A sweet man from South Dakota, 18 and ready to take on the world. Heat rash has covered his body for a while now. It is painful and even the doctors could not find relief.
My outreach team was the last to arrive home. It was tender and sweet. Everyone gathered out on the dock and all of our friends ran to greet us. I cried when I saw Hannah Renee and again when I saw Nat. There is something crazy that has happened in all of our hearts. We have bonded more than most DTSs. We've been made fun of, but that's okay. We love with everything we have.
After hugs all around we started to sit and talk with everyone about the overall experience of outreach. Things were both positive and negative. While sitting and chatting in the lounge, a group of people came in and said we were praying for our brother. So we stood up and prayed Korean style (Everyone prays at one time, out loud). I asked if anyone received a word or a picture and Rey said she had 24 hour prayer. So I found a piece of paper and we wrote down time slots of an hour each, asking two people to fill each slot.
I am amazed.
God is good and He is great and mighty to save. The slots filled and we started at 10 pm. Hour by hour, my brothers and sisters gathered to pray for one of our own. Many times there would be people that weren't on shift that would come to pray as well. The first two started a piece of paper for others to write down words, pictures, or scriptures from the Lord. We prayed through the night. We didn't see healing, but it didn't phase us. We kept. on. praying.
Morning dawned and Nat and I started our shift at 8. The group before us started another sheet for what the Lord was speaking about other things. One thing was to really start the sessions with worship. So we did.
I cannot explain to you how much the lounge changed over that time. The atmosphere was changed. You could tell that the Holy Spirit was dwelling there. When two or more agree, that's when the crazy, beautiful happens. There were more than two of us.
The 24th hour we decided to do corporate worship to end everything off. Looking back on that night still amazes me. We prayed all together for our brother and two of our sisters who needed healing as well. We didn't see healing.
That doesn't mean that God didn't work though. Just because we didn't see immediate healing does not mean that our God does not heal. He does heal and He does work, but only in His timing. Does that mean we should just give up? No. Prayer does change situations and people's hearts. It brings the Kingdom to earth. Someone asked me quietly why we didn't see healing, and this is the impression The Lord put upon my soul.
"If I had healed him in the second hour, would you have kept praying? If I had healed him in the twelfth, would you have kept praising My name? If I had healed them, would you have come together to worship Me like you did?"
Silence
Now it makes sense. While we didn't see physical healing for Dillon, Hannah, or Naomi we did see amazing healing in people's hearts. We saw prayer warriors and worshipers rise up to do what they were created for. That is enough. Our praying didn't heal our fellow students, it changed us.
We also found out that my outreach teammate who had to go home due to a knee injury does not have to have surgery. That is the work of my God who heals and saves. It is so exciting! And encouraging!
Praise: Minor outreach was amazing and we saw God work in incredible ways.
Prayer Requests: Last week we found out we would have another member added to our outreach family. My outreach team is the underdog team as well as the older team. There are 9 of us. 8 women and 1 man. We would greatly appreciate your prayers. The newest addition to our family is another leader. Her name is Selena. She actually just returned from Milne Bay about a month ago. It will be a blessing to have her on the team, and she will bring a whole new vibe to what we're doing. I'm excited.
I think that's plenty for now. Thank you for bearing with me and my sporadic, generally long blog posts. Be blessed and much love from Down Under.
-Katie
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