Finally updated! (sorry for the long delay:( )

             I realize that I haven’t posted anything in over a month, and I apologize for that.  Things got a bit crazy for a couple of weeks and then we were in Manchester the week before last so I could write nothing then.  The weather has become much better here and spring is at last arriving swiftly to Carlisle.  Trees are budding, flowers are blooming all around the city, and the back garden of the Vic is beginning to come alive with color and life.  As these changes in season are occurring in the city, the Lord has been speaking to my heart about awakening from the time of winter and moving into spring.  My eyes are being opened to the love which He is pouring out on me, and I’m finding myself sitting at a window or going out on a walk just to talk with Him and spend time with Him.  It’s not easy to do though because I’m so used to think of myself as simply “doing things” for God, rather than just being a child of His.  He is beginning to show me just how much He loves time spent with me, no matter what I’m doing. 

                              The week before last we went to the city of Manchester and joined about five other YWAM bases from England, Norway, and Wales for a week on evangelism.  About sixty of us stayed in a church located at the heart of the city where the area wasn’t the greatest, but the people were in desperate need of Jesus.  I learned so much during that week about God’s heart for people, and I learned things about myself as well.  It was a packed week with lots of meeting new friends and stepping out of comfort zones.  We went out and had some good conversations and got to pray for people while getting some good teaching on evangelism and fear of the Lord.  I especially loved one “treasure hunt” I did with Lucy (staff on the Norway base).  What you do in a treasure hunt is ask God for clues about the “treasure” that you and your partner are going out to find, aka a person God wants to bless, and write them down on a piece of paper (your “treasure map”).  This could be a physical description, place, prayer needs, etc. Then you go out and look for people who fit some aspect of the description you got and talk to them about what you’re doing. 

                              When Lucy and I went out we talked with about six different people, some long conversations and some fairly short.  One that was encouraging to me was when Lucy and I were talking to a teenager and his little sister when a mom with a double stroller with two little red-heads in it walked by.  I really felt like we needed to talk to her, so when we finished our conversation I asked Lucy if we could go look for the mom.  As we walked in the direction she had gone, we looked ahead and saw that she had stopped at the entrance to a park and was turning to walk back towards us!  As she neared I asked her if her young ones were twins and she said yes.  It turned out she was the mother of five boys and the twins were the youngest, which reminded me so much of my family I began to really feel God’s heart for her.  As we told her about what we were doing and asked if we could pray for her, Lucy got the sense that she needed to give the mom a prophetic picture she had drawn of a woman walking a dog on a beach with the words “Rest and Restoration” written at the top.  It turns out the family had a dog, and just the weekend before she had gone to the beach with some friends for a short vacation.  I think she was really blessed by what we said because we spoke a lot of life and peace into her and I really felt like the Lord wanted her to be rested and refreshed, as being the mother of five young ones with twins at the bottom can be highly stressful and tiring (you can ask my momJ).  I really enjoyed seeing the Lord reach out to people and touch their lives through me, it is blessed to be a blessing!

                              We leave for Asia in three weeks, which is so crazy to think about.  It’s almost been three months since I left home, and I can really see the Lord’s hand in where He has me.  I feel so blessed to be His child and to know that He will always watch out for me: He won’t let me fall.  Going to Cambodia, Thailand, and China is going to be an eye-opening experience for me and I’m looking forward to experiencing the beautiful Asian culture first-hand. If you could pray for our team this last couple of weeks it would bless us very much; there is still so much preparation to do, especially for the staff, and it can be very stressful. Thank you so much for your support and prayer, I’m really trying to focus in on what the Lord wants to show me now and will keep you updated on what He does, hopefully more often than I have the past monthJ

I send my love back home to all of you, bless you!!!!

<3 Aubrey