A month ago, when my team and I returned to California, my plan was to go home on the 5th of March and stay in Denmark until October. Then I’d go back and do a secondary school @ YWAM LA. As I’m writing this, I am in Los Angeles, so obviously, that didn’t work out.
It’s only been 26 days since I graduated DTS and here I am – it feels a little unreal, yet it is exactly what I asked from God.
On the 28th of Feburary there was a little meeting about the School of Ministry Development, and since I planned on doing it in the fall, I went to get some information. At this meeting the school leader randomly tells us, that students who say they’ll come back after a while often end up staying at home.
This statement made me feel so concerned. I was in that category, so did that mean that I most likely wouldn’t follow my plans? I went to be alone and ask God what was going on. Why was responding so strongly to this? I had this strange feeling that God was giving me a challenge – and a choice. Since I really want to do this school it was obvious, that I’d love to be able to do it already this spring, but financially that wasn’t really an option. I didn’t have money for that AT ALL, especially not considering the fact that if I went, I’d only be home for three weeks. It didn’t even seem worth considering.
As these thoughts were running through my head a song started playing in the background.
“Be lifted high, God, be lifted higher,
for your glory be lifted high”
In prayer I agreed to that. All that really matters is for God to be glorified, because it is when I see his glory that I’m most satisfied. And then a thought, a peculiar question popped into my mind. What do you think would give me more glory – to provide for you in three weeks or to let you go home and work for half a year before you go back to LA?
I think I made a grimace and told myself that it was just my own silly brainwork. But I think I was wrong on that one. At least I soon started questioning that it would have been my own thought. It seemed like everyone I got to talk to had something unusually wise or challenging to say, whether they knew what I was considering or not.
At one point this man sat down with me and a few friends and started telling us, that if we had dreams that we could fulfill without God we should get some bigger dreams. I kept it together but on the inside I was going all crazy. Why would he just randomly say that? Then someone else told me, that if I was considering going home I should know, that God would call me home as faithfully as he had called me to DTS in the first place. I honestly didn’t feel like God was calling me home. I do love city I live in and I do love the people there, but something about going home just felt.. off, I guess. On the other hand I was really aware that it was an emotional week and I wouldn’t make a decision just based on that, so I told God that if he was serious about this, he had to be really clear. And so, the incredible conversations continued. People would tell me all these stories about how God had made money come in miraculous ways. A friend, who didn’t know what I was working through said, that she felt God telling me, that it was his turn to work and that I should just watch him do it.
At the end of the week I had a list of strange conversations that all pointed in a very exciting and very scary direction – going back to LA in April. I went home to Aalborg and knew, that I really wanted to do it, but still I didn’t know how on earth it would be possible. I was nervous about telling my family and friends, but God worked that out too. As I explained to people what had happened and why I wanted to go back everyone was so supportive. That threw me off and yet it was such a confirmation to me. I really felt like the Lord asked me to take a leap of faith. After a week of just relaxing and processing in my home I figured it was time to think about the finances. I had to lay down my Danish pride, knowing that this time I wouldn’t be able to work and pay it all by myself as we tend to prefer in Scandinavia. I asked God what to do. He explained to me, that if I just told my story and why I wanted to go, he’d take care of the rest.
He sure did. God really showed his faithfulness to me through other people’s generosity, through a scholarship I applied for last year that randomly got accepted in March, through my parents friends who had just heard that I wanted to go, through my friends, my family and people I don’t even know who just coincidetally read my blog etc. It was so overwhelming. I thought I’d maybe have to go without having all the funds, but as I was doing the math last week my jaw just dropped as I pressed “=” on the calculator. All the money were there. I could pay my school fees. I was absolutely amazed. God is so unbelievably good!
I’m so thankful that I get to do this and a huge, gigantic, massive THANK YOU goes out to everyone who has prayed for me as I walked through this process and to everyone who chose to support me. The bible says, that generosity is to be blessed and I know, that it’ll be a blessing for both you and I and it gives glory to God, who sent me here. Thank you so, so muh.