8 months ago, I took a leap of faith and quit my job, left my home, and stepped off a plane to enter into a season of abandonment. I left everything I had become familiar and comfortable with so that God could use me to spread His name throughout Asia.
I thought that I would see God move more externally than internally. Now, don’t get me wrong, I have seen God move in incredible ways. I have seen people healed and combatted demons, and seen people accept Jesus as their Savior. God is definitely at work in Asia, and it’s just the beginning. But what I didn’t expect was that God would do an even greater work within me.
I have been refined throughout these past 8 months and have been pushed in ways I didn’t expect. God has also given me new passions and has built onto ones that I already had.
Let me give you a brief rundown of what’s happened so far.
In Mongolia (month 2) and Japan (month 3), I was struggling a lot with insecurities that I’m sure a lot of people experience on the race. At home, I was working out a lot and had a healthy diet. But in Asia, carbs are everything, and they’re cheap. The drastic change in my diet caused me obsess over changes that were occurring in my body. I started to feel a lot of anger for the lack of control over my diet.
Towards the end of our time in Japan, my teammate, Laura had written a listening prayer note to me and it said that I shouldn’t worry about the way that I look, that God loves me and adores me and thinks I’m beautiful just the way I am. It was just what I needed because I wasn’t able to hear God speaking those truths over me. I started to proclaim those truths over myself so that I could walk into my true identity. I can’t lead others to freedom if I don’t know who I am in Christ.
Another significant thing that happened while in Japan, was one of the people we met there came to me on Thanksgiving and said, “Alex, I just wanted to let you know that you will be a leader for women one day”. I thought to myself, “that’s really cool, but I’m already team leading an all girls team… so I didn’t really know what else to think about that.
In Nepal, we worked with an anti-sex trafficking ministry and one of the women that was leading the ministry had a community home with rescued women and discipled them. The whole idea of that was something that I absolutely loved and desired for myself. I already had a passion for women’s ministry, but I hadn’t really given it too much thought before.
One Saturday night, we went to a prayer night with YWAMer’s and I sat in the middle of the room on the chair so that people could pray for me. A group of them came up to me and started to speak over me. Again, somebody spoke up saying that I would be a leader for women.
Another person spoke over me saying that when they prayed, they saw a picture of me giving money bags to God, and in exchange, He was giving me eternal riches to pour out over people. My first thought was that I would step away from my career as a nurse, where I was financially secure, and hand that completely over to the Lord and in exchange, go in another direction that the Lord would guide me in.
That night, I started praying about what that could look like, and what could I possibly do about it? I don’t know how or where to get started, but I also didn’t want to focus on it because I was only in month 4 of the race at that point.
The following month in India, we worked in different orphan homes with 10 kids per home where they lived with the pastor and his wife being discipled and raised up as men and women of God. I loved the whole concept of this type of home because they were living in community with one another. It was so much more than a pastor and his wife taking care of the kids… they were doing Bible studies with them, singing worship songs, praying together, growing them, and helping them to be a light for the darkness that is around them in the villages.
In India, it just clicked for me. My heart for discipleship started beating and I couldn’t shake the idea. I told my teammate, Kelsea, and she explained what G42 is and how they could help me learn more about this passion that the Lord has placed in me. It’s something that intimidated me because I would have to fundraise… again. So I just prayed about it and asked God for clarification. I wanted to know that this was something God wanted and not something I selfishly wanted.
I told my squad leader, Myles about it as we were leaving India to go to Malaysia, and he encouraged it so much and explained even more what G42 is. He encouraged me to just apply. What could it hurt to just apply, right?
I told him that I was scared and wasn’t sure if this was for me.
In Malaysia, I was still tackling the thought of being scared and continued to pray through that. Well, one day, my teammate Haley gave me a listening prayer note that said, “I see you standing on the edge of the cliff and you’re scared, but God is telling you to jump and he’ll help you fly”.
I instantly knew that it was regarding G42 (which I hadn’t talk to anyone about on my team except Kelsea). So, that night, I applied. I was scared, but once I clicked on the final submission, I felt so much peace and knew that God was going to be with me regardless of if I get in or not.
I found out just the other day that I have been accepted into G42! I will be going to Mijas, Spain to pursue my dream of learning what I need to be able to disciple women with the giftings that God has given me. It’s such an exciting thing to think about.. knowing that this is what the Lord has planned for me next. This is more than just an opportunity to travel to Europe. It’s the next adventure that the Lord will take me on to carry out the plan that He has for me.
If you’d like to know more about what this next step is, e-mail me or message me and I’d love to tell you more! Please keep me in your prayers as I continue on the race and for this next step after the race is over. 🙂
if you would like to financially support me for G42, click on this link
http://www.g42leadershipacademy.org/donate
#AlexsAsianInvasion
