“But surely You wouldn’t call me to that, Lord!”
Exhaustion had hit me like a ton of bricks after serving a week at a football camp in Ethiopia and I was just certain that this was causing me to hear God incorrectly. Wasn’t God aware of the career I had back home? Did He not know that this was not part of the plan?
Yet God quietly reminded me once again to trust Him.
When I was 16 God allowed me the opportunity to take a short-term trip to Senegal. And it was during this trip that He planted in me a desire to see the nations come to call Him Lord. Somehow, some way, He would use me as a part of His work that He was already doing around the world and I was more than willing to follow His call on my life. It was also during this trip to Senegal that I met a missionary whose assignment was to manage the finances of the West Africa region of the mission agency. All my ideas of what a missionary was fell to the wayside when I realized that missions and professional skills could work effortlessly together.
Sometimes when I look back on my life and reflect on the faithfulness of God, I can’t help but laugh. Growing up I would always say I wanted to be a teacher (except for the brief few months where I wanted to be a wedding planner!). Never would I have said that I wanted to be an accountant when I was older—it’s just not the most glamorous or exciting career choice a little one can dream about. But God has a way of leading us in just the right directions in life and allowing us to fully utilize the gifts that He has given to us.
I still remember the very first accounting course I took in school and how quickly everything seemed to click. I knew that God had called me to go to the nations and I could see that I had an aptitude for this accounting thing, but how was God going to use them together? I remembered the missionary I had met in Senegal and I knew that God would one day allow me the same opportunity.
Over the course of about twelve years God was working in my waiting. I was ready to jump into a career as a missionary right after college, but God had other plans. I was ready to start with a missions agency about two years into my public accounting career, but God still confirmed to me that the timing was not right. One of the hardest lessons of life is to learn to wait on the Lord’s perfect timing. We know it in our heads that His timing is what’s best for us, but it is another thing altogether to live in that period of waiting. But it is in the waiting that He is doing a work in us and reminding us to trust in Him.
So there I was, sitting on a couch in the SIM Ethiopia guest house, crying out to the Lord that I was ready to step into this life that I knew He was calling me to but I was not ready to trust Him all the way. Leaving a career with a steady income and moving to a support-based salary was scary! Yet the Lord so gently reminded me that He could be trusted. If I couldn’t trust Him to raise up a support team, what could I trust Him for? He had provided for my needs in the past and wouldn’t fail me now.
One of my favorite quotes is by Corrie Ten Boom:
“Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.”
If we know Him, we know all that we need to know. How is the Lord asking you to use what He has given you to reach those who do not know Him? He has gifted you with a unique skillset that He is wanting to use to reach a world that needs to hear about Him. Trust God with all your unknowns and ask Him to show you how you can make an impact for Him with what He has given to you.
Courtney serves with Sports Friends and SIM USA in Charlotte, NC, providing accounting, finance, and administrative services. She brings a set of skills and experiences, as well as passion and commitment, that are desperately needed to sustain and enhance the development of ministry all around the world.
Are you interested in using your gifts to serve the Lord with Sports Friends? Contact [email protected] to find out more about our current opportunities.
