Evangelism in Lietuva Part 1

Many people have been asking me this question lately....."Why Lithuania?......Kodėl Lietuva?"
I honestly don't even know  where to begin. As I was walking the cold rainy streets of Klaipeda this afternoon, I was reminding myself as to why exactly I was here.... Why would a Lithuanian who lived in America most of her life move BACK to Lietuva...seriously Why? Most people would say that makes COMPLETELY ILLOGICAL SENSE. You know, in some aspects it is true. In the world's eyes moving back to Lietuva doesn't make sense, but in God's eyes it makes perfect sense. The illogical is made logical in God's eyes. I'll never forget the hot desertous 40 Celcius day I was walking the poorest street in Macedonia exactly a year and a half ago, and God simply whispered ONE word to my heart......"Lietuva"....My entire mind, heart and being stood frozen on the dusty abandoned road.....and that was the beginning of one of my greatest adventures with God and my music missionary calling to Eastern Europe.

I simply have a passion to love on all the people of Eastern Europe. God has given me a heart for Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Ukraine, Russia, Belarus...and so on. When everyone or some people lost hope in their countries, God inspired me with a new hope to bring back. I really believe with my whole heart that God is going to doing many amazing wonders in the Baltics that will forever impact each nation within the next years and decades......

Several days ago, I was chatting with some of my dearest sisters, and we were discussing our vision for Lietuva when it comes to Christ.......What would it take to reach EVERYONE in Lithuania for Christ?
I really enjoy open minded  theological questions that have no definite answer or solution....

I firmly believe in the complete healing and restoration of this country, whatever it takes, I believe it is possibe in God's perfect timing. I completely believe NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE WITH GOD.
I firstly believe ALOT OF PRAYER is going to shake the foundations of Lietuva. Simply praying as often as possible for Lietuva. Also, simply taking the time to get to know each dear soul that God blesses me to cross paths with in this beautiful life. From my perspective,
Loving people for God, is an artistic mess, It's open to interpretation. It's never going to be the same every time, and to Jesus that is simply beautiful.

If I could sit down with every Lithuanian and tell them about Jesus, this is what I would say....

Jesus loves you more than you can ever imagine. He died on the CROSS for your sins, because He loved you that much,  and then rose again so you could have eternal life with Him after this life. I would tell you that Jesus desires to have a PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP with you, He's simply NOT a historical figure that looks down from heaven and is angry with you...He is ANYTHING but that. He smiles down upon your beautiful soul. You can simply talk to Jesus like He is your best friend. You can share EVERY detail of your life with Him.  The EMPTINESS  you feel every morning you wake up, is the God shaped hole in your heart that only Jesus can fill with His hopeful love. This relationship with Jesus will COMPLETELY TRANSFORM your life, and your PURPOSE and MEANING of life will be found in Him. He can heal you from every scar, every pain, every depression in your life......

I think it's CRUCIAL to simply be who God created you to be. You will then attract people according to who you are. Even if you might stick out in society, and people might judge you and not understand you, just be who you are anyway. I think the world needs more brave souls who are willing to stand out for God's glory. I look back at my own life, and how many times have I MOCKED  my dearest Savior, because I was SO ASHAMED to be myself because I felt SO DIFFERENT from everyone else around me?  I believe at the end of the day, the cost of hiding who I really am to others is alot greater, than pretending to be like everyone else in society.

Loving dearest Lietuva for Jesus will be the greatest challenge of my life, but I know deep down in my heart, that the hardest things in life are ALWAYS the most worth doing in God's eyes.......

 

I Forgive You

In response to this past weekend's inspirational speakers at LCC.....
One phrase that really struck me was,

 "I simply had to forget about "him" and move on."

This poetic expression struck my heart in such a way.

I'd like to dedicate this blog post to all my dearest sisters.

Throughout our lives we've met so many guys. Wither it be our annoying brother that we would enjoy shipping in a cardboard box to Siberia to your closest friend to that handsome dark brown hair, deep blue eyed young Russian man.....or whatever in your case.
Some of our relationships with them have gone well, others have completely shattered our hearts into a million stained glass pieces. I would like to focus on the shattered glass that occupies the dusty attic corners of our hearts.
I look back on my life, and I question so many friendships and relationships. I question God everyday why some relationships never worked out. It's like you meet what you thought was the perfect young man, but something happens, and you're left standing there completely lost.
So traditionally, when a young man breaks our hearts, our first reaction? Well, let's be honest, we pretty much want to kill him. Straight.up. Seriously. Our hearts and minds are beyond traumatized and we are emotionally devasted. We simply then try to "FOREVER FORGET HIM"...........but somehow the pain in our hearts still remains, long after that.

As I was praying about this whole idea, God challenged me with the following.
What if we instead of  "Completely forever forgetting...."him"....We PRAYED for him..........Pray that God would bless and completely restore his heart and life. Sounds a little mind blowing, doesn't it? Sounds like something that "he" doesn't really deserve? I know..... But seriously, I BELIEVE in the power of prayer like no other. I don't think we even realize how POWERFUL our prayers truly are. Prayer takes the two hardest coldest most impossibly closed hearts, and softens them into the texture of the most beautiful golden sunset and brings them back to life.

I FORGIVE YOU for being indirect
I FORGIVE YOU for scarring the heart and soul of who I am
I FORGIVE YOU for all the misunderstandings
I FORGIVE YOU for all your dishonesty
I FORGIVE YOU for never really understanding who I was
I FORGIVE YOU for judging me
I FORGIVE YOU for all the times you made me cry my eyes out
I FORGIVE YOU for completely leaving me hanging, standing there in horror, absolutely speechless

Why do I choose to forgive you,......you may ask? The answer is simple, the reality of applying it can simply be pure hell at times. Since Jesus forgave me of my sins, on the cross, once and for all, I have firmly decided in my heart to "Forgive him"...... I encourage you dear sister to write that forgiveness note wither you send it to him directly, or tear it up and burn it....just knowing in your heart so that you would have a peace.....
I Forgive you.......i forgive you.......i......forgive.you.

Missing by Flyleaf: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-X5lbZi6UUo

Valuable by Remedy Drive: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KToXxEZYilg
 

Materialism

Breathe in,
but don't breathe out,
remember the day you forgot how to smile,
your serious haunting poetic death stare,
let it consume your soul,
start wearing see through floral blouses,
where your bra is clearly seen,
 this is the fashion
conform,
give in
DO IT,
GIVE IN,
put on that scandalous wine is everything red lipstick,
you must impress,
oh how you must impress "him",
wear those high heel shoes that make your toes freeze a cold siberian blue,
walk as if you have three men walking behind you
GIVE IN
CONFORM,
DO IT,
 Let the culture shock kiss your lips like a scandalous betrayal lover,
You thought you knew how to sing?
SHUT.UP.
LOSE.YOUR.VOICE.
Who are you to sing?
Believe those lies.
Originality?
Yeah, right, you let it slip through the cracks of your broken heart a long time ago.
The pressure just murders your soul.
You look at yourself in the mirror,
and cry out in absolute horror,
your knees start shaking as you collapse to the cold hard unwelcoming ground,
and you scream, "My dear God, what have I done with my life !?!?!?"
and He whispers to you,
"My most precious daughter, I love you..........I love you...........I love you,
you for you.
I created you SO unique, SO original, SO beautiful,
you don't need to impress "him",
just be yourself,
and the right "him"
will come along in My perfect timing,
My dearest daughter,
don't be afraid to sing with the voice I gave you,
show them who I am,
show them how I changed your life forever with your precious musical heart,
how I put a heart warming smile on your face, and a sparkling light in your eyes,
and the echoing laughter in your soul,
I pray my most precious daughter, that you NEVER lose the soul of who you are....




 

His Heart

I was walking the streets of my greatest passion in life,
I looked into his dreamy Baltic brown eyes,
I smiled at her echoing laughter,
and I just cried.
I cried as I walked to class.
I cried when I walked to the store.
I cried as I met every beautiful soul.
I cried as I sang my first song on Lietuva soil.
I couldn't help but cry at God's miracle of the impossible.
To stand on Lithuanian soil was the greatest challenge of my life.
I don't think you realize what it took to get here.
Every hell,
Every heaven,
Every painful tear,
Every scar,
Every depression,
Every joy,
Every smile,
Every laugh,
Every dance,
Every song written,
Every prayer prayed,
All the times I wanted to give up on moving to Lietuva,
I look back,
and I thank God that I didn't.
It was SO worth to meet you.
My dear God,
words can't even begin to describe the excitement in my heart.
and my mind endlessly wanders as my soul whispers to itself...
So this it what it took to get to God's heart.....
So THIS it what it takes to get to God's heart.....
 God's heart...
God heart.....
Oh his beautiful heart.....

Conformist

I have a confession to make,
to declare,
I woke up to the most beautiful Lietuva sunrise,
I just wanted to cry at it's honest beauty,
which my heart had abandoned,
I decided to do a week long experiment,
where I would "blend" in culturally,
So I started wearing black high heel shoes,
I started walking in a very serious authoritative manner,
I stopped smiling,
I painted my nails wine red, and made sure they were absolutely flawless,
and as I was walking home this late evening,
I thought to myself,
What the HELL was I doing?!?!?!?!?!?!?
Who was I trying to IMPRESS?!?!?!
Trying to change myself into someone I'm not.
Trying to blend into a culture my heart was never made for.
 Flyleaf's lyrics SCREAMED through my Lietuve soul,
  
"I don't know who I am anymore...
Not once in life have I been real, but I've never felt this close before...
I've been looking in your window....
I've been dressing in your clothes...
I've been walking dead watching you...." 

Growing up, I thought I dressed  really nice,
then realizing the high maintenance culture shock many years later,
my greatest fashion day,
was but filthy rags in the eyes of Lietuva,
and in that moment,
I realized,
that if I chose to conform,
the Lietuve soul of who I am,
would be forever lost,
the alive passion in my heart and eyes would die,
and the whole phrase of "Be a voice not an echo"....(Barlow Girl)
took on an entirely new meaning....
Why the HELL did I choose to be an echo,
When God told me that I could be a voice?
I may never entirely fit in this culture of my own flesh and blood,
but I simply cannot give up
my passion,
my love,
my laughter,
my LOUD voice,
my overly colorful punk rock dress style,
crazy spike glue Polish dreadlocks hair,
wine red lipstick,
black lace up boots,
NEVER.
It would be like Judas' kiss.
Looking into the eyes of a lover I was never meant to know.

This Close ~Flyleaf <3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuNGMvR8ASQ

FAILURE.FAILURE.FAILURE.

The past couple days have been quite challenging for my life. In my epitome of discouragement, I came across a book my best friend Jenna gave to me before I left for Germany. It is called “The Crowd, The Critic, And The Muse” by Michael Gungor. I recommend this book to ANY artistic/creative musical soul. You have not LIVED until you’ve read this book. God has this way of always putting books in my path, when I need to read them the most.   I’d like to dedicate this following reflection to all my dearest brothers and sisters who have ever felt like the following, and need some encouragement in their creative artisticness.

Pg. 25 The Crowd, The Critic And The Muse

“ That night, I decided to stop singing. After the concert, I didn’t sing a not for anyone for four years.”

Four years! She didn’t even insult me. She just didn’t compliment me. This is how fragile the ego can be in connection with our creative expressions. The critics voices is so powerful because it resonates with the voices of our deepest fears, those voices speaking from inside of us, telling us that we are not good enough. The critics confirm our repressed and terrified suspicions that we don’t measure up, that we are unsafe and unlovable.

We can hear “Bravo!” from ninety-nine voices, but they don’t mean nearly as much as the “Eh” from the one. The voice of the critic can be like a hot dagger that reaches the heart quickly and surely…But the critic’s voice is untrustworthy…the voice that I heard that night from my grandma’s lack of compliment said “You are worthless as a singer. YOU SHOULD STOP SINGLING FOREVER. In reality what she was probably thinking was more like, “That performance was not very good. You need to work harder.” Or perhaps, she didn’t even realize that she hadn’t said anything to me and didn’t think much about it either way. But whatever it was, I heard something else. This is how it works with the voice of the critique. It is untrustworthy; more is always heard than spoken.

Creators are prone to listening too intently to the voice of the critic. We change ourselves and our art to please the critic so that we can feel safe, feel like we are worth something. But the critic doesn’t care about your work in the same way that you do. The critic’s voice is most often the voice of the preoccupied, a voice concerned with its own issues and its own ego. You are just a brief flicker on its radar screen. “

The voice of the critic is not sturdy enough to build your work on. It’s too fickle, too fleeting.”

Lately, my heart has really resonated with the following passage.  As a passionate artist when it comes to music and artistic painting expression I am reminded of countless incidences in my life where I simply had those thoughts of  “YOU SHOULD STOP SINGING FOREVER”.  Coming from my situation of life, I’d say my musical soul is VERY fragile. I’ve had moments where musical life has gone well, and  those moments of life where I just wanted to die on the spot and never show my Lietuve face in public again. What I’ve noticed in my life as a general trend culturally, we are SO AFRAID to admit that we have “failed”. For me I never believe we have “failed” at life. As long as you have blood flowing through your veins, you’re breathing….You’re still ALIVE……… Growing up in a culture where “failure” is highly looked down upon,  I believe it forms this mindset that is unrealistic. It’s always a blessing to come across books and articles where musicians/artists, share their successes and FAILURES. It’s like “PRAISE GOD! THEY FAILED AND WERE ABLE TO GROW AND LEARN FROM IT!!!!” I sometimes feel like I’m the only one in the world who has failed musically. Personally, I think it’s best to hear both perspectives not just solidly one or the other.

I know me, growing up I always doubted my singing. It’s that little voice I heard as a child, “Oh, your voice is nice, but you should focus on something else….” When I accepted Christ when I was 8, looking back 12 years ago, He clearly anointed my life with the passion to sing. It was that voice inside my soul that even if I wanted to stop singing and ignore it I couldn’t. I look back and there are SO SO SO many “failing” situations vocally that could have made me never want to sing again, but I encourage you dear friend, even when it’s hard and the critic’s voice is MURDERING your SOUL keep persevering, keep pushing through and God will bless you for holding on to the very last moment. I honestly don’t know why I held on to my passion for singing so long.

So with that said, just thought I’d share with you some of my musical stories, that I can now look back upon and sweetly laugh.

I remember when I was around 8 I started taking piano lessons.  For most children piano is something that you eat, breathe and sleep from where I grew up. Over the years, my heart learned to greatly despise this instrument. There was just something about playing the piano that reminds my soul of so many musical scars. Performing in public was one of them. I hated recitals. Piano recitals were like a death sentence to me. I remember when I was about 15, and I played the variation of “Amazing Grace”. I held onto the pedal for too long, and it totally killed the song. I was in a gym auditorium so the sound quality was terrible to begin with…..I just walked off the stage in horror thinking that I would never be able to play such a common melody again.

Also, I remember I had to memorize and sing the song “Porcelain Heart” by Barlow Girl. It was a very hauntingly poetic moving song, and as an 8^th grader anything past the high C was a struggle vocally. There was this particular part in the song

“Creator, only you take brokenness, and create it into beauty once again”.

I totally murdered that part of the song. My high C was scratchy, raspy, nervousness kicked in….Ahmen to Ahmen. And knowing my soul, for me to murder an artistic poetic line that inspires my heart is such a devastating feeling.

I remember when I was  18 and I decided to sing the song “Before the Morning” by Josh Wilson. I only practiced the song for a few weeks, it was kind of a last minute vocal decision…. My piano teacher started playing the melody, but it was too fast, and I sang part of the song in the wrong key….I think. I performed this song in front of my entire highschool, so as you can guess I just wanted to melt and die and never show my face again. To make it worse, I remember I was also hoping to impress this guy that I liked at the time…..so much for that…….SIGH….God has a cute sense of humor. To this day, I still can’t sing that song without my heart feeling so traumatized.

These are just a few of the many examples of what I once thought were “musical failures”. I’m learning that it’s okay for those moments of life to happen.  These moments happen so God can grow us more to be like Him. We learn lessons we otherwise would have not learned. Coming from a European culture perspective, I feel like as a child perfection was required, it was not an option.  I know especially in Europe, standards for music and art are very high, so it’s easy to become discouraged and hide your creativeness inside. This is a place in my heart where I believe God has called me to be a voice for my dearest European/Russian brothers and sisters.  I may not be Beethoven or Mozart, but I FIRMLY BELIEVE if God has given you a heart to express yourself creatively through music or art or whatever, then EXPRESS YOURSELF. Excuse my language, but  Don’t give a SHIT at what people are going to think. Even if they judge you. Honestly, to BLOODY HELL with what they think. I know for me for the past several years, I have been struggling with what people think of me as a musician and an artist. It’s a battle in my heart and soul every day, but with Christ, I do my best to overcome it and pray for strength to NEVER stop expressing myself for His glory.

The Law .

I dedicate this poem to any of my dear brothers and sisters who have ever felt like they have been misunderstood, judged, or simply afraid of showing the world  your God given true self. My heart goes out to you <3

I’ll never forget my darkest night on German soil

The loud screaming thunder echoed the cries of my silenced heart

I ran out into the haunting cloudy dark depressing pounding rain

My muddy barefoot steps illuminated by the terrifying lightening

and as I collapsed to my knees on the drowned soil that was gasping for air but had no comfort,

so was I,

reality had hit me too hard in the face,

I couldn’t stand it’s painful blows,

I just wanted to strangle the law that was passed in 2010,

The cursed fact that I couldn’t escape,

I was just so sick of the lies,

I promised myself that if being deathly honest was the key that would end it all,

That would just end the beautiful gaze in his deep blue glaza,

So be it,

I hate the past,

I’m ashamed of my past,

I’m sick of explaining to people of my past,

I had no choice of my past,

It happened,

And the scars of 20 years later remain,

Seriously, don’t judge,

If you would have walked in my shoes,

You would have understood my pain and scars,

You’re honestly so narrow minded,

Judging me out,

Because I wasn’t born into the country I wish I could have been,

Travel the world,

Gain some global perspective,

Get out of your” little country is the entire world” mindset,

Open your heart,

Open your eyes,

I choose to be honest,

It hurts like hell to be honest,

As I look in your blue glaza,

But the time has come,

To show and be my true self,

And whatever happens,

Is simply God’s will,

I honestly hate being honest,

Because of your judgments and misconceptions,

But I’m honestly so done with this mask of lies,

I’m so done with trying to impress you and act like I have it all together,

Being someone I’m not,

It’s time to be my true self,

And simply forget what you think.