Too daunting?
Have there been moments in your life when you didn’t achieve your full potential because the task at hand seemed just too daunting?
Daunting: “making you feel slightly frightened or worried about your ability to achieve something.”
For many, to serve a mission is a daunting task!
After a few days in the mission field, as the new arrivals look forward to the next 18 or 24 months of service, the challenge ahead, the future before them, can look very daunting!
Discouragement can come as quickly they realise the difficulties and challenges of a new culture, a new language, and new daily routines.
Trials, obstacles, tribulation, and opposition are daily occurrences for every missionary!
That said, time and time again, I have experienced that these young men and women are more than equal to the task!
Day by day, step by step, the daunting task ultimately becomes achievable.
As they search for their best selves, their hearts begin to change.
Adjusting
Adjusting to missionary life takes time.
What may appear initially to be a daunting challenge, becomes easier to manage over time, as each missionary consistently strives to adjust and change, eventually overcoming their insecurities.
It may not come as quickly or in the format they desire, but answers come, and change happens.
“That which we persist in doing becomes easier to do, not that the nature of the thing has changed but that our power to do has increased.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Perseverance is a positive, active characteristic, it is vital to any endeavour.
And how do they change?
It comes from deep inside and an increase in faith through personal religious habits such as, obedience, discipline, prayer, scripture study, and service as they draw closer to Jesus Christ and put their trust in Him.
And of course, with great help from their trainers! Sometimes even vice versa!
In time, each missionary moves forward with a greater conviction and vitality, determined to succeed as their attitude also changes.
“Remember, a good attitude produces good results, a fair attitude fair results, a poor attitude poor results. We each shape our own life, and the shape of it is determined largely by our attitude.” M. Russell Ballard
How do you overcome something that appears to be daunting?
