Don’t forget the milk, I mentally noted since I didn’t write down my to-do list today.
I was about to run out of milk at home, but on a larger scale, I was about to run out of the self-confidence, passion, and faith in the Race that I hadn’t even started. So what happened today at the grocery store when I was getting the milk was exactly what I needed from God to keep me going and get my head and heart fully back in the game.
Today, I failed miserably. I relapsed in a sin I’d been struggling with for a while and which I’ve been confiding in a spiritual mentor and friend of mine. I have been relapsing and relapsing to the point of apathy, and it frightened me. Simultaneously, my struggle with this recurring sin kept me from believing I was fit for doing the World Race.
For now, allow it to suffice to say that it was an ongoing struggle between the whims of the flesh and the loving tug of an almighty God. Whenever I messed up and did the same old sin again, I’d have this thought, “I’m not even worthy.” I didn’t feel like I had the missionary material needed to help others when I couldn’t even help my own soul.
On top of that, I’m leaving a place I’ve called home for the past 3 years and 3 months. If I’m awkward at hello’s, I’m terrible at goodbye’s and there are just too many of those that I’ll need to be facing in the 3 months I have left in South Korea. “Do I really need to say those goodbye’s right now?” Another doubt seeping in.
How about that personal calling? You know, Christine, the one God supernaturally gave you 2 years ago to help the North Korean people? I don’t see North Korea on the country list for World Race… Hmm, think you might have missed something there? So many around me, with the best of intentions, echoed this very same self-doubt.
And so, my own was compounded into the monster burden I’ve been carrying around for the past couple of months… Like Cheryl’s “Monster” backpack from “Wild”:
So the idea of a Plan B had its slow and painful birth: What if I give this up and do something else instead?
With a plethora of Plan B’s out there, it would’ve been totally, almost wondrously feasible and not a whim less appropriate than doing the Race. From the human eyes’ perspective, at least.
But God gave me a mission, and that is the mission He reaffirmed today in my wildly wandering soul at the grocery market as I was picking up the milk.
At the register, I noticed a foreigner in front of me who had just rung up her groceries–a very sweet, youthful curly-and-blonde-haired young lady whose name I later learned is Leanna (sp? Apologies to the lovely girl if the spelling’s off!). Well, I was so used to foreigners all around me in Korea by now, and the novelty of running into one had worn off when I soon realized that we are everywhere. So I had no intention whatsoever to even give a second glance to Leanna, let alone strike up a conversation.
But for some reason, I looked up at her again before she gathered her purchased goods to ask the old fallback question, “So how long have you been here?”
“Two days,” L replied.
“Really? You must be teach English here?” Don’t we all. Well, very nearly.
“Actually, I’m serving with my team at an orphanage now.”
Oh? “Oh, that’s cool. I used to serve in a North Korean orphanage.”
I don’t know what exactly led me to play Inspector Gadget, but I just kept asking more and more questions, stepping beyond the “small talk” boundaries and trying to get the specifics of who-what-when-where-why.
“So are you, like, with an NGO…?”
“Actually, my team and I are here with a program called the World Race.”
Wait. Whaaaaaaaaaat?????!!!!!!!!!!!!
“Wait. What?! I’m doing it next January! Expedition!” I gleefully proclaimed, surprised at my suddenly confident declaration.
“No way!”
“Oh, my gosh!”
Oh, my God!!! Is this really happening now?!!
We proceeded to have a nice little chat that led to me meeting the rest of the team that was out shopping along with Leanna, and that ended with me giving my contact information to one of the girls so we could have a chance to chat further before they headed out from Korea.
Since we had both already rung up our groceries, we started heading out from the store together too. I also found out that the place where they were living and serving was “nearby,” and I soon realized just how nearby “nearby” was. We were taking all the same turns and walking across the same bridge, past the same waterfall park and bus stop.
We were literally at the street corner of my place when I asked, “So where are you ladies at? My home is just up there.”
“We’re right over there.” One of them pointed at the white, fenced-off building that I had always seen but never looked at whenever I walked past it, which was everyday. This place–an orphanage with painted animals outside and a little basketball court indoors–was literally adjacent from my home! We could have made a telephone cup line between us!
As we began to part ways, I felt my heart leaping at the possibility of spending a little more time with these ladies before they depart for home. Since this is month 11 for them (and by the way, they were looking so gorgeous and energized when I’d expected the total opposite for the last-month Racers), we made some tentative plans to get together some time, either at my place or perhaps at a Taco Bell whose existence in Korea had been mysteriously rumored to them. I’m really looking forward to an evening with these girls, hearing their stories and testimonies, and maybe even throwing in some local sightseeing if they have the time!
And well, that’s how my most important, unwritten to-do item today came to be. Surely, most certainly, definitely, without another seeping doubt, God knew I needed this, all of this–
Not just the mess-up relapse this morning and tearful confession to my beautiful, always-listening spiritual mentor and bbang sister, who kindly assures me it’s okay to be “uninhibited” with her even on my Debbie-Downer days…
Not just the long walk home, thinking and doubting myself and my will and my future and God’s plan and whether or not I’m worthy of such a thing…
Not just the doubts of those around me, whom I realize and appreciate actually care about me enough to express it. I am so grateful, because I know you want the best for me, and for our future as we journey forth…
And certainly not just the milk! Though that trip was absolutely pivotal to lead me to this group of World Race ladies (Team H, I believe?) who encouraged, inspired, and re-motivated me to believe I’d be in their shoes one day very soon!
On top of all this, covering all of me, is His love, expressed through divine reaffirmation, His providence in reassuring me that there is, was, and never will be a Plan B. We’re sticking with the original blueprint, which He personally and purposefully fitted for my life, and we’re moving forward with a renewed sense of passion, excitement, and faith that THIS–World Race January 2016 Expedition Route–is it! Bam!
Still need to do a lot of stuff, loads of stuff, but now I’m not carrying Monster. I’m laying it down for good and picking up my passion again so I can eagerly, belatedly, finally take a single sturdy step forward. Journey of a thousand!
