He doesn't assign you to a place. He assigns you to a person.

My first area was Kita Kyushu.

I was greener than green. I could barely speak the language. A teenage girl had been meeting with the missionaries for a while before I arrived, and during lessons my companion did most of the talking while I sat there trying to follow what anyone was saying.

Then during one particular lesson, about six months into my time there, I felt something.

A prompting. Clear as day.

Invite her to be baptized.

I hesitated.

I was the junior companion. My Japanese was barely functional. I rehearsed the sentence in my mind over and over, terrified I would say it wrong, or worse, offend her. What business did I have extending that invitation?

But the feeling would not go away.

So I did it. In broken, barely understandable Japanese, I invited her to be baptized.

She said yes.

The next week, I was transferred.

I was not there for her baptism. I did not see her enter the water. I did not get the moment of watching someone make that covenant because of something I had done.

At the time, I was frustrated. Why send me there if I was not going to see it through?

Years later I finally understood.

That was exactly why I was sent to Kita Kyushu. Not to baptize her myself. Not to receive any credit. But to be there at precisely the right moment to follow a prompting that, in that instant, only I was positioned to give.

The Savior was that specific. He is always that specific.

I think about Jonah a lot when I think about this lesson. Jonah went where he was sent, eventually. He did the work, mostly. But he spent a long time questioning why instead of trusting that the Lord knew exactly what He was doing. I was a lot like Jonah in Kita Kyushu. Going through the motions. Present but not really trusting.

The Lord sent me there for a person. I just did not know which one yet.

That is how mission calls work. That is how most of God’s assignments work. He does not send you to a place. He sends you to a person. The city, the area, the companion, the timing, none of it is random. The purpose is almost always invisible until later. But it is never accidental.

If you are somewhere right now that feels like the wrong assignment, I want you to sit with this honestly: what if you are not in the wrong place? What if the person you are there for simply has not shown up yet?

Proverbs 3:5 says to trust the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. That is easy to quote. It is much harder to actually do when you are six months into an area and nothing makes sense.

But He knows what He is doing.

He always has.

Ponder this: Where are you right now that you did not choose? A mission area, a ward, a job, a season of life that feels like the wrong fit. What would change if you trusted it was not an accident?

This is Lesson 2 from Learning to Walk with Him, available June 1 at learningtowalkwithhim.com. The Five Lessons Guide is free right now at learningtowalkwithhim.com/guide.