Slingshots and Giants

So today is a big day... My big brother, Kevin is being commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Marines! Super excited for him but sad I am missing the ceremony and picnic to follow! So excited for him!

Anyways, after my last slightly sad and challenging blog, I was reading the story of David & Goliath and was looking though some of my sermon notes from the unlikely heroes series at newhope... (if you didn't catch them... make sure you do at newhopenc.org)! So yeah Pastor Scott spoke about David and being an unlikely hero. He was just a Shepard. Pastor Scott said few things that have brought me encouragement and have made me think during my journey to Haiti (whether it be in a couple months or in a couple years).

He said "The only two credentials God is looking for is Humble & Willing". I had to think about that, I am definitely willing but am I humble about my decision. I feel so strongly about my choice to move to Haiti that sometimes I don't think I am humble. Does that make sense? It may make sense to those I have spoken to about my decision. Needless to say... I really need to work on my humility and being humble not only in my decision, but in my life.

Pastor Scott also said that God is trains world changing heroes through their daily routines and asked how much we complain about routines... but David did the same thing day in and day out but his job was to protect those sheep from predators such as lions (Did you know David killed a lion before defeating Goliath? You should check out his story in 1 Samuel... it's a good one!). You know what weapon he had? Just a slingshot! So God gave David some amazing aim and trained him well on that slingshot... I bet David never thought his slingshot skills would lead him to be king over Israel... but guess what it did! My point is, at times our lives may seem mundane and somewhat pointless but one act can change your life forever. The routine that you have been in for the last however many days, weeks, years may just be God training you to be a world changing hero or how about we just start with one.... That routine could make you a hero to one person or even better, bring them to Jesus!

So, here's the blog questions of the day. Are you an unlikely hero? Maybe you are and just don't know it! What will be your slingshot? Who/what is your Goliath?

There is one thing I keep trying to remind myself during this application process... God can make opportunities arise at any second! Haiti is on my heart and on my mind. Don't worry, I'll keep you posted of any news or decisions! Please keep on praying! 

...to be continued...

-B

A little background...

It all began on March 17.... Just kidding! Ok so here is just a little background to get this blog started.

I'm going to fast forward past the rough teenage years (you'll probably get snippets of this throughout the blog as I continue writing) start around college. I pretty much always knew I wanted to be a nurse... an oncology (cancer) nurse to be more specific but I also at that time had a heart for Africa and thought God was leading me towards a life of medical missions overseas. I started going on short-term mission trips pretty young and continued to do them throughout college to the most recent one which was about 3 weeks ago.

My college & career path regarding becoming a registered nurse was clear until that moment where I got a C- freshman year second semester of nursing school and got held back a year. At first I just thought I'm never going to be a nurse but alas God knew what he was doing. Due to a new curriculum set into place the following school year, I essentially started fresh in the what was suppose to be a 2 year RN program. The next two years were a blur. With a little bit of low self esteem going in I was still determined to pass Gwynedd's program. During these two years I studied my butt off, worked 2-3 jobs during school, got involved with campus ministries/Alternative Spring Break/SGA, but most importantly, made life-long friendships with people I would have never met. I did a lot of these things the first year at Gwynedd too but years two & three were a lot different.

Back to the point... Although a lot had occurred and was going on, I graduated in May of 2008 from Gwynedd with my Associates of Science in Nursing! At that time the Dean of Nursing had to approve you to take the nclex... She did approve very reluctantly but told me straight up that due to my freshman year & a practice test she didn't think I would pass the boards. Well, you already know how this story ends. I passed the boards in 75 questions on the first time and made sure she knew.

God always has the right timing. I was able to get an oncology job right out of nursing school after working as a tech in the NICU for a little over a year during school (thanks again Mary for helping me get that job!). About two years later I found God calling me to NC where I've been working for the past two years at Duke in Oncology and graduated from Drexel University in December 2011 with my Bachelors of Science in Nursing!!! Yay, for signing RN, BSN behind my name! Again, these two years have been a blur but God placed me exactly where I needed to be, in the church I needed to be in, with a new group of friends that I needed to be with.

So with all that said it leads me up to getting to my main focus of this blog... Deepening my relationship with God, becoming debt free, & moving to Haiti.

...to be continued...

-B