Recently I’ve been struggling with how I’m going to raise the rest of my support to be fully funded in less than a week. This blog is my last resort, because it’s something I’ve been putting off posting, and something I honestly did not want to have to post if I didn’t have to. This is me being real and honest about how I feel about support raising and how the World Race has changed my life.
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At the beginning of November, I was challenged by a teammate to be honest with our whole team about how I’ve been struggling with the possibility of not being fully funded by the end of the month. Telling my own teammates about my financial need was one of the hardest, most raw things I’ve had to do since coming on the Race. But it was also one of the most rewarding things I could do, because by being honest about my need and about my struggle, they were able to walk alongside me with it this month. My teammates have prayed for me and with me, shared my blog posts, and as a result of being honest, some of my teammates’ parents have become my supporters. But this, being completely raw and honest about my financial need here on my blog post, is definitely way scarier than opening up about it to my teammates.
Once I post this blog and it becomes live, it’s out there for the world to see. And it’s something I don’t want the world to see, something I’ve been too prideful to admit so openly besides getting the gumption to post updates about where I’m at with my financial goals on my blogs and Facebook every once in a while, is how much I need your (the reader’s) help. Well, today is 4 days away from my final financial goal and deadline for the World Race, and I am not yet fully funded.
The World Race hasn’t just been a dream of mine just since last October when I got accepted. The World Race has been a dream of mine since God placed this dream on my heart in late February or early March of 2015. A woman named Susan Perry came to my college to speak about how she was fundraising for the World Race and told us about how God put that dream on her heart. When she was speaking, my heart started pounding and I knew with every fiber of my body that someday I would go on the World Race as well. I had been praying about an opportunity to go on about a year-long mission trip to go serve God overseas right after college, and this opportunity seemed too good to be true.
I didn’t know specifically where I wanted to go or which country God wanted me in, so 11 countries in 11 months? It sounded perfect to me. I would get to experience 11 different cultures and 11 different ministries on 3 different continents and figure out if God called me specifically to serve in one longer term after the Race. And if He wanted me back home after the Race either serving in ministry somewhere in America or going back to start a job in the field I majored in, well, then at least I had served God well for a year overseas and been stretched and grown in new ways.
In every aspect of my dream of going on the World Race, I never had any doubt in my mind that if God called me to this ministry specifically, that He would provide everything I needed. I didn’t know exactly what that would look like, but I jumped into support-raising head-first for the first time in my life and learned what courage and humility it really took. Want to know a secret? No one likes asking for money. Probably 99% of missionaries fundraising would rather crawl in a hole than ask people to partner with them in their ministry and support them financially. And the other 1%? Well, maybe they just have better people skills than the rest of us, or have such faith that they never doubt what God will provide for them.
Overall, I had no doubt that God would provide. Inside, I was terrified. Ask people for the money they worked for? Why couldn’t I just try to earn it myself? But upon looking at that giant pricetag that came with me going on the World Race, I knew that this was more money than I had ever made in a year, probably more than I’ve ever earned in my whole pre-Bachelor’s degree life. But this blog is my personal invitation to you, reader, to join me in this dream that I’ve had for a year and a half now.
I’ve been on the mission field for almost 4 months so far. The initial excitement has worn off, but I’ve grown to love the World Race for all it really is. Adventures in Missions’ plan for the World Race is that it’s a mission trip that pushes Christians from the ages of 21-35 out of their comfort zones to become who God created them to be in order that they can use their God-given talents to bring God’s Kingdom to the whole world. Being in month 4, I’ve experienced moments full of sorrow and full of joy, I’ve been stretched outside my limits of uncomfortableness, I’ve experienced culture-shock in most of the places we’ve been (because, haha, I’m one of the few Racers on my squad where this is both my first time out of the United States and my first time on a mission trip of any kind), but I’ve also grown a lot in Christ and in learning how to reach others for Christ.
Something I have learned? It all starts with love. Whether or not you can speak their language, you can still teach children games, you can still send the elderly woman down the street a smile every morning, and you can still bring along one of the locals with you to help spread the Gospel in their native language. The World Race is a lot more than a mission trip. Our leaders are discipling each one of us to become leaders ourselves in the way God created us so that we can reach the unreached in different countries around the world, and so we can continue to be that mature Christian man or woman God created us to be when we return back home.
I can honestly say that if I did not reach my fundraising goal by Nov. 30th and I got sent home that I would not be the same Geneva that left. Don’t get me wrong, I would still be myself, I would just be more of myself that God created me to be because I have been stripped away of everything that used to define me at home and forced to face God and seek Him in new ways. I have learned a lot about my identity in Christ, about healthy communication, and about how to say “yes” for what God has for me, even though that might seem different than how I pictured that to be.
But most importantly, even though I have grown a lot in Christ, I am not yet done learning what He has for me in this season of my life. God sent me on the World Race for a reason, and if I was sent home right now because I didn’t raise all my support in time, it wouldn’t be the end of the world, but I also definitely wouldn’t reach my full potential of the plans God has for me right now in this season of my life.
The World Race is not a piece of cake. Most days it’s really hard, but it’s those challenging days that really shape you into who you’re meant to be. This wasn’t meant to be a journey of going overseas to go on vacation or to find myself, but a mission trip of seeking after God for whatever He has for me each day and learning how to love like He does in order to extend that love to everyone I meet.
One of my most fervent prayers recently has been, “God, please let me be so filled full of You that I would be overflowing with love to everyone I meet.” This is not something that just happens overnight, but something that takes time how to learn how to cultivate. I’m sure God could use me to do something back at home, but I also have an even stronger feeling that He’s not finished with me yet in this season of me being on the World Race. There are still things He can teach me here that I don’t believe I’d be able to learn as quickly back at home. This season of dependence on the Lord has been real, and real difficult. But it has also been a beautiful season of blossoming into who God the Father created me to be as his daughter.
Please help me to not give up on this dream now, while there is still so much more that the Father is teaching me. If you would like to help me stay on the World Race, you can help by praying for me to be fully funded by Nov. 30th, by clicking “donate” on my support bar in the upper right of this page, or by sharing this blog on social media or with someone you know. Even just $5, $10, or some other amount the Lord has placed on your heart goes a long way!
As always, I am ever grateful and humbled by your support. Without your help, I would not be here on the field today in Month 4 of the World Race! Thank you so much!!
A very Happy Thanksgiving (a few days late!) to all my family, friends, and supporters back home! Love you all so much!
