That question is one I've heard many times over the past few years. I guess that's the thing about having a passion you talk about all the time – people expect to see you fulfilling it.
When I tell people about World Race, what I usually end up saying is, "This has been a long time coming." I grew up in the church, and when I started short-term mission trips in high school I was hooked. I began to fall more in love with the Jesus I was getting to know better all the time, and I wanted to serve the way he did – simply, with love and compassion. After college, I began searching for longer service opportunities. When I got the chance to intern with Mission Lazarus in Honduras, I felt like God was throwing open a door I'd been searching for in the dark. At the same time, I'd fallen into a pretty comfortable and complacent pattern. I'd gotten used to being a homebody, and the thought of heading off into the unknown was pretty daunting. I was excited about Honduras, but a part of me was secretly hoping that I would get this crazy missionary idea out of my system.
Anyone who has ever heard me talk about my time in Honduras knows that this idea of serving God's people abroad has worked it's way so deep there was no going back. When my fellow interns and I were evacuated from Honduras due to a military uprising in 2009, I was devastated. I immediately began to set plans in motion to go back. The call to go and serve was burning inside me, and all I could think about was answering.
Then the door slammed shut.
I wasn't able to return to Honduras. I lost confidence in my calling. I was still searching, but at times it felt like a blind search. The door wasn't just shut in the dark anymore; now it seemed locked, with obstacles in front of it, and all the distractions of life keeping me from finding the key. I spent several years working at a job I had thought would be temporary, still unable to imagine a life where I didn't respond to the desire God had put in my heart to serve his people abroad. I spent these years missing what it felt like to be doing what I was made to do. When I first heard about the World Race, I spent months agonizing and considering before officially making the decision to go. Of course, I realized then that accepting this call had been inevitable from the beginning.
Hebrews 12:25: "See to it that you do not refuse Him who speaks."
So here I am. I can't wait throw myself into God's plan and see the life he has for me once I'm not in the driver's seat anymore! Thank you to everyone who has been supporting me with prayer, advice, and a good hard shove when I tried to talk myself out of this.
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