Making Choices

Sometimes choices are easier when the differences are stark.

We’ve been reading Kisses from Katie: A Story of Relentless Love and Redemption by Katie Davis and Beth Clark, and we’ve reached a watershed event in Katie’s life. She’s finished a year in missions in Uganda, she’s returned to the United States to attend college to fulfill a promise to her parents, and she’s finishes her first semester with the certainty that she belongs back in her new home.

The chapter ends with Katie preparing to return to Uganda; her parents have accepted her decision and essentially released her from the commitment to attend college as had been originally planned. Katie describes the torment of the certainty that she belongs back in Uganda, but details are few (non-existent) about how she and her parents came to an agreement.

I suspect there’s a reason for the lack of detail. I suspect there’s a lot of pain here, and a lot of love.

The options she has to choose from are stark – remain in the U.S. as a college student, or return to a Third World country. For Katie, the choice is not only not difficult; it’s also obvious and simple. She is meant to be in Uganda. The four months she spends in college are important – but primarily in the context of how it helps the work in Uganda.

For Katie, it’s not a question of leaving home, but of going home.

For most of us, choices are rarely that stark or obvious. A major life decision is often fraught with uncertainty and doubt. Prayer can quiet the turmoil, but prayer doesn’t automatically make the choice clear. For many of us, even after a decision is made, we still have questions, doubts and fears.

In my novel Dancing Priest, the hero’s guardian mother Iris McLaren is having a conversation with the heroine, Sarah Hughes. They’re talking about Michael’s faith and Sarah’s lack of faith. And Iris says this: “Michael has assurance. He knows, that’s all. It’s that simple. And for Michael, that assurance is a song in his heart. It’s a blessing to have it.”

I wrote that line years before Katie Davis first went to Uganda, but it applies as much to her as it does to my fictional hero Michael Kent. She has assurance. She knows, and it’s that simple.

And I suspect it’s a song in her heart as well.

Led by Jason Stayszsen and Sarah Salter, we've been discussing Kisses from Katie for several weeks now. To read more posts on this chapter, "Living the Secret," please visit Sarah's site, Living Between the Lines.