We were asked to write a blog about how we were called to this mission trip. Here is my story…
There I was, looking up missions trips on the internet. Let’s see… I want it to be around 9 months, with discipleship a main key… How in the world did I get there? Hadn’t I been planning for quite some time now to go to the exact place I was in- at that very moment- this coming fall? Yes, but God’s plan was different than mine, and as always, way better.
So let’s back track, I’ve only been on one mission trip, and that was in Junior High I think… I have a difficult time remembering when things happen. It was for a week in Mexico and even though I wasn’t a committed Christian at that time, I had a good time. You see, I was raised in a Christian family, so I called myself a Christian and followed most of the rules, but I didn’t have a relationship with God! I didn’t really understand what being a Christian meant, and living in the U.S. made it easy to flippantly call myself a Christian. It wasn’t until my High School years when I began to grasp what it meant and started to develop a relationship with Jesus. All this to say, I hadn’t had much experience in missions at all.
The thing is, in these last few years, I’ve discovered a passion for missions that God has placed in me. Whenever someone would talk about it or people would go on a mission, I would always get the desire to go on missions. I’m not saying that Christians can’t be ministering anywhere they are, but I felt this desire to not just live a normal Christian life. Even if I just did missions part time, I knew that’s what I wanted to do. Being in school, however, prevented that, for most missions were during the winter- which is understandable in Alaska. This last winter I did one year at the school Alaska Bible Institute during my senior year because I finished High School early. I was planning, with my family rooting me along, to go to Ecola Bible School in Oregon. Both of my brothers attended this school and loved it, and thus convincing me to go. After ABI finished, I decided to go visit my brother Kevin at Ecola for a week to be with him and check out the campus.
In that week, God changed my future.
I think it ironic that I discovered that I wasn’t going to go to Ecola while I was at the campus. I was worried that my brother would think i decided not to because I didn’t like it. I just knew; going to that school is not what I wanted to do. I wanted to do missions, even if it was just for a month with my church and another one with a separate group. Then for some reason I started looking online for a mission program, because I wanted something more long-term. Now I’m not one to go signing up for something on the internet I hardly know anything about, but it was perfect! I didn’t know what I was looking for… but then again, I did. I knew someone who went on a 9-month trip to Nicaragua, and that sounded like the perfect length. One of the first sites I found was AIM, come to find out the person I knew had done it through AIM, also. I felt like God was saying: YES! I applied when I got home, and a few days later got interviewed and accepted in the same day. Ever since then, just thinking about it builds excitement up within me. God has really been providing and amazing. Africa or Nicaragua, either way, I’m so excited for what God has planned!
