I Showed Up Anyway
I met Kayla 10 years ago. It was my first day of university; the Haskayne School of Business orientation lecture. I was more than 25 pounds overweight and my face was covered in acne. I felt insignificant and wished I were invisible as I walked into a lecture hall filled with 300+ business students eager jump-start their undergraduate career. It was the last place I wanted to be that day, but I showed up anyway.
As I was waiting for the orientation to begin, I turned to my left and introduced myself to the girl sitting next to me. Her name was Kayla and she was an international student from Vietnam.
She had been living in Canada for the past three years learning English and studying hard to transfer to the University’s business program. She asked if I was also a transfer student and I shared that no, it was in fact my first official day of university, I had just returned from Bible college in New Zealand.
At the word “bible” her eyes grew wide. She put her hand on my knee and asked, “Are you a Christian?”
Surprised at her enthusiasm I replied with a simple, “Yes”.
“Oh!” She gasped, exuding both gratitude and hope. “I prayed to God I would meet a Christian today!”
Kayla’s sister had recently encountered Jesus for the first time after moving to Singapore and told Kayla she needed to find a Christian to tell her about Jesus; that Christian happened to be me. I did not expect that ‘just showing up’ would be enough to change the trajectory of someone’s life.
Nearly 10 years later, month 6 of my Race, I found myself sitting across from her again, this time in Ho Chi Minh City, where she happened to be for a weekend business trip. Six years had passed since she moved back to Vietnam and yet we hardly skipped a beat.
Conversation flowed with the same ease and vulnerability as when we first connected. We shared highs and lows and everything in between, giving testimony to the Lord’s faithfulness at every turn.
Delicate tears welled up in her eyes and paused for a moment. “Steph”, she said, “You changed my life and I think God brought you here to Vietnam to remind me how much He loves me”.
Of course it’s always encouraging to know that our lives are having an impact but what Kayla didn’t realize is that those same words could have come from my lips:
I think God brought me to [Asia] to remind me how much He loves me.
I didn’t set out to change Kayla’s life 10 years ago. I had just enough courage that day to show up. Jesus changed her life. Similarly, I didn’t set out to run this Race, I just had enough hope to say ‘yes’ to an unlikely invitation and Jesus is changing mine.
I am seven months into this 11-month journey and I still wake up everyday amazed at this life I am living right now; worlds apart from the life I dreamed for myself and yet exactly where I am supposed to be, for me, for Kayla, and for the millions of other men and woman here in Asia who need to know that there is a God who is passionately pursuing them with a fierce, intimate and perfect Love.
The World Race is an epic adventure but it’s also real life, with real people. Wherever we go, there we are, faced with the same daily decision to show up.
I have meet several “Kayla’s” over the past 6 months and along the way I have learned that authentic connection, even if just for a moment, not only has the power to change the trajectory of our lives but the lives of people around us.
Brene Brown speaks about what it means to cultivate authenticity in her book “the Gifts of Imperfection” (for all the perfectionist out there, go buy this book, it’s phenomenal). She writes, “Authenticity is not something we have or don’t have. It’s a practice – a conscious … collection of choices that we have to make everyday. It’s about the choice to show up and be real. The choice to be honest. The choice to let our true selves be seen. Choosing authenticity means cultivating the courage to be imperfect, to set boundaries, and to allow ourselves to be vulnerable”.
Wherever you are, whatever you are called to today, I encourage you to show up. Be real. Be honest. Let you true self be seen, even if you would rather be invisible.
We may not always get to know the impact of our courage to choose authenticity, but I believe we all want the real deal. And we know that waiting to show up until we have it all together is a waste of time, because we’ll always be waiting for something. It’s not about us anyway. Wherever we go, Jesus is already there. I promise. He showed up 2,000 years ago, as real as real gets, and He is still changing the trajectory of lives all over the world.
