friends

Hi everyone! January 2016

I am so sorry for my lack of updating you guys. It was very difficult to find time and a computer to write these updates in Cambodia as I don’t have a laptop of my own.

Cambodia was so amazing and fulfilling. The people were so beautiful and loving!

My team and I had a number of different ministries including English teaching, various different children’s ministries, evangelism on the streets of Battambang and in the slums and helping out at different churches every Sunday encouraging other believers. We explored different parts of Cambodia also, including Seim Reip and some remote villages about 2 hours away from where we live and God has taught me so much along the way!

First arriving in Cambodia was a little bit crazy – everything there is so different than anything I’ve ever experienced before and I was quite shocked. I knew I loved Cambodia so much (the joy of the people is infectious!) but it took about two weeks to really start to settle in. I had to learn to really rely on God and although I seemed so far away from home as I just leaned in on Him more and more, I began to find my comfort and rest in Him. He’s the best Father and wants to be a home for us – we just need to trust and let Him!

“Those who live in the shelter of the Most High will find rest in the shadow of the Almighty. This I declare about the Lord: He alone is my refuge and my place of safety; He is my God and I trust Him.” – Psalm 91v1-2

This passage became so real for me in those first few weeks and I am so thankful that in every situation He has the opportunity to teach us something new. Go God!!!

After settling in more I really started to fall in love with Cambodia. I have become very good friends with a Khmer* girl, Sopheak and on the back of her moped (the transportation of choice in Cambodia) she took me on adventures around Battambang and the surrounding area and I loved experiencing true Khmer culture. Spicy (VERY spicy) noodles from a slightly dodgy looking side of the road food stand, 400 stairs leading up to ancient temple ruins on the top of a mountain, eating fried rat, snake, cricket and grasshoppers, market places with stenches I wouldn’t wish upon my worst enemy and sooo much more. It was all so much fun! There are so many crazy things to do and I did my best to try it all. Praise the Lord that I never caught some strange illness or parasite after eating so much dodgy side of the road food and drinking unfiltered water with my Khmer friends. Food is such a way of bonding with people and such a good way to experience culture and I knew I couldn’t turn down food offered to me because it “wasn’t up to standard”, instead I just prayed that God would strengthen my immune system and He was faithful!

One of the best experiences for my team and I was staying in a remote village for a week. There was very little access to electricity, no running water, no beds – true Khmer style! It was some of the most fun I’ve ever had! I had to put away my “western princess tiara” for that week and really rough it but it was so worth it! During that week we stayed at a tiny church and during the days we did house visits in surrounding villages.

It was a crazy week! We saw 10 salvations, baptized 10 people and saw a handful of healing’s! So, so, so cool! I was praying for one lady whose eye sight was very poor and as I was praying I specifically prayed for colour to be restored and when she opened her eyes she began to touch her grandsons bright green jumper and said that she’d never seen colour like that before! It was so amazing! God is so amazing!

Through everything I just fell so much more in love with Jesus. He taught me that my role or job is not to see hundreds of healings and salvations but my role is just to be His child and have fun with Holy Spirit on the adventures He takes me on. From that place of personal encounter, my prayer is that God will use me to help lead others to a place of encounter with Him – this is my prayer forever and in whatever journey He takes me on next.

DTS has been so life changing and looking back on it now makes me feel so incredibly thankful. GOD IS SO GOOD! I am so confident in His faithfulness and He is so tangible and real in my everyday life. I am determined not to let DTS be something I look back on in years to come and think, “I was so happy and close to Jesus then”, NO! DTS has launched me into the rest of my life – His love is all that I need and as I have now finished DTS I will still be seeking after knowing Him and the ways of His heart more. I am so excited to do the rest of my life with Jesus!!!

Thank you again to everyone who has supported me financially through this. Not only did your gift of money enable me to go on this incredible journey and learn more and draw closer to God but it ALWAYS came in such perfect timing – I would be freaking out one day because I needed a certain amount of money in and then the next day I would get a call from my mum saying that the exact amount of money had been donated! Crazy! God used your generosity to teach me so much about His Father-heart, so thank you, thank you, thank you for listening to Him and being obedient. It is more appreciated than you know!

And thank you so much for supporting me through prayer. I can truly tell you that I always felt the effects of your prayers on the other side. You are all so awesome!!!

If you EVER need prayer for anything please let me know and I will pray for you or we could catch up for coffee and pray together! I would love that so much.

Bless you heaps!!!!! With love, from Jasmine

(*word used for Cambodian)

Sometimes in life we are blessed with a truly extraordinary friendship – I have been blessed in this way with my friend called Bin. Actually she is the brains behind this blog. She is the one who puts it all together and makes it look so great. For 17 years we have been the closest of friends. We now call ourselves sisters and our families think of each other as family.

Together over 17 years we have journeyed the good: The birth of seven children (my last child and her six), miraculous healing, marriage reconciliation, wonderful New Years together, fantastic holidays and just great fun. We have also journeyed the bad: Marriage separation, mental illness, wayward teenagers, and Mark’s cancer, long term illness and death. We have laughed a ridiculous amount, cried together and prayed and sought God together. They have been 17 very blessed years!

At the beginning of this year Bin found out she was pregnant with her sixth child, and in May we found out that after five handsome sons Bin and her husband Bring (his nickname) were expecting a daughter. I remember her ringing me and telling me and Jasmine when we were parked at a shopping mall, and we just sat in the car and cried with happiness at the blessing our dear adopted family was receiving. How exciting – a little girl!

Very early on the 22 September Bring & Bin welcomed their little girl into the world. With great excitement we raced to the hospital. They named her Sadie, which means Princess – so incredibly appropriate for the youngest and only girl but also because this little girl is a daughter of the King of Kings!

For ten weeks we all enjoyed getting to know this little bundle of joy, and then in the blink of an eye it all changed. After what was supposed to be a routine doctor’s check, Bin and Bring headed to the hospital and within days they were told their precious baby was very, very sick with a serious heart condition.

Thirteen days later on the 14th of December at just about 12 weeks old, Sadie left us for her eternal home prepared for her by Jesus as he promised in the Bible in John 14:3.

Tragedy has struck my dear precious friends. I cannot take their grief and pain. Grief and pain that I am all too familiar with, but this is a baby – it seems so senseless.

But senseless it is not in our loving Heavenly Father’s eyes because Sadie had to be born to live forever. You see, Sadie has always been in God’s mind. In Jeremiah 1:5 it says

God knew all about Sadie… God knew Sadie… God had holy plans for Sadie. But none of that would have mattered if Sadie had just remained a thought. Conception brings life and the minute Sadie was conceived God’s thought was given life! Our Sadie had to be born in order to live forever with Jesus.

And it is the same for Jesus. He had to be born so that we could live forever.

Over 2,000 years ago God came in the form of a human baby to make a way for all of humanity to be able to live forever. Through Jesus’ birth, life, death and resurrection ALL of us are given a way to live forever in heaven with our holy and loving heavenly Father.

Sadie has been taken from us. She is out of our vision. But Sadie is not lost – she is home. She is now a citizen of heaven, which is where we all will be one day if we have accepted the truth of Jesus. One day we will be with her and we will understand the joy that although she was here for such a short time, she had to be born to live forever.

Death is tragic but it is only tragic for those left here grieving our loved one. But for Sadie, for Mark, for all the others who have died knowing Jesus, death was their welcome home!

Sadie had to be born to live forever!

AND JESUS HAD TO BE BORN SO THAT WE COULD ALL LIVE FOREVER.

This Christmas CELEBRATE!!!

Celebrate Jesus’s birth for the truth that it truly is – OUR WAY HOME!!!