Monday, May 3, 2010

"Dear God...You want me to go WHERE?!"

A lot has happened since my last post:

I'm no longer a nanny.
I work two and a half days a week at Hot Springs with mom.
I got a Keeper Aide Position at the Small Mammal House on Monday mornings and I love it.
And oh yeah, I'm going to South Korea.

On Valentine's Day, Kara and I were on our way home from meeting Joanna at Cheesecake Factory. We were both talking about how we didn't really have plans after camp this summer, and Kara mentioned that for a long time she's been thinking about going to South Korea to teach English. During the course of our conversation, she decided that's what she was definitely going to do and I started to feel that God was trying to tell me something. I wasn't sure what at the time, just that He wanted me to do something that was going to be way off the track I thought I was on. I later figured out He meant going to South Korea too. It scared the crap out of me. To say the least.

Through lots and lots of prayer and agonizing over the situation, I decided/figured out/whatever that going to South Korea really was what God wanted me to do. That was on March 21st. Since then my head has been spinning over recruiters, paper work, a TESOL course, packing lists, the feeling of time running out and personal insecurities...

I know that this experience is going to be all about being stretched for me... God has big plans for the year I'll be away. Starting in September, I'll be several time zones away from all but one of my [current] friends on the opposite side of the Earth, living on my own [for real] for the first time, in a country where I won't be able to read street signs or the names of products in the stores, where there is strange food and very few people who speak English, doing a job I've never seriously considered before. Just thinking about it all is a very stretching experience. But I know that it is going to be okay. Because God is sending me there.