We were asked to write a blog about how we were called to this mission trip. Here is my story:
First of all…Brevity isn’t always my strength and I can try to keep these a bit shorter in the future so please bear with me…but if you only read this I want you know that your ministry is WHO you are and your mission field is who you are with…
When I was a little child my parents set my brothers and I up to sing for the church and while I sang many songs, there was one in particular that really stuck out in my mind. There was a song called “Here am I Lord, Send Me” and a few of the lyrics were as follows:
Let me see my mission field,
all around each day,
let me shine with Jesus’ love,
use me Lord I pray
Here am I Lord send me,
Here am I Lord send me,
I will serve you faithfully,
Here am I Lord Send me
Now the thing about that song is that from the time I started singing it, I meant it and I knew that I meant it. As a child I was willing to go wherever whenever to love whomever.
A few years later, I went to a Christian camp called Gitche Gumee in Eagle River, MI. While here, my life was altered by two people in particular. The first was a man with the last name of White and he would speak to us children about stories of his life and God’s faithfulness through it. This man of God had gone through some incredible things and had seen God work in mighty ways and my heart yearned for that kind of life. There was more than an entertainment value to the stories he would tell us. The depth and truth of the words that gently rolled off of his heart brought a light to my eyes that made me realize that there is a majestic power beyond description that is orchestrating my life for His good pleasure. While I remember mere pieces of his story, this was the seed that started to burn in me for reaching the lost and going to places unknown and unseen.
The other man was Jerry Keranen, who later ended up being my youth pastor and the closest thing to a mentor (outside of my dad) that I have ever had. Jerry is a humble servant after the heart of God who used to joke that his only gift was “availability.” He used to tell analogies which is no doubt one of the reasons why I do it so much now. The one that he told that day devastated my heart and broke me…it overwhelmed me with the love of God and gave me a piece of something so incomprehensible yet true that my only reaction was to boy my heart and surrender it completely. I will take some time to fully express this analogy another time in its own thread.
Growing up I was a “momma’s boy” who for the most part was obedient and chill. I loved life and lived it fully with little care on my heart or mind. God blessed a number of areas of my life and my life remained fairly easy. I was an active member of just about everything whether it was baseball (real little,) soccer, hockey, basketball, youth group, NHS, the orangemen, band, choir, student council and whatever else was going on.
Ironically there was also a period of my life where I was quite quiet and shy as well. However, God used a week at Wheaton, IL during a conference called SEMP (Students Equipped to Minister to Peers) to make me realize that people needed to know His love and I needed to be willing to show them it.
Regardless, I came into college feeling bold, confident, strong and ready to take on the world. I wanted to make changes and thought I had the strength to do it. By the time I came home for Christmas, I started to realize how much pride I had in my life. After digging a bit deeper, I realized that much of my pride came from the thoughts of: “well, of course God is blessing me because I do this, and I do that, and I don’t do this and I don’t do that…” I had based much of His blessing in my life on myself. Now don’t get me wrong, He delights in His children making good choices, but His blessing of my life was completely and wholly based upon His faithfulness…not mine!
Right before my sophomore year at NMU, I was working at an IV camp called Cedar Campus. The weekend before I left, all the staff were acting out the book of Mark without props or anything else. During this time, I was “Jesus” and for the first time there were some things that just came alive in my heart and I felt Him calling me aside to go and be with Him. So, I took a flashlight the size of a hot dog and took off into the woods along a path I hadn’t been before to a place called Gnomes Rock. This is a place where people paint little rocks with all sorts of things and then put them on a big rock that looks out into Lake Huron.
As I started off I said to God “when I was little, I used to sing the song Here am I Lord, send me…I meant it then and I mean it now…wherever, whenever to whomever…”
Now I grew up around woods and feel as comfortable as anyone walking alone in the dark in the woods but this night marked one of the few times in my life where I truly felt uncomfortable in that type of situation. There were a number of times where I felt like turning back and I thought about just coming the next day…but I kept going. I finally arrived at the rock and put my flashlight up to take a look at it. When I did, it was directly on a rock the size of my palm and it was of a guy on his knees looking up at a cross on a hill with the words “Here am I Lord, Send Me.” WOOOOOOOOSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHH….and there was peace in my heart…God caught my attention
This is the rock where we chatted…near Gnomes Rock
I had never had a time in my life where my communication with God had been so clear as that night…He calmed me and we chatted about a number of things and I worshiped Him in spirit and in truth. He told me that this was the calm before the storm that there were going to be times when I wouldn’t necessarily be able to see Him but to know that He was in control and that He was going to take me through it…that what I was about to go through was for my own good. Let’s just say that He was faithful and the storm that rocked my life for much of the past 5 years rocked my socks off but overall it did a number of things to increase my strength in Him and has given me a firmer foundation.
If you read my bio, you’d know that I then went to Africa for my student teaching which was the start of my world race in a sense. From there God called me to an island in the middle of the Bering Sea called St. Paul Island Both of these areas stretched me in many different ways and forced me to look deep inside of myself and face my heart. It was during a number of long winter days that I found myself questioning if I was to teach in a public school as a full career or not. A couple years earlier I had come to the realization that if I had to teach to love on kids, I would be willing to teach…however, there was a prompting in my heart that perhaps he has something that is more suited for me…in the end, we’ll see where he takes me. Regardless, it was at this time that I came in contact with Emilie J. who went on a world race and had just got back. I checked out the website and the more blogs I read the more I realized that this had been the desire of my heart for years and there was finally a way that I could tangibly do something like this. Overall there just were a lot of pieces that worked together in His perfect timing to create this opportunity.
SO…here I am, once again at a point in my life where I’m standing in front of God saying “OK, God…wherever, whenever to whomever…Here am I, Send Me” and in reply I believe He is saying “OK, Benny, I hear your heart…it’s time to go”
