Looking Back as We Press Forward

I've committed myself to working on grant applications this week.  I just finished writing out a testimony for one and found what I was procrastinating as a just another chore to check off the list to be a great opportunity to gaze back on all the "Stones of Remembrance" as I explained the journey of my faith thus far. 


Here are a few excerpts:

I grew up in a Christian home and accepted Jesus as my Savior at the age of five, praying with my mom on a summer evening after concluding my first Vacation Bible school experience.  Even as a young child I felt called to ministry, often answering adults that I would like to be a missionary doctor in Africa when I grew up.  

After graduating high school I attended the Moody Bible Institute, majoring in Urban Ministries.  My career goals had changed from my childhood dreams of being a missionary doctor, but I still felt God’s call into ministry.  
 

 I have often struggled to reconcile what I have felt to be a lifetime of calling towards ministry with my wholehearted belief that the best for my children is to be their primary caregiver.  More and more I am realizing that these two things are not just compatible, but one and the same calling.  I’m astounded as I look back on my life and see that what at the time I had thought were divergent paths were actually ribbons interwoven, mingling and crossing and separating, but ultimately twisting together into the life God has always been calling me to – a life devoted to Him throughout every season of life.  Right now, I’m smiling to think of me as a small child, heart overflowing with compassion to heal the bodies and spirits of children in Africa when presently I’m endeavoring to do just that, though not in a way I could have ever imagined as a child.  God is calling me to Africa, to Ethiopia, and to live the hidden ministry of a stay-at-home mom.  Only by his glorious design could these callings be woven into this story I’m living as we prepare to bring our son home from Ethiopia.

How is God weaving together your life story today?


P.S.