#86: Memorabilia (from Peru)

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately about Missions. Ever since I first learned about missions and went on my first trip to Panama, I have known that that is what I would do with my life. I just felt so passionate about it, so certain and so convinced.
Well, after I graduated from college (2 years ago!! I can't even believe it) I just felt so hopeless about the whole thing. I couldn't find a job that I loved and I just felt like I wasn't ever going to find my niche. I kind of set the idea of missions aside, thinking that it really wasn't meant to be. I searched for jobs that had to do with my degree, but honestly I just felt like a failure. I felt like I wasted my years at college getting a degree that was pointless in the real world, and the sobering facts that I wouldn't be able to do what I love just sort of depressed me.

After Phil and I got married we talked about doing missions and we thought it would be a good idea to try it out. Ya know, do a short term trip to see what we think. We hadn't done missions together before, so we thought we ought to go on a trip together before we started applying to any organizations.
I talked with the missionary's that I had served with in Peru, and we planned on coming there for a month or two the following summer (2011). I was excited again about the prospect of doing Missions and I was even more excited about showing Phil the places I had been in Trujillo!
But in October I found out I was pregnant, and my due date was set for July 7th. I told the missionary's we wouldn't be able to come, and that we were holding off on doing missions because of the baby.
I put the thought of missions aside, and became increasingly excited about starting a family and settling down.
But then, at the end of November, I had a miscarriage. It was devastating and has taken a while for me to finally be okay.
I didn't even consider Missions after that. My mind was focused on starting a family and settling down. I dreamed about the house we would buy, how I would decorate, where our kids would go to school and what it would be like to be a mom. Missions was so far from me, that I was completely thrown for a loop when Phil got an email from Nathan Davenport with Pioneer Bible Translators. He asked Phil if he had ever considered using his Business degree to do Missions.

And now, the process has begun. I can see now that God clearly had a plan. Looking back, it is all so obvious! My degree wasn't wasted, I do get to do what I love. God's timing is perfect! Phil and I have almost been married a year, Phil just graduated from college, and now we are in the beginning stages of doing Missions. It has all worked out. I felt hopeless and useless for no good reason. I am learning to trust God with everything, but it is something that I quite regularly fail at.

Anyway...I was looking at that pottery that I had gotten in Peru, and I was thinking about all of this.