A couple of months ago, Maya Reagan, a Fayetteville, NC college student, on leave from college, approached me and offered to serve as a volunteer at St. Gabriel's School. She left on March 3rd for Haiti. Here were her thoughts as she prepared to head to Haiti. (She has promised to report back on her experiences while there. We'll pass them on to you.)
Hello friends!!!
I've recently been blessed with the amazing opportunity of spending the next several months in Fontaine, Haiti doing volunteer work at St. Gabriel's School. I will be there until late June. While there, I will teach English to the Haitian students and assist in a project that will benefit the work of the University of Buffalo medical students. When they arrive in April to conduct their spring medical clinic, I will assist them. As a pre-med student, I cannot find the words to express my excitement about this opportunity.
If you had asked me a year ago where I would be right now, I can honestly tell you I certainly wouldn't have pictured myself getting on a plane and going off to a remote village in Haiti. I'll be the first to admit that this past year has been one crazy rollercoaster. It has been very frustrating for me. Since the 8th grade, I've had my life planned out. Get the "high school experience"? Check. Graduate 2 years early? Check. Get an Associate's degree? Check. Transfer to a university? Check, check, check. Have God laugh at my life plans and change them so they fit his own? Definitely, check.
Life can sometimes be ironic. I've always been the friend who listens to everyone else say how their life is falling apart and their future is uncertain but that they know God has a bigger plan for them. Now for the first time, I am that person. Let me use an analogy from poker. When you bet all your money on one hand, you say you're going "All in." This can result in deteSometimes this results in detrimental losses. For years, I've been going "All in" on my life plan, and my plan alone. But when we pause and open our hands and let God take complete control of our life, when we go "All in" on His plan, the results can be life-changing. (Proverbs 16:3)
And so, here I am, putting my life, and everything I have ever believed to be right and true, into the hands of God. For now, he is taking me to help the underserved people of Fontaine Haiti, and I eagerly look forward to helping change their lives, knowing that, in all likelihood, they will change mine, too. That's how God's grace works.
Love,
Maya Reagan
