Here Am I…Lord, Send Me

Lord willing, one week from today I will be traveling to Hope of Life International in Zacapa, Guatemala.

This trip is a dream come true for me and is the answer to many prayers I have prayed.

It has been seventeen years since I last traveled abroad.

In 1988, I was fourteen years old when I embarked on my first cross cultural missionary journey to Honduras.

Looking back, I now wonder “What were my parents thinking, letting me go that far away without them?”

At that young age, God gave me a passion to share His love with others, near and far.

My trip to Honduras opened me up to a whole new world, exposed me to a new culture and showed me that there are beautiful people everywhere, I fell in love with the people of Honduras so easily.

From the age fourteen to twenty-two, I took missions trips almost every summer (Honduras, Chicago, Haiti, Chicago, Haiti, Albania, Haiti, Haiti).

I also spent a full year in Haiti after graduating from highs school.

Darrel and I were able to go to Haiti together before we were married and even spent our first anniversary together there the following year.

I really thought I’d raise my family on the mission field, probably in Haiti.

Life definitely took a different turn and by our second anniversary, baby Brandt was due.

All of the sudden, traipsing off to foreign places, being exposed to malaria infested mosquitoes and hand sized tarantulas didn’t seem so wise.

I was a mom now, and I needed to think of this sweet little one first.

It wasn’t hard for me to do, as I had always wanted to be a mommy.

Always.

Two and a half years later, two more baby boys came along and at this point, it was all I could do to keep up diapers for three, sleepless nights and caring for three babies.

Flying away in a jet plane was the furthest thing from my mind.

A few years later, I was presented with an opportunity to go to Africa.

I have always dreamed of going to Africa and I jumped at the chance.

At that time, we were going through some very painful things at home, things that were out of my control.

When I put in my application for the trip, I was told by a leader, “Heather, you cannot go to Africa and be a basket case there like you are here.”

Those words cut me deeply and even though I have forgiven that person for speaking such things over me, it has taken a long time for the sting of those words to subside.

You see, I knew others thought of me as a basket case.

I cry when I am happy, I cry when I am sad.

I cry when I am joyful, I cry when sorrow is strangling me.

Tears are my most blessed and cursed expression of emotion.

I often resent myself for being a cry-er.

I say things like, “This morning I will not cry when I am leading worship at church or sitting with a client at the pregnancy center.”

I’ll put mascara on my eyelashes and declare, “Today I will not cry off this make-up.”

Of course, within the hour, the black streaks are flowing.

When I made the decision to go on this journey to Guatemala, one of the first questions I asked, “Is it OK if I cry?”

How can I hold a limp, lifeless child in my arms and not shed a tear?

How can I bathe a frail, boney body and not weep?

How can I talk to a mother who has lost her child to hunger and disease and not be moved?

Thankfully, I was assured that tears are OK.

Suddenly, I am looking at my biggest weakness and finding it to be a great strength.

Surely, the God of the universe, the One who knit together these precious lives, weeps over the ones who are starving, dying and alone.

Why, oh why would I count it anything less than a privilege to mingle my tears with His?

Why, oh why would I let the words of a mortal man keep me from being exactly who God made me to be?

Why, oh why would I despise the very gift He placed within me?

Oh, Father, forgive me!

I am sorry for trying to be anything except who You made me to be.

I am sorry for trying to be someone I am not.

I am sorry for believing that I am less than others or weak just because I cry.

I surrender to You.

I belong to You.

Thank You for giving me the deepest desires of my heart and for allowing me to take this journey.

Two years ago, You began to draw me to Zacapa and every step of the way, You have been faithful to provide for this trip.

I want to serve You and the ones You chose to place in my path.

I want to be Your hands, Your feet and Your heart to every man, woman, boy and girl that You choose for me to meet.

”Here am I, Lord send me.”