Hineni (Here I am, Send me)

Anticipation. There’s something really beautiful about the waiting. There’s a heaviness, but an excitement. There’s anxiousness, but peace. There’s fear, but goodness. There are many reasons to resist, but only one reason needed to say yes. There is something about the tension that is my favorite place to be. The place where God calls me so much deeper into trust with him. The place I learn the next thing is bigger than anything I could handle on my own. It’s the place I learn dependence. It’s the place I learn to surrender. It’s the place I sit in Hineni. A word that means ‘ready, willing and able, complete surrender, Here I am Lord, you have my full attention’. It is also the place He says it back to me. The place I feel the most held. The place I grieve what I am leaving and prepare for where I am going. The place I balance between holding my breath and taking the deepest breaths. The place where I realize just how small I really am to a giant God, but where He proves to me over and over how intimate He is. The place where I feel pursued. The place where I feel in the midst of the biggest weight that I know I am not carrying on my own. 

This is the place that a stone is placed. A place of remembrance. A place where I know my life will never be the same. A place that marks a significant moment in time. A place that tells me I have to move forward and no longer can I look back to what was, but what is to come. A place where I learn to trust God to hold everything He is asking me to give up. 

“But Jesus told him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.” -Matthew 8:22 

There is a cost to following Jesus. We find it over and over again in the bible. He never said it would be easy, but that it would be worth it. That his burden is light, so much lighter than the weight of carrying the world. 

The Lord has brought this verse in Matthew to my mind so many times over the last few months, and caused me to ask the question, “What is my cost?”

For me, it is my family. It is not easy to be far from them. It is not easy to miss out on birthdays and family get-togethers. It is not easy to not have my mom hold me when I am feeling sad or sick, or talk about our days over coffee and chocolate. It is not easy to not have my dad there to join me in music and worship, or push me to do the things that scare me. It is not easy to not have my brother there to make me laugh, read my mind, or give me big hugs when I feel overwhelmed. It is not easy to not have my grandparents there to share delicious home-cooked meals, or talk about my hopes and dreams, or just have warm hugs when I need them most. It is not easy to not be there for my cousins and watch them grow up, hear about their hopes and dreams and their struggles and fears, and impart to them any wisdom the Lord has given me. It is not easy to not to be home when my dear friends get married, have babies that I want to love on so desperately, or achieve great milestones that I want to support. 

It is really hard to not be with all the people I love. 

It is even harder to explain why I choose this life of missions anyway. 

The only answer I can give is because God is so worthy of my ‘yes’. I don’t know why He chose me for this life, but man oh man has He blessed me immensely in my ‘yes’ to Him. 

I have traveled the world, been a part of many different cultures, invited into so many homes, hugged by so many different children, been a part of people finding freedom in Christ, helped serve physical needs such as construction, painting, feeding the hungry, and providing materials needs for those who have none, and helped set people free from emotional and spiritual chains. I have seen lives completely transformed by the Love of God, and have experienced unexplainable joy. I have seen fears annihilated, and hope restored. I have seen heaven on earth. I have seen the kingdom of God. 

He has invited me into restoring His people back to him and there is no greater joy or purpose in this life. I have tasted and seen His goodness and now I can’t go back. 

So does it still hurt every time I leave my family, or miss a big milestone of someone I love, or not be there to comfort the pains? YES. Absolutely. But the Lord never leaves me alone. He also never leaves them alone. I know when he calls me to something different, He is also waiting to fill the gap in their lives. 

Now I have family all over the world. No matter where I go my heart is missing someone. That is the cost of being a missionary. I love people with all I have and then have to let the Lord fill in the rest. I carry a broken heart that always longs for my people. But I don’t carry it alone. God gives me so much joy in the midst, and it is the greatest gift to love and be loved by so many of His children. 

So now I sit in this place of anticipation. I sit in the wonder of where He will bring me next. I sit in the hope that it is somewhere I have been before. But also the trust of somewhere new. I wait on the Lord to show me His next steps. To stack the stones in my life (Joshua 4). I will trust that wherever I go, He will be with me. I will also trust that He will be with whoever I have to leave behind. I will trust He will bring me back to the people I love so dearly. I will trust His ways are so much better than mine. 

So when He asks me to go, I will go. When He asks me to stay, I will stay. I will leave my hands open and I will trust because I have seen His goodness and He is so worthy of my ‘yes’. 

I don’t know where my ‘next’ is. But I know I have to leave everything I have known behind. And I also know that wherever it is will be really, really good. 

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” – Matthew 28:19-20