Andrews University has a long history of sending out students as missionaries. This week, for our blog, I invited one of AU’s currently serving student missionaries to write a guest blog. Margaret Rogers is serving for the 2025-2026 school year on the island of Palau as a middle school teacher. 

The Most Reluctant Missionary: My Long Road to Yes

“I want to be a missionary!” I repeated outloud. It had been a beautiful week of prayer hosted by Adventist Frontier Missions at my local high school. We had learned about mission work and its impact on the world. It was the last night when they made a public appeal, asking those who wished to give a year of their lives to service to come onstage. I couldn’t help my feet from taking me down the long chapel aisle and standing proudly on stage, a smile on my face as I felt ready to take on the world in the name of the Lord.

“Imagine being a missionary!?” I scoffed during my freshman year of college. It had been three years since my original commitment to the Lord, and I had long strayed from His side. It was once again Student Week of Prayer, and this time I found myself at Andrews University. I listened to the students upfront, sharing their testimony, talking about how deeply God changed their lives through their year of service. I was jealous, angry at their service, and was unable to look deeply into the longing in my heart that wished to be them. Instead, I let my heart be hardened and vowed I would never be a missionary, that one thing I was sure of.

“Am I supposed to be a missionary?” I asked Chaplain Gibbs one chilly October morning. It was now my sophomore year of college, and much in my life had been changing. I had started attending campus Bible studies and, despite my best efforts, found my faith growing. I knew this was a true and genuine connection, but I was scared by what that meant for me. I knew God was transformative, but I wasn’t ready to be transformed. Throughout the first couple of months in this new relationship with God, I wondered if service was for me. Yet, in my heart I felt deeply that there was something more I was called to do. It took a few clear signs from the Lord, but before I could stop myself I had submitted an application to be a Student Missionary. I knew God was calling me out, calling me deeper, but I was so scared of what that meant for me. I had never been out of the United States before and was unsure of what the outside world would be like. Overtaken by this fear, I made a clear deal with God, “I will go serve you, Lord, but I am NOT leaving America.”

“I think I’m supposed to be a long-term missionary?” The words poured out of my mouth before I even found myself ready to say them. I was 5 months into my 11 month stay in the beautiful islands of Palau; turns out God had wanted me to leave the United States. I had already been faced with some of the greatest challenges in my life, yet I felt a sense of fulfillment and joy unlike anything I had ever experienced before. I was scared of what a mission life could look like. Leaving my family for years at a time? What about the future, my career, all these things I had been planning? Although God had been speaking to my heart for many weeks, I was unable to say the words aloud to anyone until that afternoon. I was met by a large smile and approving nod from the missionary across from me. “Tell me why?” he asked, and so I went on to tell him the delightful story of my heart in mission service, and I knew at that moment my heart was solidified in the Lord’s plans.

Now, as I sit on my old, broken couch in my hot apartment, I no longer ask if I am supposed to be a missionary. I simply ask, ‘Lord, where next? I don’t know exactly where the Lord will guide and direct or what exactly I’m supposed to do, but I’m no longer afraid of the unknown. Instead, I feel driven by this strong love and power, a calling in which He’s entrusted to me that compels me to pursue His gospel to others. Looking back, I see I was never asked to do something God had not intentionally created me for. Every season, the waiting, the wandering, even the hardness of my heart, was shaping me for His purpose. The girl who once scoffed at missions now prays boldly for the next place God will call her to serve, and this time, she is ready to go.

You probably aren’t going to become a middle school teacher on a tropical island. Yet, you are called to serve God wherever he leads. For many who are wrestling with taking that next step with God, I hope Margaret’s story is a reminder that saying, “yes” is the best answer you could ever give. It will change your life in ways you would never imagine and leave you with no regrets. If you are currently wrestling with what God is prompting you to lean into, take this blog as your moment to say yes and join the adventure he has waiting for you