Lecture phase is over. I’m not entirely sure when that happened, but somehow I’m in Nepal, sweating in my makeshift Punjabi, drinking heaps of Nepalese tea, and reflecting on what God’s done in the past 3 months. I came to DTS for all the wrong reasons, but God’s power to change our lives isn’t limited by human motivation. I moved to Australia to get a tan, an Aussie boyfriend, and experience working in third world medicine. At the end of lecture phase, I’m pale, single, and no longer considering the Introduction to Primary Health Care School, but God has given me something greater: a calling.
I used to think God was distant and uninterested in my life, that He was looking down from heaven, shaking His head at my failures. I used to think I had to spin around three times with my finger to my nose to get Him to speak to me, but God’s been showing up for me these past 3 months, and He’s a different God than the one I thought I knew. He created me uniquely and perfectly and He’s been guiding my life since day one. He loves me unconditionally, regardless of whether or not I make Him look good. He’s always been speaking to me, even when I was too stubborn to hear Him. I came to DTS with a broken view of God and myself, but if there’s one thing God’s been working to restore in my life these past few months, it’s dignity.
Simply put, dignity is knowing your inherent value regardless of the opinions of others. Dignity is knowing what you’re made of, or made after, and that’s God’s image. Dignity is an easy thing to lose. When we swallow Satan’s lies about who we are, we sacrifice the image for a black and white photocopy. We wander around in a mess of dissatisfaction trying to find ourselves, when all we’ve really lost is the truth. The truth is God wasn’t messing around when He knit you together in your mother’s womb. He wasn’t messing around when He created the ins and outs of your soul. He wasn’t messing around when He gave you your family, your community, your country. God’s plan for you has never been anything but perfect, but the minute you begin messing with that perfection, you run into trouble. Like Eve, who traded intimacy with God for a bite of rebellion, we trade our divinely-inspired dignity for a forgery.
I’m writing this not as a reprimand, but as a confession. I came to DTS with a smashed-up view of my own image, and it’s taken months of God’s gentle, persistent love for me to even recognize it. For years, I’ve relied on others to tell me who I was. I’ve run the rat-race of people-pleasing, and I’ve run it well. And dignity? I lost my dignity somewhere in my sea of self-doubt, and I’ve been struggling to keep my head above water ever since. When I reflect on what God’s saved me from, I’m reminded of Paul's words in Romans 7: “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” God is both the granter and restorer of dignity and it’s His truth that sets you free.
As I began to seek God for my identity, He began to speak dignity into my life. I came to DTS with a desire to be a doctor, but God quickly extinguished that desire and replaced it with a much deeper, life-long passion. The vision of the Priceless DTS is women, specifically victims of human-trafficking and prostitution. I chose Priceless because I’ve always had a passion for women’s issues, in fact, it might be the single greatest passion of my life. I heard somewhere that if you want to find your calling, figure out what makes you mad. Nothing makes me more furious than injustice against women. It’s funny, but when God told me He had called me to women, my first thought was, “that makes absolutely perfect sense. Why didn’t I come up with that?”
The second week of DTS, I asked God a simple question: “who am I?” If you’ve never asked God that before, I’d suggest you give it a try because God has a surprisingly large amount to say on that subject. With those simple words, the floodgates were opened and God told me who I was, reminding me of things I’d always known about myself and revealing gifts and passions I never knew I had. Perhaps the greatest revelation I received that day was God’s call of communication on my life. I’ve always been a passionate communicator. Writing, speaking, reading—I love words and the power they have to spread truth, sway minds, and inspire hearts. As I prayed that day, God told me He had created me to speak to the nations, specifically Europe. Now, if I could just figure out what the heck that was supposed to look like, I’d be golden.
As lecture phase continued, God continued to refine His calling for me. Week 6 of DTS focused on communication and advocacy. Our guest lecturer was Amber Hawkes, the CEO of International Justice Mission Australia, an organization of lawyers, social workers, and other professionals who seek justice for the poor. That week, I asked God a question related to my physical identity and He spoke to me so clearly, I could almost hear His voice. He said, “If you’re going to advocate for women, you need to look like a woman.” Grace is a two-way street—God was restoring dignity in my life so I could restore it in the lives of others.
It was becoming increasingly obvious that it wasn’t God’s plan for me to complete the Introduction to Primary Health Care school, but what was the plan? For someone with absolutely zero patience and an unhealthy obsession with planning for the future, the silence was deafening. When I prayed about the future, God’s response was always, “Wait. The plan is coming.” I looked into several second-level YWAM schools, but nothing seemed to fit. It was strange, but Amsterdam kept coming up. Suddenly, everyone I met had a friend from Amsterdam or an amazing story about their trip to Amsterdam or a picture of the city’s canals and bike-ridden streets. I knew God was calling me to advocate for women and to Europe, so just for kicks, I decided to look up the YWAM base in Amsterdam. On the website, I read about a ministry of YWAM Amsterdam called the Lighthouse, which ministers to the prostitutes in the city’s notorious red-light district. The ministry visits the women in the windows, runs bible studies, and works to raise public awareness. The web page also happened to mention the Lighthouse’s desperate need for full-time staff. In the few spare minutes between dinner and Thursday Night Meeting, I sent off a hastily written inquiry.
I received a reply to my letter a few days later. I continued to pray about God’s direction concerning Amsterdam, but the response was still to wait. For the next month, I complained to God about waiting at night and to everyone else during the day. On a Thursday almost 6 weeks after I found out about Amsterdam, I had a serious discussion with God. I asked God, in the interest of public health and safety, to give me permission to apply for a staff position in Amsterdam, preferably at Thursday Night Meeting. That night the message was on dignity. The speaker highlighted the story from Luke 13 about the woman with the disabling spirit. In a society where women were excluded from education, government, even worship, Jesus noticed a woman who’d only ever been ignored. Not only did He see and speak to her, He touched her, shattering cultural barriers with a simple act of acceptance. In a society that valued sons, Jesus called the woman a daughter of Abraham. For centuries, women have been pushed to the side, but dignity is being included. For centuries, women have been silenced, but dignity is speaking the truth. For centuries, women have been told who they were supposed to be, but dignity is knowing who you are.
I have decided to apply for a two-year staff position with YWAM Amsterdam, working with the Lighthouse ministry to restore dignity in the lives of broken women. No, it’s not a year down under. It’s not medicine. For a while at least, it’s not college. It’s my call and my privilege and for the first time in my life, I know who I am. I’m a beloved daughter of God, endowed with dignity and purpose, and now it’s my turn to restore that dignity and purpose in the lives of others.
I used to think God was distant and uninterested in my life, that He was looking down from heaven, shaking His head at my failures. I used to think I had to spin around three times with my finger to my nose to get Him to speak to me, but God’s been showing up for me these past 3 months, and He’s a different God than the one I thought I knew. He created me uniquely and perfectly and He’s been guiding my life since day one. He loves me unconditionally, regardless of whether or not I make Him look good. He’s always been speaking to me, even when I was too stubborn to hear Him. I came to DTS with a broken view of God and myself, but if there’s one thing God’s been working to restore in my life these past few months, it’s dignity.
Simply put, dignity is knowing your inherent value regardless of the opinions of others. Dignity is knowing what you’re made of, or made after, and that’s God’s image. Dignity is an easy thing to lose. When we swallow Satan’s lies about who we are, we sacrifice the image for a black and white photocopy. We wander around in a mess of dissatisfaction trying to find ourselves, when all we’ve really lost is the truth. The truth is God wasn’t messing around when He knit you together in your mother’s womb. He wasn’t messing around when He created the ins and outs of your soul. He wasn’t messing around when He gave you your family, your community, your country. God’s plan for you has never been anything but perfect, but the minute you begin messing with that perfection, you run into trouble. Like Eve, who traded intimacy with God for a bite of rebellion, we trade our divinely-inspired dignity for a forgery.
I’m writing this not as a reprimand, but as a confession. I came to DTS with a smashed-up view of my own image, and it’s taken months of God’s gentle, persistent love for me to even recognize it. For years, I’ve relied on others to tell me who I was. I’ve run the rat-race of people-pleasing, and I’ve run it well. And dignity? I lost my dignity somewhere in my sea of self-doubt, and I’ve been struggling to keep my head above water ever since. When I reflect on what God’s saved me from, I’m reminded of Paul's words in Romans 7: “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” God is both the granter and restorer of dignity and it’s His truth that sets you free.
As I began to seek God for my identity, He began to speak dignity into my life. I came to DTS with a desire to be a doctor, but God quickly extinguished that desire and replaced it with a much deeper, life-long passion. The vision of the Priceless DTS is women, specifically victims of human-trafficking and prostitution. I chose Priceless because I’ve always had a passion for women’s issues, in fact, it might be the single greatest passion of my life. I heard somewhere that if you want to find your calling, figure out what makes you mad. Nothing makes me more furious than injustice against women. It’s funny, but when God told me He had called me to women, my first thought was, “that makes absolutely perfect sense. Why didn’t I come up with that?”
The second week of DTS, I asked God a simple question: “who am I?” If you’ve never asked God that before, I’d suggest you give it a try because God has a surprisingly large amount to say on that subject. With those simple words, the floodgates were opened and God told me who I was, reminding me of things I’d always known about myself and revealing gifts and passions I never knew I had. Perhaps the greatest revelation I received that day was God’s call of communication on my life. I’ve always been a passionate communicator. Writing, speaking, reading—I love words and the power they have to spread truth, sway minds, and inspire hearts. As I prayed that day, God told me He had created me to speak to the nations, specifically Europe. Now, if I could just figure out what the heck that was supposed to look like, I’d be golden.
As lecture phase continued, God continued to refine His calling for me. Week 6 of DTS focused on communication and advocacy. Our guest lecturer was Amber Hawkes, the CEO of International Justice Mission Australia, an organization of lawyers, social workers, and other professionals who seek justice for the poor. That week, I asked God a question related to my physical identity and He spoke to me so clearly, I could almost hear His voice. He said, “If you’re going to advocate for women, you need to look like a woman.” Grace is a two-way street—God was restoring dignity in my life so I could restore it in the lives of others.
It was becoming increasingly obvious that it wasn’t God’s plan for me to complete the Introduction to Primary Health Care school, but what was the plan? For someone with absolutely zero patience and an unhealthy obsession with planning for the future, the silence was deafening. When I prayed about the future, God’s response was always, “Wait. The plan is coming.” I looked into several second-level YWAM schools, but nothing seemed to fit. It was strange, but Amsterdam kept coming up. Suddenly, everyone I met had a friend from Amsterdam or an amazing story about their trip to Amsterdam or a picture of the city’s canals and bike-ridden streets. I knew God was calling me to advocate for women and to Europe, so just for kicks, I decided to look up the YWAM base in Amsterdam. On the website, I read about a ministry of YWAM Amsterdam called the Lighthouse, which ministers to the prostitutes in the city’s notorious red-light district. The ministry visits the women in the windows, runs bible studies, and works to raise public awareness. The web page also happened to mention the Lighthouse’s desperate need for full-time staff. In the few spare minutes between dinner and Thursday Night Meeting, I sent off a hastily written inquiry.
I received a reply to my letter a few days later. I continued to pray about God’s direction concerning Amsterdam, but the response was still to wait. For the next month, I complained to God about waiting at night and to everyone else during the day. On a Thursday almost 6 weeks after I found out about Amsterdam, I had a serious discussion with God. I asked God, in the interest of public health and safety, to give me permission to apply for a staff position in Amsterdam, preferably at Thursday Night Meeting. That night the message was on dignity. The speaker highlighted the story from Luke 13 about the woman with the disabling spirit. In a society where women were excluded from education, government, even worship, Jesus noticed a woman who’d only ever been ignored. Not only did He see and speak to her, He touched her, shattering cultural barriers with a simple act of acceptance. In a society that valued sons, Jesus called the woman a daughter of Abraham. For centuries, women have been pushed to the side, but dignity is being included. For centuries, women have been silenced, but dignity is speaking the truth. For centuries, women have been told who they were supposed to be, but dignity is knowing who you are.
I have decided to apply for a two-year staff position with YWAM Amsterdam, working with the Lighthouse ministry to restore dignity in the lives of broken women. No, it’s not a year down under. It’s not medicine. For a while at least, it’s not college. It’s my call and my privilege and for the first time in my life, I know who I am. I’m a beloved daughter of God, endowed with dignity and purpose, and now it’s my turn to restore that dignity and purpose in the lives of others.
