Little did I know what me being a missionary would actually look like. I had heard of missionaries, of their incredible enduring faith, their hardships, them seeing extraordinary miracles and of hundreds even thousands hearing the gospel through them and being encountered by the Living God. Like anything we aspire to do, we tend to romanticise it a little. That's not to say that I was thrown into the deep end and swept away by my naïveté. All the years of working a desk job, sowing where God showed me to and enduring through trials in the wilderness had prepared me to walk on water once I stepped out of the boat. When God calls you to go, He knows the work He has done in you that has sufficiently prepared you to launch out even if you don't feel ready. We are never ill equipped but we are well equipped to confidently move out of the old and into the new, leaving behind the old wineskin that was sufficient for the previous season.
I just didn't expect to encounter the kinds of trials that I did and as quickly as I did. So when the first one came it was a great shaking, necessarily separating any romantic notions from the purity of my purpose for that season. At the time I felt I was standing in a raging storm with waves churning around me, my first thought was, eject! Yet, that peace that I mentioned earlier remained. When I questioned if I had done the right thing being where I was, again God's peace filled me. So the choice was to endure or leave. I chose to stay and endure. What I found out was as difficult as the challenges were the joy and peace that accompanied them overflowed. As I listened for Holy Spirit's guidance and followed it, sometimes thankfully against my better judgement, I started to see fruit, much fruit. Our prayers were being answered, a friend in our midst gave their life to Jesus. The mission was being fulfilled, shifts we saw in the heavenlies were manifesting in the earth before our eyes even though the trials remained. We got spoiled by little breaks here and there, a lovely couple offered us their home as a place of rest, it was a peaceful and beautiful place and we so enjoyed it there. We were blessed with a two week holiday travelling to London, Liverpool and Wales. We ate heartily, we cooked for others, we prayed and prophesied. As we abandoned ourselves completely into His capable hands, we found we could enjoy Jesus' abundant gift of life fully in the midst of great trials, knowing finally that the trials were perfecting not destroying us.
When you rely on God for everything, everything He does is miraculous. You start to become grateful for water, air, electricity, every morsel of food, transport, fuel, shampoo and toothpaste, you get the picture. You start to see the reality of His hand in every detail, every day. So when He says, you're going to South Africa, Northern Ireland or the USA and you don't have any money, you rejoice as you are perfectly positioned for a miracle of provision because you have seen Him provide a car and a home when you didn't have one. It has been more than a year since I earned a salary of any sort. It is not because I don't want to work or am incapable of holding down a job. It is because that is the season of life God has called me to for now. In that time I have not lacked for a thing. There have been times when the tap has been turned to full and the abundance gushes out over me. There have been times of collecting our daily manna, enough for that day. There have been times of leaness. But at all times, the peace has remained and I have learned to be content with the little and the much (Philippians 4:11-13). In all of it, I have grown closer to God than ever before. I hear His voice and in knowing I hear I have peace, in hearing I have more peace and in obeying I have complete peace.
In this season, the Lord has said, sit at My feet like Mary and learn from Me. I remember walking through the forest in Wales that surrounded my beautiful cottage by the river Wye and listening to Kris
Vallotton, Bill Johnson, Heidi Baker and others as I hiked the hills. I remember thinking how young Kris sounded and marvelled at his wisdom and the revelations he had from God. Then I realised he was way past his twenties (no offence Kris!) and had been journeying for years to garner the kind of pearls he shared with us. I heard about the Bethel Supernatural School of Ministry and my heart so deeply desired to partake of that. Was it too much to ask to go there? We've heard the scripture that nothing is impossible with God. We know that God aligns the desires of our hearts with His. But do we believe it? 
This week about seven years after I first started listening to Bethel podcasts, I got to see Kris teach in person. I got to hug Bill Johnson. I got to sit at the feet of Jesus and learn from the many excellent teachers at Bethel Church who have allowed their wells to overflow into streams of living water so those who hear are refreshed and changed to follow Him with more passion and hunger than ever before.
Our needs are already met by God. Jesus said, our Father knows our needs before we ask (Matthew 6:24-34) . That does not mean we don't ask, just that we ask from a posture of thanksgiving being confident that we can trust Jesus, He is the Truth. The Truth sets us free. Now that that's settled we can be free to seek the purpose for this season and begin to enjoy fulfilling it, trials included. 
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