I cannot believe that an entire month has already passed on the World Race. It truly feels like we left Georgia a week ago. We traveled for 4 days in order to get to our first ministry site in Guija, Mozambique. While our month was short with the Christian Bible Institute, God was at work in my life and in our two teams. Looking back, these are some of the things I will take away from the first month.
You Have to Buy In
During training and launch, alumni World Racers kept reiterating that you have to buy into what the World Race is. You can walk away from this incredible experience one of two ways. You either walk away seeing different cultures and getting great pictures, or you walk away with a deeper connection with God, His people, and His purpose. And the choice is solely in your hands. As our squad came back together, people going through the exact same things would have completely different experiences and it was all because some bought in to what the World Race is and some were holding onto the comforts of the states.
Our Host was Amazing
Tienie (ten-e) is a South African man who gave up his life to move to Guija in order to love on the elderly, widows, orphans, and terminally ill people. He is linked with His Church in South Africa and he has spent the past 9 years building relationships in this community. Not only is his life an amazing story of living for Christ, but his character is wonderful. We were two all-women teams, and we walked away feeling like Tienie was a father figure. He would crack corny jokes, tell us the weather in the mornings, help us with our dietary needs, and take care of us when we were sick. He is a great man who stewards the gifts God has given him with grace, and I couldn’t have been blessed with a better host.
Relationships are So Important
I feel like this is going to prove true throughout my race, but God made us for relationships, and we need to put value and time into the relationships God puts into our lives. The community we were in was based on relationships. Our host’s ministry was based completely on relationships. Him and his team goes out every day and talks to people and helps people. When we walked through the community, every story was about how the people had nothing, but Tienie and the church would visit. Value your relationships because they add value to your life.
My Home Community is Very Strong
One of the hardest parts of the month was feeling like I was alone (even in a house with 11 other women). Back at home, I have a best friend that pushes me to grow and is walking in the Bible with me, I have a boyfriend that encourages me to believe in who I am, and I have a church family that will pray over you if you ask (and even when you don’t). A lot of people don’t have that support back home. I felt so blessed that I did, even though it made coming into a new community difficult.
Spiritual Warfare is Real
The first day, our host told us about the witches that live in the community. He said that it’s real, and the way he most sees them work is through disunity. In my head, that equated to fighting and gossip. But spiritual warfare is real and the devil likes to subtly screw things up. And it happened. Half of us felt alone and that there weren’t people we could depend on. Then others felt like we couldn’t hear God and that He wasn’t talking to us. It was only after we left Guija for debrief that we realized the devil was at war and the disunity that we had warned about had weaved it’s way into our community.
The devil doesn’t want us to succeed. But we are fighting from the side of victory, meaning that the only way we can lose is if we give up. I saw 12 women fighting this first month and because we refused to give up, we walked away feeling like we had made good relationships and that even the 112-degree weather couldn’t ruin our first month. 10 months left!
