"Patience My Child"

Today would have been the day that Moriah and I would be on the airplane headed for our new home in Cameroon... Instead I'm in Oregon, waiting.

To say that I am completely fine with that would be a lie.

I want to get on with my adventure. Go where there will be a challenge. Where I'll need to depend fully on God (why don't I start on that now?). Leave the U.S. for the place that is really home. I'm reminded though that God is in control, there is a reason I'm still here... waiting. It's as if God is saying,

"Patience my child, not all your plans will play out the way you plan them.... you've got to trust."

This shouldn't be new either, in fact all my plans have been turned upside down.

The plan I started out with was to go for a full year of mission service and it was going to be in Ethiopia. On top of that I would have gone down to see my sister in Malawi for Christmas break. Once the plans for Ethiopia fell through, there was a period of waiting... the view of leaving in June diminished as there was no call coming through. April went by and then it was the middle of May I hadn't heard from any of the hospitals I had looked into. At this point I was wondering if I would be SMing or not. Then I heard from a little clinic, soon to be hospital in Cameroon.

The craziest thing was that it wasn't anything that I had been looking for.

My picture had been remote and someplace closer to Malawi... what I got was a university town, far away from Malawi and being the only SM (later on found out that Moriah was coming with me). Despite all that God gave me a peace of mind and an excitement about it. Next came the funding. The due date for all the money was July 1st and that day came and went. It wasn't till the 21st that I reached the $3,200 mark. At that point I could get my ticket so it was set for the August 17. I sent my visa in to the Cameroon Embassy and thought things were finally falling into place! Unfortunately, that was not true, on the 10th I got a call saying that the embassy was backed up so they wouldn't have my visa processed in time.

Bummer!

Now, I have three more weeks of waiting till I (perhaps) leave for Cameroon :)

So....

I'm not going to Ethiopia.

I didn't end up leaving in June.

I still have money to raise.

I'm not leaving today.

I'm only going for 9 months.

I struggle with patience and trust.

I don't know what God's plans are.

...Yet God is STILL in control!

And perhaps all this waiting is just one of the many lessons that God is teaching me.

What disappointments do you have in your life?