I found myself in an orphanage in the Philippines yesterday (still can’t really believe or grasp where I am) and I encountered a problem. A small boy was screaming over and over with everything that he could muster. At this point, my engineering education kicked in and I began to systematically fix the problem. I studied it for a minute, and noticed a slightly bigger boy would say something right before the smaller boy would yell. Bully. I picked the small boy up and tried to distract him and even take him out of the area, but none of that helped at all. So, my attention turned...

I found myself in an orphanage in the Philippines yesterday (still can’t really believe or grasp where I am) and I encountered a problem. A small boy was screaming over and over with everything that he could muster. At this point, my engineering education kicked in and I began to systematically fix the problem. I studied it for a minute, and noticed a slightly bigger boy would say something right before the smaller boy would yell. Bully. I picked the small boy up and tried to distract him and even take him out of the area, but none of that helped at all. So, my attention turned...

As I looked around to see small huts and dirt stirred up all around in a village outside of Manila called Tent City, my eyes couldn't bear it. They could only focus on the sweet face of one year old Jaime as I held her in my arms. Her hair was a sweaty mess and her nose ran for the entire hour and a half that I held her. Sweat poured off of me from the added body heat and strength needed to hold my new friend. Anytime I so much as shifted her weight from side to side her little arms would wrap tighter and tighter around my neck. She was shy at first, longing to hold my hand but not...

Before I came on this trip, I was honestly very skeptical about my "calling," if you will, to go. I love being at sagu and I love attending to school and going to church and basically being a normal 20 year old girl. It's not really normal for someone like me to take a semester off of school to fly halfway around the world for three months and serve with a missions organization that I knew almost nothing about. Everything in me wanted to stay at school and graduate. I had my life plan all set and ready to go. But I'm not called to be normal. And God has a way of changing...

As I looked around to see small huts and dirt stirred up all around in a village outside of Manila called Tent City, my eyes couldn't bear it. They could only focus on the sweet face of one year old Jaime as I held her in my arms. Her hair was a sweaty mess and her nose ran for the entire hour and a half that I held her. Sweat poured off of me from the added body heat and strength needed to hold my new friend. Anytime I so much as shifted her weight from side to side her little arms would wrap tighter and tighter around my neck. She was shy at first, longing to hold my hand but not...

Before I came on this trip, I was honestly very skeptical about my "calling," if you will, to go. I love being at sagu and I love attending to school and going to church and basically being a normal 20 year old girl. It's not really normal for someone like me to take a semester off of school to fly halfway around the world for three months and serve with a missions organization that I knew almost nothing about. Everything in me wanted to stay at school and graduate. I had my life plan all set and ready to go. But I'm not called to be normal. And God has a way of changing...