So, I’ve got some news… ready for this?
I’m not going to go on the trip.
WHEW! Wouldn’t that be easy to say? Just throw my hands up and quit… walk away without ever having to face anything that I’m so scared of facing these next 11 months. Where is all of this coming from? Wasn’t I just SO EXCITED to get started? Let’s backtrack a little bit…
I went to training camp in October — my squad and I spent 10 days out in the middle of the hills of Georgia camping on red, glittery dirt and went through all sorts of trials that were ultimately to get us ready for what life would / could be like out on the field. Read more about that here: Training Camp
Since training camp, I entered into the busiest photography season, weeks of designing Christmas cards for clients, crunch time at school, and of course the necessary time spent with family for all of the different holiday gatherings that were planned. I didn’t foresee any time for me to get completely ready to go amongst everything else I had to do!
I also began really thinking about how wonderful my life in Myrtle Beach really is! I have family right at my doorstep, a vast group of friends, three incredible housemates, two great jobs, and so many other comforts and blessings! How am I supposed to leave that? When my photography is finally booming, I’ve found a teaching job that I adore, and people that surround me with so many fun times and laughter… why would I walk away from that to go live in a tent, sleep on the ground, eat goodness-knows-what, take bucket showers, sweat more than I have in my entire life, fight off mosquitos, and face, I’m sure, many frustrations? You’d have to be insane to trade such a perfect life for something like that?
What made it harder was that I constantly had people back at home telling me “You don’t have to do this,” or begging me, “Please don’t go! Just think of all you will be missing here.” While both of those are true – I don’t HAVE to do this and yes, I WILL be missing a lot of events back at home while I’m gone, I ultimately knew that I couldn’t forego the plan that God had for my life.
I also began to fear that I wasn’t packing the right things, or that I’d forget something, or bring too much! I just couldn’t handle the stress of having to pack for a year in one large and one small back pack!
Well, for the last two months, I went into a frenzy trying to get everything ready for me to leave it for almost a full year. I did photo shoot after photo shoot to try to earn money for the trip, get last minute photo orders in for clients so I wouldn’t leave them without their prints for 11 months, detox my house and all of the junk I had accumulated over the past year, took three different trips to Charlotte to go to REI to get camping gear, said goodbye to everyone I could in the small amount of time that I had available, celebrated Thanksgiving and Christmas, and then prepped my classroom and lesson plans for a new teacher to come take my spot when school started back in January. I also had to make list after list of things I thought I’d need, things I realized I didn’t need, and things that I needed to be done while I was gone.
I’m the type of person that likes to constantly be doing things. I like to be productive. To be leaving my house, my jobs, and the rest of my life at home with no way to control anything that happens to any of it is TERRIFYING TO ME! What if someone needs a picture that’s on one of my many external hard-drives and I have no way of getting it to them? Did I leave my house clean enough? Are my plants still going to be alive when I come home (roommates, that was for your humor). All of these different thoughts and more have been racing through my brain making me wonder why I even decided to go.
But then, as I have been spending time in the word, I keep getting reminded that my job as a Christian is to simply be obedient to God and let Him handle everything else.
My house isn’t going to fall apart if I’m not there to sweep up the leaves on the floor or water the plants. My middle schoolers are in great hands with their new teacher and she is fully equipped to complete this year efficiently. My family has each other and can definitely get by without my presence. My clients will find a new photographer to take my place while I’m away for their photography needs. Am I so silly to think that God needs me in Myrtle Beach to take care of things or they will all fall apart?
Yes, I like to be involved in a lot and help out whenever I can to do things and get things done, but I’m not the glue in all of those operations. He is.
So for the past two months, I’ve wanted to quit. I’ve wanted to say, “Forget it! I’m not going. I’d rather stay home,” but then I realized that I’d just be giving up not only on some great adventures and memories to be made, but ultimately, I’d be giving up on God. Did He not open this door for me? Did He not send me sign after sign that I was supposed to go on this journey for Him? Then, what am I afraid of?
Am I ready to take this on? No, I’m not. Is God ready for me to take this on? Yes, He is. So, for the next 11 months I pray that I will be a blessing for His kingdom and that I will do my job as being the hands and feet of the Lord to the best of my ability.
“It’s a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you’re ready. I have this feeling that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now.” –Hugh Laurie
Do not be anxious about anything. Instead, pray about everything. Then, you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand -Philippians 4:6
