Testimony for Africa Application

I grew up in the church, living the epitome of the “church kid” life. I went to church nearly every Sunday of my life until my sophomore year of high school, when I transferred from the small private Christian school that I had gone to since kindergarten, to a big public school, a world of unknowns and great temptations.

Growing up in the church I knew a lot of facts about Christianity but I didn’t really get the personal relationship aspect of being a Christian. I can specifically remember a time in 8th grade during a chapel on Wednesday morning at my Christian school. We were supposed to find a prayer partner to pray for my friend’s mom who was dying of cancer. I turned to my other friend and asked, in much too perky of a tone, “Want to be my prayer buddy?” She looked at me with a confused and concerned look and said, “Don’t you know this is serious?” Up until that moment I thought my faith was serious. But it was then that I realized that I didn’t know how to talk to God. Prayer was a mechanical nuisance that I found myself repeating every morning at school, every day before meals, and every night before bed. I don’t think I really grasped the concept of prayer or understood that God was God. He was more of an idea that I had grown accustomed to believing rather than my Savior and my Best Friend.

Before freshman year had a chance to begin, I was part of the girl’s swim team at the public high school while I was still enrolled in and attending private school. I made friends on the team, perhaps the first people I ever knew who were not Christians. I was not very close to many people at the private school and so the public school was very enticing as I found myself growing in my relationships there. I began to hang out with my public school friends more and began to reject everything that was at the private school. I rejected what my parents and my teachers and administrators had to say and turned against them. I said that they were oppressing me and didn’t understand me. And in the middle of my sophomore year, I switched schools. I was scared and I thought it was wrong, but I told everyone it was what I wanted and that as of that moment, I believed it was what God wanted for me. But I never prayed about it. I didn’t know what God wanted with me. I stopped going to church and doubted God’s very existence more than I ever had before.I lived a worldly life, succumbing to the traits of people around me, picking up the bad habit of swearing, and living ever so selfishly in my own world of pleasing myself, lying if I had to, to keep everyone, including myself, believing the lie that I was doing just fine on my own.

By the grace of God and a lot of prayer from my church family, by the end of my junior year, I found my own faith that didn’t depend on my parents or my siblings or my friends. Around December-January of that year, I started struggling. I had fallen out of three or four really strong friendships, life wasn't going as I planned and everything was all messed up: friendships, church life, school life, I was no longer involved, I was no longer motivated, and I wasn't portraying myself as the person that I wanted to be. I really wanted to be walking with God, but I still couldn't make myself believe any of the things that I'd been taught for the first 16 years of my life, and I didn't have a clue how I was supposed to believe. I remember being on the track team and running with one of my friends. She is not a Christian and says she doesn’t believe in God but she did pray once and what she prayed for came true. And so she thought that if there was a God he must have answered her. I was frustrated about her hearing from God because I wanted so badly to hear from him and couldn’t. So, I did the one thing that had always worked for everyone else. I prayed. I remembered that he who seeks after God with all his heart will find God. So, whenever I felt alone or afraid, I prayed that God would let me see Him and not doubt and know that He is my Savior. Then one day I woke up and I believed. I don't know how or what happened, I just had this overwhelming feeling of desire to learn everything I could about Jesus Christ my Living Savior. Soon after I went up to my youth leader, Katie, and said that I wanted to be involved in the church again. I now attend her small group on Tuesday nights which keeps me going every week. I also attend church every Sunday morning and youth group on Sunday nights. I went on to be a part of a mission’s trip to Rocky Boy Indian Reservation near Box Elder, Montana last summer. I faced a lot of spiritual warfare while on the trip which greatly strengthened my relationship with God, especially during the ‘winter seasons’ of our relationship when it just seems hard. After the trip I felt called to be involved in a Bible study at my public high school. I am now an active member of the Bible study which meets after school.

One of my favorite aspects of my faith is learning to see God at work in places that seem impossible. For example, my high school, my work place (I work at a city pool.), and in other people’s lives. I have a friend at work who is Mormon and I had prayed for opportunities to share my faith with Him. As I was just about to leave work one day, the fire alarm went off and we all had to evacuate. We were waiting outside for the firemen to come and my friend asked me what I was planning to do after high school. I told him that at that time I didn’t know what I was going to do but that it would be ok because one thing that I had learned on the mission trip over the summer is that God already has it all worked out, and all I have to do is trust Him. Since then, he has asked me more questions about my faith and been open to discussions of faith and religion.

Over the summer, while on the mission’s trip in Rocky Boy, I felt a very strong call to be involved in a Bible study at school. I began to attend the Bible study after school, but it was very superficial. We hardly talked about God and our faith and the struggles of knowing Christ while being in a public high school. And so I prayed that for change in the group. I wanted to have a book to help the group stay focused, I wanted other people to join the group who had the same passion as me, and I wanted our group to pray together. For the longest time, there was no change and I began to get really discouraged. One day, the leader of the group said that she didn’t know what to do because she felt that the things we were going over in the group weren’t really satisfying. She asked for any ideas and I proposed the idea of the book. God gave me a perfect opportunity. He also brought two other people, Olivia and Nick, to the group who are strong Christians and Olivia told me later that she had also been praying that God would do something wonderful in the Bible study. Finally, that day, after we had discussed book topics, the leader of the group, asked if anyone would like to pray. No one said anything, so I got the opportunity to lead us in prayer. It was so wonderful to see God working in the Bible study and answering my prayer!

Through this experience in Africa, I hope to strengthen my trust in God through whatever circumstances I am given. It has already been a huge step of faith for me to become vulnerable to God’s plan for my life by applying for this internship. It’s really scary because I don’t know where God is taking me and I feel so very out of control of my life, more so than I have ever felt before. I also want to learn from other missionaries. I would love to learn from their lives, their prayer, their faith, and be able to see God work through them, and in my life. This summer I would like to strengthen my prayer life and my leadership abilities. I hope to become a better evangelist, learning how to be a witness for Christ. I feel that I could be a benefit to the program with the use of my photography skills, my love for kids, my creativity, and my service. I am more excited to see how God will use me, find out the new ways he chooses to mold me to be more like Him, and discover what he has been planning for my in Africa, my purpose for being there and what I will learn.