Belize Part 2- Trip Two, Take One!

As our church began planning several mission trips for this year, I decided that I wanted to go back to Belize. I had an amazing trip last time and though I did go with the wrong motive, I still learned a lot and I'm glad I went. So this spring I picked the trip I wanted to go on (the trip that went July 2-9th of this year) based on some other things I wanted to do this summer. I began babysitting to raise money for that trip and I collected some, but not a whole lot.

Then one Sunday at lunch my mom said something that stopped me in my tracks. She told me and my brother that it was great that we wanted to go back to Belize but she asked us if we had prayed about it to make sure it was God's will and not just ours. I realized that I really hadn't prayed about it, so from that point on anytime I thought about the trip, I would pray and ask God if He wanted me to go or not.

Over the next couple of weeks as I continued my plans for the trip, things kept falling through. Babysitting jobs didn't work out, I wasn't able to do some of the fundraising stuff with the church and then one day in April I got my answer. I was at school, about to meet with my advisor, when the trip came to my mind. It was kind of a random thing that popped into my head, but I stopped and just prayed about it, asking God that if he didn't want me to go, to make that clear to me. I met with my advisor and because of a really complicated chain of events (it's a long, very frustrating story) I found out I was going to have to take summer classes which were going to overlap with my trip to Belize. I left campus really upset, but I knew I had my answer. I continued to pray about it, but I knew I was supposed to stay here that week.

That next Sunday there was a meeting about the trip giving out some more info to the people who were going. I told my youth pastor that I couldn't go, and I didn't attend the meeting. That was one of the hardest things that I've ever done, because I really wanted to go on that trip! I knew I was doing what God was asking by staying, but it was still really hard!!

But, even though it was really hard and I was really disappointed by it all, I have seen Romans 8:28 and Jeremiah 29:11 played out in major ways! God still had a plan-I just had to be ready and willing to follow!