As I listened to a podcast from my church in Portland, I was reminded of where I was a year ago. The teaching was rooted in Genesis. God had told man to be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth (Genesis 1:28). Yet after the flood, Noah’s sons found a good plain and settled there. According to the command to man, settling was an act of disobedience.
This was mirrored in the New Testament. Jesus said to his disciples, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Yet it wasn’t until Acts 8, after Stephen was martyred, that the believers were scattered according to the geography of Acts 1:8. The pattern was established: the command to go and the eventual settling.
Every day we face the decision to settle for an easy life or to scatter to be fruitful and multiply, to make disciples. Last year I felt the shake-up. I knew that I had settled in Portland because it was easy. I had heard the command to go, but I had settled. As an INFP (Myers-Briggs talk), I make big decisions based on how I feel. Last year (and honestly before that) I had felt uneasy in my spirit because I knew I was not being obedient to God’s call on my life.
When the World Race came onto my radar last June, it was like the stagnant waters had been stirred up. Like I had been in a daze but was woken up and excited back to life! The decision to apply, sell most of my stuff, sell my car–it was all easy because I knew this is what God was calling me to do next. The past two weeks have come with confirmation that this is indeed where I am supposed to be. The lack of anxiety I had in traveling to Guatemala, beginning the Race; the excitement in saying goodbye to the States (by the way, sorry if I didn’t seem sad enough; I was just so ready and excited to go!); the acceptance of being in a place where I have to throw toilet paper in the trash instead of flushing it down the toilet. I don’t care about that. Because I am where I am supposed to be.
Further confirmation came through a comment on a picture I had posted. My best friend commented that I look the happiest I have been in a long time. I really am.
