Coming Home

"For HE said to me, 'My GRACE is sufficient for you, for my POWER is made perfect in WEAKNESS.' Most gladly, therefore, I will boast about my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may dwell in me." 2 Corinthians 12:9 

Dear friends,

Since last I posted, many things have changed. I have no idea where to begin. I last wrote about March, "I have no idea what plans God has for me for this month, but I'm excited about them!" March certainly included something I didn't expect: a call to return home.

There is so much to tell. How did I come to this decision? What all led up to this? Please know that this decision came with a very heavy heart and with much, much prayer from many people.

This entire year, I have battled head-to-head every day with anxiety. This battle has been very hard but it has refined me. I have been able to do so many things that I never imagined I would be able to. I have also discovered my limits. I wrote in a journal entry a couple months ago, "I am constantly running up against the walls of my limitations. I am discovering the dimensions of a box I didn't know existed. If I keep running hard enough against the walls of the box, will they expand?" In some ways, I think they have. I have been able to accomplish more than I ever dreamed I would be able to, through Christ's strength. 

But I have been limited, and I am so very, very human. As we all are. In discovering my own limitations, I have discovered God's lack of limitations. In running up against my own walls I have seen that His love knows no bounds. I have fought with my flesh. I have asked God to remove the thorn in my side. He has not, but instead, He showed me how much I could still do with that thorn still in me. And for that I am SO THANKFUL. He showed me that even in my weakness, I could STILL SERVE HIM and give Him my all.

And so despite anxiety, I fought on, being supported by His strength alone every day. I haven't been able to accomplish anything on my own strength here. I have never felt so inadequate as I have in this year, and I have found that His strength is more than enough to support me and to work through me. If there is anything good I have accomplished here, any lives changed, any friendships formed, I can say, truthfully, that it is ONLY in the Lord that these have happened. And many, many, many good things have happened. More than I could ever have dreamed of. More friendships made than I ever would have imagined. My ties here are so strong. I feel God's hands having bound me to the land, to the people, my voice mingled in their own. I have known deep, deep life in Him here. I have clung to His word with all my strength, and I have found it to be my sword and my strength against the attacks of the enemy.

Around the end of February, I sunk into a depression. I thought initially it was just feeling down after the amazing visit at Freedom Firm. But I kept sinking, lower and lower until I found myself in a place I'd never been before, new places that frightened me. I continued to try to do everything as much as I could but I had absolutely no internal resources left and it became difficult for me to do my work. I fought and fought and the depression worsened to include physical effects. During this time, everyone around me was immensely supportive. With the recommendation of my doctor back home, I tried starting medication, but it's just too hard to figure out this kind of medication and deal with all the side effects from 12,000 miles away from home and from my doctor.

During this, in around the third week of March, God made it clear to me that it was time to go home. At first I was very reluctant to hear it. But I realized that I was putting my health in danger. I was fighting, fighting, fighting, but I was deeply hurting. I realized that I hadn't felt like myself in months, that my attitudes and thoughts were not at all like me. I realized that I had become sick. In one big culminating moment, I had a huge internal struggle, where I was fighting to stay because I wanted to stay, and I felt God said to me, "Claudia, stop fighting. You've done what I sent you to do here. Now it's time to be healed." I realized that the only reason I was fighting to stick it out until the end was so that I could say that I completed my year. That's it. It was all about ME and my pride. My pride took me a long time to admit that this was bigger than me, that this was out of my control, and that I had not been myself in a long time.

This was the hardest decision I've ever had to make. I went back and forth and back and forth on it. I prayed for God to clarify things for me, to just show me His will. I knew that my will was to stay and fight, but I couldn't do it any more. I didn't want to spend the rest of my time in India counting down the days until I go home and barely making it through each day. The struggle was over. 

I admitted that I really needed to seek healing, and that I felt that I needed to be home to receive healing. I never expected this. I never wished this. I didn't think this is how my year would end. The enemy attacked me with lies about being a failure and a quitter.

It took me awhile before I told anyone my decision, but once I did, everyone was extremely supportive. More supportive than I could've hoped for. They all had known that I was struggling and seen that I was battling, and wanted to help me, to see me healthy again. They helped me battle the lies that Satan was feeding me about being a failure because I hadn't completed my year.

After all, I was going to return home in June, and now I'm returning home in April. Most of my programs were ending in April anyhow. This has allowed me to give myself some grace. And some very exciting news: a couple months back I was asked by a couple of the choir directors to write a book on choir directing so that they would have something to keep once I left. I wrote about 40 pages of the book (oh my goodness do I feel so unqualified), and Dr. Aswan of Harp n' Lyre music academy, and one of the members of the Director's Program, helped me complete a video series component to go along with the book demonstrating conducting fundamentals and warm-ups. I will be continuing this work from home and will remain actively in touch with my friends back here as they help me edit the book. So though I am leaving, my work with this community is not finished.

So I realized that I was making this a much bigger deal than it is and that it was more important that I take care of my health. When you get sick, you seek help to get better. And that's what I need to do. It took me awhile, but I'm not afraid to admit that, now. I know that I am weak, and I will boast about my weaknesses, hoping that the power of Christ will dwell in me. 

I have been feeling so much better about my decision. God has given me a deep peace about it that I would not have thought possible a few weeks back. It is the hope that I will soon be well again, and the truth that I HAVE been successful. I know that He has plans for this testimony. No, I have not finished the time of mission that I set out to finish, but I have finished what He intended me to finish, in His timing and in His plan, not in my own. God had different plans for me than I had for myself. After all, in serving Him we must be flexible. We do not know where or when we may be called, but we must follow after Him. And we do not know when He will call us to another place to serve, or when He will call us home. We do not know what lies ahead. We must follow Him day by day, not with our own plans and our own boundaries, but go where He goes, stay where He stays, and move when He tells us to move. We must walk with Him, just day by day, step by step.

God made it very clear that my time in India (for now) has come to a close. I gave everything I had to the relationships and the programs here, and for that, I am pleased. I don't think I withheld an inch of myself. I feel that I really gave my all, and it's a good feeling to know that I don't have regrets or that I withheld a part of myself from His service. The professors all helped me wrap up my programs earlier and they all finished successfully. Gigi Sir and all of the professors and everyone could not have been more understanding. Initially I wanted to come straight home but I strived to stay to direct the two Kottayam Mixed Voices concerts, one on April 1st and one on the 7th.

There is so much more to share, but I will do so later. The past couple of weeks have been filled with wonderful send-offs, finishing up the programs, having convocations for the programs, and so on. I'll write more later about how everything finished up. These are the most difficult goodbyes I have ever had to say. I am saying goodbye to the people who took care of me as parents and family. I am saying goodbye to brothers and sisters. But I hope, Lord willing, to return to India.

I know that this will come as a shock to most of you. Please know that this has been a decision surrounded by much prayer and the seeking of God's will through wisdom and discernment by many, many people, for a long time. Thank you so much for being so supportive and for encouraging me to take care of myself when I need to. Thank you for loving me, and giving me a place to share my testimony of what He is teaching me here.

I will update more later. I will be returning on this Wednesday, the 11th, travelling for two days, and still arriving on the 11th (because of the time zone changes). Please pray for me during this difficult time and these heartbreaking goodbyes. Please pray for peace of mind during travel and for God to protect me for anxiety as I travel home. 

I hope and pray that you are all doing well. A better support system I could never have asked for. I can't wait to see you soon and begin to share with you all that the Lord showed me in India. I know that this is just the beginning. God has plans for me and for this testimony, and I believe that He is going to use every bit of this to make me more a more effective servant of His. I believe that He will awaken me to be restored to better than before.

Wishing you a very happy Easter, as we celebrate worldwide the ETERNAL LIFE we have through our Savior, Christ Jesus! THANK YOU, JESUS, for dying on the cross that we may know You and draw closer to You for eternity! Thank You for sending us Your son and for caring for us as you do. 

In Christ,

Claudia