This past weekend was really good. It was great to get away and relax. It was really nice to sit on the beach and watch people surf. As one of my friend's said, "God has some imagination". While sitting on the beach and walking around I was able to see things that I have never seen before in real life. Like a competitive surf competition or parrots in the wild. Also, I have never seen a gray beach but it was really nice and we had a lot of fun relaxing and taking in God's amazing imagination.
I wish I could say that the weekend ended well but it didn't. Nothing really bad happened (Praise the Lord) but the possibility was there. Traveling at night even with a group is not fun in Costa Rica, and I wouldn't recommend it. If I had known that the bus was going to take 4 hours we would have left earlier. I am not going to go into details but it was a very stressful evening for me. So stressful that I came back and almost had a panic attack (I am prone to having situational panic attacks). Today, I have cried on and off through out most of the day both because of the stress of the situation and in praise to God for His protection.
The bad experience of traveling back was necessary for growth because now I can be more caution in the future. Also because of that experience I now recognize an issue that I have to work on. You can never avoid an issue or problem in your life forever sooner or later you are going to be forced to face it. My issue goes back to a bad experience from a few years ago on a previous mission trip and from a broken relationship. Well now I am staring directly at the pain and my imperfection, and I am praying for the next step to take.
I share a bit of this with you to let you know that the mission field is not always easy but God is good. We are never sure why God allows certain things to happen or affect us, but what matters is how you respond to the situation and to God. When I said His will be done I knew that there would be hardships, but I trust in Him. Jesus' life was not easy so why should you expect yours to be any different.
Please pray for continue protection and please also pray for my heart. I say my my heart because it is aching right now and although I don't wish to share all of the details I could still use your continued prayers.
