IT IS SO EASY to feel like you have been forgotten, especially when you see others achieving and getting their breakthrough and you aren’t.
“Do not grow weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up,” is a passage I have read and heard numerous times, but only last weekend did it really connect with me.
Please permit me for the purposes of this article to reword this passage found in Galatians 6:9 to read: “Do not lose hope and grow weary in doing you, for at the right time your turn will come”.
When I was in secondary school, I listened as friends described their vacation trips abroad. They spoke of going to Miami, New York, Canada and the United Kingdom, and visiting sites, going shopping in the malls and enjoying the food. I felt so left out because I had never travelled overseas and as a result, I couldn’t join in the conversation. There was one time, I think I was in 4th form, I was asked in a mocking way by a girl, “Wait, you never travel, you never went on an airplane?” I felt really bad and embarrassed.
At church, friends would talk about their experiences vacationing in the US and that was like rubbing salt in the wound. They weren’t being mean or inconsiderate, they were just sharing stories, but I still felt bad and left out. I knew my mum couldn’t afford to take all four of us overseas, even though she would have loved to, but my dream remained in my heart to one day travel the world.
In 1999 my opportunity to travel came and I went to Trinidad with the cadets. In 2000, when I became a Christian, I remembered praying and telling God I wanted to travel the world but under two conditions: (1) It was to do His will and (2) I didn’t have to pay for it. Over the next two years I strengthened my walk with God, dealt with personal issues, developed as a young man and a young Christian, and sought to find out what my purpose in life was.
In 2002 I travelled again to Trinidad but this time for a Christian camp. Since then, I have travelled to St Vincent, St Lucia, St Kitts, Dominica, Grenada, Suriname, Tobago, Haiti, Jamaica, US (Miami, New York, California, Kansas, Maryland, Minnesota), England, Scotland, Netherlands, Finland, Germany, Turkey, Malaysia, Uganda, Nigeria, Australia and Israel. I mentioned as many as I could remember to give you an idea of how “my turn came”. I am certain that many of my friends who travelled before me, never visited most of those places.
What is even more remarkable about this is that I have been to some of these countries numerous times and 90 per cent of all my travels, I did not pay for. I was either travelling as a youth ambassador, youth leader, missionary, conference delegate, artist or as a speaker. Through the support of friends, family, strangers, organisations and governments, God answered my prayer.
I know God has an appointed time in which to give us our rewards, opportunities, increase and promotion, but His timing is almost never in sync with ours. I believe God withholds our “rewards” from us to protect us. He allows us the time to grow, mature and develop so that when “our turn” comes, it wouldn’t easily destroy and change us. We would remain humble.
If God had given me those opportunities to travel when I was a teenager, I would have probably been very boastful, so He allowed me the time to grow and mature before He gradually rewarded me. I started travelling within the Caribbean for about three years and then in 2005, I travelled to Finland, and that opened the door to my international travels.
Seed, time and harvest is a principle of God and it is seen in nature and all aspects of life. All plants have a harvest time and believe it or not, all humans as well. All today I felt left out but I am encouraged and hope was restored when I reminded myself of this principle. Let us celebrate and rejoice in the accomplishments of others and be patient during our time of preparation and growth, because at the proper time, our turn will come.
• Corey Worrell, a former Commonwealth youth ambassador, is director of C2J Foundation Inc., a project-based NGO focusing on social development. Email: coreyworrell@gmail.com
