On July 10, 2002, I was on my first international mission trip in Guatemala when, during praise and worship, I just felt an overwhelming sense that I was called to be a long-term missionary.
In reflecting on it the next morning there in Guatemala, I looked back to see what, if anything, I’d written in my journal a month earlier in Michigan when I’d felt the Lord first whisper to my heart, “You should be a missionary.” I had prayed right then along the beach in Michigan for God to confirm if that was really Him and His call for me, and within hours after I prayed for confirmation, I was cleaning my bedroom and came across my confirmation certificate from church. I noticed for the first time that the date was spelled wrong: “October Sevententh” instead of “Seventeenth,” and I thought of “Sevententh” like 7/10th, which in the US, would be the date July 10th, because the previous year on July 10th, I had written a memorable prayer after I’d felt God helping me make more sense of what He was calling me to do. So that day in Michigan (June 10th, 2002), I’d written down in my journal that “Sevententh” reminded me of July 10th.
I had forgotten that when I was looking back at it in Guatemala a month later…and how amazing to realize that the day I felt the overwhelming sense that indeed God was calling me to be a missionary was July 10th ("Sevententh")!! And how cool of God to use my Confirmation certificate to confirm in advance the day I would feel such a strong sense of my call to missions!
In prayer later that month (July 2002), I felt God calling me to Botswana, Africa, and I soon learned that Botswana then had the highest AIDS rate in the world (reports said close to 40% of adults were HIV positive) and therefore had many orphans. Over the next months and years, the date July 10th would come up many times in connection with Botswana and fighting AIDS/caring for AIDS orphans.
For example, the next month (August 2002), I had a dream where I was telling people I now felt called to be a missionary. I woke up and wanted to write down the dream before I forgot it, but all I could find to write it down on was a year’s worth of a tear-off desk calendar sheets from 1996 that my mom had given me. I just pulled one out randomly, but felt I should flip it over: July 10th!
On a BBC website about AIDS in Africa, the first two related articles were on July 10, 2000.
In January 2003, President Bush was scheduled to go on a 5-day, 5-nation tour of Africa. Botswana was chosen as one of the countries. The trip was postponed due to the war in Iraq that was heating up. Of all possible days of the year, the day set aside for Bush to spend in Botswana was July 10, 2003!
He spoke about AIDS in his speeches that day in Botswana (i.e."This is the deadliest enemy Africa has ever faced, and you will not face this epidemic alone") and visited AIDS orphans. Congress in the U.S. on July 10th discussed Botswana specifically and voted to increase spending to fight AIDS in Africa under the PEPFAR (President’s Emergency Plan for the Funding of AIDS Relief) plan.
In 2004, I was on a two-month mission trip to Botswana and shared the gospel with a group of young adults in Maun, Botswana. They seemed to truly grasp the gospel and wanted to pray to give their lives to Christ. The translator from a local church turned to them after they prayed and exclaimed, “You need to write this down in your diary. If you were to die tonight, you know you’d go to heaven. This is the day that changes everything for you! What’s the date? What’s the date? July 10th! July 10th! This is the day that changes it all for you! July 10th!!”
Just after that trip, I read a BBC article about Botswana, and in the margin it said: BBC Country Profile – Botswana – 10th July 2004. The website all about Botswana (population, capital, climate, government, etc.) was written on July 10th!
I found out the AIDS treatment centre where I’d volunteered with AIDS orphans in Maun, Botswana was opened on July 10, 2002!
I later learned it was funded by the $100 million plan by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Merck Pharmaceutical company to fight AIDS specifically only in Botswana. That $100 million plan to fight AIDS in Botswana was unveiled on July 10, 2000!!!
I discovered Youth for Christ in 2006 through a brochure that described their short-term mission trips around the world. They had a trip to Botswana, scheduled to leave on July 10, 2007! It was the only trip with July 10th as the starting or ending date!
The World Bank approved the "Botswana National HIV/AIDS Prevention Support Project," channeling $50 million to Botswana to fight/prevent AIDS. It was approved on July 10, 2008! So that means both of these major projects to fight AIDS specifically in Botswana ($100 million plan from Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation & Merck, and $50 million project by The World Bank) were announced or approved on July 10th!
On July 10, 2010, there was an article posted describing Botswana as a beacon of hope:
My first July 10th in Botswana after moving here was July 10th, 2011. It rained that day in Botswana, which is extremely rare in the dry season and a great blessing (the Botswana currency is called Pula because rain is so valuable in the desert country). That July 10th, I shared this July 10th testimony at a church in Mantshwabishi, Botswana.
On July 10, 2012, there were two articles on the website of National Public Radio in the US about the Botswana AIDS situation!! One had a link to the press release from July 10, 2000 of that $100 million plan to fight AIDS in Botswana (that would fund the AIDS treatment centre in Maun where I’d served that was opened on July 10, 2002)!
Also on July 10, 2012, there was a conference in Washington DC on July 10th to evaluate the previous ten years of PEPFAR (President’s Emergency Plan for the Funding of AIDS Relief), which was what Congress voted to increase spending for on July 10, 2003 when they discussed Botswana specifically (because President Bush was in Botswana that very day)!
Still on July 10, 2012, a book was published specifically based on orphans and vulnerable children in Botswana:
On July 10th, 2013, there was a totally unusual DOWNPOUR of rain for hours during the dry season. Again, rain (pula) is a great blessing. The average rainfall for the entire month of July in Botswana is 3mm but on July 10th, it POURED for 6 hours! It had not rained for months before, and only rained once (lightly) in the two months after July 10th!
On July 10, 2014, I went with a friend and Youth for Christ volunteer, Gugu, to the David Livingstone memorial ruins in Kolobeng, Botswana. Livingstone was the first missionary to Botswana and he built the first church in Botswana there, along with his house. Back in 2013, I read that Livingstone wrote about his house there on July 10, 1848 soon after moving in: "Hope it may be more a house of prayer than any we have yet inhabited." We have felt the Lord speaking to us that He wants to use us, living stones, to rebuild the walls of the house of prayer in Botswana on the foundation of Christ that Livingstone laid. So Gugu and I decided to go there on July 10, 2014 to pray for God to continue rebuilding the walls of the house of prayer, using the believers in Botswana as the living stones.
Next, July 10, 2015 was the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Britain, in which the Royal Air Force (RAF) fought to withstand the Nazi Air Force in order to defend England from a land invasion by the Nazis. The story of the RAF has been connected in several ways to Botswana and is an encouragement that prayer can shift history. See the amazing testimony here: https://hope4botswana.blogspot.com/p/raf.html
For the 21-days leading up to the inauguration of the new Botswana President on 1 April 2018, we felt led to pray each night at 9pm for the nation and for a peaceful leadership transition. This was based on how the people of Britain and the Commonwealth prayed every night at 9pm during the Battle of Britain for the RAF, and even a Nazi intelligence officer said that every night at 9pm the British used a secret against which they could find no countermeasure! Three days before the Botswana inauguration, I felt led to look at the magazines at a shop called CNA in Gaborone, Botswana and saw one that mentioned the RAF and that in 2018, the RAF turns 100 years old! I wondered what the exact date was, and then I saw in the magazine that the RAF would turn 100 years old on 1 April 2018! The same day we had been praying towards, when the new Botswana president would be inaugurated!
Upon looking up the RAF 100 Centenary celebrations online, I learned that the RAF 100 celebrations would culminate on July 10, 2018 with a parade and the biggest flyover of RAF planes ever in history! I thought perhaps they chose July 10 because the Battle of Britain began on July 10, but I later learned that they are having a baton relay through the nation starting on 1 April and going for 100 days. The 100th day is July 10th!
Altogether, the connection of July 10th to the RAF can also be seen as more connection of it to Botswana, since there have been many connections already between the RAF and Botswana as detailed in the RAF page on this blog.
On July 10, 2017, I felt led to an allegorical book (Master Potter and the Mountain of Fire) that I had bought but hadn't read yet, and I opened to a section entitled "The Gift" where it mentioned "ember" and how God has named us and that, "Your name is your prophetic destiny, your calling." The gift is described in the passage as a "flaming ember", "fiery ember", "fiery stone of intimacy from the heavenly altar of Incense", and "glowing ember" that awakens hearts!!! And then God gives the character a new name!!!
So that was a personal touch on July 10th, because as you can read in the page on this blog "Ember New Name Testimony: https://hope4botswana.blogspot.com/p/ember.html (or click on the shorter version on the tab at the top of the page), Ember is a new name that the Lord gave me as I recovered from breaking my neck just before moving to Botswana. Also, my Setswana name given to me just after I moved to Botswana is Neo, which means gift. So for me to read about "ember" and Gift in a section about a new name on July 10th just confirms yet again that the Lord indeed uses the date July 10th to confirm my calling. And the connections to the RAF seem to be more encouragement for us in Botswana to see ourselves like the spiritual Air Force (or Prayer Force)--that our prayers are important and can shift the history of the nation.
Conclusion and Disclaimer :)
In conclusion, I believe the connections of July 10th to Botswana are too many to be mere coincidence. I see the hand of God in their orchestration. I don't understand why God chose to guide and confirm things to me in such a unique (dare I say weird) manner, but perhaps it is to help people, perhaps yourself, believe that God is real and still guides us today. To be clear as a little "disclaimer," I also don't believe God needs to confirm things so clearly or speak in such a way to call people--I have profound respect for those who sense God calling them in different ways and obey with less outward confirmation. I believe the key is for us to surrender our lives to God and His plan for our life, and then He will guide us in a unique way. Way back in 2003, I was asking God why He was "beating me over the head with this?!" (I was already convinced and planning on moving to Botswana), and I felt that the confirmation was not just for me, but to share with others who might be doubting God's existence or guidance today. However, I know now that the overload of confirmation with this July 10th thing (and many other ways God has confirmed His calling on my life) has also helped me stay the course when I have faced several severe trials in fulfilling my calling.
Isn't God amazing?!
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