When Voluntary becomes Mandatory

"Mental preparation" it's one of those terms that we all know the meaning of but find it difficult to define. After all, how do we prepare for something mentally or otherwise when we really can’t be sure how it will turn out? We assess “the plan” and consider its impact on us and we think through telling ourselves what we should prepare for. Perhaps we consider all likely emotional and physical requirements and we assess our ability to meet them and “shore up” in the areas we may be lacking. If it is something we are looking forward to the process is simple and we seem to have better access to those emotional and physical resources.
I had several months to mentally prepare for my quick eight-day journey to South Africa. I pride myself in being able to take whatever comes, but I still needed a mental picture of what was to transpire. I have traveled quite a bit and know I can take a week of any type of mission trip. Beyond ten days, I become acutely aware of the absence of my wife, and stateside life.
“The plan” was that Anthony, a guy from my church and I, would do some manual labor around a church camp that is being built on Paardeberg (Horse Mountain) about an hour from Cape Town. I was looking forward to it and was prepared for a week of building projects in the hills of South Africa and getting to know the missionaries there and experiencing their ministries. After a couple days it was going as expected even better. The accommodations were wonderful and the camp was beautiful. Anthony and I faced some frustration in completing one of the projects and the Lord gave us 48 hrs of practicing our patience, something we both are working on. Good progress was made on Thursday and Friday and we were looking for a day off on Saturday to go out in a boat and see some great white sharks. Then, quite unexpectedly we heard of a volcano that had blown in Iceland and all of European airspace was shut down.
This was not part of the plan.
We were to fly to Amsterdam in less than 36 hrs. Over the next 48 hrs our hope peaked and faded as we heard conflicting reports about opening the air for flights again. The end result was the first flight available from Johannesburg to Atlanta to Chicago was in eight days. Suddenly eight days was not a quick trip but seemed like an eternity. It is amazing how our attitude shifts when things are out of our control. As long as things went the way I planned I was fine. I was voluntarily here for a week to help some brothers in the Lord feeling very good and now I was “stranded” While in Cape Town I saw a post card with a picture of the prison cell that Nelson Mandela was imprisoned in for 19 years. It was unimaginable to me, yet certainly put things in perspective. “C’mon Bill, it’s just a week!” I thought. After processing my feelings I realized that it was not the extra time away against my will that bothered me, it was that it disrupted my plan and kept me from something I wanted. There many other issues to deal with. Anthony had an engineering job he needed to return to and MBA classes and exams he’d miss. I am an obsessive pre-planner and had much scheduled to accomplish that first week home for a busy summer of mission teams coming to Chicago to help our ministry. Most people might rejoice at being “required” to spend another week in such a magnificent place as Paardeberg and Cape Town and indeed Anthony and I tried to make the most of it while longing for our families those extra days.
Our Lord has an amazing way of revealing our weaknesses and dependence on Him. He pops the cork on one volcano on a little island few ever think about and it paralyzes millions of people, affects the global economy, costs companies billions of dollars worldwide and way down in S. Africa, 10,000 miles away two men trying to serve Him are wondering why? Why? What difference does it make? We cannot possibly fathom the outcomes God had in mind when He allowed the eruption to occur on April 15, 2010. Yet there was an outcome in my comparatively insignificant life, planned and prepared by my heavenly Father. When He chose to move the earth to allow this eruption to occur, he had me, and you, in mind! Perhaps you were not impacted at all, maybe you were one of the fortunate ones who watched it all from your living room and were free to move as you wished. Today I am home in Chicago and Cape Town is 8500 miles away and a grueling 36 hour journey, 22 hrs of which were in flight. Some key interactions took place during the second “unplanned” week and it remains to be seen if how God will use them. I may never know these things but I do know there is purpose in all that God does and allows. I do know this, I know I have learned that I must not hold anything, including my work, plans, wife and family more dearly to my heart than my Lord and His will for me. His working in the grand plan and in the minutia of my life is what must be closest to my heart.