Kristin

 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore

The Lord has been teaching me to trust Him more and more when I speak with people about Him. I struggle with fear, though God gives us a spirit of power and love, not timidity. I used to try to go in with a script in my head and I depended upon that. He has been showing me over and over these past few months how much better conversations about Him go if I let Him lead.

The first person I experienced this with was a new neighbor, beginning in June when we got back from our honeymoon, named Kristin. She was severely anorexic. She was quite literally skin and bones. her cheeks were sunken in. She was only 26 but she looked so aged, so old. She would come over a lot, sometimes just to talk, sometimes desperate for food. She lived next door with her mom and I knew she must be provided for so I didn’t understand this until a couple of weeks ago. Her mom told me she could only keep enough food in the house for one day at a time or she would binge and purge and potentially kill herself.

One week she went into the hospital at under 70 pounds and I prayed she would live because I wanted to share the gospel with her so desperately and I hated the idea that she should die before I had found out whether she knew the Lord.

She came home and a few days later asked me if I would sign a do not resuscitate form for her (she needed someone who wasn’t related) I told her I just couldn’t, her life was too precious. I really just did not want to take away any opportunity she might one day have to hear the gospel. I went upstairs and hit my knees in the living room and just asked God “what do I do with this?” I felt Him saying, so gently, “You’ve been wanting an opportunity to talk with her about Me, she just told you she didn’t have much time left, this is a pretty big opening! Get up, go over there and knock on the door.” I did, only by God's mercy.

She opened the door and I could tell she was upset with me but she tried to be patient. She just wanted rest from this battle she’d been fighting for 12+ years and I was the one keeping her from it. I asked her to come out on the porch. She sat on a chair and I knelt beside her and said, “if it’s getting this serious, Kristin, have you thought about where you’re going when you die?” She said “Yes, I’ll be with the Lord.” It was one of the sweetest surprises of my life!

 I asked her to explain a little more about what she believed and she said “I believe Jesus died for my sins and that there is nothing I can do that He won’t forgive.” She knew the gospel, she knew what she needed to be saved: that she was a sinner, like all of us, separated from God and that Christ came to die for her sins to redeem her, that, out of His grace, He suffered the death she deserved so she could be reconciled to her Father. I was satisfied.

“Okay," I said, "I will sign the form for you if that is really what you want, I just couldn't without knowing.” She said "yes" and we went inside. As I was leaving I thanked her for being open with me and she said, “thank you for thinking enough of me to ask.”

I got to talk with Kristin a few more times after this and hear a bit more of her story. She died a few weeks later at under 60 pounds. I got to visit with her mom and see a picture of her healthy, as I only imagined I would see her in heaven. She was so beautiful and I know, in the presence of God, she will be more glorious still! I can’t wait to see her glorified and free from pain and suffering!

"Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth...And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God...'Behold the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. And He who was seated on the throne said, 'Behold, I am making all things new." - Revelation 21:1-5

"Go and Make Disciples"

A cool thought: We can all trace our spiritual heritage back to one of the apostles of Christ.

If you are a believer in Jesus Christ, in that He died to rescue & redeem you from your sins and rose again to give you hope of eternal relationship with Him, instead of infinite estrangement, then someone, somehow told you about Him.

I pray that since then, someone has worked with you, trained you as an apprentice, taught you how to develop a relationship with God, to serve and love Him, and others, in His name.

If you have been discipled like this, you are like that person's spiritual son or daughter. The person who trained your discipler is your spiritual grandmother or grandfather. So which apostle do you think is your super great grandfather in the faith?

My favorite's Peter (I love his passion and the way God uses him to demonstrate His abundant forgiveness).


The same parting words with which Jesus left our spiritual ancestors have been passed down from one generation to another along with the good news of His salvation: "Go and make disciples of all nations."  (Matt 28:19)


I have a fantastic new understanding of what this looks like after a summer of reading Master Plan of Evangelism with the lovely Shannon Morton who has so graciously been discipling me. "Make disciples" does NOT just mean "Make believers, make converts," it means make believers and then train them into maturity.
 
Give them someone to whom they can be an apprentice, someone walking closely with the Lord, whom they can imitate and in so doing imitate God!

It means, teach them to observe all that He has commanded us! (Matt 28:20) It means teach them to LOVE HIM with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to LOVE OTHERS as themselves. This is all He has commanded us!

 {Me with Erin, my Bible Study leader from last year, Shannon, and Mark, in the background, all of whom have taught me more by their examples than could ever be put into words}

I dare say people learn best by observation and imitation. Just LOVE HIM. LOVE OTHERS. and find younger believers or people who don't know God to bring into your life.

Just let them hang out with you and your family or friends, follow you around, see how you are kind to your waiter, or patient in traffic, or quick to come to someone's service without desiring that your good deed be noticed. Let them see you pray before making a big decision, or use the Word to govern your behavior.

In just letting someone watch you walk with Him, you will teach them to walk with Him, and you will make a true disciple.

We don't want to just make believers who will stay baby Christians, unable to digest solid food. Feed them scripture, feed them an example, and watch them mature from believer to disciple, a disciple who will be able to make more disciples for His glory!

I am so grateful for this new understanding as we go into directing Doulos this fall. We get to be part of the lives of all of these precious freshmen and hopefully provide them with good examples in their sophomore leaders who are growing with the Lord and who can train them to follow Him!

Costa Rica! Pura Vida!

Hey Everyone!

Here is a peak at our AWESOME honeymoon to Costa Rica! Enjoy :)

The first place we stayed was on an organic coffee plantation where we went on a tour of the farm and had a coffee tasting.

Our tour guide Leo showed us how they use banana trees to irrigate the coffee plants and plant fruit trees amidst the coffee plants to draw bugs away from the coffee (organic pesticides. Bummer for the fruit trees...)

  

Unroasted Coffee Beans

 Roasted Coffee Beans

We learned how to discern bad coffee from good (in this case old from new).  A coffee tasting is called a "cupping". You try to detect different aromas and tastes, which part of your tongue the coffee stimulates most.  Mark is well on his way to being a coffee conosouir.

 Part of the cupping was to cleanse the palate by slurpping water noisily in between tastes of coffee and also slurpping the coffee from a spoon (you taste it better that way) Mark was a natural!

The next day we hiked to a volcano, El Poas, the second largest crater in the world. No one knew what the first was, it didn't seem to matter. The important thing was that theirs was the second!

 

Our balcony at Finca Rosa after an afternoon rain...

 It was the start of the rainy season while we were there which meant bright sunny mornings and cozy rainy afternoons!

On the way to our second hotel we stopped in a topiary garden!

 

El Silencio was our dream world! So much beauty! God is truly incredible to gift us with a world like this to enjoy! Imagine what heaven will be like!!!

                             

Everything we ate here was organic as well. They had their own organic vegetable garden and chickens for eggs (not to eat) we could pet them :)

We went hiking to three waterfalls and to a town nearby where the school that the hotel patronizes is located. We got to walk through an orchid garden and have a tortilla making lesson.

Most Amazing porch in the world!

Sad to say we were unable to get pictures of us zip-lining and white water rafting. Would have been a little tricky I guess.


We hope you enjoy these!
love,
the Luffs


P.S. "Pura Vida" seems to be the national saying there. It is used as a greeting, a response to "how are you?", a celebratory declaration. As best we can tell the essence of its meaning is "life is good!"