For Such A Time As This

Today, as I was pondering over the five hours of sleep I got the night before and the book report I had yet to write I realized I have limited time here in Australia. Five more days and I leave for London!

To tell you the truth I wasn't too fond of the idea of going to London. It's a westernized place, a bunch of others get to experience the people of Papua New Guinea trekking through a jungle (which I would LOVE to do some day), and I have to go to this place that could feel more like a vacation than an outreach.

But God is a loving faithful God, that even through my bitterness continued to show me that the people of London need the Gospel just as much as those unreached people groups hidden in the depths of Papua New Guinea.

Today I overheard some of the girls on my outreach team talking about how cool it is that God is calling each one of us to go to London...even though over half of my team would've wanted to go on a different outreach. Then I hear the words...maybe we're called to such a time as this.

Those words...for such a time as this, brought me back to that December Sunday in my small town church when my mentor and dear friend gave a short sermon on the story of Esther.

If you haven't read the story of Esther I encourage you to do so, it's a great book of the Bible.
For those unfamiliar with the story...there's a part where Esther is taken to this king with many other women in which the King would pick one of them as his wife.
Sounds like a Disney story doesn't it...girls wanting to be princesses and queens.
But I bet it probably wasn't in Esther's best interest to go and be taken by guards, even with the possibility of becoming Queen.
She might've had different plans in mind, different dreams she wanted to live out. I doubt she always had in her mind that she would be a part of royalty.
But she trusted God even after being taken away from her home, and everything she's ever known.

Later she becomes Queen, and puts a stop to the instruction to destroy, kill, and to annihilate her people, the Jews.
Perfect ending eh?

I can relate this to my situation right now... I wanted to go on outreach somewhere else at first, God had a different plan. Just as He had a different plan for Esther and her becoming Queen. And the things He wants to do with me in London far exceeds anything I could ever hope for in a different outreach location.

For I believe He has called me for such a time as this.

preparing.
mariah