Shawna Deines - Testimony

This trip to Ukraine was so awesome. God has taught me so much. But the biggest thing that God did in me was He showed me how much my heart can actually stretch to love more and more people. The story that started this revelation was during the kids camp that we did. I had originally been assigned to a team of kids for the first day and I got attached to them, learned their names and all that. But the second day I got switched to another team. At first I was really sad, because I already loved the kids I was with and I really wanted to stay with them and pour into them a lot. But as I was walking with my new team the Lord showed me a picture of my heart and it was full of people, then I saw God’s hand come in and push everyone to one side and He said, “Move over make room there’s more coming in.” And I just realized that it was really a good thing that I switched teams, because I got the privilege to meet and pour into more kids than I would have if I had just stayed with one group. Well anyway, the revelation has just been that our hearts can stretch and we can keep making room and loving more and more people. When we got here and Lloyd was talking to us about Ukraine and some of the things we would be doing, he mentioned that as far as the public transport systems go, there’s a rule here in Ukraine, “There’s always room for one more!” We all laughed, and then discovered that it’s really true. But I feel like that is what God has been speaking to me about my heart. He has just really shown me that if we are made in His image then we can and do have His heart capacity. Now don’t get me wrong I’m not saying that we could ever love the way that God loves, because no one loves that way He loves. But I am saying that I do believe that human heart has the capacity to continue adding people and to continue to stretch. God wants us to love the way He loves, He wants us to offer our hearts to people over and over again even if they break over and over again. Someone else on our team said that if our hearts are in God’s hands, it’s okay if they break, because God can heal them and put them back together, time and time again. So that’s the biggest thing the God has shown me. I have fallen in love with Kiev and Ukraine and the people here. And to be honest, I feel like my heart is breaking as I am leaving, because, I’m leaving everything I has here, Pastor Jayde told us many times before we came, to leave it all on the field. And I feel like I am leaving a part of or even my whole heart with the people I’ve met here, so it’s hard to leave. But there’s always room for one more, or there’s always room for one more country, so I know that my heart will stretch even further now that I’ve broken it out of the container that it was in, and now God can continually pour into me more and more of His love for people.