"So you must go and make disciples of all nations. Baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Teach them to obey everything I have commanded you. And you can be sure that I am always with you, to the very end." -Matthew 28:19-20
 
Daily I strive myself to be better, to grow in Christ, and to grow as a Christian in general. Many times I fail, and many times I say the wrong thing when I am evangelizing. But if I was perfect I definitely would not need Christ's undying love. I've been to Brazil, I've been to Uganda, and will hopefully be going to Mexico in Febuary. But I guess you can never do, enough. I guess there is never a point in your life when you can honestly stop and say "I've dont enough. I've done what God called me to do." You can always better yoruself, you can always do more. And that's what I'm learning every day whether it's through seeing my grandparents still evangelizing, my parents inviting people into their home, or my peers going to differen countries for the past 7 summers out of their adolescent lives. I pray that I will someday be able to fulfill Matthew 28 and fulfill what it tells me to do and to be. But until then I will strive to do my best and to be the best verrsion of myself.
Being around the orphans in Africa, the teenagers in Brazil, or the children in Englewood, I will always need to be better.
I have found myself in so many different situation, I've been scared, happy, sad, heart-broken, joyful but even in the scariest times I have a bigger responsibility.

I find myself being a mom, when we almost had a shooting last month between two of the boys over a basketball game, I found myself being a mom. As I told one of the boys little brother to "stay by me" and "dont go home until it safe" all as I was holding this little boys beautiful niece who had fallen asleep in my arms.

I find myself being a big sister to the teenage girls as one of them told me something about a boy she liked because she said she didn't know who else to tell. And a little sister to these boys who just need a woman's love. Sometimes a man just needs a hug, somebody to tell them their worried about them, somebody to care and to love them. And I find myself doing that with over half the boys at the ministry.

I find myself being a nurse as a young boy who shows me a bruise he has right in the middle of his forehead. Or the little girls who scrape their knees playing on the play ground. I find myself kissing bumps and bruises because that's what my mother did to me when I got hurt.

I find myself being a house wife. Teaching these girls how to bake, how to clean, how to be a women of God, someone who honors their husband. And teaching the boys how to treat their girlfriend, friends, sisters, moms. And how to run the house, how to be the spiritual leader in the house... etc. 

When I stop and think that these kids have never had someone yell at them, because their worried about them. Or had someone make sure they give them a hug when they first see them and when they leave because they dont know when their going to see them again and their going to miss them. They've never had someone kiss their scraped knee. They've never had someone care.
And that is something that I've had to learn. I dont know how to be a nurse, I dont know how to be a mom. But I do know how to love these kids and I guess thats the most important thing.

Love,
Katlyn

My Beautiful Michella

As I sit here with Michella (a 7 year old girl who comes to UYO often) I have never seen her so calm and so beautiful. As everyone was busy playing video games, on the computer, talking to each other, we just sat. We just sat in the midst of everyone. We took out a coloring book and some crayons and we just talked for 15 minutes. And it made such a difference. The next day she was different. She had a peace about her and we had a unspoken connection where we will just always have that, we will always be able to talk.