I believe that God works in mysterious ways.
Throughout the process of getting ready for this trip I faced many obstacles. Vaccines, tourist visa registration confusion, sickness, rude co-workers and sarcastic bosses, car troubles, spiritual warfare, and fundraising efforts failing. All these things had flooded my mind with negative thoughts about this trip. At one point the burdens had become so heavy that I had contemplated backing out of the trip. I emailed my youth pastor and told her that I was thinking about dropping out of Adventures In Missions, and that either Satan knew that God had something huge planned for me on this trip or that this trip was simply not in God’s plan for me. After reading her email response and praying long and hard about my future trip to Africa, God reassured me that being a missionary to Africa this year was in fact where He was leading me, and that I had to stay strong and fight for my calling to be a missionary. The obstacles continued. I had never gotten vaccinated as a child, so I had to schedule about five trips to the doctor office and get the big list of shots. By the end of July I felt like a pin cushion! Then I had to track down a doctor in a special travel office to give me the “foreign shots”, however problems kept comming up keeping me from accomplishing my medical papers which were by that point past due. It took me about two months to finish my medical paperwork. I kept pressing on. I finally got over the mystery sickness which I had gotten during a 60 hour work week, so I was starting to see that things were looking up. My passport came swiftly after I applied for a new one, and I accomplished the majority of my visa application.
On the way to church one Sunday my car transmission completely broke… when I was on the highway. My dad came to my rescue and I asked him if he would drive me to church. Although I got to church about fourty minutes late, it was a fantastic service and touched on areas I really needed to hear. In August my fundraising hit a plateau and barely any money was comming in from my waitressing job. I was losing hope, until on a Sunday not too long ago the sermon was about pressing on through suffering and discouragement. The topic applied to how I felt and it really helped me to gain back my momentum. My support letters started getting responses, two teachers from my old school donated generously to my fundraising efforts, and I felt a real balance in my life for the first time in a while. Now that I have less then twelve hours until I get on a plane and start my journey as a missionary I can certainly say that it has been a crazy few months, but I am glad that everything happened the way it did. The obstacles made me stronger and they helped me to grow closer to my Heavenly Father. Today as I was driving to church, I got a case of cold feet and I was hit in the face with the fact that I was going to be leaving for nine months. As I turned onto the road of my church my car started to chug… and my mind was filling up with negative thoughts, ultimately stressing me out about the trip to Africa. The more I grew discouraged, the worse my car acted. I started praying in tounges and rebuking anything and everything that Satan was trying to do. My car started to work better, then worse, and back and forth the whole length of that road until I got to the parking lot of my church. My car completely stopped and I litteraly rolled into a parking space. Soon after I ran into the church and into the front of the congregation and had one of the most intimate worship segments I had ever experienced. I had chills the whole time and was singing in tounges. I gave my plans, my worries, my burdens, my everything to Christ and a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders. He told me that I was going to be a magnet to people, and that those who I was with would be drawn to me throughout the trip. I spoke to the congregation briefly, and that was it. Church was over and I was completely renewed and feeling amazing about what is going to happen in the next nine months. So, I believe that we should all expect the unexpected. God works in CRAZY ways and He always knows what He is doing. He knows how we are going to react to certain things. He was right next to me as I endured the things that were trying to get in the way of me leaving tomorrow, and I know that there will be way more obstacles and spiritual warfare. However, I know that my God is with me and that anything that comes my way He will prepare me and strengthen me to show Satan that He has no say in God’s will.
