Mary with members of her host family
For more about Mary’s experience go to her blog: http://marycanfield.tumblr.com/.
Proverbs 3:5-6
At the office the other day one of the new missionaries asked how long we’d been working with CFCI. We told her nearly three weeks. She asked if we were about ready to go home with a tone that assumed we must be exasperated and ready for some peace. It didn’t take me long to respond with a firm “No…not at all.”
It’s not that I don’t miss home, or won’t be really excited to be there again when my time here has been fulfilled. It’s more that everything about this trip has felt right. Like this is exactly where God wants me to be and that I’m doing exactly what He wants me to be doing. It’s one of the most peaceful comforting feelings in the world; knowing that you’re within God’s will, doing His work, serving his people.
It’s weird to look back and think that a few weeks before the trip I was so exhausted (in so many ways) that I wasn’t at all looking forward to coming here. I was coming off of one of the most spiritually and emotionally draining years of my life. I wasn’t sure I had the capacity to love and serve the way that I should, the way that I would want to. “I don’t think I can do this anymore…” was on the tip of my tongue every time Sara and I discussed plans and logistics, but, thankfully, God kept my mouth closed.
Two nights ago Sara told me she felt the exact same way.
We were having a conversation about God’s perfection, how he has a plan, and how that plan becomes manifested in our lives when we walk with Him. We both felt convicted to be here, we both knew that at one point or another God told us that this is what we needed, so we came. We came despite the questions, despite the doubt. We came, and it has been beautiful. To say the least.
During my time here I have been learning so many things, but the overarching lesson has been faith, and learning how to be faithful even when you don’t want to be. Since before this trip God has been laying large sized revelations on my heart about some large sized things. He has been asking me to make choices I don’t want to make, to go places I don’t want to go, and to press on when giving up seems so much easier.
This trip has been a reminder of the beautiful truth that He knows best, a reminder that when God asks you to do something you don’t want to it’s not because he wants to hurt you or make you suffer, it’s because he can see the bigger picture. Trials may come as a result of those decisions, but ultimately, if you’re living for Him, His will will be done. His good, pleasing and perfect will. Through the trials, peace can be found in the knowledge that He is with you, He won’t leave you or forsake you. Especially in the valleys. Especially when he has brought you there.
Through these realizations, He has given me the strength to stand firm in the decisions that He has been asking me to make in regard to the coming year, as well as the faith to trust His ultimate plan.
I have no doubt that El Salvador was a part of God’s plan for my life. Through it He taught me so, so, much. It’s scary to think that had I chosen to ignore His will and given in to my fears and doubtful human nature, that I would have missed out on all of that growth. The fruit that has come from this time has renewed my faith and has brought about a jarring realization of how little I have had in the past year. I spent a lot of time trying to escape God’s will for me. I tried to work around it and to justify walking away from it. I won’t say it was wasted time (Hebrews has recently helped me to see the beauty in God breathed discipline), but it was a painful time. Had I embraced his plan and had faith in his provision I would have struggled a lot less to keep my head above water.
If you can learn from my mistakes, please do.
The next time He wants to take you in a direction you don’t want to go, submit and recognize that he is God. Take His hand rather than slapping it away, because before you know it…it may be the only thing left to hold you up.
Trust the God of the universe with your future.
He knows what He’s doing.
I promise.
So. Much. Love.
In Him,
-Mary