My family and I then moved to Connecticut to take care of my Daddy's father who was in poor health at the time. It is in Connecticut that my mom began homeschooling my brother and I. Those years of homeschooling were perhaps some of the most fun memories I have from my childhood. For example, I will always remember the week that one of the television channels was showing a marathon of Star Trek episodes every day from noon until midnight and my mom allowed us to skip school because, after all, it counts as "science."
The summer before my freshmen year of high school we moved to Florida. The reason we moved here was not because of family or a job but because we simply felt that the Lord wanted us to and, in retrospect, I am so glad He did! It was during that first year that I began questioning what I believed about God, Jesus and the Bible. At that time, I learned that a friend had posted that she was an agnostic. Concerned for her, and knowing that she was a big reader, I began what turned into a year-long quest to find her the perfect book. At the conclusion of this year spent researching and studying dozens of books, I selected three to send to her. Regardless of what she did with them, my own faith was crystallized, and, as a result, within two years, I went from someone who did not know what she believed to a girl who wanted to go into missions!
"Missionary" was never on my list of possible career choices. Nope. I didn't even know missionaries were still around until I was in high school and, even then, I thought those were just the crazy, whacked out Christians. Clearly, not someone like me. As you can see, I was a prime candidate for someone who needed God to work on their heart. One evening during my junior year of high school, my church had a missions night and that was when I heard about New Tribes Mission for the first time. A representative from the Mission came and spoke and unrolled the gigantic scroll that listed all the languages that had yet to hear the Word of God. That image became branded in my mind and I felt the Lord beginning to change my heart. About a year later, after reading multiple books, meeting with missionaries so I could "interview" them and praying tons and tons, I concluded that I wanted to become a part of what God was already doing around the World to bring the Gospel to every people group.
Because I had been homeschooled my whole life, I decided to earn my Associate's degree before heading on to the New Tribes Bible Institute in Waukesha, Wisconsin. The May-June after I graduated in 2011 with my AA degree I had the opportunity to participate in New Tribe Mission's five week Interface missionary training program. While there, I learned so much about tribal missions, the body of Christ, and the people of Papua New Guinea. It was an awesome trip! After I returned, I submitted my application to NTBI and was excited to get started that August. However, the Lord had other plans.
You see, despite everything I was trying to do and how hard I was working, He didn't open the door for me to attend that fall. I was devastated, angry and frustrated. I mean, why would the Lord NOT want me to go Bible school???? However, God not only grew me so much in those five months, He had another plan in the works: if I had gotten it my way I would not have been placed in the same class as Cameron. I now thank God so much for holding me back even when I was kicking and fighting the whole time.
For me, my time at NTBI was one of the highlights of my life thus far. The friendships I formed with my roommates and classmates were life impacting and I will always treasure those late night talks and uncontrollable fits of laughter over something that really wasn't even that funny. The hours spent in classes and on homework were challenging as I learned more about the Word of God and the character of the Lord. The faithfulness of the Lord has encouraged me in my relationship with Him and given me confidence in His sovereignty. I am truly grateful for all the staff at NTBI who make such a training program possible! And I am extremely grateful for NTBI because that is where Cameron and I met! True, we didn't really start becoming friends until the spring semester of 2013 but, being that our class was less than thirty people, we had the opportunity to observe each other and get to know each other as friends. I am so thankful to the Lord for bringing Cameron into my life! He is a man of God who desires to know Him deeply and serve Him with his life. I love him so much and cannot wait to spend the rest of my life with him! He is the best "change to Caitlin's plans" that God has ever made!
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