In early September, an unexpected event triggered a panic attack that I had been fighting for the past few years. I spent a night in the emergency room and was discharged. The aftermath was a period of emotional withdrawal, and I experienced what felt like a soul-sucking experience. Looking back, I self-diagnosed myself as having fallen into what is technically called a spiritual slump. My motivation and self-esteem had plummeted, and my zeal and enthusiasm were unmotivated.

I've mentioned the three brothers of spiritual balance before. They are: the silence, the clueless, and the loneliness. The brother closest to me is loneliness. It comes like the flu and you want to avoid it as much as possible, but you can't help it. I have experienced that when this loneliness meets a spiritual stagnation, it creates a serious scene.

When the two meet, my ministry and mission are under attack. It invades and tramples on my reason for being. And I felt my self-esteem, under grace, being muddied by the dirt. Looking back, I realized that this sense of recognition was due to the time I had spent praying to the Lord and looking in the spiritual mirror. I decided to make a drastic spiritual decision. It was a decision to live.

Despite the difficult economic situation, I forced myself to buy a plane ticket to Korea. I entered Korea like a fugitive. I arrived late at night, slept, got up, walked around Seokchon Lake (Jamsil), which is around the mission center, and walked and walked and walked. The next day, I took the bus and subway and walked all day, and I kept walking until the third day.

After three days of walking, I was out of breath. If I had to put it into words, it was as if my confused thoughts, complicated mind, and stagnant spirituality were being cleared up, one letter or word at a time, every kilometer I walked. A week passed, and in the second week, for two nights and three days, I went to the prayer center to cry out and to hear God's voice for the first time in 27 years. After asking, I listened and listened and listened.

The songs of small birds, the cries of chickens, the cries of prayer in the mountains, and even the sound of snow falling after 117 years in November in South Korea, the crunching of the snow, and the sounds of people walking down the mountain. As I reflected on the sounds I heard for three days, I felt that God's voice was there. I know this because He gave me a new spiritual and physical organization beyond what I had organized the week before.

On our 14-day journey, we saw late fall and heavy snowfall. When I left, it was late spring in NZ. When I returned, it was the middle of summer. I saw four seasons in roughly 16 days. I went on a 16-day journey, overcoming being cornered on all sides and discovering hope in every season. This is the gift of organizing through prayer.