I’m a missionary. I live in a sweltering, uncomfortable, remote corner of the world where consistent medical care and convenient eating are nonexistent. We have no parks, no movie theaters, no museums, no zoos, no open air malls with cute little trains, no MOPS groups to join. Church is spent sweating through a theologically questionable hour and a half long sermon, followed up by a recap of said sermon for another thirty. By night we sleep with one eye open knowing every time Jett barks it could be the bark telling us to wake up and defend the house, by day we get spotty vision and light-headed doing basic chores in the heat. I chose this life with my husband to see people without access to God’s word, gain access to God’s word. Clearly, I am an elite Christian, a cut above the average.

Wellllll. No.

As a natural people-pleaser, I have mastered the art of figuring out the right answer and giving it. You think I’m a model Christian? I shudder at revealing that my true identity is actually a far cry from your ideal, so I can put that face on to keep you happy. “Oh, yes, Random Person. I have a deep commitment to spiritual disciplines and I’m constantly applying God’s commands to every corner of my heart.” “Oh, my, yes. I’m deeply emotional every time I see one of those Bibleless peoples videos! It’s why I do what I do!!” “Verse memorization??? So important. So, so, so important.” “Bursts of uncontrolled anger when life just sucks? Never do that. Oh, no, I’m sure I never.”

Missionaries aren’t somehow closer to God than those other Christians who choose to stay home. We have a wider lens for our worldview allowing us a different perspective from our home culture counterparts, but it doesn’t automatically make us spiritual giants. I struggle to seek God. I struggle to reach out in prayer, to read my Bible, to devote my heart to Scripture. There are days, weeks, months of darkness. Months of going through the motions, saying the right things to people at home knowing they see me striding confidently when in reality my walk is at best a knee-skinning crawl. God can feel absent. The water stain in the ceiling I’ve been staring at when I pray is exactly as far as my prayer goes during these dips. It hits that sagging bit, recoils from the deafening emptiness it finds (and probably the gross mold) and smacks me back in the face. Then I stop engaging with believers around me about anything deeper than surface level to-dos, and the solitude closes in along with all those right answers.

Almost a year ago I decided to try to read through the Bible with some of my fellow teammates. I was struggling to care and I thought by having a quarterly meeting discussing what we read and applying it specifically to our lives here in PNG I would find the motivation to put one spiritual step in front of the other. And I have. On and off. I intentionally chose a reading plan of least resistance. There would be no slogging through the Old Testament prophets. We would bounce, getting a little of the mysterious prophets and a little of the clearer truths in the New Testament. Regardless of those breaths of clear love from John, I still found myself wavering at the sight of the Old Testament God. The brutality. The coldness. The wrath. I was sure these accounts would isolate me further from my New Testament Father of ultimate sacrifice and love. But more than any other time I’ve spent reading Leviticus, the Kings, the Samuels, and the Chronicles, I felt God reaching back. Through the confusion and in the confusion, he reached back asking me to simply trust. Not to ignore the stories about him I abhor, but to face them. To face him. To recognize my own limitations understanding righteous judgment and to accept the ultimate truth that He is good. All the time. Even (or especially!) when it looks polar opposite to my earthly definitions.

Last night I read about King Asa in 2 Chronicles. Asa started off ruling Judah with a deep faith and reliance on God. He won a terribly difficult battle straight away because He relied on the Lord. He ruled for 35 years in this manner resulting in a peaceful kingdom, and then he quit. He didn’t quit being king, he quit relying on God despite all the overwhelming evidence that God should be relied upon. There’s no explanation for it. Was he going through a time like all of us do when our prayers seem empty and lacking audience? Did he become so lackadaisical in the peace to forget where the peace originated from? I don’t know what happened, but he chose to quit seeking God. As a result he spent the last six years of his reign embroiled in battle and with diseased feet, turning on a prophet who reminded him that the peaceful years were attained through total trust in God. And then he died.

We’re facing change both this year and next and though it thrills the bones, it’s terrifying. So much of it is unknown and terrifying. Some of it we’re prepared to talk about (like furlough) and some of it we’re not quite yet, but whether or not we share our burden, it is still ours to bear. I could choose to rely on friends, family, and churches for finances and advice, or I could rely on God. I could choose to rely on professionals and experts in making some big decisions, or I could rely on God. I could choose to rely on myself or Brian in all our combined brilliance, but instead I will heed King Asa’s life experience and make a better choice than he. I will choose to rely only on God.