Week 1 (and some): (June 13-21) Strabane and an Update

I have been in Northern Ireland for a little over a week. And, I have been astounded by the breath-taking views and vibrant colors of Ireland. The weather is very rainy and overcast here, but that is what makes the country so green. 

(This is the Bridge of Sorrows in Glenveagh National Park.)

I flew into the Belfast airport on Thursday, June 13th, after flying all through the night. Alison Smyth and Lauren Cornell greeted me at the air port. Thursday was concluded with joining the Cornells for their small group bible study. We ate dinner prepared by Darlene Cornell and went through Genesis 2 led by Joe Cornell. 

June 14th, Friday, consisted of helping with the soup kitchen at The Bridge all day and then returning to help with Elevate, the youth club. 

My Saturday, June 15th, started with practicing for worship with Claire Smyth and Kerry Aiken. Claire played and sang, and Kerry and I took turns switching to play the piano and bongos. Above is the piano keyboard and Claire's guitar with the mic. Saturday ended with dinner and bowling with the church fellowship. Below is Alastair and Alison Smyth at our dinner with their niece, Lucy, Jason and Alison Smyth's daughter. 

Below is Damian McCrory with me at dinner. He has just finished grade 8 and has been attending The Bridge about 2 years. 

The picture below is Claire Smyth, Lauren Cornell, Jenna, and little Rebecca, Jason and Alison Smyth's daughter, during bowling. 

After bowling, William Boggs, Alastair and Alison Smyth, Claire Smyth, and I all went out into Derry on the Peace Bridge as seen below and onto the Derry walls. 

On Sunday, June 16th, I played for worship with Claire and Kerry at The Bridge and listened to the sermon message by Charlie, a visitor, on 1 John 2:1-14. Later at 2:30 pm, I went with Clive and Shelia Johnston to Craig and Alison Johnston's for lunch with Stephen and Kerry Aiken to celebrate Father's day. At 4 pm, I went to Kerry's for Fuse with the young adults. 

On Monday, June 17th, I went to Colrain, taking a train from Derry, with the Cornells. Below is a picture of Colrain. Many of the buildings in Ireland are painted vibrant colors such as the ones seen below, but these little shops were especially bright to my delight. :) 

Below is a picture of me on the walls of Derry. 

On Tuesday, June 18th, I went with Shelia and Clive to The Bridge for prayer with some of the members of the fellowship and we all prayed together for a few hours before opening up the Bridge for people to come in and have tea or coffee. Later in the evening, the fellowship met at The Bridge for the walking club and we walked through Strabane together. 

Wednesday, June 19th, consisted of spending the day out seeing the beauty of Ireland in the company of my hosts. We drove through Letterkenny to Portnablagh, Dunfanhehy in the County of Donegal and went to Falcarragh (An Fal Carrach, also known as Na Crois Bhealai, Gaelic for "The Crossroads") and Glenveagh National Park. It was a rare beautiful day with little rain and the sun shining through at times. Below is a map that was posted in Falcarragh that is in Gaelic  showing the areas that we were in the Republic of Ireland.

Below is the lovely place that we had lunch at in Dunfanhehy. 

Muckish Mountain in Glenveagh National Park in County Donegal in the Republic of Ireland.

This is a view of Muckish from the cost of Portnablagh in Dunfanhehy.

I couldn't get enough pictures of these views. So beautiful. 

This is what was called "The Black Pool" in Portnablagh. A crystal clear river cutting through the rocks into the sea that Clive's friend, Charlie, kayaks in with his kids! It's narrow, but Charlie said that he and his kids will jump into it in the summertime even though the water is usually freezing and the river is quite narrow!!!

This is Falcarragh.

This is the Bridge of Sorrows Stone by Muckish and Errigal mountains. The inscription is in old Gaelic. Clive speaks a wee little Gaelic and could only make out a wee bit. 

This Clive and Shelia walking in Glenveagh National Park (Pairc Naisiunta Ghleann Bheatha). 

 Clive insisted on talking this one of me in the garden of Glenveagh castle. 

We did not have enough time to go into Glenveagh castle because we had to drive back in time for our small group bible studies, but we did enjoy exploring the garden and the glimpse of the outside of the castle. Below is Shelia and I admiring the vines on the side of the castle.

Here is a wee glimpse of the Glenveagh castle for yourselves. :) 

Thursday, June 20th, was not a busy day, instead it was a relaxing day. 

On Friday, June 21st, I joined the Cornells at The Bridge for the cafe ministry tea and coffee with people who stopped in from Strabane. A few folks from a church in Derry stopped in to say hello to the Cornells and have lunch before the Cornells return to the States and to discuss information with me about me joining some of their ministry work while I am here. Later, Claire and I practiced for Sunday's worship. In the evening, I joined Lauren with some of her friends for a BBQ. It was good crack! (That's a saying here for "It was good fun.") 

(The girls at the BBQ- Lauren, Jenna, Lauren, and Ruth)

(The guys- Graham, guy behind him whose name I don't remember...Chris, Tom, Simon)

My first week has been full of building relationships and friendships with the people at The Bridge who make it so easy. I am so thankful for this opportunity to be a part of their lives and serve with them. Their methods of evangelism through building friendships and making disciples through relationships are healthy and wonderful ones. 

Please pray for The Bridge as it continues to grow and as it is a small light in a dark city that desperately needs to know Christ. 

I want to leave you all with my favorite picture from the garden of Glenveagh castle as it sort of reflects what I see the Holy Spirit doing through The Bridge in Strabane. 

Ireland: A wee overview of The Bridge, N. Ireland history, and the G8

Well, it has been about a week since I have started my travels. I arrived last Thursday morning on June 13th in the Belfast airport. 

Friends, Ireland is magical. It is so gorgeous. It is beautiful and bright even when the sun is covered by the clouds but when the clouds no longer hide the sun, it transforms in an even more magical beauty. I love it here. 

(This is the backyard view of Northern Ireland from Clive and Shelia Johnston's house.)

Who I am staying with: 

Meet Clive and Sheila Johnston. 
I am staying with the Johnstons at their house in Sion Mills outside Strabane, Northern Ireland for about 3 weeks. 

-Clive is known as "The Book of Knowledge" by most of the fellowship at The Bridge and rightly so since he is full of wisdom and knowledge. Clive is one of the elders at The Bridge.
-Sheila is known as "The Oracle" because she is full of wisdom and discernment. 

(This was in the garden of the castle in Glenveagh in the County of Donegal in the Republic of Ireland)

Strabane and a Little History of Ireland

Strabane is in Northern Ireland, very close to the border of the Republic of Ireland. 

Northern Ireland is still part of the UK while the Republic has been a separate entity. In 1922, the "Irish Free State," still under dominion of the British Commonwealth, seceded the UK under the Anglo-Irish Treaty. It has been called the Republic of Ireland since about 1949. The Republic comprises 26 of the 32 counties in Ireland. 

Because Strabane is on the border of Northern Ireland and the Republic, it has been in the middle of the political and social struggles known as "The Troubles," (in Irish: Na Triobloidi). Strabane is an impoverished city with a rate of unemployment at about 30%. Strabane has the highest concentration of Catholics in Ireland at 98%! The remaining 2% is nominally Protestant with only 10% of that 2% being strong believing Christians. 
Part of that 2% is at The Bridge Fellowship of Strabane. 


The Bridge Fellowship of Strabane:

The Bridge started 3 years ago in 2010 with a small group of evangelical Christians who had a heart and a mission for Strabane and the unbelieving people of the city. Sadly, Catholicism and Protestantism in the country of Ireland have been more and more political entities and less and less about actually Christ centered faith and works. The people at The Bridge have desired to reach out with the purpose of evangelism and discipleship to the city of Strabane. (The name came from a little bridge in Strabane and also symbolic purposes of evangelism. :) )

They have been in this building since 2011 and their fellowship has grown to about 25 members and 30 attending on Sunday mornings in the past 3 years which is virtually impossible in such a heavily Catholic concentrated city. How great is our God? 

A Few of the People at The Bridge: 

Joe and Darlene Cornell and their daughter Lauren are from Danville, Virginia and have lived in N. Ireland for 5 years. They are heavily involved at The Bridge. They are in the process of moving back to Virginia this July. Joe is the leading elder at The Bridge. The whole family helps with the various ministries at The Bridge. 

Meet Stephen and Kerry Aiken and their little ones, Timothy and Naomi. Stephen is from Rochester in Kent, England but now lives right down the way from Clive and Shelia with their daughter who is his wife, Kerry. Stephen is the deacon at The Bridge. Kerry leads the young adults group called, Fuse at her house on Sunday nights and plays piano for worship on Sunday mornings. 

Meet Alastair and Alison Smyth. Alastair (Ali) and Alison have recently married in December and are new Christians. Ali has designed the logo for The Bridge. Alison has been keeping up the walking club on Tuesday nights.

(Bowling last Saturday night, June 15th, with the fellowship.) 

Meet Claire Smyth. (The girl sitting down on the cannon- this is on the walls of Derry.) She is in charge of worship on Sunday mornings- she plays guitar and sings. She also is in charge of and started a youth night called Elevate on every other Friday night. 
William Boggs is a member of The Bridge as well and works with Jason Smyth (Ali's brother). 

Activities at The Bridge: 
Sunday morning worship
Fuse- Sunday night young adults group at Kerry Aiken's 
Tuesday morning prayer meetings 
Walking club Tuesday nights 
Cafe ministry on Tuesdays and Fridays 
Soup kitchen every other Friday (2nd and 4th Fridays of the month) 
Elevate youth club on Friday nights 
3 home group bible studies held at members' houses 

Something that has caused alot of talk over here is the G8 meeting. 
The 39th G8 Summit:
Last week, June 17-19, President Obama came to stay in Ireland representing the USA for the Group of Eight, commonly called the G8, which is an annual forum of eight of eleven of the world's largest economies. The holder of the presidency of the G8 decides the agenda, hosts the summit for the year, and determines what ministerial meetings shall take place. Such events bring together ministers responsible for various portfolios to discuss issues of mutual and/or global concern. Topics include health, law enforcement, labor, economic and social development, energy, environment, foreign affairs, justice and interior, terrorism, and trade. Responsibility of hosting the G8 changes in this rotation: France, the United Kingdom, the United States, Russia, Germany, Japan, Italy, and Canada. (The European Union is also represented but cannot host or chair summits. China, the 2nd largest economy, Brazil, the 6th, and India, the 9th, are not included.) France and the United Kingdom wish to extend the G8 to a group of five developing countries, known as the Outreach Five (O5) or Plus Five (P5) consisting of: Brazil, People's Republic of China, India, Mexico, and South Africa. 
This year was the 39th summit held at the Lough Erne Resort, a five-star hotel and gold resort on Lough Erne's shore in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. The UK's prime minister, David Cameron, was the host. This year's official topic of discussion was tax evasion and transparency but with all the unrest in Syria, the Syrian civil wars was the main focus of conversation.

Incredulity and Pre-Irish Endeavor Jitters

Man, sometimes I can be a little silly... My mom has been asking me all sorts of practical and good questions, but my mentality has been so "chill" that to my ears it sounded a little worrisome. But, as all the little details click into place, (many last second) I realize how wise she has been, and that maybe I was a little too "chill" in my preparation. 
***(NOTE: ALL DAUGHTERS SHOULD LISTEN TO THEIR MOMS BECAUSE THEY ARE OLDER, WISER, AND VERY MUCH AWESOMER THAN WE REALIZE OR GIVE THEM CREDIT FOR. Or at least, MINE is.) ***

But, here I am; everything in place. Everything ready. 
Ready to GO. 
Wait... is this REALLY happening? 

So many thoughts start running through my head... 

"You deserve this. You worked your butt off to make it happen."

"Who are you kidding! You DON'T deserve this at all!" 

Who is to say what we do and don't deserve? 

Sometimes I wonder. 

All I know is that I definitely don't deserve to go to Ireland. Psh no. Nope. Not at all.  

Yet, here I am, in the airport, waiting for my flight to NJ, laying-over to... N. Ireland. WAIT. What... 

No way. 

And, all I can think of, as I am about to do some mission-oriented and relational and discipleship oriented ministry, is how much I don't deserve this and how much I fall short. I think of my sin and my selfishness. 

But, then I am reminded softly, "Kait, do you deserve the grace of God?" 

Certainly not. Yet, here I am covered by His grace. An undeserved WRETCH, blind to my own depravity. 

Saved. Being sanctified. So blessed. 

And, here.... as I wait, dumbfounded and, a little nervous, but so so excited, I am just so thankful. Thankful that God would have it in His plan for little old me to go to Ireland, of ALL places. 


I REALLY CANNOT BELIEVE THIS IS HAPPENING! 

To my dear friends, beloved family, and fellow readers, 
thank you all so so much for your prayers, support, and encouragement. 

Goodbye, USA- Sweet Ireland, I will be with you for about 7 weeks. 
:D

Veiled

"There is something more serious than coldness of heart, something that may be back of that coldness and be the cause of its existence. What is it? What but the presence of a veil in our hearts? a veil not taken away as the first veil was, but which remains there still shutting out the light and hiding the face of God from us. It is the veil of our fleshly fallen nature living on, unjudged within us, uncrucified and unrepudiated. It is the close-woven veil of the self-life which we have never truly acknowledged, of which we have been secretly ashamed, and which for these reasons we have never brought to the judgement of the cross. It is not too mysterious, this opaque veil, nor is it hard to identify. We have but to look in our own hearts and we shall see it there, sewn and patched and repaired it may be, but there nevertheless, an enemy to our lives and an effective block to our spiritual minds." - A.W. Tozer from The Pursuit of God 

True humility is seeing ourselves truly as we are and seeing our God truly as He is. 

"The self-sins are these: self-righteousness, self-pity, self-confidence, self-sufficiency, self-admiration, self-love and a host of others like them. They dwell too deep within us and are too much a part of our natures to come to our attention till the light of God is focused upon them. The grosser manifestations of these sins, egotism, exhibitionism, self-promotion, are strangely tolerated in Christian leaders even in circles of impeccable orthodoxy. They are so much in evidence as actually, form any people, to become identified with the gospel. I trust it is not a cynical observation to say that they appear these days to be a requisite for popularity in some sections of the Church visible. Promoting self under the guise of promoting Christ is currently so common as to excited little notice." - A.W. Tozer from The Pursuit of God 

My friends, we must pray for humility that our eyes will be opened to our need of the gospel, not only for our salvation but our daily sanctification! Daily sanctification ensures our salvation because the Spirit of God is at work in us through Christ to the glory of God. 

Tozer continues in The Pursuit of God: 

"One should suppose that proper instruction is the doctrines of man's depravity and the necessity for justification through the righteousness of Christ alone would deliver us from the power of the self-sins; but it does not work that way. Self can live unrebuked at the very altar. It can watch the bleeding Victim die and not be in the least affected by what it sees. It can fight for the faith and preach eloquently the creed of salvation by grace, and gain strength by its efforts. To tell all the truth, it seems actually to feed upon orthodoxy and is more at home in a Bible Conference than in a tavern. Our very state of longing after God may afford it an excellent condition under which to thrive and grow." 

"Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, 

"Today, if you hear His voice, 

do not harden your heart as in the rebellion, 

on the day of testing in the wilderness, 

where your fathers put Me to the test 

and saw My works for forty years. 

Therefore I was provoked with that generation, 

and said, "They always go astray in their heart, 

they have not known My ways." 

As I swore in My wrath, 

"They shall not enter my rest." 

Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called "today," that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence frim to the end. As it is said, 

"Today, if you hear His voice, 

do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion." 

For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was He provoked for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did he swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief." 
-Hebrews 3:7-19

We are offered rest in the Beloved when we believe. He has lifted the veil that has blinded our eyes! But, we have to daily fight the sin that so easily entangles and deceives. It is our old nature, but because God's Spirit is in us, we are being renewed day by day. We must be vigilant and on guard against our old nature- against sin and against the schemes of the devil! We must encourage each daily- pressing on together in unity as the body of Christ: His church. 

Tozer continues, 

"God must do everything for us. Our part is to yield and trust. We must confess, forsake, repudiate the self-life, and then reckon it crucified. But we must be careful to distinguish lazy 'acceptance' from the real work of God. We must insist upon the work being done. We dare not rest content with a neat doctrine of self-crucifixtion. That is to imitate Saul and spare the best of the sheep and the oxen. (Note: referring to King Saul's disobedience in 1 Sam. 15) 

Insist that the work be done in very truth and it will be done. The cross is rough, and it is deadly, but it is effective. It does not keep its victim hanging there forever. There comes a moment when its work is finished and the suffering victim dies. After that is resurrection glory and power, and the pain is forgotten for joy that the veil is taken away and we have entered in actual spiritual experience the Presence of the living God." 

2 Corinthians 4:1-6 paints it beautifully for us: 

"Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word, but by the open statement of truth we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled only to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, "Let light shine our of darkness," has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." 

Friends, we cannot keep silent. Let us sing the praises of our God! 

2 Corinthians 4 continues in verses 13-15: 

"Since we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, "I believed, and so I spoke," we also believe, and so we also speak, knowing that He who raise the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into His presence. For it is all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people is may increase thanksgiving to the glory of God."