The first thing any World Race Alumni will tell you is to let go of any expectations you have for the Race. This first means you have to recognize what expectations you actually have. My biggest one is that after this year I wanted to know what to do with the rest of my life. Of course at training camp that was the exact example of an expectation that they told us to surrender. Another expectation I had was that I would get to go back to South Africa. I actually didn’t know this was one of mine until all of our assigned African countries changed at launch, and I had to wrestle through some serious disappointment.
Another expectation I have for this year is to have some crazy, epic, adventurous stories. Watch any World Race video and try not to let the background music stir up some excitement for adventure. Watch kids dance, see the glimpses of worship and prayer. There are clips of bungee jumping, elephant riding, and tarantula eating (alright I did do that one). There are hundreds of these videos, now can I not expect this?
I expect to be used in awesome powerful ways this year. But maybe that’s another expectation I don’t get to keep. I want God to move in mighty ways. I want the epic, the pillar of fire, the flames of tongues. But what if He wants to be a dove or a whisper?
Right now, God has been telling me to move and obey without an explanation. I feel like a little kid when my Dad tells me to go to my room or play outside, and I ask why. Of course I will obey, but I wanna know why. When you tell me you have a surprise for me, I want to know what the surprise is right this second. And if you won’t tell me, I’ll spend all of my energy trying to figure out what it is.
I think God wants to surprise me. I think He wants me to obey him even when I don’t understand. I think He wants me to hear his voice even if it’s just a whisper.
So I’m trying. I’m not great at this by any means. He tells me to pray for a man, and I finish my lunch first and then obey. I pray for healing for his missing leg, and guess what. Nothing happens. I’m sure there are things I will never see. I can’t see Heaven; I can’t see God. There are just somethings that happen in the Spiritual Realm that I don’t get to see this side of eternity, and I’m learning to be okay with that.
But other things, other things like seeing people get healed or seeing people’s heart change- those things I don’t see. Yet. I wonder if I would be okay coming home without an epic story. I wonder if simply trusting that I obeyed God would be enough. Right now, I don’t think it is. And that’s okay, because it’s a process.
But if I spent 11 months loving people I will never see again, if I pour out my heart, if I leave it open and exposed able to be broken again and again, that would be enough.
If you read the Bible and all you walk away with is a collection of pretty epic stories, then you miss the point. All of the stories are about Love, Perfect Love and how He loves. You can have stories without love, but that’s just pointless. I can go to a movie theater for that.
Right now, I want to love. I want it to be fierce and scary and the kind of love that hurts because you truly see people and feel their pain. And you love them and you take their pain, and if you can’t take away their pain, if healing doesn’t come, well at least you shared their pain. That’s not just a story I want. That’s a life I want.
