After God answered my prayer to work in a learning centre, I was new, eager and honestly quite hopeful.

After all, there were members of the leadership team who were Christians. I assumed that meant the environment would naturally reflect Christlike values.

But not long after I started, I began to feel unsettled. The pace was draining, tensions were high, and I found myself wrestling with situations that troubled my conscience.

When I tried to understand what was happening around me, I often left feeling more confused than reassured.

I raised my voice and made children cry. I hated who I was becoming.

As the months passed, the long hours and emotional strain slowly wore me down. I was physically exhausted, spiritually drained, and struggling to reconcile my convictions with the environment I was in.

To my shame, I found myself becoming harsher and less patient with my students.

There were moments when I raised my voice and made children cry.

I hated who I was becoming.

Staying when I should have left

Even early on, I sensed that God may have been leading me to leave.

But I stayed because I thought walking away meant I had failed. I wanted to persevere. I wanted to prove I could endure difficult things.

Yet through prayer and wise counsel, God began showing me that perseverance and self-destruction are not the same thing.

Eventually, I resigned. What followed was one of the most emotionally difficult seasons of my life. I experienced misunderstanding, conflict, and deep emotional exhaustion.

I tried to quietly endure it all, holding on to Isaiah 53:7: “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth…”

Even when I felt misunderstood and alone, I clung to the truth that I am God’s child (John 1:12).

By the end of those months, I was burnt out and crying uncontrollably. I felt trapped and helpless. My mental and emotional health deteriorated to the point where I eventually needed medical leave and treatment.

During that season, I wrestled with difficult questions. I wondered whether my struggles meant my faith was weak or whether I was somehow failing to trust God enough.

But God reminded me that my condition did not mean my faith was weak or that He wasn’t my strength. I am simply human, walking through pain with God.

Throughout this trial, I saw glimpses of God’s care. He did not remove me at once, but He gave me strength each day to teach and care for my students. I would come home amazed that I had survived another day.

Even more astonishingly, God enabled me to pray for the people who had hurt me.

What God was really after

God also used this season to expose things hidden in my own heart. I realised how much of my identity was still tied to people’s approval and being perceived well by others.

Part of me longed to stay in favour with those around me, even at the cost of compromising my convictions.

Through this experience, God began chipping away at my fear of man, my desire for approval, and my desire for self-preservation.

In particular, Paul’s words confronted me: “If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ” (Galatians 1:10).

I also realised how easily I had equated Christian labels with Christlike character. God humbled me and reminded me to place my trust in Him alone, not in appearances, institutions or titles.

More than anything, this experience caused me to pray like the psalmist: “Search me, O God, and know my heart” (Psalm 139:23–24).

Even in the darkest moments, God gave unexpected encouragement.

One day, while I was still on leave and struggling deeply, I noticed a stranger wearing a shirt with the word “Unshakeable” and Isaiah 54:17 printed on it: “No weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed…”

It felt like a reminder from the Lord that He saw me and had not abandoned me.

God also surrounded me with people who prayed for me, checked in on me and carried burdens I could no longer carry myself.

I watched my husband’s faith deepen through the trial, and together we learned what it means to depend on God more fully.

I once thought that answered prayer would always look joyful and straightforward. But God’s answers are sometimes unexpected and painful.

Like David, who was anointed king yet spent years fleeing in the wilderness, I learned that God’s ways are higher than ours (Isaiah 55:8-9). He is more concerned with the condition of our hearts than fulfilling our expectations (Deuteronomy 8:2).

This season stripped away many illusions I held about strength, faith and control. Yet through it, I came to know God more deeply as my refuge, my defender and my ever-present help in trouble (Psalm 46:1).

I am still learning to trust Him and to see life from His perspective rather than my own.

But through this painful experience, God has given me greater compassion for those in difficult environments and a greater confidence that He remains faithful even when the path is confusing.

Being a child of God means knowing Him deeply enough to trust that whatever He allows is for His sovereign purposes, never to harm us, but always for our good (Romans 8:28).