Daniel Lee is a student at Biola and was a part of the Nicaragua team last summer.
Towards the end of my sophomore year I really began to struggle with academics, relationships, and almost every other aspect of my life. I questioned why I was choosing to study biology and why I wanted to be in the medical field. I questioned God why I had such a desire and why this feeling began to turn into resentment and bitterness. I was confused, lost, and torn between my inner struggle of desire, God’s will, and my career. I could not think of a good reason why I wanted to pursue the medical field. Thinking that it was a financially safe route that led to a comfortable life left me feeling uneasy and burdened. So I prayed. I prayed that if it was in God’s will for me to pursue the medical field then He would allow me to do it with the right heart and mindset.
It was through this submission to God that the thought of medical missions began to grow on my heart. I had never seriously thought about this before, but the moment I was able to fully surrender this to God, an overwhelming sense of peace engulfed me. This is also when two different opportunities were presented to me. One was an internship at Harvard Medical School during the summer and the other was an opportunity to go on a month long missions trip with a team of random college students whom I had never met before. Surprisingly I did not have a hard time choosing between the two. I knew that if God wanted me to take that internship then He would open up more doors in the future, so I took a step of faith and chose missions.
The first week we got to Nicaragua I got sick with an illness that no one could explain. I was confused. I asked God why He was allowing this to happen. I felt like I had given up so much to come to Nicaragua and serve the Lord, but all I was able to do was lay around, too sick to do ministry. Between moments of throwing up and going to the restroom, I would complain in my heart of all the pain I was going through. I came into missions thinking I was going to do so much, but God had different plans.
Through this sickness, God broke down my pride, broke my heart for the people of Nicaragua, and reminded me of all those desperate prayers I made a few months back. It was through this sickness and God’s grace that I was able to visit two different hospitals. This is when God opened up my eyes and heart to the things around me. Seeing how broken and poor the conditions of the hospitals were broke my heart. I cried out to God asking what He was trying to teach me through this. After sitting there in silence, the question of “what are you going to do about this?” was pressed onto my heart. This is when my desire to pursue medical missions was solidified. I was reminded of all those prayers I made back at school asking God to use me in what I was learning to truly serve and glorify Him for the rest of my life.
Through this I was reminded of God’s never-ending sovereignty over my life. Even through the most difficult situations and the most painful situations where nothing made sense, God was still in complete control and used that brokenness to reveal His glory. Through this I truly learned how weak we are. There is nothing that we can do on our own without God willing it to happen first. Therefore we must always be dying to ourselves and to our pride and constantly be surrendering everything up to God in humble exaltation. And the crazy thing is this: even though we are so weak and so broken, God still chooses to use us in our weak and broken states to show how powerful and sovereign He truly is.
