Who's your best friend?

I have a handful of "best friends", but can I honestly say Jesus is my best friend?  This can be such an odd question/thought process and our speaker this past week, Dan Baumann, did an EXCEPTIONAL job of showing me what this actually looks like.  Dan's with the YWAM base in Kona Hawaii and it would take multiple pages to write down everything he was able to teach me. Best week yet? No doubt.  Dan has one of the most passionate relationships with Jesus that I have ever witnessed.  He has lived an incredible life of obedience to God and his insane stories are nothing but a testament of how God longs to be our best friend.

A short clip of Dan's testimony:  Dan spent 9 weeks in an Iranian prison, where he experienced the darkest times of his life.  Dan was beaten multiple times and lost over 40lbs without any sort of explanation for his imprisonment.  After 9 weeks, Dan was brought before a court to determine his future.  When asked what he was doing Iran, Dan responded by proclaiming the Lord as he began to preach uncontrollably before the Iranian court for nearly 45min.  In the end, Dan was released from prison because the Holy Spirit had moved so swiftly within the room and through his sermon.  His passion & sincerity showed the court that he was indeed a missionary & not a spy like they had suspected.  Dan walked free the next day.

Relationship with Jesus:

• Being 100% sure of what God is calling you to do is overrated.
• It is more important to know God's character so you can hear his heart.
• Everything you do for God has to come from intimacy with Him.
• Jesus wants to hangout...he likes everything about you & wants to unconditionally hangout.
• God just wants to continually show his revelation of love upon us.

Hearing God:

• Often God will lie something on our heart & then not say a word.
• We need to trust what God says first.  He is just waiting for us to commit to him.
• God is more committed to fulfill his will for our life, than we are to find it.
• The will of God, is that we fall in love with him.

Praying:

• Ask God to grab your heart to feel what he longs for.
• Lift someone up in prayer.
• Their name may have never been mentioned in heaven.  What a privilege!

God is with you:

• Where does God want you to be?
• Right where you are.
• Where is the safest place to be?
• Right where God wants you.

If we are willing to listen to God and be obedient to his calling, to the dreams he has for our lives, then we need to realize that often we're NOT going to feel ready.  God won't ask us to do something if he doesn't think we're ready & when we aren't ready, we are forced to rely on God 100%.

Not only does God want to fill our lives with surprises, but he planted our passions & interests within us so that he can use us for his purpose.  Once we place God in the middle of all our priorities, we just need to ask him to walk with us and hangout.  Yeah that may seem goofy, but all he wants to be is our best friend and that's what best friends do.  They hangout! Whether that's playing sports, cooking, going for a joy ride, a lunch date, working, watching tv, or anything you do throughout your day.  It's not about separating our sacred & secular activities, because when you're in love with someone, you welcome them into your entire day.

Something else that I found really intriguing was the fact that your emotions don't determine your passions for God.  Your emotions change all the time & often in the morning you don't feel as passionate about God as you did the night before.  But that's NOT it!  God loves us in the morning just the same & our passion for him doesn't change.

What keeps us from having passion?  Dan said passion is related to not sinning.  When we focus on not sinning, it's selfish because we're focused on how we need to change.  We're trying to fix ourselves, when Jesus is the one fixing us.  The best way to get over your sin - fall so madly in love with Jesus that you become obsessed & lose yourself.

Fact: Many Christians are so bored.  Well I have news for you... God is NEVER boring.  Passion is a steady long-term growth.  There will be ups & downs, but you need to continually seek the heart of God.

I'm sorry, but I had to share all of that.  Dan spoke so much truth and I found it so influential.  I hope there is something you're able to take away.  I am growing even closer with the community here and it's depressing to think how fast the time has flown by.  Every day that passes by here makes this place seem even more like home.  Everyone is striving to seek God with all their heart and learning these important lessons together brings us all so much closer.  I just don't feel like I could ever thank you all enough for all your support.  I can feel your prayers & I know they are making an impact!!  Gooo God!

Saturday we had Outreach Olympics & my team surprisingly took home the Gold!  The most interesting event was eating Ox brain.  Yes, Ox brain.  It smelling like grilled chicken & had the texture of a mushy egg.  It was rubbish.

Love to you all!  I enjoy hearing about your lives back home so please continue to comment, message, skype, and email me :)

"If we are told to do something, but don't know where, go somewhere!  God loves the whole world."