One morning our team set out for The Nehemiah Center, in hopes that possibly the Lord would provide us a place to stay or someone who had suggestions, but instead the Lord had something totally different in mind. We got connected with Food for the Hungry and appointed a time where the team would travel and see their villages in Nicaragua that future World Race teams could serve at to see if it was a fit partnership. Still stuck without a place to stay in Managua, I decided to contact Megan, a co-team leader. Her team was serving at Breaking Chains in Managua and they had mentioned being able to let us stay there if we were ever in the city and needed a place to stay. Our team decided to take advantage of that opportunity and that night moved into their ministry hosts’ house.
While we were there, my sickness took a severe downward spiral. I had fever all day, everyday. I couldn’t move out of bed. My head felt the size of a basketball and throbbed just sitting still. I cried for 24 hours straight in the deepest pain I have ever been in and no medication appeared to relieve any symptom. To open my eyes seemed like the death of me and to sit up to take medication was nearly impossible. After 2 days, I decided to go to the doctor, which I cried the whole way there.
We walked into the office of the doctor and told him my symptoms. He told me I had a very severe infection, prescribed me with 4 different medications, and put me on bed rest for at least a couple of days, assuring me that I would be completely better by then. I got back to the bed, took the medications, which I typically don’t do, but I was desperate and needed a miracle someway, somehow. My headache only let up a little, but in that improvement, my whole body digressed and went completely achy, granting me severe back pain and sharp pains in my legs that didn’t allow me to walk. I was a little puzzled as to what was going on and beginning to be gripped by fear. I remember laying in bed in the middle of the night while everyone was asleep, telling Jesus I would see Him very soon for I seriously thought I was dying.
Almost a week passes by and I am still in bed. My team is going on without me to different ministry sites to check them out and talk with them about ministry opportunities through AIM. Then other girls started getting some similar symptoms and at one point we had 5 of the 7 of us down with some sort of sickness. Because of this, we decided to go get blood tests done for Malaria, Dengue, and all other bacterial infections. My results for Malaria were negative, but my other general test, which included Dengue, had a note that I didn’t understand on it.
Because the results were online, I wasn’t sure if it was worth going to the doctor again because things didn’t seem too off target. I asked my friend, Charlyn, from another team to ask the doctors when she went what this meant. She did and texted me back and said they think it means you probably gave Dengue, which is something retrieved from mosquitoes. In my mind, there was no way! Dengue, from what I heard, was deadly and you bleed out every orphis of your body. I was not bleeding; therefore, continued to believe that I didn’t have it until 2 weeks later, I was continuing to have headaches and fever everyday with achy, painful muscles and joints, and my whole body except for my face broke out in rash that was immensely itchy.
It was then that we googled our symptoms to find out that there are many strands of Dengue. I began to read the process of Dengue and day-by-day my symptoms lined up with everything that was listed. Needless to say, with a month full of travels, meetings, and phone calls, sickness was the least ideal thing I could’ve ever experienced. I wasn’t only sick for a couple days, but from day one of Nicaragua to the last day in Nicaragua still having minor symptoms and not being 100%. As much as one would think that I would look back on Nicaragua and hate it, I look back and see the Lord’s hand in it all. From the nice men that physically took our hands and lead us to the bus we were supposed to be on to the deep and intentional lessons that the Lord taught me through laying in bed for almost the whole month.
Throughout this time, I felt stripped of everything.
Stripped of my mental capacity and the ability to focus on anything other than pain.
Stripped of being with my team a lot of the time.
Stripped of a lot of ministry.
Stripped of my ability to take care of myself in every area.
Stripped of being able to pour into my team and serve them well.
Stripped of motivation and energy.
Stripped of decision-making.
Stripped of my health.
Stripped of a month.
Stripped of being able to spend time with the Lord in a way that I saw fit.
But in being stripped, I discovered the end of myself. I didn’t realize that myself was still so long and a huge part of my everyday life. I discovered that God is so faithful and there’s absolutely nothing I can do in my own strength.
I learned to watch others thrive in their own leadership abilities. I learned the power of prayer and unity through trials. I learned dependence upon the Lord like I had never had to experience before. I discovered the boundaries of my trust. I walked far enough to where I didn’t think I could trust no more, only to find out there was land to be discovered on the other side of the border I had put up. I am thankful for my month in Nicaragua and the trials I walked through.
I feel as if the Lord was intimately holding my hand and taking me on a walk to the borders of trust and asking me to cross the line to break the fence that has been hindering me from experiencing more of what He has for me. Through the trials I was able to find a trust that has no end and a strength that wasn’t my own. I was able to find the Lord in a way I never had. The only way I can explain the passing through the valley was the one who held my hand through it all, Jesus.
