You are the same person that left home. You may not have had a haircut for a year and you may be a little dirtier from when you left, but you still have the same skin the same brain and even the same soul. God’s plans to use your life have not changed since the day you left.
My heart is the same, although it has been broken and repaired many times. I am still the person God created me to be. I am not a different person.
Everything that God has walked me through this year has brought me into closer resemblance of who God made me to be. This is what He created me for. I am finally using the many tools He gave me for the right purpose. My life is now completely and utterly His.
“The refining pot is for silver and the furnace is for gold but the Lord tests the heart.” Proverbs 17:3
When we are refined of our imperfections we become closer to what the Creator intended in the first place. We refine ourselves by glorifying God completely.
We are in the mission field for 11 months, but we are never anywhere for more than a few weeks. This is not a long term mission trip. Yes, you will help the poor, hug the orphans, and bless churches. But they will turn around and bless you right back tenfold. For now the lasting impression is not on the people we briefly touch lives with, but on our own souls. God’s work will be most visible in us.
I will carry pieces of people’s stories with me for the rest of my life. I will not forget the feeling of a small child’s hand in mine or the eyes of a grandmother as she looks gratefully into mine. I may have changed their day a little, but they have changed my life forever.
I am still the same person as when I left, but now I fit a little better into the mold that God made for my life
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