After Touring London...And a God Story

I have spent the last six hours walking around London, asking anyone with a British accent for directions and of course getting lost on the Tube (or Subway). Some of the members of the team and I went on the subway from the airport to somewhere around Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, House of Parlament, The Eye of London (a huge ferris wheel), and for lunch we went to a Tavern called St. Stephens Resturant. I claimed they spelled the name wrong but there was no way of changing it...the menus were already made. This resturant had been in the same place for 230 years! That location: right across the street from Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. The architecture here is amazing! It has an old feel to it and the statues are just beautiful! There is even a statue of Nealson Mandela!

Okay, I have to share a God moment. This morning when we arrived in London Heathrow Airport, we had just gotten off the plane (after 6 straight hours; I only got 10 minutes of sleep) when we were hit with...London Security aka Satan trying to mess with us. Words cannot describe the emotions running through the team members as we watched the only male on our team, Mr. Brian, get frisked, get all his tolietries taken away and then had to put all the "allowed" items back in his bag after they throughly searched it. But all was good afterwards, the girls and I offered him our shampoo and deodorent...he was out of luck with his shaving cream though but at least he'll smell "shower"fresh". We were in line for our boarding passes for London to Nairobi and Nairobi to Entebbe when we lost Ms. Jodi, the flight attendant. We looked all through the security lines and didn't see her. When we finally saw her she was very frustrated. We learned that the security people were being very rude to her pretty much because she was a flight attendant and they wanted to show her dominance because she wasn't in the United States. So while the rest of us waited, all of the contents of two of Ms. Jodi's bags were taken out and placed in "keep" and "trash" bins. (We later found out that the things that are confiscated, the security guards are rumored to have parties with the good stuff). Her large roller bag didn't set off the alarm, so Ms. Lisa S., the team leader, grabbed that bag and brought it over to us so the security wouldn't check it. Ms. Jodi was very frustrated because she had left the United States being allowed to carry the things she had in her bag but the security told her that she shouldn't have been allowed to leave the United States with the things she had in her bag...quick question, how did she get to London? Nevertheless, this went on for about an hour and half. During that hour and a half, a woman almost threw her things on Cate, a sophomore in college who is on the team, and just about sat down on Cate! Cate jumped up real quick and just escaped being sat on! We were all tired and frustrated and it was very hot in the security area too. When we finally got to the SkyTeam Lounge, we were all ready to relax, sip on coffee and soft drinks and shower. When we tried to check in, nothing happened. It only took about fifteen minutes to smooth this bump in the road so before long we were lounging upstairs in air condition and eating amazing free food. And best of all...I got to brush my teeth!!
To tie this in with God: the devil is ALWAYS trying to get you to turn from God. All of the difficulties we have had actually led to blessings because we handled them in a (somewhat) Christian way. I admit I got frustrated and was wondering why missionaries were getting so much trouble, but God has a sense of humor. It was raining when we arrived in London and if we hadn't had those delays we would have been in the cold and rain walking around, most of the girls in flip-flops. Getting lost on the subway led to us seeing sights in London that we weren't expecting to see but they were memorable just the same.
So the next time you're just having one of those days, smile and think "God's got this." Besides, He's never going to leave you, so why not just let Him have it all?


P.S. I just might be landing the next plane we fly on because I didn't like the landing we made in London this morning...I'm a professional flyer now since I've been on two flights.