We finished up ministry in Cambodia and it was wonderful. It was a much needed month of joy with the kids, dancing, and playing volleyball. We ended our time there the same way we started it…with a dance party!! It was super fun.
We left Phnom Penh and have been in Siem Reap for a few days now for Debrief. This debrief has mainly been talking about re-entry back into the States after the Race. That wonderful question of, “what’s next”? It’s a big question. There are several options. I could get home and freak out (which will happen for a short while). I could dive right into job interviews for engineering. I could continue working and growing witth AIM. I could do any number of things really. So how on earth do I decide?
Well luckily the pressure is off of me because I know that God will reveal exactly what He wants me to be doing when the time is right. One thing I do know though, is that there is no turning back from this experience. I will never be the same person I was before this journey. I’ve seen God move and come alive. I’ve seen the world. I’ve seen things in this world that are absolutely unnacceptable. Things that are going to continue unless someone does something about it. So one thing I know for sure is that life is not going to be comfortable for me. This world is not about me. I’ve been healed and changed and transformed in so many ways and others need to know about it. The world needs what I have. So the question is, the things that tore me up and broke my heart on the Race, did they tare me up bad enough that I’m willing to sacrafice my life for the Kingdom of God and not go home to my comfy couch and do something about it. I don’t know what that looks like exactly. Truth is, I may never know. I’m just going to have to lay it all down, and walk out in faith and do it.
I get to come home on May 12th. I GET to come home. I get to come home to family and friends and community and a church and ice cream and cake and double cheeseburgers and a big juicy steak. But I’m not ok with the fact that I get to do that while at the same time, so many of my dear friends in Ukraine, Romania, Ireland, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, Nicaragua, and El Salvador don’t have that. In fact, they don’t have homes, they don’t have parents, they don’t have money to put food on the table. So they are on the streets, they are begging, they are hopeless, they are scared, they are tired and weary, they are selling their bodies to feed they’re children, they are crying out for help. Those faces are not just going to disappear. I have to keep going. I have to keep answering God when He calls me to put on a bigger coat and do bigger things to bring Him glory.
So where do I go from here? Who the heck knows. But I know that God is worth the risk. God is worth me giving up a bed and worth me eating rice and beans everyday and worth me smelling like a dead skunk and scratching dirt off myself and worth me getting Malaria and whatever other diseases and parasites are all up in my grill. He’s worth it. Do you think He’s worth it? Will you come with me? Will you continue to partner with me? Will you make sacrafices and be radical? Will you answer God when He calls you?
I don’t know what my next step is. But I have vision. One that is bigger than I can fit all the pieces to. Are you ready to run with me?
