Answers - Or Lack Thereof

I'm the kind of person who likes everything to be in order. I like things to be well-planned out. I like to know exactly what's going to happen long before it does. In short, I like answers. And I like to have them fast.

Unfortunately for me, that's not always the way God works.

I'll admit that when I fasted last weekend, I expected answers right away. I expected God to reveal exactly what I was supposed to do exactly when I wanted him to. And He didn't.

After much pointless fretting and worrying, I took the advice of my parents and decided to wait until the last minute to make a decision, giving God as much time as possible to reveal His will to me. While this definitely seemed like a good plan, it went against every fiber of my planning-obsessed being not to want a fast decision. To want to make that decision before I needed to.

Well, I've hit the deadline. And there was no magic revelation, no time that I knew exactly, positively that this is what God wanted me to do. But, throughout the week, everything has pushed me towards making this one, certain decision. It's made me more confident about it, and I think that's God's way of telling me what He wants me to do.

This year, I will be applying to go to both China and Peru. This is approximately $5,500 in mission trips. I have to raise that by summer. At first I thought it was crazy. In fact, everyone else thought it was crazy too. How in the world could I raise that much by summer? I had trouble raising the $1,500 for Peru last year - this was more than triple that!

But God's in the business of crazy. I fully believe now that this is what God wants me to do. The only thing holding me back was fear that I couldn't do it, that God couldn't do it. But He can. And He will.