For the past three days I’ve been thinking wow where did March go? I feel like I have blinked and it’s spring and wildflowers are blooming and summer is sneaking up on me. I’m so not ready for the summer much less September 1st. I keep thinking I have so much time to prepare and so much time to get things I need and raise money, but really it’s not that much time left. It’s going to take 5 months alone for me to say goodbye to my family, my friends, and Texas. It’s so weird that this year I will make my home in 11 different countries all over the world in a tent, a hut, an orphanage, who knows. I have always been taught that home is where the heart is. You know I don’t think I’ve ever really thought about it before. I mean I always considered my parent’s house my home, but even recently I have been calling medina my home. I mean it has been for 2 and a half years. It is where my heart is. It is where God led me. Now, I have to come to terms that I will be getting a new home. God is taking me on a new adventure beyond the Texas Hill Country and into the world. It will be a weird reality. Most days I feel so separated from the world out at camp, like we created a new world, but now my eyes will be opened to the outside world filled with sin and danger where peace is something that is hard to come by and faith is hard to keep. It’s a little scary to think about. You know I think about how to prepare and I’ve realized that it’s more than the packing list. I have to prepare my heart and prepare my mind. I have been going before our Lord asking for guidance in how to do this. I know it’s so helpful to talk to people that have either gone or have even done mission work abroad, but this is a journey that me and God are taking and I know He is the only one that can truly prepare me for what’s about to take place in my life. He is the only one that can prepare my heart and mind and ready me for the race that has been set before me. I am encouraged by Hebrews 12:1-3 which says, “Therefore, since we have been surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”
