Captivate me Lord Jesus with you

I was listening to a song called Captivate Us by watermark. I was thinking about this year and what my goal as a teacher was going to be and how I wanted my life to change through that. I honestly want this to be my goal and I wanted to share the lyrics with you.

Lyrics to Captivate Us :

Your face is beautiful

And Your eyes are like the stars

Your gentle hands have healing

There inside the scars

Your loving arms they draw me near

And Your smile it brings me peace

Draw me closer oh my Lord

Draw me closer Lord to Thee

(chorus)

Captivate us, Lord Jesus

Set our eyes on You

Devastate us with Your presence

Falling down

And rushing river, draw us nearer

Holy fountain consume us with You

Captivate us Lord Jesus, with You

Your voice is powerful

And Your words are radiant bright

In Your breath and shadow

I will come close and abide

You whisper love and life divine

And Your fellowship is free

Draw me closer O my Lord

Draw me closer Lord to Thee

(chorus)

Let everything be lost in the shadows

Of the light of Your face

Let every chain be broken from me

As I’m bound in Your grace

For Your yoke is easy, Your burden is light

You’re full of wisdom, power and might

And every eye will see You

(chorus)

The past couple of months I have seen a lot of lost of earthly things and there is a part in this song where it says Lord devastate me with Your presence and we look at devastation as bad but how many times does God use loss to bring us to him. I want this song to be my goal for my life and my class. I want to be in his presence at all times good and bad. I want to be captivated in Him. My prayer is that our school and home will be Captivated in who Christ is.

School starts Monday and I am so excited for my students to come. I have 12 students 5 boys and 7 girls. My room is all set up and pictures will come to the blog soon.

Wow!, I can't believe I am back in Ghana. Life here seems to be so simple compare to America. There are not the distractions that you have in the US. I am all moved into my house and all my house mates are here minus one and we don't know when she is coming in. Coming back was an exciting time for me. My flights went well after about a 45 minute delay in Chicago we made it off the ground and was in the air and made it to Washington D.C. where I could finally relax and wait for Tayler. I arrived and there was William ready to pick us up and I was thrilled to be back. THe school looked amazing there was another floor. GOd is working here in Ghana and it shows by how much our school has grown. So I got to school and I have found out that my classroom was moved again, I am not going to lie I was kinda of disappointed but then God showed me what a blessing my room is going to be. Setting up my classroom I started to get even more excited about the opportunity to teach. I will have pictures coming soon. More to come with Monday the first day of school.

13 days and counting...

Today in my devotions I read about Nehemiah and how he was building the wall and how he could not do it by himself. It later went on to say that this person worked side by side with another person. The main passage was Mark 6. 7-13 and how God sent them out two by two so they could work together to share the gospel and work in miraculous ways. That really got me thinking about how I fit into this whole situation and this passage. My first thought was I am at a school where I work with 13-20 teachers and staff in a school setting where are purpose is the same. We at AIS are all there to teach the students subjects but more importantly to share the gospel of Christ. Every single teacher or staff that comes in contact and shares Christ is on the team and it is just not one teacher that is working with these students but there are many and that is the whole point of the passage. I also think that God sent them out in pairs to be accountability to each other and an encouragement to keep each other built up so that the purpose will stand.

So as I head back to Ghana I ask that you pray our team is strong in its purpose of sharing Christ and build each other up and not be divided against each other. Pray that I can take everything I need to back to Ghana with me and that my suitcases are on weight. Pray as I travel in a couple of days and as I meet up with the first grade teacher.

PArty in the USA

I am back in the states and going like crazy. I have done VBS and now i am in Memphis for two weeks and then I will be back home. Feel free to give me a call because I am always looking to hang out with people.

God's Faithfulness

More and more this year I have seen God's faithfulness to me. I was reflecting this morning on all the times God has been there for me. I would like to recap them for you just so that maybe if you are going through a hard time that God is faithful to be there with you.

Getting me to Ghana was the first thing. The week before I came to Ghana I had the stomach flu and I was well enough to leave and not be sick on the plane.

Then when I first got here my bank card didn't work and I couldn't get money out. However God has one bank in my area that would allow me to get out with my debt card and there is one in the mall which is also just amazing part of God's plan and His faithfulness.

The next event came 3 weeks before we were to leave for Christmas break and we still didn't have our passports back from immigration. The week before we were supposed to leave we had to fill out all the paper work again and knowing that everything takes so much longer here in Ghana, it was not looking good. However a couple of days before we left God delivered again and His faithfulness won against doubt.

Then when I was leaving for Spring break we were not sure if we were going to have our passports again however God is faithful to get those for us our visas were not renewed but we had our passport. Knowing we would have to pay a fee we were prepared to leave for Germany. We got to immigration and God again proved His faithfulness by getting us through immigration with no fee at all. Praise His Name!

Now with British Airway on strike my flight gets cancelled and I am stuck in Ghana however, God worked in His ways and I have a flight home on Monday night through Germany and then straight from Germany to Chicago. God is good and His faithfulness reaches to the mountains.

Why do we still doubt? I think its because we try to control situations and we can't see how something good can come from it however as Christians we need to just realized and believe that God is in the driver seat and that He is more than capable and He knows the outcome of any situation. We have to remember that God is not going to give us more than we can bear and He has His hand in everything. In Bible class we have been looking at Christ overcoming things and one was overcoming nature and it was the story of Peter and Jesus walking on water and how Peter when he was focused on who GOd was he was more than able to walk on water. However, when Peter started looking at the waves and all the negatives he sunk. In this world I think ( I know I do ) so often we look at all the things that go wrong and don't look at the times God has gotten us through these situations and we can rejoice in the positives rather than the negatives. Even the little things like a hug from a student when you are having a bad day or a wave from a little boy on your way home from school that has never waved to you before even though you wave at him all the time after a stressful day when you are about to break into tears. God puts those little reminders around us on our worst days I believe to give us a reminder to look at who He is and His faithfulness.

I will be home with you all on Tuesday evening. Praise the Lord for his faithfulness and His knowledge of all we do.

You alone can rescue. You alone can save. You alone can lift us from the grave, You came down to find us, lead us out of death You alone belong the highest Praise.

flight

My flight has been cancelled so I do not know when I will be home with you all. Missing you greatly Pray for a flight that is in the next weekend, SOoner then later.

The last weekend with everyone

Preparing for the last week of school is exciting and sad all at the same time. Being in Ghana and the people here have impacted my life and to think that the people who have been my family this past year are now leaving is a joyful sad occasion. I never knew how hard it would be to say goodbye to the people I live with. It is kind of being like in college again. Each day this weekend was a little bit different. On Friday I went with the girls downstairs to La Gallete. It was so good and it was awesome to spend the last Friday night for some of them with them. Then all day on Saturday I helped clean downstairs and picked up some of the things they didn't want for next year. Then tonight we had our last care group where we just worshipped and listen to the people that were leaving talking about what they learned. After hearing all those testimonies and hearing how faithful God is to His promises, you just come away inspired.

This past week I have really noticed how God has been talking to me about not worrying about the things I can't change and the negatives and focus on the positives. This week in Bible we have been talking about Jesus' miracles and how He walked on water and Peter joined Him, and as soon as Peter started focusing on the bad things and the waves and took his focus away from Jesus he sank. This week I have been reminded more than once to focus on God and His faithfulness in every situation. For instance I taught it on Tuesday and on Tuesday it seemed like I was hungry all day so I randomly said "I am hungry" in class and one of my students Winy raised her hand and said "Miss Meitzler you should focus on the positive things and not the negative things just like Peter and Jesus." How precious is that little reminder she gave me. Then also on Tuesday I found out that my friends flight was cancelled and it is two days before mine so I started stressing about that and again I was reminded of turning my focus to the positive things instead of the negative . I am so worried over something that God already has his hand in.

I Peter 5.7

Cast all your cares on Him because He cares for you!

Prayer Request

Flight I find out on Tuesday wether it is canceled or not.

Adjusting back into America

The ladies in my group for PFO (Pre Field Orientation)

8 days until I home worshiping with you !

Faith