Mercy Finds Her Calling
In the Fall of 2022, Mercy was at the end of her rope. A dance major, she had dedicated more than a decade of her life to the art of dance, and she was about to go into her senior year of college. But now, everything in her life seemed to be falling apart.
“I was lost in my walk with the Lord. I grew up a believer, but, personally, I felt very far from the Lord,” said Mercy. “And dance was killing me. Emotionally. Mentally. And even physically. I couldn’t dance anymore. I had overworked my body, and my cellular structure crashed.”
It was because of this that Mercy found herself in the MAPS Global prayer room that Fall after a friend invited her to the MAPS Annual Gathering conference.
“I thought, ‘well, I don’t have anything else I can do, so I might as well sit here and be in the presence of the Lord,” said Mercy. “Then, the moment I touched foot in Richmond, things were changing for me. I started hearing the Lord with a level of clarity that I hadn’t experienced. My ear was being tuned to hear the Lord all of 2022 through very random circumstances, but it was like a fine-tuning when I walked into the prayer room.”
During the Annual Gathering conference, Mercy said she started hearing the Lord so clearly that it was almost scary. She knew there was no way she was making it up.
“Thursday through Saturday of Annual Gathering, my life flipped upside down,” said Mercy. “On Thursday night, I first heard a clear invitation from the Lord to come closer to Him, and to meet Him in that space. I was writing everything down in my notebook for accountability, but I didn’t tell anybody. The Annual Gathering schedule is that you are there at night, morning session, evening session, prophecy in the middle. I was at every session. I would write down a question, and each sermon was reading my mail. I would ask the Lord a question Friday night and get a response to the question Sunday morning. I would write down another question or have a conversation Saturday afternoon, and then I would step out in the hallway and meet somebody, and they would start prophesying over my life without even knowing what I had asked the Lord.
Everybody that I met, the gift of prophecy was just on them.”
As the Lord drew Mercy in and spoke to her, she wrestled with accepting what He was doing.
“I was like okay, God. I know the Bible. I am a pastor’s kid. I grew up on a pew. I am a house of prayer kid. I am even a missions kid. I grew up in this stuff. But, in different seasons, I have not been able to understand your word or your ways. Or even some religious expressions that I have experienced and things that have been imposed upon me in the name of the Word of God. I want to know you, but I don’t know how. I want to obey you, but I don’t agree with you,” said Mercy.
The Lord brought her to Ezekiel 36, where He promises to remove the heart of stone from His people, and give them a heart of flesh, and put a new spirit in them. For Mercy, it was a very clear confirmation. As the conference went on, the Lord made it clear to her that He was calling her to move to Richmond and attend MAPS Global.
Mercy made peace with it in her mind and applied for the MAPS Global School. She halted her senior thesis, withdrew her applications to professional dance companies she had applied to work for, and stepped away from her university.
Today, Mercy has come a long way from her first willing “yes” to the Lord. She was in the MAPS Global school of Spring 2023, and went to the Arab Gulf for her 90 days overseas. She then felt the Lord calling her into full-time missions work. After leading a team for 90 days in North Africa, Mercy launched to the Levant in the Spring of 2025, where she is serving as a long-term missionary. The Lord kept His promise to her from Ezekiel 36. She has been sent forth with a new spirit!