Here I am, month sixth of the Race in Botswana!! I am soon coming up to my last deadline and I am starting to wonder if I am going to go home early because of the lack of funds. I am often discouraged when I look at my fundraising page and yet God is continually reminding me to lean on Him for support and to have faith in Him. It isn’t easy and I often times get caught up on the thought that after this month, I might be going home. I know that is how the enemy is trying to catch me up though… making me focus on funds when I need and want to be focused on what God is doing around me and through me and in me, because in all reality, that’s what is most important. And if God wants my journey to end after this month, then He has something else in store for me. I know that God will come through for me if it’s in His will.
And that’s the crux of the whole thing though… my faith in God must be under His will. If it isn’t in His will for me to continue, then it won’t happen. I’m trying to take my comfort in that alone… that no matter what, God’s will for my life is more perfect and so much better than anything I could imagine up, including staying on the Race for the rest of the trip. I’m not discounting that God can make miraculous things happen and that He can move on my behalf and I have every hope and faith that what I need will come in… BUT my faith isn’t in the funds or the people back home or even in an unknown rich great-aunt who suddenly takes an interest in my life and my missions trip. My faith rests solely on my Father in heaven who has me in the palm of His hands and has all of my days planned and numbered according to His sovereign will.
God has been showing me so much grace and He is constantly my only peace. He has taken me through so much in the few short months that I’ve been away from everything I was comfortable with. Through team changes, getting sick with a flesh eating skin disease, the Race not looking like I thought it would, and many more tough things, He has always been there for me and leading me towards a newer me… the me that God has always wanted me to be. And through all the leading He has done, He has also been leading me towards a deeper understanding of how much He loves me and cares for me and wants HIS best for me… towards Him… always towards Him!
I know that I am not the same person I was when I left home and I know that I’ve still got a ways to go in my relationship with Him, but I am not focusing on the past or the future because I know that right now, here in this moment in Botswana, is right where God wants me to be. I am coming to understand that I don’t want to be anywhere He is not, I don’t want to go anywhere He is not leading me, and I don’t want to stay anywhere He wants me to move on from… as hard as it is. I don’t know where He is leading me but my faith is in Him alone, not what I think is best for me or what I want to do. My faith must be under the sovereignty of God’s will. He alone is who I left America for. He alone is who decides where I should go. He alone is my guide. My faith rests on His will alone… no matter what!
