Dear prayer partners in the Lord,

I would like to share with each of you a life maturing experience I went through in the period just passed, but I hardly know where to begin . . .

Sometimes I like to be an especially independent person, and on the field I want to be someone who is self sufficient, who doesn't need to trouble others. When difficulties come, experience tells me that if I can just tough it out for a while, I'll get past the problems . . .

But then -- I don't know exactly when it started -- I realized that I didn't have the inner strength anymore. I couldn't keep it up . . .

How did I know that I couldn't keep going?

When I realized that my annoyance at things was getting worse and worse. I easily lost my temper and then regretted it later, but I couldn't control my own emotions, and I couldn't change my reactions . . . I felt hopeless about myself.

I told God that if things didn't change, then I should leave this place and get into different surroundings. My idea was that after finishing this term of service, I didn't want to continue here anymore . . .

I also told the members of the missionary team, missionaries with other missions and some of the local believers, and I asked them to pray . . . Some prayed. Some encouraged and comforted me. Some gave me some excellent books . . 

But, my heart just didn't want to be comforted. I just helplessly looked on myself from the outside and waited for the days to pass. My attitude was a little like that of the prophet Jonah: Look at how I am going to die -- forget God's call!

I asked God to give me a good reason for quitting. My own reason was that it was too hard. At the end I was always upset and unsatisfied with everything. This was not a good witness. Staying here would not have any benefit for others or myself!

I climbed Mount Kinabalu in Sabah, Malaysia, and participated in the Chinese Women Missionaries Second Convention and the following retreat. While the messages and missionary testimonies were wonderful, my heart was already encased in a hard shell and nothing moved me. My inner thoughts were that missionaries are just people, people with weaknesses just like me. Nothing sank in!

On the plane, when I started thinking about those vexing problems, I couldn't stop crying. I asked, "Do I have to go back?"

When God moves . . .

The first day back in Cambodia I got sick and couldn't do anything. While my body was refusing to obey, my hard heart was softened, and I could no longer keep on being upset and unsettled . . . Do you see? Sickness and pain are so frightening, but after a few days I had to give in and submit.

My feelings haven't been so light and easy for a long time. As I go down the road I want to sing. I'm surprising myself! 

In the following two weeks, God answered some very significant prayers, including the matter that made me not want to get off the plane. Most of the time when I pray, I have to wait for a long time, but the books that hadn't arrived, finally arrived.

I know that now I need to change the way I live, to be more forgiving of others and myself, and to do more encouraging. When facing people problems, I need to pray and lean on God more, rather than relying on my own experience and wisdom to look for a way to solve the problems. I need to let God carry the burdens, while I always rest in Him.

Relying on God's grace and your prayers, she who can continue to serve here . . .

Rebecca
June 25, 2005