Shine // Latvia // Germany

Well, it is decided. I am the official Shine Seminar 2013 Leader. I couldn't be more thrilled and terrified at the same time. For those of you who do not know, Shine is our 6 week course on the global sex trade and how we as Christians can response. It's pretty much a training for those who are interested in working with those in prostitution or have been trafficked. Modern day slavery still exists, and it's closer than we realize. We just want to play a small part in working to end it. This will be our 3rd year doing this seminar. We really have a desire to take it from Amsterdam and bring it all over the world. My life is about to get even more busy, but I am so excited. If you are interested in partaking in Shine email me at Shine@ywam.nl and I will send you an application (that I just spent several hours creating mind you :) The dates are April 18th to June 3rd.

And going to the next topic, Latvia was really amazing. We have a sister ministry in Riga, called Freedom 61. They are a small team that reaches out to the street ladies there who are working in prostitution. Almost all of them are addicted to drugs. They also do prevention work in schools and orphanages as Latvia is considered a Source country. In regards to trafficking humans, you have 3 different types of countries:

1: Source Countries: from which people are trafficked out of

2: Transit Countries: a temporary stop, momentary exchange

3: Destination Countries: where the victims end up (Amsterdam is considered a Destination Country)

So prevention work is pretty important in these Source Countries. But while we (myself and the 3 lovely volunteers we have had here in Amsterdam for 3 months from IHOP) were there, we taught about intercession, interceded, as well as did some outreach to the ladies. I brought my scissors with me and did some haircuts. It was awesome to be able to use a physical skill the Lord has given me. It even brought in some ladies who have never come into their cafe before. Oh to explain, they have a cozy room in the middle of the "Red Light District" there, where they offer a warm place for the girls to sit, have some coffee & tea or soup or just a conversation. Or while I was there, a haircut. It snowed while we were there so someplace warm is nice. The last client I had, had never come into their cafe before. And while I was running my hands through her hair, she opened up about her life story. How she had been trafficked and bought and sold. They got to build a relationship with her, and I pray it grows. The cafe was also where many would meet in the underground Church during the Soviet Union. So amazing!

Doing work!

The team that went to Latvia

Part of Freedom 61

Traditional Latvian Food!

Lastly, my colleague and I went to Germany to teach at a DTS on Justice. I was SO stressed out, but guess what? Everything came together and worked out! My friend and I split the week in half and really tagged teamed all there is about Justice and the Word of God. It was a wonderful experience. Got to see some old friends, meet some new ones, pray for the students, showed Nefarious, and taught from the Word of God. Oh and Köln is such a beautiful city. We spent one afternoon checking out the Love Lock Bridge (Hohenzollern Bridge) the old Cathedral (Dom) and eating really delicious German cake. There are never any complaints when it comes to German cake. But truly, it was an awesome week.

Els and I on the train to Köln

Seeing Rahel at the train station!

Hohenzollern Bridge

                                                                                 The Dom Cathedral

                                     
Oh! And so I just ended up taking my severely broken bike to my Croatian bike fixing buddies and just told them I will spent the large cost in replacing the parts. He called me a few days later saying that he could not replace the parts (because its such an old bike and hard to find them) but he somehow fixed the problem and only charged me 25€! It was such a relief and a blessing. I am SO thankful to have a bike again!

On the train to and from.

I had the privilege of teaching with my colleague in Köln, Germany for this past week on the topic of Justice. When I found out I would be speaking, it got me excited, because I knew that in the midst of my studies I would gain much knowledge as well. We broke the week up and my topic would be "The Biblical Foundation of Justice." If anyone knows me they know how much I love scripture. I love to study the Word of God. I love to decipher every single word and compare it with other verses. I became quite frustrated because I was opening up a can that would take me months if not years to study. But I had only a certain amount of time and I had to come up with something. Many days my attempts to start my notes wouldn't even begin because I would get so caught up in what I was learning.  But I got most of what I wanted to say onto paper and the week went pretty smooth. What I did get out of this teaching though was Jesus's heart for injustice. I don't work in these issues because its the "next cool thing to do," I work with them because thats what Jesus did. And I long to lead a life after His. The first recording of Jesus speaking publicly; He proclaims Isaiah 61:1 and part of 2. That is His heart, that was His mission. My mission is to point others to that place of being justified before Christ. I don't just want to see broken men and women set free physically, I want to see them set free spiritually. Working with justice issues is much bigger than seeking to abolish human trafficking, its seeking to see one justified before the Righteous Judge. When we reach out to these girls its not just seeing that they are taken care of physically but longing to see they are taken care of spiritually as well. It's easy to get so caught up in our physical work and forget the heart behind it, forget Whose heart is behind it.

Also I want to really make it a point to say that I don't do any of this work for myself. Truly, I don't. It doesn't make me feel better for "doing good" nor do I take my identity in my work. I love because He loved me first. I can love only because He first loved me, and the reason why I love is because He first love me. Anything I do is for God, not to please myself or make me feel better.

On a side note, me and a few others from our team is going to Latvia on Tuesday til Saturday to visit and encourage our sister ministry, Freedom 61. I look forward to this and so do my scissors and comb. Latvia is a very interesting place, I would truly welcome your prayers. And my life in Amsterdam is still up and running. Always busy. I really do love this city.

Some practical things you can be praying for:

I recently reapplied for my visa, so pray that I can afford the fee and that it gets approved.

And my bike seems to be completely dead, and I need another one greatly, but finding a reliable, working one that is my size and in my price range has been more difficult that I thought it would.

I think that is it for now, thank you to everyone who does hold me up in prayer, it is so greatly appreciated.

Back to the heart of the city

Well, I had a wonderful, interesting, growing, painful time back in America. But gold has got to go through fire to be refined. I got to go home (San Diego) for a month. To be honest it was such a emotionally intense time that I haven't been able to really write about it yet, for I have spent this week contemplating it. But when am I not contemplating life? haha. It was so wonderful to see my family and friends. My little nieces and nephew are getting so big and so beautiful it hurts, literally. That was something I understood about serving the Lord abroad, it comes with sacrifice. I have to sacrifice being apart of watching my sweet young family grow up. I know it will be worth it, but for now it's hard. So I got as many hugs and kisses in as I could. They truly warm my heart. It was also wonderful because my mom and best friend threw me a Birthday party and it was perfect. I had a slight fear of turning 25 but I now feel like this new season it brings me is going to be a great one. I have such incredible family and friends, truly I am amazing at how blessed I am. The difficult time has definitely happened for good but it was still hard to live through. I experienced so many emotions at once it was almost too much to handle. The overwhelming understanding that I was leaving home again, the fear that came with turning 25, the realness of the work I was getting back into, the memory of the spiritual atmosphere of Amsterdam, getting my heart broken, leaving my sweet little ones to grow another year without me there... just so many extreme emotions showered over me at once and it was hard to trust the Lord's plan. But it's those moments when you experience just how wonderful your parents, friends and family are. They love you and pray for you and let you lean upon them when you can't walk on your own. I needed them and they were there for me. I also realized how much I needed Jesus. I couldn't survive without Him. It had been a long while since I had experienced that, and it was crucial for me so that I could put an end to this old season of my life and move into my new one. I have longed for this old season of walking in the wilderness to be behind me and I am so joyful that there is now so much light in my once cloudy sky. After crying my heart out for a few days I had a wonderful, intimate moment with God. He spoke so clearly about personal things I needed to hear and I have not wept since that Wednesday morning. I know I have a beautiful road ahead of me, not only in my Amsterdam season but the season that comes after. I am so thankful I have a God who loves me and cares for me and guides me when I am walking blindly.

This past week has also picked up where I left off with ministry. The girls still remember me and that warms my heart. "Deborah" is supposed to come over to our place tonight for coffee, I look forward to continuing our friendship. Please continue to pray for her, God truly is reaching out to her and I am desiring to be His hands and feet. I also am preparing a teaching for a DTS in Köln, Germany which I will be speaking with my colleague Elisabeth. I am nervous yet excited. I have no idea how to teach about "The Biblical Foundation of Justice" however it's slowly coming to me and the bit that I have so far has been an encouraging learning experience for me already so I hope it will be for them too.

Red Lights Keep on Burning

Why is it the moment I feel inspired to write I have to work in 12 mins? Let's try using these fingers for some fast typing. Tonight I went out with Not For Sale on our weekly "Soup selling" They have a business here that makes homemade, healthy, organic soups and sells to the ladies behind the windows. This has been a great way to continue building relationships with the girls. Because I live in the center of the Red Light District, I get so used to seeing such unnatural things. It starts to become normal. Like for instance, my colleague and I were talking to a girl in the windows. She had just gotten back from vacation and we were chatting about that. She put her usual order in for soup and behind us a man boldly approaches (it's amazing how in this place its not just tolerated but honored for men to buy sex publicly, even their friends support and cheer them on gladly) and asks how much for her service. She jokes around a little but then says "no seriously, its 50€" he says "Alright" throws down his cigarette and moves to step into her room. It was so casual. Just like he had asked her how much a haircut would be or something. I realized how used to that kind of talk I was, I mean I hear it everyday. But tonight it's like my eyes remembered how unnormal this sort of transaction is. Just because you witness it over and over doesn't make it right or civil. I travel home for a month next week and I think it's coming at a perfect time. My roommate/colleague went home to Norway a couple weeks ago. She said it was so interesting driving in a beautiful place where sin and tolerance isn't plastered in every window or in every alley. I know I will be yearning to come back here but truth be told, I am ready for a break.

So my fingers didn't type fast enough, now I am finishing this post the next day. Last night I also walked by a girl's window who i have really good contact with. We will call her Deborah. She and I went for coffee weeks ago and was eager to hear the gospel. We have tried to meet up since but she kept canceling (which is normal) but tonight she was eager to talk and opened up as to why she has been canceling and I was just reminded how amazing and kind she is. She wasn't canceling for her sake, no, she was canceling for mine because she had been going through some heavy things and felt like she "wouldn't be good company." I almost started to cry, i reached out to take her hand and told her how she would NEVER have to worry about that. That I would always love to visit with her no matter how she feels or what she is going through. I also reminded her how much God loves her, and how, contrary to popular belief God's presence is with her, even in the windows. He does not flee from evil, evil flees from Him. It's those moments of being able to love on a girl here who doesn't get much proper love and more often pushes true love away makes living here in this wretched city so worth it.

Another awesome thing that happened on Wednesday, we were bringing coffee and tea to the ladies and one of the girls was sitting down in her room with the curtain closed (most of the windows are connected so you walk into one and see the other) her foot had a horrible cramp and she couldn't stand. My spanish speaking colleague asked if we could pray for her. In the middle of praying she started to almost laugh, when we finished she said the pain was completely gone. The Lord loves these ladies so much, and we just want to help them see that.

Yours is the Kingdom

The last two days have been simply powerful and I felt the need to blog them. Last night we had a showing of Nefarious: Merchant of Souls (you can go here for the trailer: http://youtu.be/Q-VC8AUE3Bc) and two ex prostitutes who were interviewed in the movie were there. One of the ladies  hadn't seen the movie before, so you can imagine there were many tears shed. I had watched the movie a few weeks ago with my team, but watching it last night with a larger crowd and the two ladies really moved me. To hear of the work Jesus has done in people is one thing but to see the experience on their faces and hear their stories right in front of you is just incredible. My heart is beginning to burn more for seeing broken people transformed in the sex industry. I was looking for that passion to arise in me again.

The group right before the film.

Real Talk

Oh goodness. You know for 5 years I prepared moving to Amsterdam. That was all my life lead up to. Then the Lord spoke to me that this was going to be a "starting place" for me and that He had other plans for me elsewhere. That sure took me for a turn. I had put so much emphasis on living my life here. Now that I am here things are not what I imagined either. I thought it was just recently, but as I read my journal from last year I realized I am experiencing the same things I did then. I was told about this "spiritual heaviness/stronghold" on the city but shrugged it off because I usually am not effected by such things. But as I started my life out here I knew I needed to research more on the matter.
Five years ago when I did my DTS here I was in pure heaven. This city was truly my tabernacle; the place I felt the closest to God. But now its the place I feel the most distant. I don't feel like myself, I feel like my spiritual gifts are on the back burner, I have no desire to draw closer to the Lord, or study the word, or pray, or any motivation to move forward in the things He has called me to do here. It is so completely insane. I knew it would be hard but I didn't expect this at all, really AT ALL. It's like I have to go against everything I feel and every emotion to just live obediently. Had it not been so clear to me that I was supposed to be here for the next season of my life I would have gone home. And thats real talk right there. But I am stubborn and will not give up, especially since I know God has promised me that great things will happen here. But I am emotionally and spiritually drained. Something has to change I am just not sure how.
Something that has also been heavy is when I walk outside my door I am surrounded by the most vulgar, crude pigs/men. It is exhausting. Its like all your eyes can see are these men craving and drooling over women and drugs and alcohol. It is so hard to remind yourself that there are good men out there in the world when all you see are the worst of them. It's becoming harder and hard for me to love them, but I am trying.
But today I was encouraged in an unexpected way. I was cutting hair for a family downstairs and their kids were watched Veggie Tales. The story of Esther was on and it nearly brought me to tears. It reminded me that God uses who we are to do great things. He uses our weaknesses to prove His strength. When the Lord truly shows up in this city it will be no doubt that all glory will go to Him and not me, because I am so incapable of doing such great work on my own.
That's not to say it isn't hard. I want to be honest about the emotional and spiritual setbacks I am going through, so you can keep me in prayer. Not only am I an almost 25 year old missionary living in the heart of one of the darkest cities but I am human, going through human worries, distractions, anxieties, crushes, heartbreaks, loneliness, but also some good things too. When I was a kid I would separate missionaries from normal humans, now I realize just how human I am once I am living on the mission field. I am not even close to being qualified to work here, but God is, and with Him on my side how can I go wrong? I really need to press through and persevere during this time in the wilderness. And to be honest, I realized today that I may never come out of the wilderness while I am here in Amsterdam but until I know my work here is done I will stay and I will choose to focus on the joy of the Lord.

Letting go

I always feel like I need to come up with something very profound to update my blog with. Or I just tell myself no one really reads this so just update later. But I realized I don't need to write anything intense nor do I need people to read what I write, I just need to get more into the practice of expressing my life and thoughts here in Amsterdam or where I am living at the moment, which is by the way, in a new apartment in the Red Light District with 2 amazing ladies =)

God is definitely doing a lot of work around me, although my incompetent eyes cannot see this most of the time. But I know in my heart and soul that glorious work is being done. There have been a lot of revelations that I've received. The kind that are right there in front of you for a while and when you finally realize them they bring tears to your eyes. One of these big "ah ha" moments was when I finally realized I didn't have to work hard at making what God called me to do here come to pass. I mean; God the one who called me to Amsterdam, He is the one who told me what He had planned for me here, so why was I striving to perfect that plan He already had drawn the blue prints up for? It doesn't make any sense, yet I was working so hard to see this calling through. A few months ago I was having such a sweet Skype talk with my dad and I told him how I felt like I was doing nothing towards my goal here, that I felt I needed to be teaching prostitues how to do hair and because I wasn't doing that I felt so worthless. He just simply stated "Katy maybe teaching the ladies how to do hair is just the cherry on top, maybe it won't be your main ministry there but just a small part." That kind of shook me a bit but lead me to the realization that the one thing God called me to do here was "to pioneer a Tamar Center in Amsterdam." When He told me this (in 2008) the ministry I am now working with wouldn't have even been close to pioneering such a thing, but God knew. These last couple weeks we have been meeting and praying as a Lighthouse Team for vision and how to move forward in that vision. Last week it hit me. The Tamar Center is a place "offering hope, healing and a new life to the bar girls in Pattaya, Thailand." So basically what God called me to do here is pioneer a place that offeres hope, healing and a new life to broken women in Amsterdam. Here I was striving for the last 7 months especially on how to achieve this goal, yet God just showed me that is exactly what we are doing now. Me and my team of 6 others are in the "pioneering-transition" stage of building up The Lighthouse; a place that longs to see these broken women healed and set free. All this time I knew thats what we are doing yet, embarrassingly enough I never compared the two. What a weight that was lifted off of my shoulders. It wasn't that God was telling me that that was what I had to do, it was as if He was prophesying it over my life. Anything else that happens here will just be an added bonus. Which leads me to my next topic.

My wonderful friend Saskia and I met last year during Shine. She pioneered/worked as the director of Not For Sale in South Africa for 3 years prior. When I began talking to her my soul started to leap, I knew we would have a connected future. Last night we cut each other's hair (oh did I mention she is also a hairdresser?) and then went out to dinner. We talk for hours about our hearts and desires for Amsterdam and they are so simultaneous. She is a half YWAM-er half NFS-er which is just perfect. She really longs to just see Jesus transform the lost and broken here and simply wants to be apart of that. We both know that God is doing work and is about to pour out some amazing blessing and restoration here, and we're stoked for it to come to pass. She suggested we get together this week and just pray and ask God what He wants us, as individuals, to do and how He wants us to do it. Then act on that. No holding back anymore, but really just begin to take that step of faith and watch what God will do. As you can probably tell, I am really excited. I know I am a hairdresser, and I know God loves to work in our natural giftings, so I look forward to seeing how He will do the things He longs to do.

Whenever I have been praying about things happening here I keep getting a picture... and maybe it can help you to understand that we (usually as Americans) think "this is what I am going to do, I will move out there and it will all fall into place and everything will be great and everything will start working immediately." Missions is NEVER like that, especially pioneering a ministry. Expect God to do great things but don't expect it to all happen smoothly or quickly, it is a slow and patient-teaching process. The picture I have is of a roller coaster; you start to climb uphill very slowly, bit by bit. Then finally after the ascent, you drop down the slope extremely fast and you can't slow down. I really feel like that will be a image of my time here. Right now I am climbing up, and I truly feel like I am getting very close to the top, then once I am finally there it is a fast ride down. I look forward to it, and I am thankful God is preparing me now as I slowly inch my way to the top.

Prayer:

-There is a true "Spirit of busyness" here and I am feeling it like no other, please pray it calms down some. And when I mean busy, its mostly things not having to do with the ministry but just added on to the everyday life, it just keeps coming in wave after wave.

-My mom comes out to visit in a week, pray for safe travels, and also that her time here would be super slow so it would be like a month and not a short week =)

-For me to continue with a joyful heart, learning patience and balance is not coming very easy to me.

-God has been providing everything I have needed, whether it means having $3 left in my account for the rest of the month, or getting a bill a month or two later than I should or just having to wait longer for things like furniture for my room it all works out. Maybe not in anyway I had planned but He really is taking care of me. I am not sure if its good to be soo dependent on Him and be content with what He has given me or to also ask for people to pray and see if God puts it on your heart to provide for me as I am here in Amsterdam. So I will leave it at both. God is meeting my needs but there is not quite flexibility to soar here yet.