When an email requesting volunteers in Tanzania hit my inbox, it was a knock-you-off-your-horse type moment. Gratefully, God didn’t strike me blind like Paul, but I definitely slid off my chair and onto my knees in recognition of His Voice. I had been studying missions for a year and was consumed with a growing restlessness and dissatisfaction over the last few months. It didn’t make sense to study how to serve God for four years from the safety of my little college bubble. I was ready to go, to do, to share God’s love in real and tangible ways.
After hearing that Voice of calling, I had prayed for weeks for my parent’s support. I didn’t want to disobey my earthly father in trying to follow my heavenly one. So, when my dad readily agreed to the plan, I took his acceptance as a sure sign of its divine origins.
Then I rushed into my mission professor’s office, bursting with the good news. He had also served in East Africa and was passionate about that place and those people. He had even agreed to teach me Swahili and helped me secure school credit for it. I never imagined he wouldn’t support me now.
“You should not go to the mission field without a husband.”
His words hit me like a rock to the gut. I was flooded with disappointment. I thought this man respected me and God in me. Now he was telling me I was not enough. I was not made of the right substance to serve God on my own.
Where only seconds before I was filled with hope and excitement, I now harbored doubts and fears. How could one sentence call into question what God had told me so plainly to do? This was God‘s calling clear and true: take a semester off of college, travel to Tanzania, and teach English for four months.
I don’t remember the rest of the conversation. However, I do know I had entered as a self-assured adult but was leaving as a chastened child. I slunk out of his office, feeling embarrassed and small.
Would his pronouncement crush me, or would defying it make me stronger?
Later, a favorite verse came to mind: “Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.” (Galatians 1:10)
Well, what if I want to please both?
As a perfectionistic people pleaser, I wasn’t able to stop caring about my teacher’s approval. I craved his acceptance and had labored hard to earn it. If I left school now without my professor’s blessing, could I ever return to my religious studies there? I feared I would be branded a dissident. My status as a model student was being called into jeopardy, and I was desperate not to lose it.
Yet, something deeper was at stake. As a girl about to exit my teens and become a young woman, this moment was a watershed: whom would I depend on to define me, to help me make my decisions, and to determine my future path? God or man?
Ultimately, the decision came not from hours of Bible study or intense prayer or the advice of others (although I sought all those things). Instead, the answer came from deep within my soul. God was there. The Word of God written on my heart. The Voice of truth that never wavers.
God gave me an inner fortitude that I could never have summoned up on my own. The answer was clear: I could live with one man’s disapproval, but I would never find abundant life apart from my Creator.
And since we serve a God who consistently does far more than we could ever ask or imagine, I finally did graduate from that college. My time in Tanzania had clarified my call to medical missions, and I walked across the stage as a dual missions and biology major. The sweetest graduation gift that I received was a note from that same professor, simple and handwritten. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have tried to dissuade you from your calling. I’m glad you didn’t listen.”
I’m grateful I knew which Voice to listen to.
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Alyson’s medical missions work has taken her to Tanzania, Haiti, and Zambia. Along the way, she’s discovered a passion for sharing stories that honor God and encourage people. Her writing has been featured on A Life Overseas, Busted Halo, Verge Magazine, Red Letter Christians, and more. You can follow her at www.alysonrockhold.com.
