Passport or Textbooks?

I LOVE to travel. I think that’s a desire God has given me because it’s part of what I’ll be doing in my life. I get impatient sitting around my room like I am now because I know there’s a great big beautiful world out there just waiting to be explored. I also know that same world is full of hurting people who don’t know Christ.

I just want to go. I know God has called me to missions in some way, and given my love for languages and travelling to far-off places, I feel like it’s going to be on the foreign field. At the top of my list are places like New Zealand, Ireland, Australia, Italy, Greece, Spain, Portugal, India, Costa Rica, South Africa, Brazil…I could go on and on. If God chose not to place me in any of these countries permanently, I’d at least love to see some of them before I die. I don’t know where I’m going-not in the next year, and certainly not in the next ten years.

God has this way of only revealing things to us piece-by-piece because the big picture would overwhelm us, I think. He must smile a little when I come to Him, demanding to see it all right now. At the moment, I’m in one of those places where I feel like He’s about to show me another piece soon. I’m fairly certain I’m on-schedule to graduate this May, which means I’ve got to be thinking about what I’m going to do once I’m through college. With my Biblical Studies major and calling to the mission field, seminary seemed like the logical choice. (Here’s a hint, folks. In case you didn’t know, God doesn’t really work based on our logic.) Now I’m not so sure. I’ve begin weighing the options, making lists of pros and cons. Do I really need an M.Div to serve God? Should I take a year off and travel or do mission work through a missionary society? Journeyman? Should I just get involved with an international ministry and forget seminary altogether?

I’m surprised at the fact that I’m not freaking out yet, but I feel that’s God’s hand in all this. He’s going to let me in on things when I need to know. Like Gandalf (he-he): A wizard is never late, Frodo Baggins. Nor is he early. He arrives precisely when he means to!