Date:  Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Day 21 of 180

Another day, another milestone.  I’ve now been in Taipei for almost a full month.  And to be honest, I love it here.  Everything is just so easy here.  Getting places is easy because of the amazing public transportation system.  Eating good is easy because of the variety of food available in Taipei.  Life is just great, between great tropical weather, amazing people, and good food life couldn’t get any better.  Not only that but because of the transportation system you’re no more than a train ride from either the mountains in central Taiwan or the beaches in northern Taiwan.  Like I said, life is good.

Since we’ve last talked, I been given a more specified role.  Days I’ll work with Love Network, which is an after school program for at risk teens.  Nights I’ll be working with the bilingual ministry and ALPHA group ministry at TLC.  And during the weekends, I’ll working primarily with both Love Net and with the bilingual ministry.  So I suppose this is when my 6 months actually begins.  Though I suppose it’s actually 5 months now.

As far as how I am adapting, I would say that I’m getting there.  Still getting used to using my Mandarin so often, but I’m finding it becoming increasingly easier, which is nice.  And to the issue of culture shock, well I don’t really feel it.  I’ve been to Taiwan before, though the difference now is that I’m here all by myself.  I don’t seem too anxious or nervous.  I just don’t see the point in being worried about something that is outside of my control.  Relationships will come when they come.  I believe that God will place in my life those people who I need the most at this point in my walk with Him.  I just need to have the faith to trust that He will provide for every need I have whether social, emotional, or physical.  It is to this end that I have found myself being increasingly less anxious.

It is just so much easier when you give up control.  When you choose to go outside your comfort zone and live in real faith, you will not be disappointed.  When you live everyday dependent on God to provide every need, you find God’s ability to meet every need.  Some say it’s hard to live outside your comfort zone, I say it’s the only way to live.  Because it’s when you’re at your limit that God becomes so much more real.  Your Faith become so much more than just an abstract ideal, but it becomes the very blood and marrow that make life possible.  When God takes you to your wits end when life seems all the more unlivable, this is when god becomes GOD.

I dare you all to dream big and live dangerously for the Kingdom of God, because it here, at your limits, that you find limitless Grace, Mercy, and Peace in the arms of God.

                                                                                                                          Living for HIS Glory,

                                                                                                                                                  David