Exactly one year ago today started the first steps of this wild journey ……
I was on American soil in Chattanooga, Tennessee at The World Race training camp. It was a week of intensity. It was a week of passion. It was a week of tears. It was a week of fun. It was a week of adventure. It was a week of pursuing the Lord. It was a week of community. It was a week of preparation.
Although I really don't think anything could have actually prepared me for this year.
This has been a year full of ups and downs, sides and turns and learning how to stand level when everything around you is spinning. I have been to over a dozen countries and honestly can't even begin to count how many different cities, possibly over 50? I have traveled by plane, train, automobile, bus, motorcycle, subway, bicycle, ferry, tuk tuk and on foot.
This has been a year full of tangibly seeing the Lord move throughout the nations. One thing I am sure; the Kingdom of God is advancing. There is so much Hope for this world! I have literally seen God show up time and time again, over and over. God is real and His desire is for His people to know love, be loved and be love.
This has been a year of waking up and embracing my identity. This has been a year of the walls in my heart crashing down. This has been a year of letting go of fear, hurts, anger, hesitations, offenses and embracing forgiveness, grace, mercy and peace. This has been a year of coming to know who my Heavenly Daddy is on a deeper level and resting in His arms and embrace as His little girl.
As I sit here on my bunk in the last and final weeks of my trip I reflect and am overcome with emotions. This has been one crazy year! But God isn't finished with me or with my squad or with the nations, we will finish strong and we will finish well. As Jim Elliot would say 'where ever you are, be all there.'
My heart remains in the hands of my God, open, beating, exposed, and fully alive, expecting to not only see Kingdom come but to be an active participant in the coming Kingdom and story of redemption.
So a year ago today I rang in the 4th of July in the middle of the woods in Tennessee… this year I will ring it in on a rooftop of a YWAM missions base in Penang, Malaysia. God is good!!!!
