“You never know when or where or how God will invade the routine of your life.”
– In the Pit With a Lion on a Snowy Day, Mark Batterson
The World Race was nothing that I had in mind at the beginning of this year. The only plans I had made at the beginning of this year was to go to Guatemala in May. In February I made plans to travel to London by myself for 12 days in March. It was an amazing experience and I was so glad I made the decision to go. It is definitely a safe and easy place to solo travel to, especially being a female and having never solo travelled before. I learned a lot about myself and how much I could handle traveling the world. At the end of March I hadn’t even thought about the World Race any this year. May came quickly and I was then boarding a plane to travel to Antigua, Guatemala for 3 weeks. A portion of that trip was a mission trip, while the rest of it was me staying extra simply to be there longer. I have connections in Guatemala that will last a lifetime. My heart is left in each place I travel. Coming back from Guatemala I knew God was incorporating missions into the plan for my life. My plan while in Guatemala was to travel to Thailand in 2015 for 3 months and minister to the women who are working in the bars in Thailand. I had talked about how awesome it would be to go on the World Race and how in the long run thats what I wanted to do eventually, but it never crossed my mind that was going to be God’s plan for me in 2015. It’s crazy how fast God can invade the plan or routine that you have set out for your life. It’s in a simple moment that plans to attend a college, plans to travel, and plans to spend your next year are completely changed by God.
It was in July that I was planning in less than 4 weeks to start attending University of Alabama at Birmingham when I knew God was calling me to go on the World Race. I was supposed to be registering for classes the week that I started filling out the application for the World Race. I completely changed every plan I had for myself before I was even accepted to go on the World Race, because I knew that that was what God was calling me to do. I didn’t register for my classes at UAB, instead I registered for one online class at a local community college to give me more time to work full time to save money for the World Race. I went out and even bought my pack for the race, because even though I hadn’t been accepted to go yet I had to take a step of faith showing God that I believed He would provide for the plans He had made for me. After my interview process was when I began to worry and doubt the step of faith that I had made. I thought that what I had just done was crazy and that I wasn’t even going to get in. I had to let that moment of worry and doubt go, because there was no way I was going to be able to get through this by worrying. I asked God to give me peace about it all and He did. A week later I got the call that I was accepted to go on the World Race after I had just prayed that morning whether God’s answer be ‘yes’ to ‘no’ that I would have peace about it either way.
After going through the whole process of being accepted and seeing God’s goodness through it all I am still learning to see His’ goodness through it all. There have been days within the past two months I have worried about fundraising, whether I’m going to be able to do this for 11 months, and how far I will be from everyone I love. It has definitely been a growing process in my walk with God and I have learned through it that He is always here with me. I believe that there will still be times between now and next July that I will have moments of doubt and worry, but thats when I must turn to God and believe He will get me through it. Next week I am sending out fundraising letters and ask that as I send out those letters that you would be in prayer with me that God will provide and give me peace through the fundraising process. Also, if you’d like you can click on the support me tab and help me get started with the fundraising process early before my letters even go out. Most importantly I ask that you would keep me in your prayers that I would continue to see God’s provision through this whole process.
