another essay

Describe an experience in which God surprised you.

I have found that God has different plans for us than we often have for ourselves. I have heard that if you want to make God laugh tell Him your plans…and my second year in Malawi was exactly that. I went to Malawi with a plan and purpose: to work with the youth program of the Synod in starting a girls’ program. Within 2 months of my return my contacts in the Youth Department had been fired and I had to find my calling outside my original plan for the year. My plans had fallen apart in the first months of my return, I felt lost, useless and like I must have misread the signs about coming back. It took time and reflection to adjust my outlook and find the ways that I was called to be in Nkhoma—to not be affiliated with one of the many facets of ministry there but to help where I could in the community. I spent the year helping at the hospital, the school, and the guesthouse as clerical assistant, teacher, headmistress, teacher assistant, and manager. Had I planned to come and help at the school, hospital and community in the mish-mashed way that I did, I most likely would not have returned. The surprise at finding my niche in the school and hospital and community after my youth work failed was gratifying. Beginning the year with a completely different picture of what I would be doing and how I would be helping, I found it to be an eye-opening experience of what I could do and how to be flexible in God’s plan. I felt that I was supposed to be there, doing what I was doing and maybe that was why God got me there.