Pictures soon to come, I promise! (although nothing much to show yet, just training in a church on Fort Lauderdale.)
REAL QUICK: I want to do a blog theme of “11 months of ______”. Each day I will do a picture or video of one specific thing in that theme and put them all together as an album or montage. Possible ideas I have had are each dinner, peoples feet, windows, crosses, hands, and eyes. If you have one of these that you really like, or a completely different idea that would be a cool picture, please comment and give me your input!
LAUNCH.
I love the World Race….ok, to be fair, it is day 2 of launch (check back in month 7 ish).
But seriously.
I love that the entire focus of the thing is loving and serving each other, growing into the people God called us to be, recognizing our identity in Christ, worshipping ALWAYS, developing relationships, and changing the world….one person and one moment at a time.
There is something about the environment that is just so powerful and uplifting and focused on what matters. A place where it is normal to always hear a guitar being played and worship songs being sung, seeing people praying together or reading their Bibles or journaling, a place where every person we see or meet is an opportunity to reach out.
I know what a lot of you are thinking. What a bunch of hippie, tree-hugging weirdos that need to step back into the real world. (because the countries we are going to and the time that will pass is in an imaginary world? yeah, I have yet to understand such remarks…)
But that is actually way off the mark….we have married couples who had homes and mortgages payments; 35 year olds that had established homes and people to marry; some people who had jobs in major banking and finance industries, some with jobs in nursing and teaching, others with jobs that had them quickly climbing the corporate America ladder. On the “education and career” front that people so often measure their success against, we have everything from high school diplomas to dual Masters degrees from prestigious schools.
Of course some of us love walking around barefoot and putting dreads in our hair, but there is no shortage of “Put some shoes on ya big hippie!” being playfully shouted across the room. Others have their designer jeans and boots, nice make up, and hair straighteners; some have skinny jeans and converse sneakers; others are decked out in athletic gear and running shoes.
Some people have never been on a mission trip, others have spent years in missions; we come from backgrounds ranging from conservative Southern Baptist to off-the-beaten-path liberal churches.
The point is, we are all very different people, but we all have one very important thing in common that unifies us all: our love for Jesus and desire to serve Him. The sense of love and community that comes out of that is unmatched in any arena I have ever encountered. Constantly giving each other feedback and building each other up is SO refreshing from the usual tirade of gossip and back-stabbing that often goes on in the so called “real world”. So for this reason, more than any other, I love the World Race.
If you are thinking about going on the World Race, if you love reading the blogs and watching the videos and fantasizing about doing it….please, please pray about it and consider if it is a place God wants you. Whatever you do, don’t let fear of technical details (car payments, careers, student loans, etc.) stop you. The stories I have heard about God working that stuff out would give you chills.
We fly into La Libertad, El Salvador tomorrow morning and hit the ground running….I hope to update again soon once we arrive!
