29 “Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel 30 will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.
Willing to Go: A Wife’s Perspective
As wives, it is our responsibility to lovingly and respectfully submit to our husbands and to follow them wherever God calls them. However, I know from my experience, that God speaks to women just as clearly as he speaks to men. God also reveals his will - not just to husbands, but to wives as well.
I did not feel God speak to me about his plans for our future until I was willing to go wherever he called us. Then, one night as I was praying, one word almost audibly came to my mind – “Ecuador.” I prayed for awhile longer and dwelled on it for quite some time. It was so odd because Trevor and I had never before discussed this country. In fact, I wasn’t even sure where it was! The very next day, after a meeting with the executive director of BMAA Missions, Trevor sent me a text that read, “You’ll never guess the first country he mentioned that we (the BMA) did not have any missionaries in.” Luckily, I was able to call him, and I found out that not only had Trevor been feeling called to go to Ecuador, but our association currently had no missionaries in the country either. Since that time, God has continued to affirm to both of us that he wants us to move our family to southern Ecuador in order to tell others about Jesus and to teach them to obey him.
Whenever I tell others about what we’re doing and where we’re going, I get a variety of responses: surprise, shock, indifference, and of course, encouraging affirmation. Some have told us that we’re crazy to sell everything and move to another country. Maybe we are, but I believe that God often calls us to do things that seem “crazy.” From Joshua being commanded to march around a city and yell in order to defeat it to Jesus calling four uneducated fisherman to leave their nets and families and follow him, the Bible is full of stories of people who did “crazy” things in response to God’s calling. Isn’t the God who sent his only son to die for us worthy of all of our devotion?
Will it be difficult to leave? Absolutely! It hurts to think about the good friends and family we’ll leave behind. As a woman, it’s also hard to get rid of all of the stuff I’ve accumulated after ten years of marriage, but in the end, it will all be more than worth it. Why? Because “Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel 30 will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.” Mark 10:29-30
Nafisa
That is amazing! I look forward to hearing more about your families call the missions. John and I and our two youngest kids spent three weeks in Kenya last summer. It was amazing. We did low cost water well drilling.
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