I’m standing here, on solid ground. I feel the dirt and grass under my feet, below that there are miles upon miles of solid earth. Holding me, the reason I am standing: a solid foundation. My toes dangle off the edge, flirting with the idea of what waits below. I see the depth, the height and I hesitate. I turn around, try and talk myself out of it, but to the cliff I still return.
Looking out into the sky, I close my eyes. I take in the calm, the peace of the edge; weighing it, judging it, making sure it is just that… Peace.
I’ve decided to jump but it is not time yet….
My solid cliff is the World Race. The World Race is certainty, 9 months of my life planned, and that’s comforting. Serving God and loving people. Growing and learning more about who God is. Letting people from around the world teach me about how they see God and know God.
Traveling, that’s my forte. Studying language and cultures, that’s my heart. Meeting people I otherwise wouldn’t, one of my favorite things.
The World Race had my name written all over it and God called me to it. He asked me to follow Him to the ends of the earth and I said “yes”. This is the life I want to have, not just live out for a year and then go into the typical American dream. I want my life as a representation to serve and be obedient to God’s calling.
Sometimes being obedient to God’s calling means stepping away from everything you had planned and you thought God had planned for you.
For the last month, I have been struggling with this idea of jumping off my safe cliff…
It all started in Thailand when I heard, “At the end of the month you are going home”. I pushed it out of my head but I couldn’t shake the idea. I wanted to write it off as just some strange thought but I couldn’t forget it. I didn’t know whether this was an attack from the enemy or from God. I searched my own heart… Was I wanting to go home? Was I trying to convince myself that I should? Am I running from God and His plan? Am I avoiding growth or trying not to face something God is asking me to?
Honestly… I started freaking out. I wanted to hear from God so bad… I wanted a straight answer. I wanted to hear the audible voice from God telling me what He wanted. I cried out, stressed, begging God to hear Him say what made the most sense, what everyone expected of me… I wanted to hear Him say, “stay, finish this out, travel the world, serve me throughout the nations”. I didn’t, I heard silence. Or what I thought was silence… God had spoken and I didn’t want to accept it. I kept taking what I heard and my heart to the Lord.
I kept fighting this idea hard… For many reasons. Crying at the thought of leaving and saying goodbye to everyone. This is my family. They’re some of the closest friends, brothers and sisters, in Christ I have ever had. This is the best, the most challenging, loving community I have ever been a part of… I don’t want to leave it.
As the weeks went on, I started letting go. I was tired of fighting… Exhausted even. Fighting God is always a losing battle.
I had bronchitis and had been to the hospital twice for being sick. I was tired of trying to figure everything out, get the answers I wanted, and be reassured by people and not God.
I turned to Him, I was defeated. I just gave up all I wanted and begged to just rest in God’s presence, I just wanted to feel Him with me again.
I started to lay more and more things at His feet. Like my boldness, my personality, and other things I had never thought before. He was pushing me to be more and more bold and more confident as the weeks went on in Thailand and the days in Malaysia. This growth and being stretched was new and different for me.
The next three weeks, all the way to Malaysia, I just rested in God’s presence. I asked for peace about what He wanted, to change my heart, take away my selfish desires and give me His, and to let go my expectations and what I think He would or wouldn’t do… Because God wouldn’t call someone away from the Race or a mission’s field, right? That makes no sense.
But through the three weeks from the end of Thailand to the beginning of Malaysia I started to get more and more peace about going home. Then, I felt a call to reach out to the leadership team a second time for guidance and to make them aware that this was still felt like a push from God.
After the leadership team talked with each other, there was no response for them in either direction. They don’t want to see me go, but they also don’t want to take me away from something God is calling me to. They just left the decision up to me… Which went along with what God had been speaking to me all along. “Be bold.”
So…
I am on the edge of this cliff. Standing out looking at an abyss, not knowing at all what God is calling me to or what might be ahead of me. I have decided to jump, to go home and trust God.
I am going home December 30th. Thank you to everyone who has been a part of the journey that is the World Race. Your support then and now means more to me than words on a screen could ever describe. I could never repay the kindness that you have shown by joining me on this journey.
