Hello my name is Tonga I am a young lady from Zimbabwe Africa. In 1993, God placed a desire in my heart to come to the United States to attend a Christian college. In an attempt to be obedient I started searching for ways to come to the U.S. My family was receiving a magazine from a popular evangelist who had a Bible college. So I thought to myself, certainly this is the way God will use. So, I wrote many letters to the ministry asking for a scholarship. I hoped by seeing my persistence they would give me a scholarship. However after receiving many rejections, God spoke to me and told me that I was starting to look to this mininstry and not to him as my source and that I was not to apply at this college any longer.
Sometime later a well know evangelist visted my country. I went to see the evangelist and was impressed, but I did not think any more about it. A while later a cousin started attending a college this evangelist had help found. The cousin wrote me and told me about the college. The Lord then spoke to me again and told me that this is where I was to go to college. So I applied and a while later a letter of acceptance came in the mail. At that time I did not have the the money to go and the college had only given me two weeks notice. So I went to a youth ministry meeting at my church and asked the pastor to pray for me, (for finances), so I could go. To my suprise he told me, "No I am not going to pray for this I am going to pray for his will." He then told me "God wants you to totally depend on him. He does not want you to have any crutches, nothing, all the people that you depended upon are going to let you down. No one but God is going to meet your needs!"
Still needing the money to go I went to my parents to obtain the money, but their business suddenly developed problems and they were unable to help me. So, I turned to my rich aunt who had helped many other family members travel abroad, but all her funds were temporarily tied up. My aunt tried to contact several of her rich friends to see if I could borrow the money from them, but they were all on extended vacations and would not be back for several monthes. So I phoned the college about the problem. They told me that they could provide me with a ticket and a job when I got to the college to help me with my living expenses and to repay the cost of the ticket. They faxed me a copy of my schedule, the name of the airline and the ticket number and told me that the ticket would be waiting at the airport.
So having my financial problems resolved I proceeded to the immigration office to get my passport and visa renewed. However, while I was there the immigration service spotted a problem with the visa. They told me that it would be several weeks before they could issue a new one. Not having that much time I started to pray and the situation was resolved and I had a new visa in a matter of hours.
So everything looked like it was going to work out. However, the night before I was to leave, I went to the airline office to get the ticket the college told me they had sent. When I talked to the airline they said they were sorry, but the college had not bought a ticket for me. So I phoned the college, but the person I talked to didn't not know anything about the situtation, so I had to wait for someone who did to call me back. About 11:00 pm that night they returned my call and told me that there had been a mistake and the offer was only for staff and not for students. At this point I was very discouraged, my aunt, who had accompanied me to the airport, told me "Tonga you have to praise God, even in this", but I said I won't say anything because I feel like I am being tested. Early the next day the airline contacted me at my hotel and told me that if my aunt was willing to repay the cost of the ticket within the next 60 days the airline would give me the ticket. So the Lord fullfilled his word to me, as well as, the words my youth pastor had spoken to me about relying on God alone.
PROVERBS 3:5-6 "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways acknowlege Him, and He shall direct your paths."
