I walked so far in one direction,
prostituted my perspective
to just one frame of mind.
I don't know just how far I've strayed
but the dark I made my hiding place
is savage, and unfriendly, and unkind.
I guess what I am asking You,
is can the doubter be redeemed,
will this blind girl ever see,
I want so badly to believe again...
I traded hope for questions,
and attached my faith to answers
only answers never came
and so my faith became a cancer
that infected every cell of me
that couldn't stand on blind belief,
but distance has been agony
....how could You love me still?
My desperate heart is finally at
a breaking point,
to choose a path
to follow or forsake the very thing I long to know.
And as I reflect on the things
that kept me back, the questionings
it all seems so extremely
ridiculous.
A prose that changes tempo,
without rhythm, without guile
seems the perfect way to tell you
just how foolish is this child
for thinking that my faith depended
on my understanding
or lack of...
but never Your love.
I walked so far in one direction,
to find that you pursued me all the way.
How comforting to know You don't
disqualify the doubting heart,
neither do you ask me to
retrace the steps I've strayed
for Your blood has been sufficient
to bridge the gap I made.
Thanks for meeting me at where I'm at,
in this place.
So I guess this non-poem is my (less than) biblical equivalent
of erecting a memorial, a epitomized monument
to Your faithfulness while I wandered
but what's lost is found,
at least today.
but when I look back on this meager non-poem
I'll remember
and I will praise.
Saturday, January 10, 2015
Thursday, November 20, 2014
This time of year is always the hardest for me. The darkest and bleakest. It doesn't seem to be bound by the circumstances in my life... I have far too much to be thankful for for that. It just comes in like a heavy fog and blankets my heart. I can feel winter coming, as my veins turn to ice and my heart freezes over. I can see my footprints, they outline for me how many times I've fallen and how few steps I have taken. The breaths I manage to catch linger in the air. And all I want to do is hibernate... find some cozy safe place, indulge a little too much in comfort food, and ride it out. Wake up when things are thawing and hope is new again.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
His Power is Made PERFECT in Weakness
It's been one of those weeks. You know the kind I am referring to? The ridiculous "everything-that-could-go-wrong-has-please-Lord-don't-make-me-get-out-of-bed-until-next-week kind of weeks. In the throws of it all, I have silently stewed over missed turns, complained loudly about the patient that rings the bell just a little too much, and overall simply buried compassion while I was too busy feeling sorry for myself for having to get out of bed at all.
It comes down to this: I am extremely frustrated by my weaknesses.
I am not one to take failure in stride;it shakes me every time I respond in a way I'm not proud of, or the times that I am unable to succeed at a task that I want to do well.
I am finding myself so ravaged by insecurity these days that I "extrapolate my hatred of my own weakness onto the world around me", and every interaction I have is impacted by my fear of failing. And fail I do, over and over again, countless times before the day ends!
In less than a month, I will be in Haiti. As the trip draws closer and closer, more and more this lie has built up and put itself on a little throne, declaring the words
"YOU ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH"
And I have believed them.
The symptoms of my weakness are showing through in my relationships, in the kind of nurse I am when I step onto my unit, and in the state of exhaustion that I have been living in. With this trip literally weeks away, I have been terrified. "Could there really be a more inconvenient time to be coming face to face with your insufficiency? How can you go away like this?" I think.
But then I remember... My weakness points me to the foot of the cross... my brokenness to my desperate need for a Savior. And in that, there is freedom, because I know that He gives grace. He is redemptive, and He redeems my ugly moments.
And all of the fears I have about not being good enough diminish when I hold them up to my Perfect Savior, a Savior who loves me wholly, who does not expect perfection from me but desires my heart, my obedience, and my trust. I withhold them all so easily when I let fear govern my life. I cannot sustain my heart, my lungs, my frame on my own strength. I have no joy, hope, or freedom apart from the Lord.
I am comforted when I think of my first interaction with Sandra Wilkins at Haiti Health Ministries via email. I asked what their requirements for volunteer nurses were, and her response to me was "Only willingness, Jessica." She didn't say I needed x amount of years of nursing experience, or that I had to be an RN instead of an LPN. She didn't ask how much creole I knew or how much time I spent reading my bible a day. She just asked that I be willing, and I think that is profoundly what the Lord asks of me...not to have all the answers, just to be willing and open to getting to know Him. Not to be whole, but rather to allow myself to be transparently broken, whatever soils I happen to be on.
It is harder for people to see Jesus in me when I hide my weaknesses. I think when my weaknesses are most exposed, people are most exposed to seeing the Jesus I love colliding with me; when His sufficient grace seeps into the caverns of my soul and restores me in impossible ways. So I have hope! For even when I fumble as a nurse, fail as a friend, disappoint as a daughter... His power and grace manifest. He is so beautifully unrestricted by my failures and unafraid of my weaknesses.
Could there be any better time to come face to face with that?!
It comes down to this: I am extremely frustrated by my weaknesses.
I am not one to take failure in stride;it shakes me every time I respond in a way I'm not proud of, or the times that I am unable to succeed at a task that I want to do well.
I am finding myself so ravaged by insecurity these days that I "extrapolate my hatred of my own weakness onto the world around me", and every interaction I have is impacted by my fear of failing. And fail I do, over and over again, countless times before the day ends!
In less than a month, I will be in Haiti. As the trip draws closer and closer, more and more this lie has built up and put itself on a little throne, declaring the words
"YOU ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH"
And I have believed them.
The symptoms of my weakness are showing through in my relationships, in the kind of nurse I am when I step onto my unit, and in the state of exhaustion that I have been living in. With this trip literally weeks away, I have been terrified. "Could there really be a more inconvenient time to be coming face to face with your insufficiency? How can you go away like this?" I think.
But then I remember... My weakness points me to the foot of the cross... my brokenness to my desperate need for a Savior. And in that, there is freedom, because I know that He gives grace. He is redemptive, and He redeems my ugly moments.
And all of the fears I have about not being good enough diminish when I hold them up to my Perfect Savior, a Savior who loves me wholly, who does not expect perfection from me but desires my heart, my obedience, and my trust. I withhold them all so easily when I let fear govern my life. I cannot sustain my heart, my lungs, my frame on my own strength. I have no joy, hope, or freedom apart from the Lord.
I am comforted when I think of my first interaction with Sandra Wilkins at Haiti Health Ministries via email. I asked what their requirements for volunteer nurses were, and her response to me was "Only willingness, Jessica." She didn't say I needed x amount of years of nursing experience, or that I had to be an RN instead of an LPN. She didn't ask how much creole I knew or how much time I spent reading my bible a day. She just asked that I be willing, and I think that is profoundly what the Lord asks of me...not to have all the answers, just to be willing and open to getting to know Him. Not to be whole, but rather to allow myself to be transparently broken, whatever soils I happen to be on.
It is harder for people to see Jesus in me when I hide my weaknesses. I think when my weaknesses are most exposed, people are most exposed to seeing the Jesus I love colliding with me; when His sufficient grace seeps into the caverns of my soul and restores me in impossible ways. So I have hope! For even when I fumble as a nurse, fail as a friend, disappoint as a daughter... His power and grace manifest. He is so beautifully unrestricted by my failures and unafraid of my weaknesses.
Could there be any better time to come face to face with that?!
Thursday, February 20, 2014
A Long Overdue Africa Post!
I am going to write something I should have written a long time ago... and it starts with an apology. One year ago, I went to Burkina Faso, West Africa with a medical team. I was graciously supported by so many amazing people... backed by my incredible church back home, the congregation at Okotoks E Free church, and also by my church family at the Miz here in Lethbridge. I intended to write, to share our adventures, to allow people into what my heart was experiencing, and yet I never followed through. I want to start off by apologizing for my immaturity in not sharing this with the very people who blew me away by coming alongside me to make it possible. I am hoping you will find this better late than never!
Just under a year ago, I was part of an 8 nurse, 3 translator team that went to Burkina Faso to do some health teaching, and to seek to understand. Over our 12 days under the scorching African sun (seriously, 49 degrees!!), we were able to attend the 10th anniversary of the BOH Boura Children's Centre, bring rice and oranges to the local prison, hold a 2 day nursing conference in Leo, visit both the hospital and the clinic in Leo, celebrate International Women's Day, and finally, attend local churches. There was so much to take in and process in such a short amount of time!
Even as I go to write, I struggle for the words. First of all, I just have to express how absolutely amazing the people of Burkina are. We were part of an even bigger team when you factored in my pastor and his family, two couples, and a small media team who were also there at the same time! We were served by those with the most joyful servant hearts I have ever encountered. There is a special kind of love you experience on Burkina soil!
One of our first days was spent at the jail. Again, words are lost to express this experience... as we walked through the small rooms where fifty men crowded to sleep each night, my heart felt so heavy. There, we met a man, twenty three years of age, who was sick with malaria to the point that he could no longer walk out of the tiny room he stayed in. His crime, they told us, was forging his birth certificate to join the army. Can you imagine? And we just looked on, because that's all we could do. We couldn't drop to our knees and tell him He was a beloved child of God, because the prison system is corrupt and we were fortunate enough to be behind the walls at all. Or maybe I could have... but I guess now, I will never know.
We walked outside the walls of the jail where they have been assisted to set up gardens to grow food for the prison. Evidently, most of the crop goes to the guards. We saw wells dug, and other projects that were built by well meaning people, but that are now either run down or in disrepair. They are projects that cannot be sustained without consistent, long term involvement.
We celebrated with Bridges of Hope and the amazing work they have done for ten years in and around the community of Boura with the work of the Children's Centre! I saw the man that leads our little Lethbridge church, a Burkinabe himself, honored for his visionary work and investment into the future of his country. I saw firsthand the amazing work that the Centre provides on our last day in Boura while every clinic staff member was present to take care of sick children.
We held a nursing conference for two days with nurses and community workers. It was an amazing exchange of learning for us as we did teaching but also learning from these amazing people who see these disease processes and rise to the occasion of meeting these needs daily.
We roamed the hospital in Leo. Privacy is not a priority in other cultures as we make it here. Rooms are shared between patients, and only medical care is provided by the nurses. Patients families are responsible to provide food, company etc. The very first encounter we had was with a man who was likely dead before we got there. We were quickly shooed away and the last thing I remember seeing as I left that room was the head nurse beginning CPR. We crossed the hallway and entered a maternity unit. A sixteen year old mother breastfeeding. A woman with tiny little twins. A ten step contrast between life and death, separated by a mere hallway. We entered the building for pediatric care, and encountered a little boy in respiratory distress. So exhausted by the effort of his breathing, he would fall asleep only to start awake when his little lungs became oxygen deprived. We watched his young parents, brows furrowed with concern, and yet so helpless. His father's face will forever be etched into my mind... I watched him reach out for his son with every labored breath. And we did the only thing we could do... we reached into our pockets and gathered some money to quietly give this family so they could transport their son to a big city in hopes that he would receive the care he needed.
We attended church, once in Leo (a smaller town), and once in Ouagadougou (the capital!). Both were the most lively services I have ever attended. I loved the dancing and the joy and the carefree harmony! In Leo, we were recruited as a team to pray for people, and I had the honor of praying with a woman who desired to receive Christ into her life!
So many things packed into twelve days. My heart could hardly process each moment. And though I saw so much and learned so much, I struggled much. I wrestled heartily with the idea of short term missions or perhaps missions at all, with what I had seen of unsustainable projects and the clash of culture with knowledge. In regards to nursing... how do we apply the knowledge that we have access to in regards to culturally appropriate care?
I struggled because it was hard to build relationship in such a short amount of time, especially in the midst of such a big team. I struggled because I felt out of my element and uncomfortable and I couldn't express myself in the language that these people knew. I struggled because the things that we sometimes think need fixing are actually working realities for people, so what changes are really beneficial, and what just doesn't matter??
I struggled, because there was so much I just didn't understand.
And it has taken me an entire year to be honest about it. To not be ashamed that I left with questions, that I left confused.
But the beautiful part of it is, God was present in every single second of it; in every single question I have asked, and in every single answer I don't have.
I got sick midway through our trip, the first day of the nursing conference. I had tried to put on such a good face, to stay so positive when I was hot and tired and processing... and when my body finally gave way to sickness, it felt like my heart threw in the towel too, and you know what God reminded me?
MY FLESH AND MY HEART MAY FAIL
BUT GOD IS THE STRENGTH OF MY HEART
AND MY PORTION FOREVER.Psalm 73:26
I think I have used enough words now... but above all, more than anything, I just want to say again how incredibly blessed I felt when you guys believed in me, prayed for me, and invested in me. It's a powerful thing, to have a family as big as the church of Christ stand behind you as you fumble your way into unknown and uncomfortable territory... I am so thankful! I pray you know every bit of Christ's love, freedom and grace wherever He finds you today!
Just under a year ago, I was part of an 8 nurse, 3 translator team that went to Burkina Faso to do some health teaching, and to seek to understand. Over our 12 days under the scorching African sun (seriously, 49 degrees!!), we were able to attend the 10th anniversary of the BOH Boura Children's Centre, bring rice and oranges to the local prison, hold a 2 day nursing conference in Leo, visit both the hospital and the clinic in Leo, celebrate International Women's Day, and finally, attend local churches. There was so much to take in and process in such a short amount of time!
Even as I go to write, I struggle for the words. First of all, I just have to express how absolutely amazing the people of Burkina are. We were part of an even bigger team when you factored in my pastor and his family, two couples, and a small media team who were also there at the same time! We were served by those with the most joyful servant hearts I have ever encountered. There is a special kind of love you experience on Burkina soil!
One of our first days was spent at the jail. Again, words are lost to express this experience... as we walked through the small rooms where fifty men crowded to sleep each night, my heart felt so heavy. There, we met a man, twenty three years of age, who was sick with malaria to the point that he could no longer walk out of the tiny room he stayed in. His crime, they told us, was forging his birth certificate to join the army. Can you imagine? And we just looked on, because that's all we could do. We couldn't drop to our knees and tell him He was a beloved child of God, because the prison system is corrupt and we were fortunate enough to be behind the walls at all. Or maybe I could have... but I guess now, I will never know.
We walked outside the walls of the jail where they have been assisted to set up gardens to grow food for the prison. Evidently, most of the crop goes to the guards. We saw wells dug, and other projects that were built by well meaning people, but that are now either run down or in disrepair. They are projects that cannot be sustained without consistent, long term involvement.
We celebrated with Bridges of Hope and the amazing work they have done for ten years in and around the community of Boura with the work of the Children's Centre! I saw the man that leads our little Lethbridge church, a Burkinabe himself, honored for his visionary work and investment into the future of his country. I saw firsthand the amazing work that the Centre provides on our last day in Boura while every clinic staff member was present to take care of sick children.
We held a nursing conference for two days with nurses and community workers. It was an amazing exchange of learning for us as we did teaching but also learning from these amazing people who see these disease processes and rise to the occasion of meeting these needs daily.
We roamed the hospital in Leo. Privacy is not a priority in other cultures as we make it here. Rooms are shared between patients, and only medical care is provided by the nurses. Patients families are responsible to provide food, company etc. The very first encounter we had was with a man who was likely dead before we got there. We were quickly shooed away and the last thing I remember seeing as I left that room was the head nurse beginning CPR. We crossed the hallway and entered a maternity unit. A sixteen year old mother breastfeeding. A woman with tiny little twins. A ten step contrast between life and death, separated by a mere hallway. We entered the building for pediatric care, and encountered a little boy in respiratory distress. So exhausted by the effort of his breathing, he would fall asleep only to start awake when his little lungs became oxygen deprived. We watched his young parents, brows furrowed with concern, and yet so helpless. His father's face will forever be etched into my mind... I watched him reach out for his son with every labored breath. And we did the only thing we could do... we reached into our pockets and gathered some money to quietly give this family so they could transport their son to a big city in hopes that he would receive the care he needed.
We attended church, once in Leo (a smaller town), and once in Ouagadougou (the capital!). Both were the most lively services I have ever attended. I loved the dancing and the joy and the carefree harmony! In Leo, we were recruited as a team to pray for people, and I had the honor of praying with a woman who desired to receive Christ into her life!
So many things packed into twelve days. My heart could hardly process each moment. And though I saw so much and learned so much, I struggled much. I wrestled heartily with the idea of short term missions or perhaps missions at all, with what I had seen of unsustainable projects and the clash of culture with knowledge. In regards to nursing... how do we apply the knowledge that we have access to in regards to culturally appropriate care?
I struggled because it was hard to build relationship in such a short amount of time, especially in the midst of such a big team. I struggled because I felt out of my element and uncomfortable and I couldn't express myself in the language that these people knew. I struggled because the things that we sometimes think need fixing are actually working realities for people, so what changes are really beneficial, and what just doesn't matter??
I struggled, because there was so much I just didn't understand.
And it has taken me an entire year to be honest about it. To not be ashamed that I left with questions, that I left confused.
But the beautiful part of it is, God was present in every single second of it; in every single question I have asked, and in every single answer I don't have.
I got sick midway through our trip, the first day of the nursing conference. I had tried to put on such a good face, to stay so positive when I was hot and tired and processing... and when my body finally gave way to sickness, it felt like my heart threw in the towel too, and you know what God reminded me?
MY FLESH AND MY HEART MAY FAIL
BUT GOD IS THE STRENGTH OF MY HEART
AND MY PORTION FOREVER.Psalm 73:26
I think I have used enough words now... but above all, more than anything, I just want to say again how incredibly blessed I felt when you guys believed in me, prayed for me, and invested in me. It's a powerful thing, to have a family as big as the church of Christ stand behind you as you fumble your way into unknown and uncomfortable territory... I am so thankful! I pray you know every bit of Christ's love, freedom and grace wherever He finds you today!
Friday, February 14, 2014
His Love > Fear
I have found it easy at times, when my sight is off the Lord
to close my heart off to truth,
to fling questions at God and dare Him to come through
while adding bricks to a wall
trying to be unreachable
because I feel broken,
because I sin
because I feel I deserve to be
out of reach
God is not daunted by my walls
and tonight He is bulldozing, He is pursuing
He is crashing through that wall
and it's beautiful to be loved,
to look at Him again with open eyes and see
He was faithful all along
and the fierceness of His love pushes back fear
Hallelujah to my redeeming God.
Monday, January 27, 2014
Going back!!!
Four years ago today, I returned from the country of Haiti wrecked, broken, and with a heart full of dreams. In the months that followed, my plan to go back to Haiti right away was replaced with going to nursing school. The dreams stirring in my heart were put off, but not forgotten.
Today, the very same day that I returned four years ago, is the day that I booked flights back!
So, from March 23-June 3, I will be volunteering as a nurse with Haiti Health Ministries! This is a clinic that operates in a town located near Leogane. Here is a map to put it in perspective :)
This is what Haiti Health Ministries is all about, as per their website!
The purpose of Haiti Health Ministries is to show the love of Christ to the lost and to strengthen the body of Christ in Haiti. Thus we endeavor to present the Gospel and subsequently follow up with discipleship training as an outgrowth of the medical ministry and outpatient medical clinics in Haiti. Patient education, community health education and screening, training and encouraging national medical workers, as well as caring for indigent patients will be a part of that ministry and used to strengthen and encourage Haitian believers and witness Christ’s love to non-believers.
If you want to know more about this amazing organization, you can view their website at www.haitihealthministries.org
If you could join on this adventure with me in prayer, that would be such a great encouragement to me! Some prayer requests that have come to my heart:
* First of all, for the amazing people who minister there full time, and for each person that is under their care
* The grace to engage fully in the culture ( and fumble through learning the language!)
* To know the Father`s heart for all the beautiful people I will meet
* That I would be flexible and obedient to His voice
* That He would break my heart to give me that capacity to love on His strength, and to depend on Him fully for all I need
I also wanted to take this time to thank everyone who has supported me in the past... your contribution to my life has been so rich a blessing, and I am so grateful to you. I hope to keep people updated as regularly as possible through this blog!
If God has laid it on your heart to support me financially, please email me so I can explain how that works. My email address is jessicafriesen@hotmail.com
If you could join on this adventure with me in prayer, that would be such a great encouragement to me! Some prayer requests that have come to my heart:
* First of all, for the amazing people who minister there full time, and for each person that is under their care
* The grace to engage fully in the culture ( and fumble through learning the language!)
* To know the Father`s heart for all the beautiful people I will meet
* That I would be flexible and obedient to His voice
* That He would break my heart to give me that capacity to love on His strength, and to depend on Him fully for all I need
I also wanted to take this time to thank everyone who has supported me in the past... your contribution to my life has been so rich a blessing, and I am so grateful to you. I hope to keep people updated as regularly as possible through this blog!
If God has laid it on your heart to support me financially, please email me so I can explain how that works. My email address is jessicafriesen@hotmail.com
I am so excited for the opportunity to love and serve in this beautiful place once more!!
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
Fleeting desires ravage my heart. They've left little but broken pieces of plans I tried to make and people I've tried to love, yet none of them remain. And now, what of this heart? Tied to people it failed in love, what is it to do? For one more beat in the wrong place may destroy it forever. One more misplaced affection and it may cease to beat at all. And oh, does it stir and burn and pound, but never with surety. Never with the kind of unwavering devotion that compels it to risk, to dive, to leap and to stand strong in the face of the impossible.
What of a heart that has never loved enough to give it all?
A heart no stranger to sacrifice, Yours beats with untamed desire. The raw fury of such love is unparalleled. It's a miracle that a heart can hold so much feeling within its chambers. Yet You give Your heart to break for my hurts, my fears, and my pain. It aches to be made one with my heart.
You touch places in my heart, places of deep longing, and you satisfy them. You touch the places that have hardened out of bitterness and anger, and they become soft. The places that have torn and bled, the scars of past hurts and the wounds that are still bleeding, Your touch restores them all. The places in my heart, dusty with forgotten dreams, You touch and whisper of Your plans, and it comes alive.
You are the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
Where my heart is wayward, yours is sure. Where mine is weak, Yours is strong. Where mine has failed, You make good.
Your pour Your heart into mine, and we beat together. With each lub-dub, I hear Your name for me. BEL-OVED. BEL-OVED. BEL-OVED.
BE-LOVED....
and I am learning to trust You with that.
What of a heart that has never loved enough to give it all?
A heart no stranger to sacrifice, Yours beats with untamed desire. The raw fury of such love is unparalleled. It's a miracle that a heart can hold so much feeling within its chambers. Yet You give Your heart to break for my hurts, my fears, and my pain. It aches to be made one with my heart.
You touch places in my heart, places of deep longing, and you satisfy them. You touch the places that have hardened out of bitterness and anger, and they become soft. The places that have torn and bled, the scars of past hurts and the wounds that are still bleeding, Your touch restores them all. The places in my heart, dusty with forgotten dreams, You touch and whisper of Your plans, and it comes alive.
You are the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
Where my heart is wayward, yours is sure. Where mine is weak, Yours is strong. Where mine has failed, You make good.
Your pour Your heart into mine, and we beat together. With each lub-dub, I hear Your name for me. BEL-OVED. BEL-OVED. BEL-OVED.
BE-LOVED....
and I am learning to trust You with that.
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