November 21st, 2022 – 11:46am – Haifa Hostel, Haifa, Israel:

Surrender. I slept and now I am laying in bed still in the hostel in Haifa. My body feels weak. I am still exhausted.

I am not giving up. Not giving in. I am going instead to surrender to God my life once again. I release the pressure for success or failure. Neither are my business here… I obeyed and came to Israel because God asked me to. So I will stay here and continue with my Hebrew class and see it to the end.

I am going to remind myself that what God chooses to do with my life is His business. My only job, task, assignment, calling is to love Him and love the people around me. And that I can do with His help.

So I lay down all expectations and all that other pressure crap. I’m going to enjoy being here in Israel. I am going to enjoy learning what I can of Hebrew one day at a time. I am going to enjoy being in this hostel day after day. Because the people I have met along the way mean more to me than anything. I have loved each one so much and the time I’ve had with them matters.

So I’m reminding myself once again of what God asked me to come here. To love. Not perfectly no… just love in the way that I love.

Today I will rest and let my body heal. Today I will ask God to restore my strength. And tomorrow I’ll continue with my class… and let God do what He is doing with my life.

If ever there was a moment for me to ask you who is reading this to pray for me… now is that time. I need you to ask God to fill me with strength and courage to finish the task He sent me here for. My story is only beginning. Day after day God is writing my story, actually He is writing our story… His and mine. And it’s being written for you. Wherever you are and whoever you are… my story is for you. To encourage you to keep walking forward. To keep calling out to Him in the midst of the despair and loneliness and struggles. Trust Him to complete His work in you… like I am. Trust that He knows better. Trust that His way is the best way. Trust His timing and His process of transforming and renewing. If you fall, get back up. If you fail let it go. If you succeed pay it no mind… keep walking forward.

He is the Living God. He is the only God. And He is the only One worth worshiping and serving in this world.

If God can take a gay man, passed out in a parking lot and bring that man all the way to Israel to share His love with people… what can He do with your life?

None of this I have done in my own strength… hahahaha not at all. If you knew me you’d know what a utter failure I am… but I said Yes. And I continue to say Yes. Because I know that God can take a wreck and use it to bring Him glory. And so I pray this prayer today:

Father, here I am. So weak and so broken. I don’t have much left to give you. I want to quit. I’m tired and alone in a land that isn’t my own. I’m struggling to just get through the next moment. But if you will… use my life to show who you are. Use my life to show your power and your grace. Give me boldness more and more in this world to speak of who you are. Transform me from the inside out to be more and more like Jesus. I want to be a man who stops and prays for the blind and broken of the world. Please help me Father! For your glory! Help me! Take all I am and use my life to bring your Name glory! In Jesus name I pray! Amen!