.Not Forgotten.

While traveling the world for 11 months, I fell in love with blogging. I blogged consistently. It was therapeutic as it helped me manage the chaos of emotions flooding my heart and mind from a years worth of mission work overseas. Painfully long- they would be the briefest summary I could muster of all the adventures the Lord was bringing me through overseas. I loved telling the story of my team's service and being blown away by each memory's revelation of just how present the Lord was in each moment of our lives.

I arrived home, began working with Not Forgotten, and tried to start posting on this blog page. I couldn't. I have probably started 16 blogs that have gone unposted and now sit flooding my draft box.

They were blogs about my struggle of transitioning back into American culture. Blogs about my broken heart for the people I had left behind on my travels. Blogs about my struggle of being "home" yet feeling incredibly alone and isolated. Blogs about me just not fitting in anymore.

But, inevitably, these blogs of struggle would somehow end with the reassurance of His constant love for me.  Reminders that He is, in fact, omnipresent, accompanied by the gentle reassurance that He hadn't left me behind.

I didn't post these blogs because I thought they were irrelevant to Not Forgotten. They were about my personal struggle. What did those writings have to do with our ministry?

How silly of me...

Reflecting back, I now see how each unposted blog revolved around the heart of Not Forgotten. Each blog was a message from the Lord reminding me that I WAS not forgotten. How'd I miss the connection there?!

At some point we all need to be reminded that we are NOT FORGOTTEN. We need to be reassured that in our heartache, He is there. In our brokenness, He is there. In our suffering, He is there. To reflect on verses like Deut. 31:6 that tell us to be "strong and courageous" because He will never leave nor forsake us, and that's hope enough to continue on joyfully. To remember that this message of remembrance is relevant to every believer:

We are not forgotten, God sees us, and He loves us.

Receiving such a revelation makes me that much more excited about delivering His message of Hope to children worldwide. We can comfort one another so much more effectively when we've had to learn the same lesson. So- Lord help us to remember so we can teach in truth and love.