Where there's a will........

In Sunday school this morning we talked about praying and God's will. The question that was asked was something like "when we pray should be just pray for God's will or should be pray for specific things?" So while we were talking about it, I started thinking about Ghana (big surprise I know.) Someone threw out the Voltaire quote that "good is the enemy of best" and it just really stuck with me. I guess what I'm sort of struggling with is how will I know that it is God's will for me personally, to go to Ghana versus my own personal desire to go. Is my strong desire to go God's way of telling me to go? Someone else said something about how, they think that for some people, wanting to go overseas on a mission trip is a way of avoiding what God might be trying to get them to do right here at home. So, how do I know which group I'm in? It really scares me to think that I might be projecting what I want onto what God wants for me. I have a tendency to think and think about things, over analyzing them to the point that it just drives me crazy. I've emailed the man in charged of the school in Ghana (a week ago) and not heard back from him yet. So in my mind I can't help but think 'so is that God closing that door' but what if it's just God testing my patience, making me wait to see if I'm really dedicated to going back to Ghana...I think that doubt is one of the devil's biggest tools and I think he knows that it works really well on me. Don't get me wrong, I still REALLY want to go to Ghana, I'm just worrying what if I want to go for myself and not for God.....then I worry that I'm being silly and letting the devil make me doubt what God really does want me to do.....I can't decide if I've been thinking about it too much, or not enough. I dunno.

So, I'm over at a friend's house baby sitting tonight. The kids have been in bed around 45 minutes, it's quiet. There's a book on the table about AIDS orphans in Ethiopia. It's crazy how blind some Americans can be to the needs of the rest of the world. My boss was talking about how he'd NEVER ever go to Mississippi or Alabama or even Louisiana, he really looks down on those places and he's not shy about it. He knows that my brother's family JUST moved to Mississippi this week. When I was getting ready to go to Africa he flat-out said that Africa was "one place he has absolutely no desire to go to." I mean, I want to go EVERYWHERE so that thought process just doesn't make sense to me to begin with. It's very discouraging to see people that you know are looked at with higher regard than you and then see that kind of attitude out of them. It's very disappointing to me and discouraging too considering that the place he has "no desire" to go is the very place I'm dying to go back to. It seems to confuse some of the people that I work with when I try to explain the whole "missionary thing" to them. They continually ask if I'll get paid while I'm over there and what will I do for a job when I get back.....they just don't get it. The sad part is they probably think they're good Christians. And some of the are...don't get me wrong, but it seems like some of them are A LOT more interested in making money than in making this world a better place. Ghana is really pulling at me hardcore lately. I emailed the guy in charge at the school early this week, but he hasn't replied yet. I'm just very anxiously waiting to hear from him. In God's time I guess. Okay, that's enough ranting on social responsibility for tonight.

Labor Day Weekend

So, it's labor day weekend, and I have nothing interesting to do. I don't have to work this weekend and the restaurant is closed on Monday so I actually have a long weekend for once. The problem....I'm broke. Yeah, I'm pretty used to being broke lately, but it's been worse lately than usual. So while my friends are going out of town for the weekend, and all my family is out of the state this weekend, I'm going to sit at home and clean up......I just can't contain my excitement...