Turkey 2012

And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. John 14.13

Just eight months ago, I had joined a team of i195 classmates heading to Nigeria to make the love of God tangible and real. Many people came to faith in Jesus on that trip and some 300 physical healing took place before their very eyes as God revealed Himself to me and the Nigerian people.

I found myself on a very different kind of trip this April with sixteen others in Istanbul Turkey, where Christians sharing their faith was not well received from strangers. Winning souls to Jesus in this country required the steady building up of relationships over time. I wasn’t experiencing the types of experiences on this trip, that I had in Nigeria. I began to question God and how He was working. Finally I concluded that something in me needed to change.

I prayed that night that God would change my heart and give me more of His heart. I prayed to be able to see the Turkish people though His eyes and not my own. When I woke up the next morning, I could already sense that something was different.

Eager to start the day, the team headed out on their daily walk to the trams and ferries to get to their English clubs and various outreaches. Suddenly, I started seeing things that I had not seen before. I know the street was the same and it was just crowds of people but my eyes started to lock eyes with the people that we were passing by. As I stared into each face tears started to fill my eyes and in that moment God spoke to me. First He said, “I love these people.’ And then He said, ‘I came to seek and to save the lost and these people are lost…’”

I knew that His desire was for each and every one of the multitudes to know Him and spend eternity with Him. My heart broke for every face that she saw. God answers prayer when we pray what lines up with His heart. Because of this particular answered prayer God has given me even more of a longing in my spirit for His children to come know Him as their Lord and Savior.