Hello friends!
For those of you who didn’t know me when I was in high school: I had it all together (to be read with the utmost sarcasm.) I knew that I was going to major in music at UTK, and have an award winning band. I would also have a nice house and a huge dog. I had a want to do missions, but I felt like it wouldn’t take me anywhere in life, so I decided on something practical. That’s what I wanted. What I didn’t know is what God wanted. Throughout high school I was your (very) basic lukewarm christian. I loved the idea of God. Now, I didn’t love the whole idea, just the God that would love me and shower me with blessings. Yeah, some of you are starting to get the picture I’m painting. I used God for my own gain. Well, I thought I was using God. God can’t be used, but we can be fooled. Fooled by the evil one.
Now, I matured and grew out of that very narrow-minded perspective. Well, I’m still maturing spiritually. I’m still narrow-minded! I’ve learned so much about the character of God. I’ve learned how He does love us, He does bless us, He does; however, He completely emptied Himself because He loves me, He blesses me so that I may bless others, He does so I can do. God is a God of multiplication. I’ve also discovered that God is also a just and righteous God. He is a father. Sometimes we don’t “like” our fathers very much when we are being taught a lesson. I learned a lot of things the hard way. I had to learn that I was made for God, not the other way around. I’ve come to the end of myself many times. I’ve been lost many times on this journey. I have been so frustrated with Him at times. Yes, I’m saying that. I’ve been frustrated. Granted, I was wrong, there’s no reason to hide it. Through all of these times I’ve found joy in God, because He was teaching me and leading me. He is shaping me into something beautiful.
I say all of that, to say this: I’m not majoring in music at UTK. I’m not going to have a nice house (or apartment) any time soon. I’m not going to have a huge dog. What I am doing is volunteering at a church with amazing leadership, I’m working my butt off to pay bills, and most of all … I‘m waiting. Let me clarify that a little more; I’m training. School didn’t work out (yet,) and I’m the one thing I had hoped to never be … dependent. I’m so dependent on the people around me! I can’t do life on my own. Given my childhood, this is the one thing I never wanted to be, but here I am. It almost seems as if I am in a different life, but it’s the same life, I’m just a different person. I am now living in the image of God, and It. Is. Crazy…
The not going to school thing has been a struggle. I mean, what are you without school? That’s how I felt for a long time. Since graduating high school God has been molding me into His image. He has been making my steps slow to shatter this idea that I can do life by myself. It has taken me THREE years to unlearn the lie of the value school would give me. THREE YEARS! In ways, these three years have been long, but in other ways they have gone by too fast. I found a church family that is so loving I couldn’t imagine ever leaving, I have opened my heart again, I’ve learned so so much about God, and have been a part of an amazing ministry team. I never want to leave. I have roots … for once I am rooted. I am comfortable. God doesn’t want me to just be comfortable. Whuuuuuuut? That’s right. I’m comfortable. All these things I cherish are great and by no means a hindrance to my doing ministry. Well, they weren’t, until I let them be. I had decided that I wasn’t going anywhere that wasn’t within driving distance of my roots. God said no to that. I should be, first and foremost, rooted in Christ.
A little less than a year ago God started moving in me to really look into missions again. He had given me this unrelenting spirit of wanting more of myself for His cause. Less of me, more of Him. More of me working for His cause inadvertently meant less of me. Well, to me it had been inadvertent. Anyway, I started looking into missions again. I was looking online for trips, blogs, schooling… I started reading books about missions and taking more interest when my church’s missionaries came in on furlough. It was like a fire in me… it was spreading.
I discovered the World Race through Google. Go figure. I had searched for trips to Africa, or jobs in Africa. In looking at some jobs, I saw a tab for the World Race. I clicked, saw the price tag, and then exited the website. There was NO WAY I would be able to come up with that money. I started talking to my pastor and he calmed the overwhelming storm in me, and helped me be more focused. He helped me find out whether my want to do missions is romantic, or if it really is a passion. I became more levelheaded, and had let the idea go (I was also too young for this trip). A few months later I attended a Winter Jam concert with some friends. AIM had a table there. I took some stuff, signed a paper, looked into it, saw the price tag, and exited the website yet again. Still nothing. A month … or four after the concert an old high school friend came into the coffee shop I work at. Well, we got to talking and he asked me how I was doing, what I was into, and what my plans were for school or life. As I stumbled through my answers I had mentioned something about missions work. His eyes lit up. He told me that I should look into the World Race. He said that it sounded like I would be great for it. Once again, I looked it up, saw the price tag, and … I had peace. The first thought that ran through my head was that I could do this. I could do this IF I trusted God.
Here I am, almost a year later, and I’ve been accepted, I’ve started fund-raising, I’ve answered God’s call. A call that is going to take me way far away from my roots, my people. A call that is demanding I die to myself so that He can rise up in me. I am to be a vessel of God, always. This is my next step, my next phase, and I am so excited.
In His Service,
Shaylee Tell
