Puzzled to Find My Home: A Spiritual Memoir

By Joy Anne Mykytiuk

By a most unusual set of circumstances, Joy Anne Mykytiuk came to a deep love of everything in one part of Asia-the Filipino people, their languages, music, and all. That love became ever broader in the people it included and ever deeper in her heart. It never left her. 

A graduate of Moody Bible Institute, she grew beyond

• Language: English
• Publisher: PageLink Solutions
• Release date: Jan 26, 2024
• ISBN: 9798989954629

Book preview

Foreword

This book is not a full autobiography, but rather Joy’s tracing of the spiritual thread that ran through her life. Although her experience of this thread was painful at first, it ultimately gave her deeply felt meaning, purpose, and fulfillment.

My wife, Joy, wrote this book in order to help others who want healing and comfort after going through difficult experiences and struggles that may have been similar to hers. Much of it arose from handwritten notes she kept during her secret devotional times with God in earlier years, especially during crises. Her notes include Bible passages and prayers that came to her as she sought the grace to find God’s point of view to lead her.

But the chapters in this book did not simply flow from a grand overview. At the beginning, she found herself disoriented in the midst of a confusing puzzle, as if she had been dropped into a maze or was wandering in a huge labyrinth and had lost her bearings. She found her way through by insights gained from Scripture, by reflecting on her situation, and by seeking God, sometimes intensely, and sometimes desperately.

Joy was extremely fortunate to receive the editorial assistance of Mr. Tyler C. Ty Williams, a Christian and, at the time, a senior in his last semester at Purdue University, who volunteered to serve as Joy’s editorial assistant while she was in home hospice. The hospice period lasted less than three months, from January 10 until she passed away on Palm Sunday morning, April 2, 2023. Beginning on February 15th, Tyler met with Joy on most Wednesdays. He gathered her scattered notes, transcribed them into electronic form, and assembled them into meaningful chronological groupings that included devotionals that matched well with Joy’s narratives. He found software that suited the various tasks involved and put it to excellent use.

I believe on Wednesday March 29, during Tyler’s fifth visit, Joy and Tyler expected to have more occasions to confer. When he thought they were done for the day and was ready to leave, Joy kept him at least an hour longer than he had expected, giving him more material, so that the book had only one small gap to be filled in (which I later did). That Wednesday turned out to be their last session before Joy passed away. I understand that final session as providential, a gift from God for the completion of the book, in order to fulfill his purposes in leading and empowering Joy to write it, with Tyler’s help.

Altogether, the writing took much of the last year of Joy’s life, and especially her last several months, to identify the spiritual thread and to assemble a flowing, coherent autobiographical narrative based on her memories and her years-old notes. I knew she was writing it and was very eager indeed to discover the spiritual insights that she had arrived at. When I expressed my desire to see what she had written, she resolutely kept it from me, knowing my tendency to edit. It was her life’s treasure to give to others, and she had no intention of letting me endanger it! As I said with a smile, that was okay.

Thus, Tyler came to know the contents of Joy’s book before I did. When, of course, he made it available, at last I had it, completely revealed in black and white. As I read it, I found myself deeply impressed by her habit of seeking the attitude God wanted her to take. Although I would not welcome the kind of painful struggles she experienced, I confess to being a bit jealous of her arriving at a clearly discerned, overall spiritual thread that ran from one end of her life to the other.

I did not realize how close Joy was to God until that became more and more evident to me as I cared for her during her last five-and-a-half years, and especially during her final months. As I have read Joy’s spiritual memoir, I have come to look up to her even more, to admire her honesty, and to gain a deep appreciation of God’s beautiful work in her.

Joy’s husband,

Larry Mykytiuk¹

Contents

Foreword

Introduction

Chapter 1: Early Life

Chapter 2: The Philippines—A Lifetime Love Story

Chapter 3: The Start of a New Direction: Moody and Beyond

Chapter 4: Deputation

Chapter 5: Second Trip to the Philippines

Chapter 6: Return to the States

Chapter 7: Third Trip to the Philippines

Chapter 8: Takeaways, with Photos

Chapter 9: The Healing Begins

Chapter 10: Thoughts about the Firing, My Turning Point

Chapter 11: Final Healing

Afterword

Introduction:

Putting the Pieces Together

Jigsaw Puzzles

I love putting small, online jigsaw puzzles together! It seems like a chaotic mess when the pieces first appear on the page. Then you begin to notice that certain colors or partial images seem to match, so you separate them from the rest of the mess and put them together in a pile. Some of them fit together readily, others not so much, but at least some of the picture is starting to emerge. When you get two or more piles partially assembled, you notice that they could connect with other parts of the puzzle. When they do, part of the picture starts to take shape. Depending on the degree of difficulty, it can take from eight to 45 minutes to complete an online puzzle.

My life’s pieces

I’ve begun to think of my life as one gigantic, complicated jigsaw puzzle. I was emotionally and verbally abused as a child, resulting in issues that have floated around my entire life and influenced my behavior without ever really coming into clear focus. I was recently able to clearly identify and put them into the puzzle that is my life. They are:

Shyness—I have never been able to make small talk or feel comfortable mingling in large crowds.

Low self-esteem

Rejection

Feeling different from other people—inability to fit in

Homelessness—always wanting to go back home where I had good experiences

Afraid of close relationships—afraid I’ll mess up, say the wrong thing, offend, act out and lose the other person’s affection

Unable to accept love—always feeling insecure about how people feel about me, sure I’ll eventually lose someone’s affection which leads to confrontations, clinginess, jealousy. This leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy. It can also lead to numbed emotions. Stressful on loved ones.

Skewed view of reality—can often