but there were two things that helped me rebuild that strength in my trust. 1. the next day i opened up the blog to see how she was doing and there was just one picture with a caption under it. it was a picture of my cousin laying in her hospital bed praying and the caption said "i didnt tell her to i just walked in and saw her praying"

this was the first time i really understood the concept of having faith like a child.
2. i opened up my bible to read [i know shocker you can actually read a bible when you arent at school or church] some of the book of proverbs and i came to [my now favorite verse] Proverbs 19:21 "Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the LORD's purpose that prevails."

if i got to choose, if my plans prevailed my cousin wouldnt be sick my family would be home with me my cousin would be able to have a baby my friend wouldnt have skin cancer my friends dad wouldnt have lung cancer BUT....

-if life was perfect how would we ever learn?
-if we were fine why would we need salvation?
-if we werent tested how could we ever relate to one another and GROW?

ok im done ;]

hannah