Invitation to Ecuador!

I am again blown away at how quickly this year has flown by!  I am now only a  week from finishing my first semester of 2nd year at Bethel School of Ministry in Redding, CA.  Most of you know at least a little bit about what I am doing.  My 2nd year at school has been absolutely phenomenal!  I feel like it has been an entirely higher level of ministry training.  1st year was all about identity and really learning how to be human beings before we become “human doings”.  This year has been building off of that foundation, but we are now being trained on how to now create the culture around us that has been cultivated in us.  This has been so good for me!  Some of the things the Lord has been highlighting to me this year:  1) Community - It is so important to move from independence into interdependence.  We are the Body of Christ!  2) Dreaming with God - The Lord has been really encouraging me to go after the dreams that are in my heart. 3) Trusting over Knowing - I don’t have to have all the answers.  I just need to in the goodness of my God.

I now am presented with another opportunity to grow and take what I have learned outside of school.  I have been chosen to go on a missions trip to Ecuador with an incredible team of people.  There are a couple of reasons I applied for this specific trip.  First of all, I love the Latin American culture and the Spanish language.  It is a culture so full of life!  Also, this trip is focused on bringing heaven’s justice to situations that are distorted by social injustices.  This is a huge passion of mine!  Finally, this trip is partnered with Jennifer Toledo and Global Children’s Movement.  Jennifer has had an incredible impact on my life through her testimony of radical obedience to God which led her to the nations.  It is such an honor to be able to see her ministry in action!

If grace is grace, then work is no longer work (Rom. 11:6). There is nothing like encountering God's love with someone who has never known that He loves them! It's not hard to love God and it's such a blissful joy to share it with street kids, prostitutes, kids in youth prisons etc. We will be serving and supporting the existing ministries and churches who pour their hearts and lives into the people of Quito, Ecuador, day after day.

Our team will meet up with social justice rockstars Jennifer and Jonaton Toledo. Through their connections we will have amazing opportunities, releasing mercy and justice in youth prisons, ministering to and feeding malnourished children, distributing supplies, loving on and healing women and their babies in the nation’s largest maternity hospital for impoverished families, ministering downtown, as well as ministering to believers through a conference.

I would absolutely love it if you would prayerfully consider joining my support team as I prepare for this amazing adventure and also while I am there.  The trip itself is for 17 days near the end of March into early April, but the preparation time is just as important.  If you would like to jump onto my prayer team and get updates, just shoot me an email and I will put you on a list.  Also, I will be blogging about my journey up until the trip, while I am there, and after I get home. I am also looking for people who feel led to sow into this missions trip financially.  Please know that I so appreciate however you choose to support me!

Financial gifts may be made online at ibssm.org. This gift is tax-deductible and you will receive a statement at the end of the year for your tax records. If you wish your gift to be anonymous, please check the anonymous box. This will allow you to receive an end of year statement, but will not allow me to see your name. This gift is non-refundable, and if for any reason I or my team does not go, the money will support another mission trip sponsored by Bethel Church.

I pray that our Father would radically bless you in this season of your life and that His love would fill you daily.

Ellie Stailey

2245 Deerfield Ave

Redding, CA 96002

Will You Choose Me?

Taking notes with Glory (the cat)

This past week in 2nd year we started our preaching project.  Everyone in 2nd year gets to preach to a group of about 30 other students and 1 leader.  We each have 10 minutes to preach and then 5 minutes of feedback.  So I know what you're thinking... 10 minutes, really?  You could take that entire time to tell one story.  My thoughts exactly.  How am I supposed to develop an entire sermon in 10 minutes?  I can't even take a shower in 10 minutes, or make my lunch in 10 minutes!  So in one respects it would appear to be a fairly simple project.  Get a good scripture, explain what it means, and give some revelation.  Done!  Oh, but let me tell you, sermon prep is not that easy.  Sure, if I wanted to talk on something random, just pulled something out of the hat, I could easily have done it.  But I wanted to share something that had been stirring in my heart for 6 months.  How do you summarize 6 months of process and revelation in that amount of time?  Well, three full afternoons, many long chats with Jesus, lots of brain food, and 22 pages of notes later, I felt like I was starting to know what my sermon was going to be about!
Now that you have an idea of the process... about my preaching.  I was the last of 5 to preach on Tuesday. I won't say I wasn't trembling on the inside or that I didn't have that moment of panic at the thought of "What if I forget everything once I'm up there?"  But I did it, and it was great!
A summary on the summary of my past 6 months/sermon...  I titled it "Will You Choose Me?" and the theme was - Jesus doesn't always make sense, but He wants to know, will you still choose Him?  I spoke out of John 6:56, 60-69.  In this text, Jesus addresses the offense His disciples have because they couldn't understand His sermon on the need to eat His flesh and drink His blood.  (Who would understand something that crazy?!)  But instead of explaining Himself, He told them that they were offended because they were trying to understand by the flesh, or through their own ability to understand.  The problem was that Jesus words were spirit.  They were looking for rational explanations from a spiritual God.  It just doesn't work that way.  So Jesus purposefully offended them to see how they would respond.  Would they allow their offense to drive them away from Jesus, or would they let it drive them closer in relationship with Him?  Relationship has always been the standard for God.  He wants to know if we can get past our right to understand and have everything make perfect sense to us, and see if we will still choose Him when it doesn't.  Can we choose Him when things aren't lining up the way we expected?  Can we choose Him when we aren't seeing the answers to our prayers?  Can we choose Him when we feel offense rising inside of us?  My challenge was that all of us would come to a place where, yes, we still seek God for answers, but that we could say "God I want you more than I want answers.  So I choose you."
So there you have it!  I have successfully finished my preaching project.  But not to worry, there will be more to come :)