Closed Mouth

For the first few days after we got to the city we were going to be spending our month in I was able to do ministry like normal. We had an orientation with our hosts and got to help out with a youth event that was taking place while the kids were on their winter break. But that Sunday when we went to the church for service my throat started hurting. Didn’t think much of it at first but I had a little bit of tea after the service and then I just couldn’t talk because tea dries out your mouth. That only lasted a few moments then I could talk again but it still hurt to talk.

Since it hurt my throat more than it already was hurting to speak, I just didn’t talk for a week and a half. From what my teammate found on the internet it sounds like I had laryngitis. Not being able to talk I decided it was for the best to not go to ministry during that time. Most of the people during ministry wouldn’t speak English anyway but just walking down the street in the cold air hurt my throat more so I thought it was for the best to stay back. 

Not being able to even speak is something that is really hard to go through. While I wasn’t isolating from my team I would be in the room with all of them and still feel kind of alone not being able to speak. This was hard and led me to start to isolate myself. Choosing to stay in my room and watch Netflix instead of choosing into my team to the best that I could at the time.

But my team and God chose to be around me even then. There was one night when I was feeling pretty bad and I decided to go to bed early even though my team was going to do communion that night. Even though I wasn’t feeling good I couldn’t sleep so I could hear my teammates in another room talking and singing some worship songs together. But after they had finished communion they came into my bedroom to check on me. I wrote how I was feeling on my notes app, which is how I was communicating the whole time. Each of them prayed for me and one of them brought some bread and juice so that I could take communion. I felt so seen and loved by my team and by God. 

After a week and a half, some of my team thought it wasn’t just a physical thing but a spiritual thing. So my team prayed over me and then asked me some questions. The big question they asked, that I had already asked myself earlier that morning was “Do you want to be healed?” The answer was yes and no. Yes because I wanted to talk to my team again but no because I was afraid to do ministry in Turkey. Between them praying over me and admitting what I was feeling I felt like I should start talking again. It still hurt my throat to speak but I was walking in faith that speaking wasn’t going to make it worse. So I started talking again and going to ministry again. 

It is really amazing to see the Lord meet you where you are at. Being obedient and starting to talk again also allowed me to take part in helping another of my teammates be healed and for our team to get closer together. But that’s not my story to tell.

God is so GOOD!