(Mike) As promised, I wanted to tell my story of how I came to the realization that serving as a missionary was the call upon my life. The process was not ideal, but since when does God work the way we think He should?
I really feel like my whole life has pieces that fit into the broad picture of the puzzle, but for the sake of telling my story, I have to begin rather recently. When I was working away from home for Ahern in the winter of 2012, I had a tough schedule that had me gone for 3 weeks and home for one week each month. I was making a lot of money compared to what I had previously made and things looked really good from a worldly standpoint. We were getting out of debt, and Carolynn was able to stay home with the kids. It soon became difficult to have a relationship with my family though. I felt like it was getting easier and easier to be away working, where I only had one person to think about and concentrate on. When I was home, I tried to make up for all the time I was away and I never succeeded. I felt like an ineffective dad, husband, friend, and person.
Different thoughts plagued my mind each evening after the routine of work had been finished. I was battling between trying to stick it out and trying to figure out a way out. Nothing seemed to make the circumstances any better. I searched my faith, my fleshly desires, and also felt like just giving up. Answers were far and few in between. One thing was certain, the world was not satisfying my thirst.
I believe God let me wrestle with this for a while to make sure I was certain when the answer finally came. It was just a whisper at first. Just the beginnings of a thought... I wondered if my life really had been designed with a purpose in mind, if so, what could it be? I had always been really interested in gardening, farming, sustainability lifestyles, building and fixing things. I felt like I knew a little about a lot. I loved learning how to do new things. I also knew that I wanted, needed to be closer to God. I wanted to know Him more.
I started filling my evenings with podcasts from different speakers, and searching the Bible more on my own. Slowly, I thought I began to hear from Him. A picture of serving God as a missionary shaped itself into my mind and heart. I didn't know if there was even a need for the missionary that I had in mind to be. Through serving this way, I thought I could help desperate people with the most basic and essential aspects of life. I would also get to be witness to God doing amazing and miraculous works of renewal and transformation of hearts through the Gospel. The picture brought together past experiences, current skills and interests, my God-given talents. I also envisioned Carolynn using her love for children and teaching gifts to serve. A compassion for the most needy people developed in my heart. Hope was renewed. I didn't really mention this revelation to Carolynn right away though because I hadn't really thought I/we could do it. I had all sorts of excuses in my mind that said so.
Before too long, Carolynn and I talked about this new hope I had and to my delight, she had been going through her own journey and had ended up in the same camp as me! The fact that both of us were on the same page without collusion spoke clearly to me. We talked about what it looked like and how we could possibly become missionaries. We had heard that God equips the called, so we believed that would happen. It began with Faith. We prayed about when I should come home. The answer was "very soon". I didn't have a job to come home to, but we trusted that God would take care of us and we were willing to give up everything in order to follow God in this new journey. I told my boss I had to go home and would not return on the next plane. It was done. Now what? The very next day, I received a phone call from an employer back home who had some work for me if I wanted it! As the weeks and months unfolded, we saw many, many examples of God answering prayers that confirmed His agreement with the path we saw.
Carolynn and I will post more stories of confirmation periodically. Thank you all for continuing your support of us!
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