Finally! "Finally" is what I think when I think about leaving in September to serve the Lord overseas. "Finally" is probably what some of you and my family and friends are thinking when you see that I actually wrote my first blog! 😉
I believe fear played into a lot of the procrastination in both of these cases so I want to take this time to share a little about that and how the Lord has been transforming me in it and actually using it to teach me more about Him and bring me to this point of surrender to His plans.
Fear leads to inaction. This has been true for me in many things throughout life. It has been true for me for years in my desire to do missions overseas. Fear of inadequacy and failure, not being strong enough or knowledgeable enough in my faith to serve the Lord properly. . . Properly? What in the world was I thinking? Being a perfectionist, I thought I had to be able to meet a certain level of spirituality to serve the Lord and share His word. . . so silly! The Lord just wants us to go, love, and tell others about the great gift Christ has given. When I think on my fear of this, I just think of the blind man that Jesus healed in John 9; he knew very little of Jesus yet he still testified to what he did know of Jesus and what Jesus had done. I want to be like the blind man. I want to testify to what I know the Lord has done and trust in God to do the rest and to keep growing my knowledge of Him as we go. I am amazed at how the Lord works in ways that we could never have imagined. . . through little things that we thought were too insignificant to count. The Lord is strong when I am not!
Fear of leaving my family, not being there if something goes wrong. . . This is one fear that I don't think I will ever be rid of but I have faith that the Lord will teach me how to cope with it and how to keep giving it into His hands. My family has been through a lot together. In all of our experiences as a family and as difficult as some of those experiences have been, the Lord was gracious in providing the love and understanding to stick together and push through no matter what. We have never been far from each other for too long and if we were we were in constant communication so the idea of not knowing what is going on with my family on a regular basis or not being there when another struggle arises does make me worry, but I have known for a long time that the day would come when the Lord would lead me to go elsewhere in service to Him. God is the one that is in control. I act like I have control in the matter. . . like I know what is best and that I am the glue that keeps things together in my family's struggles, but I have learned that this is a falsehood I have created. Only God has the power to hold things together and only God knows the future and what is best in it so I am putting my trust in Him. This is taking lots of prayer and I need your prayers in this too. I know the Lord has great plans for my family and for me in these next steps forward!
Fear of blogging. . . of not being good with words or writing something wrong. . . of not being inspiring enough. . .blah blah blah. . . I can actually say after finally writing this blog that I am glad I did it and it was fun. whodda thunk it? 😉 I wish I had done it sooner.
I want to be real with my struggles and open about what God is doing. I have confidence that the Lord is at work in my heart and in this journey! That is why I can now say, after all that fear, God used those years of procrastination, as challenging as they were (I will leave that for another blog), to draw me nearer to Him through all things, good and bad, and to have faith that all things (more of Himself, plans for the future, etc.) will be revealed in God's trusted timing and to His beautiful purpose and glory! God has been and is preparing me for a time and trip that only He could prepare me for. It was part of His plan all along. Praise God!
He has plans for you too!
"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for wholeness and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope." -Jeremiah 29:11
