Summer Sampler: Walk Forward Faithfully
Welcome to the Summer Sampler Series! This summer, we are celebrating the beautiful, diverse ways God is working in and through the women in our community. Psalm 107:2 declares, “Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story.” Every week, our Summer Sampler series will feature a different author sharing a personal glimpse into the story God has been writing in her life and ministry lately. These are authentic, honest reflections of faith, encouragement, and everyday ministry experienced “along the way” of regular life. So, grab a cool drink, pull up a chair, and join us this summer as we celebrate His presence in our everyday lives!
By Sarah Gastineau
“God takes the time to do everything right — everything. Those who wait around for him are the lucky ones” – Isaiah 30:18b (MSG).
Six years ago, at 37 years old, I learned that I needed to have a hysterectomy. My husband, John, and I received this news as both an answer to prayer and as an embodiment of God’s kindness to us. Though that is not everyone’s story who faces having a hysterectomy, it was ours. John and I were in our tenth year of marriage and had, for a long time, wondered if we were meant to have children. Over time, we felt more certain that God had a different story for us but were not quite sure what to do about that. So, we waited and prayed and wondered and finally had our answer as we made the decision for me to have the surgery.
Fast-forward several months to early January 2021, and a couple of weeks post-surgery. It was one of my first mornings alone, with John back to work and my mom, who had come to help care for me, also having left. As I spent time with the Lord, I reflected on the ten-year journey, God’s answer, and my surgery. As I read Scripture and prayed, I heard God say to me, “Sarah, this book is closed, this process is over. You have been faithful to me; you have heard me correctly. You do not need to worry about this any longer. It is now time for you to walk forward fully into what I have for you.” There were no specifics, no indications of the first step, yet that morning I felt myself able to breathe deeply in a new way.
I did not know it at the time, but that moment with the Lord marked the beginning of a pilgrimage I have been on for the last five and a half years — a pilgrimage that has been profoundly formative and transformative. A few months after that morning, God’s call to seminary came. For sixteen years I had dreamed about attending seminary one day. I had studied theology for my B.A. and wanted to continue in academics, but the Lord had something else for me, and I wondered for a long time if that dream of seminary would ever come to fruition (that is another story for a different time!).
Sixteen years post-college the door opened, and I began my seminary pilgrimage in the fall of 2021 (a pilgrimage within a pilgrimage). I describe my journey over the last five years as a pilgrimage because a pilgrimage in essence is not about the end goal or arriving someplace, it is instead about the process and the transformation that happens along the way. Though I finished my degree a couple of weeks ago, the fullness of what God has for me is still largely unknown; it seems to be in a continual state of unfolding, deepening, thickening, reforming, and revealing itself. I am asked constantly by others “What is next?” and my response is mostly “I have no idea.” It seems there is often the expectation that there is always a next thing, but maybe the pilgrimage and the process itself is the thing.
“It seems there is often the expectation that there is always a next thing, but maybe the pilgrimage and the process itself is the thing.”
Throughout my pilgrimage I have cherished the verse from Isaiah 30 and its promise that God is always at work. I am challenged by the exhortation to wait for God. Kosuke Koyama in his book Three Mile an Hour God writes that God moves slowly because that is the pace of love. Along my pilgrimage, a quote from Mother Teresa has been a constant companion for me. She states: “God does not require that we be successful, only that we be faithful.” In a socio-cultural context where there are significant pressures and expectations to be successful, to achieve goals, and to always have a next thing, I have found this quote to be divinely grounding. I am not promised success or a next thing, nor is that meant to be my goal and vision; my priority and focus is meant to be faithfulness to God.
In A Burning in My Bones, a biography of Eugene Peterson by Winn Collier, Peterson shared how his own vocational journey has been more akin to that of a dog following a scent: The dog is not certain to where or what the scent will lead, yet they can’t not follow the scent, nose to the ground, committed to the process. I resonate deeply with this image as it captures what my pilgrimage has felt like over the last five years: I have been tracing the scent of God, following faithfully, not certain of where that scent is leading, yet I can’t not follow.
Over the last five years my faith and trust in the fullness of and the completeness of God’s work has deepened, and my belief that at just the right time God will reveal the next step has sharpened. In the same way that after sixteen years God opened the door to seminary, and after ten years the Lord answered the prayers of my husband and I, and over the last five years God has done a profoundly transformative work in my life, I trust that as I walk forward faithfully, God will continue to unfold the fullness of my life’s story. This summer I have the privilege to go on an actual pilgrimage and walk a portion of the Camino de Santiago in Spain. The vision God has given me for that time is that it is an opportunity to walk out some of what God has worked in me over the last five years, and I am excited to discover more fully what that is!
Sarah Gastineau lives and works at a large Christian camping and retreat facility in central Oregon that is part of a large international parachurch organization. Her current role is to
oversee the spiritual formation program for interns. Sarah completed her master’s degree in intercultural studies through Fuller Theological Seminary in June 2026. Sarah is passionate about spiritual and leadership formation and thinking deeply, especially theologically. Sarah loves to be outdoors, travel, learn, delight in God’s created world, drink a good cup of coffee while sitting in her garden, and spend time with John and her two cats.