Happy Birthday to ME :)

I feel blessed to be surrounded by such a loving Christian community--it really shone through today. First, the teacher whose office my desk is in brought me a mocha and delicious breakfast food. Then, my 7th graders planned a birthday party for me in homeroom, complete with cupcakes and cards. Some of my seniors who lead worship had the ENTIRE school sing happy birthday to me in chapel, then proceeded to produce a birthday cake in class. The birthday surprises were topped off with a dozen roses from my boyfriend down here. (ha, just kidding...I bet my mom freaked out for a second though. They were actually from my host mom).

Anyway...I did promise a few more reflections from my volcano time. I'm inserting an article I wrote for my church back home. So, First people...this will appear in First Facts so don't feel like you have to read it twice :)

Guatemala, Volcanoes, and the Refiner’s Fire
My time in Guatemala is proving to be a time of great adventure, learning, and reflection—often intermingled. One of these experiences came just a few days ago. Guatemala is a country whose geography is shaped and reshaped by volcanoes and volcanic activity; the capital city itself is surrounded by active volcanoes. I have never seen active volcanoes outside of my Geology text books, so it is quite a sight. While a chunk of my heart beats for the rugged, piercing rocky mountain skyline, something about the cylindrical, symmetrical force of a smoking volcano draws me in. In fact, it drew me and a group of friends up the side of Pakaya. Our guide, in his traditional Mayan dress and dialect, took us around the back of this volcano to a place where thick, viscous lava oozed down the mountain and across the ground.
I do not know what I expected of lava, but it was hot. Intolerably, skin singeing hot from five feet away (and the pyromaniac in me still had to burn the end of my walking stick in the lava floes!).

I have never experienced heat with this intensity, but, along with the appearance of sunburn, it gave me a refreshed insight in the work of the Lord in my life. In Jeremiah 23:29 God compares his word to fire; in Hebrews 12:29 we are commanded to worship the Lord “acceptably in reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.” (Sidenote: Malachi 3 also refers to this image in regards to injustice—which is challenging and convicting and too much to handle in these few paragraphs. Read it!)

Our God is a consuming fire. He’s not a “let’s warm up and roast a hot dog” kind of fire. He’s a melt me, break me down to the elements, reveal my impurities, refine me into something new and better, consume me kind of fire. As I reflect on this fire that is my God, I have to ask myself a few questions:

1. How do I approach this consuming fire? Is it with the reverence and awe demanded of me? Or is it with hesitancy at what might result from an encounter?
2. What impurities does God so desperately seek to remove that he speaks to me with words of fire? Am I blind to these areas of my life?
3. Do I embrace the pain of refining fire as part of the process that draws me closer and closer to my Savior and my God?

We are all in this together (yes, High School Musical fanatics, you may sing that line). We are--individually and as the body of Christ—constantly being conformed and refined into the likeness of Christ. Like the oozing lava and the landscape of this country, we are in the process of formation and re-formation.

So here I am in Guatemala, standing (well, actually sitting in a hammock) at the edge of all my tomorrows, reflecting on the God ordained changes that have occurred even in my five weeks here. I have learned that I love teaching middle school students (SHOCK), I have learned that I love Guatemala, and maybe someday I will return and love teaching in Guatemala. I also am learning what it looks like to daily serve a God who loves me so deeply that he will not allow me to remain how I am. He is refining me with consuming fire while embracing me with a grace that is more complex and beautiful than I will ever comprehend.