A Similar Feeling...

My senior year of college I presented with the ever so popular question "What will you do after graduation?"  I had several options - 
1. Get a teaching job
2. Go to grad school
3. Serve overseas  


I remember the weekend that I knew finally that the answer to that question was that I was supposed to serve overseas.  I knew with everything in me that was what I was supposed to do.  I was going home for the weekend to go to a girl's retreat with some of the girls in my youth group that I had just interned with.  I remember crying most of the drive home to Pasadena because I knew what I was supposed to do, but I was so scared at the same time. What would my parents think?  Can I really be gone for that long?  What will I do about money?  Are my grandparents going to be mad at me?  Is this crazy?  At the retreat that weekend I found myself crying everytime we would sing worship songs and in every break out session I attended I would sit in the back and just cry even if what they were talking about had nothing to do with serving overseas.  I was crying because I knew what I was supposed to do, but I was terrified.


I remember that being the first time that I truly began to understand how much I was going to have to give up to go and serve.  I had spent the past 20+ years of my life dreaming up what I wanted my life to look like and what I wanted to do after college.  Sadly, I rarely gave much thought to what the Lord wanted for my life, but only what I could dream up.  That weekend I began to feel what it means to lay it down at the Lord's feet and tell Him that He can do what He wants with my life.  That was a scary and hard place for me at the time.  It was also the first time that the scripture Luke 9:57-62 began to be real to me.  Not only do I have to give up desires that I have for my life, but my choice to serve overseas was going to cause my family to give up the desires that they too had for my life.  I had never before in my life been faced with that kind of a decision.


As the past shows, I did go and serve in Indonesia for a year.  Some of my family was supportive from the get go and some of them took a little more time to warm up to the idea.  It's hard to believe that it has now been 5 years since I came back from Indonesia.  That was one of the most life changing events in my life.  It grew me and stretched me in ways that I could never have imagined.  I was terrified to go because it meant giving up some of the desires I had for my life and little did I know that the Lord would use that year to show me one of the biggest desires of my heart...serving overseas!


I've been saying for years that I want to go back and that I'm just waiting on the Lord to show me where and when.  That was partly true and it was also partly me making up excuses for why I shouldn't go yet.  Now I've got plenty of free time, I'm completely out of excuses, and I find myself literally begging God to just send me somewhere.


This morning at church I found myself doing the same things I did just 6 years ago...crying in church and wrestling with the thought of how much I'll have to give up if I go and serve overseas.  I cry mainly for the friends and family that I would miss being around and getting to see all the time.  I also cry because deep within me I just want to go already.  


I feel like I keep telling the Lord that I'm ready and He just keeps saying, "OK" and not much else.  I know its a process and I need to be patient...that's just not one of my strengths.  So I'll continue to scour organizations and blogs about what others are doing around the world...practice the discipline of waking up early to spend time reading scripture and seeking my Father who knows me better than anyone else...and remember that I'm still called to be on mission right where I'm at and not just be waiting for the Lord to tell me to grab my passport and go!