On following your passion

When I was growing up my dad always led mission teams to Mexico. You could tell that he loved it because he could talk forever about all the funny experiences and lessons learned on those trips. He used to say that sometimes he felt guilty, like it was selfish of him to go because he actually loved doing it. But he came to the conclusion that a calling from God doesn't mean that you have to do something that makes you miserable. Maybe God gives you a passion for something and lets you enjoy it. After all, we'd be a lot better testimonies if we had a passion to serve and were using our gifts and abilities to give glory back to Him. And it would make sense for Him to give us gifts that would be used for us to serve Him more effectively.
I kinda feel like that about Bolivia. I cannot even communicate to you that way the people there have stolen my heart. I think it's impossible to go and see the beautiful people, the magnificent scenery and the unique culture and come back the same as you were when you left. It just changes you.
I met a cool missionary last week at a little baptist church close by. He was the sweetest man, he and his wife were missionaries in South and Central America for 33 (?) years. We shared stories, and came to the same conclusion: we are profoundly changed because of what we've experienced...and we are so glad we followed God.
I am so grateful for the opportunities to go and give what little I have to offer to the Bolivian people. I know it's not much, and I kind of feel guilty because I feel like I'm the one who gets the most out of the trips I've made there. I know God is doing something good. In them and in me. And I can't get it out of my mind.
I'm going back, you know, in May--for a month (this time). So if you could say a little prayer for me...for us, I will thank you in advance. Thanks! You guys are the best! :)
So here's my advice: if you ever get the chance to go to Bolivia, or South America, or some country overseas; GO. I'm serious, you will see God in a different way, and have a completely different perspective of the World.

Okay, you wanna see them?
Here are some of the most precious kids in the world:(That's just a tiny sample).

For such a time as this

Raised by her cousin and drafted into a national beauty pageant a young Jewish girl was chosen to be queen. Warned by her cousin to not disclose her heritage, Esther had access to all the money, luxuries and status one can only dream of. However, when the lives of her people are threatened, Esther is reminded by her cousin that if she doesn't speak up for her people, that her life will not be spared, though God would send deliverance through someone else. He then challenged her saying: "who knows whether you have not attained royalty for such a time as this?"
In the end, Esther risks her life by coming before the king and then pleading for the lives of her people--which are spared.

There are so many character lessons in this story. The one I cannot get out of my head is this:
We are blessed. We also have the choice every day to build up our own "kingdoms", or to use our blessings to benefit our people.
I fail...every day. But this is something I am so convicted by.

Even if Esther had said no, maybe she didn't want to be sentenced to death by her husband--the king. Maybe she was afraid of the humiliation, or lacked the courage to speak up. Or maybe she could just pretend she though someone else would do something. But had she not done anything, and had God spared her life, she still would have had to live with that regret her whole life.

Soo...that's my 2 cents.

I highly encourage you to read the book of Esther (it's in the Old Testament of the Bible--between Nehemiah and Job). You will learn a lot. I promise.

Here's a video with a pretty song:

Call me crazy but...

i need a vacation!! (Or maybe I should say, "I want a vacation". )
It's my first semester back to school--grad school--and I'm bombarded with tons of homework. I only see my family like three days a week. I'm currently working full time in a helping profession (which also means: not very flexible to just pick up and take off whenever the mood strikes--compared to my previous jobs). Don't get me wrong, I believe God's led me here, and I'm trying to give it my best. And I like it for the most part. Some days I just get tired of the routine. Tired of seeing the same scenery all the time. Anxious to travel, see some sights and try something different for a change.
maybe all the teenagers I work with are rubbing off on me, in that I complain a lot! Or maybe I need to go back and read my own blog on contentment...
Either way. God is faithful, and the Bible does say: Hope deffered makes the heart sick. Prov. 13:12 (that kinda expresses how I feel right now) But David writes: Delight yourself in the LORD and He will give you the desires of your heart. Psalm 37:4.
So maybe not in my timing. And maybe not even exactly what I think I want or need, but God's so good. I trust Him most.



I vote: Europe or Latin America!

One Word

On the radio a few weeks back the DJs were talking about picking just one word to summarize your new year. So I took a few days to think about one thing that would really revolutionize my year and I'm finally getting around to writing about it. So here it is...

Discipline.

This is applicable to all areas of life, and a healthy dose of it will do us all some good. I promise. Be it exercise, eating habits, spending time with God, loving others, keeping commitments, doing our best at our jobs, or time management...well actually the list goes on and on... and on. But you get the point.

Paul repeatedly urged the church throughout the New Testament to "Walk in a manner worthy of the LORD". This is our responsibility as Christians. Erwin McManus, in his book called "Soul Cravings", said "To be good Christians, we cannot live thoughtless lives". There are a lot of us who are easily convinced that we can live just like everyone else, and still be a follower of Christ. I beg to differ. We are called to be different, to be set apart. Our culture is one that glorifies instant gratification, and doing what's easy and fun. Discipline is not fun, it's not easy, and it's not for the self-sufficient--because we cannot do it alone. But God promises to be our strength when we are weak. Let's live differently. Let's be intentional about our days and how we choose to spend our time. Forget about what those around us dictate, we have one person to please, and He's the one we will answer to someday for how we treated those around us, what we allowed into our lives, and how we used the time we were given.

I'm struggling through this myself, however the bottom line is this: I really want to be a woman who strove to give this life the best she had.

So think about it. And make this year count.

Whirlwind to South America

Bolivia to be exact.
What an incredible gift God gave us to be able to go to Cochabamba and surrounding regions.
I will try to adequately express the amazing-ness of our travels:

Our team united in Dallas on October 24, 2009. Kim and David came from Ohio, and Sylvia, Sara and I met up and left from San Antonio. Our flight was delayed in Dallas a little over and hour, and even as we were all crammed in the jetway waiting to board the plane I was so impressed by the testimony that I saw my team presenting. Right off the bat my very own team was meeting people and explaining to them the adventure we were embarking on; Sylvia was helping a little old lady with her heavy bag, and I just was soaking it all in. So happy since attitudes like this show how serious these people are about their God.

Due to the delay we missed our flight out of Miami. I was disappointed but reminded myself that there is nothing WE can do about it. So we decided to live it up on our American Airlines vouchers and make the most of our time. Right away I knew this was going to be good for us. Even though Cochabamba is where we wanted to be. We had devotions on the river, a good breakfast and fun at the beach in a CHEAP rental car.
We had an overnight flight to Lima, slept in the airport and got to La Paz after lunch on Monday. Our luggage had been "misplaced" and after some detective work, and favor from an American Airlines staff, our bags were returned shrink wrapped and everything. We got an incredible deal on flights to Cochabamba and went into the city of La Paz for dinner. With only one case of altitude sickness, we quickly got out of there. We arrived in Cochabamba at 11:30 p.m. and Mike Timmer, my former roomate Katie, a bolivian friend Patto, and the Cristo were all waiting for us.

Day 3:
We spent our first day in Cochabamba visiting the orphanage bearing gifts from generous supporters stateside. We had a soccer game with the kids, and I quickly realized how much the altitude really affects one. We also helped at Nate's workshop, did some grocery shopping for the week, sorted the mountain of donations and had an "orientation". My friend Katie took her personal day from the school where she teaches to spend time with us and even made dinner for us of Sopa de Mani. Delicious!

Day 4:
On Tuesday we tagged along with Mike, Ted (or "Tedly" as he was affectionately nicknamed by some of my teammates), and Remberto to the Chapare (the Jungle). We saw progress on the homes there and the tree farm which will support the day-to-day expenses of the homes. The scenery was beautiful, and it was neat to return to the jungle and see the culture there.

DAy 5:
We did some preparation work around the Hacienda (the guest house where we stayed) for the bonfire/birthday party for SARA! We made a quick trip to the Cancha (market), and then went to the Center where there was a sweet reunion with the missionaries and kids there and I proudly presented my team. (because I really am proud of them!). At the center we participated in play time, tutoring, games, nail painting, and more play time. It was a special occasion for them to have so many visitors so they decided to spend the regular class time having a soccer game. We returned home where Sylvia got right to work making Sara's birthday dinner. The plan was to have the bonfire after dinner, but once again time works very differently in South America, so dinner was getting ready the same time the guests were arriving. It was somewhat similiar to feeding of the 5,000. I mean on a smaller scale. Our dinner for 5, somehow fed nearly 30. The food was delicious, fellowship sweet, and the fire was big, though I barely had time to enjoy it.
The most fun thing of the evening was... well, 2 most fun things actually:
1st: It was really cool to see how excited everyone was that it was Sara's birthday. Everyone congratulated her, and sang the Bolivian birthday song to her with such emotion.
2nd: it was very cool to give out all the gifts that we had brought for all of these wonderful people. And incredibly rewarding to see their excitement.
It was a wonderful evening and a great way to start the 2nd leg of our journey to Potosi.

Day 6-11:
At 6 a.m we were ready with bags packed, trail mix handy and high spirits. We left on a mission to deliver Samaritan's Purse shoeboxes to rural communities in Southern Bolivia.

Jorge is a Bolivian Doctor and WAldo is a clown turned Dentist. Both men are founders of Red Vida de Esperanza (Life of Hope Network). The do a lot of work in these small communities encouraging, empowering and discipling the people there. Basically, it was an incredibly stretching 5 days. there were rarely bathrooms, we showered once, we were called upon to sing specials, give testimonies and teach classes with seconds notice. I feel that I learned and grew a lot and God came through in such a powerful way. We had the amazing surprise of returning through the Salar de Uyuni (Salt Flats). It was beautiful. We got back at 1:30 a.m., 11.5 hours behind schedule, but slept very good that night.

Day 12.
At 5:30 David and I got up and headed off to the airport to purchase plane tickets. We were expecting to have to leave that night, but miraculously a new airline had recently started up in Bolivia and offered a flight to Santa Cruz the next morning for $20 cheaper than the leading airline. We took advantage of that, so excited that we would have an extra night in Cochabamba. After breakfast with the girls, we went to the cancha again to finish up some souvenir shopping, we finished early had some Papas Rellenas for lunch and decided to take advantage of our extra hour to go up to the Cristo. We didn't have time to take all the stairs, so we took the cable cars. We got to the top to see the beautiful city one last time. Then we headed off to the center to play and say goodbye. That was the hardest goodbye, I guess because there are so many people there that were so good to me, and have continued to be an encouragement to me since then. We hurried back to Zona Frutillar and had a little Christmas Party with the kiddos and said goodbye. Dinner was with the Timmers and the Moseys followed by a rousing game of Telephone Pictionary, and then we were off to my 2nd Family's house for a visit and volleyball game. We got home late, walked Katie home and packed up.
I was not ready to leave, but was so happy with how amazing the week turned out. My heart was aching, but at the same time was very very happy. I have never felt so loved in all of my life!! Incredible.

The next morning (Day 13),
Mike picked us up at 5, and we said goodbye to the Hacienda, Pop Tart and one very cool missionary. We were delayed three hours in Santa Cruz due to a sick pilot and by the time we got to Miami, after a little confusion in immigration all of us missed our flights out of Miami and once again spent the night at a hotel. So ironic.

So the next day we got up early (once again) and went back to the Miami airport. Goodbyes were rushed and we all headed our seperate directions. I was mostly choked up as I said goodbye to my cousin, as she was the last person I saw and I realized that now it was really over. I wished it could've lasted forever... I guess that's why we take pictures.

I can never thank you enough for your support, donations, and prayers. We KNOW we could not have done it without you. There were definitely times where we would say, "do you have any idea how many people are praying for us right now?" It was a great source of motivation and encouragement knowing that we were representing you and God.

So keep praying for the people of Bolivia. Pray for favor for the missionaries with the people there, as well as workers to go. There is so much work to be done.

Don't forget that you can still sponsor a Christmas project in Bolivia. The projects are budget friendly and a tangible way to bless the people for whom you've been praying. Go to www.navidadenbolivia.info for more information.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!!
Much love.
Kristen

Keep watching the Photo blog for more pictures...

soon and very soon

Dear Faithful Pray-ers,
Greetings from the peaceful Polcyn House. (This is about the only time it is that way--at 12:30 a.m!). I trust this finds you well.

Saturday morning I will leaving-along with my lovely team- to Cochabamba, Bolivia. God has been so gracious, and His people so generous throughout this adventure we often dread called: Support Raising. While I did not need to raise any funds my team (of four--see my blog) needed to raise a pretty big amount of money. But we also received many toys and gifts for the people in Bolivia (kids, ministries and families), as well as many commitments by you all to be praying for us. We are encouraged and very excited to be representing you in BOLIVIA!

I will be updating my blog while we are gone with pictures and brief updates. I encourage you to check it regularly (even now there are updates).

I ask that you be praying with us for traveling mercies, smooth visits with customs officials, and safe arrivals of all of our precious cargo. ;) Packing has been quite the process...!

Also for the next week you can continue to pray for traveling mercies, boundless energy, and broken hearts that are willing to learn.

I can never thank you enough for your ongoing support and encouragement.

Con mucho amor:
Hermana Kristina

Navidad en Bolivia 2009

Dear Friends,

You may remember Navided en Bolivia 2008, where over $3000 was raised to bless kids, families and ministries in Cochabamba, Bolivia. Well, Navidad en Bolivia in 2009 is bigger, better and back with a website!! Adrian Nickols, my previous Australian co-worker, has organized the project this year and we have dreamed big. Last year we had to expand the project twice because you all responded so generously.

"This year we have over 220 sponsorships, and will attempt to raise over $8000 for practical needs found within 7 God-focused ministries in Bolivia. These needs include a passenger van, a data projector, internet access, baby formula, funding to establish a new ministry, personalised Christmas gifts for 50 children, and much, much more!!"

Please check out the website:
www.navidadenbolivia.info

Then e-mail me with your desired sponsorships. Until we get a better process, all sponsorships I will first need to b approved by Adrian (so we aren't doubling up). Then once your sponsorship is approved, you can send a check to me. I will be going to Bolivia in 2 weeks and will take all the money that we have raised thus far to deliver to the sponsored ministries. So it will be helpful to have as many sponsorships as possible committed before then. We will use and alternate method to send the rest of the money that comes after November.

We are limiting the individual child sponsorships to one per sponsor, and ask that if you want to give more money that you look for a bigger project so everything gets sponsored. 100% of the funds you donate goes directly to your sponsored item.

Thank you so much for your support.
God's richest blessings.
Kristen