My first mission trip outside of Canada was with my church, at the time (St. Andrews in Parry Sound, ON), to Nicaragua. We helped with different sorts of manual labour at the Skylark Retreat Centre where we stayed, visited an orphanage, hosted a sports day camp for the children in the neighbouring village, and visited the women’s ward of the hospital in Managua, among other things. I was 15 at the time, but I believe this is what initially led me to apply for the Global Development Bachelor of Arts program at Queen’s University.
This spring I will be graduating from the program above, and it has been an incredible chance to learn about different world issues from an economic, cultural, and social standpoint, and my interest has only been furthered from the research I have done in the last several years. In fact, last February (2013) I also had the opportunity to go on a mission trip with my church (Bethel Church in Kingston, ON) to Honduras. It was interesting to return to a Central American country, but this time with a background knowledge from my program. Though I entered into a country quite different than my own once more, one thing that remained the same was the incredible amount of love and faith the people that we met there had. Despite the language barrier, and the difference in our appearance and upbringing, the same unconditional love of Jesus Christ was completely present in each one of the Honduran Christians as it was within me. The feelings that I had at the end of the trip were totally new to me – it was difficult to come home at the end of those 8 days, as I felt restless returning to the comfort of my familiar life back in Canada.
That’s when I really felt that God was calling me to step out of my comfort zone yet again – this time, not only for 8 days, but for 11 months. At the time that I returned from Honduras last year, a family friend of mine was 8 months into her journey with the World Race. Reading her blog and seeing pictures of her different adventures on Facebook really challenged me to abandon the comfort of my life in North America to experience the joy of Christ in a new way – in brand new places, among new people, to learn new things.
After lots of prayer, I applied to the World Race this past fall – and here I am! I cannot wait to see all the things God has in store for the Race come next September, and the opportunities He may put in place from this experience!
