There is a moment on the race when you realize that you are far away from home, a moment where you want nothing more to go home, a moment where you realize going home is not going to be easy, and a moment when you realize where home really is.
The moment when I realized that I was far far away from home happened somewhere in Nepal two months into the race. I woke up one morning, crawled out from under the mosquito net, and as I was making my way to the door of the room a rat fell from the ceiling and landed dead a foot in front of my feet. To be honest there are many moments where I have wanted nothing more then to just go home, but these moments are often the moments that lead to brokenness, and from that brokenness always comes comfort and revelation.
Now the moment where I realized that going home is not going to be easy, and the moment when I realized where home really was, happened at the same time. It was our day off and we were looking for a place to eat dinner. We heard another team was in a nearby hotel so we stopped by to say hi. It was a super nice hotel/casino and we found the other team up stairs in one of the restaurants. I walked into the restaurant to give one of the girls a hug when I felt the strangest feeling under my feet. For the first time in nine months I was standing on padded carpet.
This is when it hit me. This is the moment that I realized that going home is not going to be easy. This is the moment that I realized that, ‘home’ is not a place. Home is the people love, it’s the place where your calling is fulfilled, it’s the place where you find time with the Lord. I realized that it’s not my own bed, air conditioning, familiar food, or even padded carpet that I’ve been wanting this whole year. I realized that I wanted to be with the people I love, I wanted a calling to fulfill, I wanted time with the Lord.
I realized I was home, and now I’m afraid of losing it, and that’s why the carpet gave me nightmares.
