The Trip!

So, for those of you who don't know (or do), I'm going to be moving to Udine, Italy for 5 months! I leave January 14th and am so excited! How did this all happen? Well about 3 years ago this crazy family named the Walti's moved to Orlando, FL and began attending Metro Life Church, (my church :) ). I remember my mom coming home from home group saying she met this woman named Jeanette who told her , that her bean dip looked like rotten guacamole. Soon after I was introduced to this sweet woman and her family, Lee (her husband) and her kids, Bethany (now 18), Hannah (now 15), Jacob (now 13), Elijah (now 9), and Abby (now 5). God quickly knit the hearts of our families together. Hannah and Bethany became like sisters to me, pretty much every week the families got together and hung out, at our house, their house or Portofino (yea like Italian, weird huh?) resort out by Universal. Last spring the Walti's began going through some changes and were led to move out to Italy and serve in a ministry out there called Saints Equipped to Evangelize. They left September 7, 2008, with me promising that I would come visit for vacation sometime the following year. I had no idea how this whole trip would develop. But as I began talking to the Walti's they told me about oppurtunities for me to serve the ministry. One was to teach English to Italians, as an outreach program for the church out there. The teachers develop relationships with the students and through those relationships share the Gospel. I liked the idea, but wasn't sure how it would all work out. As it turned out I was finishing up my pre-requisites for the nursing program and would have a free semester before I could start the Nursing Program. So I had the time, now it was just time to take the time to pray and see if this was the Lord's will. As I began praying about it I began getting more of a vision for this trip. God has given me a heart to serve the nations and I had always had a desire to go on longer term mission trips. Money was the next thing, plane fare, living expenses, so on and so on. My mom began looking at flights for me and was able to find me a ticket for free with out families frequent flyer miles! Ok, one down what next? Well the Walti's graciously offered to let me live with them while I worked with ESL, for much less than if I had lived somewhere else. Ok great! Then I needed to actually apply for the program, and I got accepted! At this point I began to feel a real peace about the trip. On Thanksgiving the Twining's (our Worship Leader and his family) came over, we had a time of worship towards the end of the night and prayed for me as I made the decision to go on this trip. It was amazing, I began to actually get excited, finally seeing that this trip was becoming a reality. Fast Foward to today, I leave in 3 days, with lots to do, but I am very excited for what the Lord is going to do in me and through me on this trip. The fact that He would so graciously allow me to go and serve His purposes and bring glory to His great name is so amazing to me! Please be praying for me in this last few days before I leave!