“Aaaaa! There’s a wasp!” My daughter cowered in her seat, watching the wasp’s lazy movements with wide eyes. Yesterday our family was camping among arid sagebrush. Jason had served breakfast to the kids and sent them outside to eat, but within a few minutes all three of them were back in the van, complaining about flies. Really? There weren’t many bugs out here at all! I was embarrassed that my kids couldn’t handle a couple of flies. My second thought was What are they going to do when we get to PNG? The tropics are known for creepy-crawlies, many of them much more threatening than flies.

As I pondered my family’s unpreparedness for missionary life, I remembered with relief a passage I keep handy for times when I feel my inadequacy. It’s from the devotional Our High Calling, page 125: “The promise is not that we will have strength today for a future emergency, that anticipated future trouble will be provided for beforehand, before it comes to us. We may, if we walk by faith, expect strength and provision for us as fast as our circumstances demand it . . . The grace of tomorrow will not be given today.” The author goes on to say that we won’t have the courage and fortitude of martyrs (missionaries?) of old until we are in the position they were in. God will give us the grace we need for each daily emergency. Jason, our kids and I are not super-missionaries. Far from it! But we have a God who promises to give us the grace we need exactly when we need it, as long as we stay close to Him. Right now Jason and I are clinging to this promise, believing that since He called us He will surely give us the grace we need.

• Twitter