In January, I will be leading a Passport trip to Nicaragua.
I will be co-leading with an amazing woman of God, Shawndell St John. Over the
last couple of days I have been asking for support from my friends and family
and God is providing! Let me explain a little of how I got to where I am today.
I’ll start with telling you that when I got back from The
World Race I was thrilled to be home. I loved everything about being home. I
was able to be with my family and friends in Memphis, I was signed up to get
back in school, I could eat whatever I wanted, I could go to the gym and I was
independent again! Believe it or not, I was so excited about going back to
school because I was ready to learn more about business and stretch my brain. My
intentions were to go back to school to finish my degree and then hopefully
start a career. I followed through with going back to school and have done very
well in school. The semester is almost done and I am passing all of my classes
with A’s right now.
About half way into the semester I was at school and God put
The World Race on my heart so heavily that I could not help but pray and ask
God what was up. I could not get The World Race off of my mind so I started
praying. When I prayed, I asked God what He was trying to tell me and
immediately He responded “I want you to squad lead�. So I said ok God I will
obey you and follow you wherever you want me to go. I kept praying and asking
God when He wanted me to squad lead and He told me “January�.
I thought January was
really soon but I still said ok God I will trust you and if you want me to lead
in January then that is what I am going to do. It wasn’t the easiest decision
because I wanted to finish my degree and I am so close to doing that. However,
I knew that I needed to follow Gods plan instead of my plan.
I started looking
into The World Race for trips leaving in January and did not find any. From
there, I kept praying asking God if I was hearing Him correctly. I didn’t get
an immediate response from Him so I decided that if He wanted me to lead in
January then He would make it happen.
A couple weeks later I was on Facebook and saw that one of
my friends was leading a passport trip. Let me explain what Passport is before
I go on any further. The Passport is
Adventures in Missions’s missions program for college-age (18-22 years old)
individuals. Passporters spend 1-9 months securing their identity in Christ,
getting equipped and growing empowered to advance God’s kingdom alongside local
churches and ministries overseas. In addition to sharing and living out the
gospel, contending for justice on behalf of orphans, the poor, and the
trafficked mark the ministry experience of the Passport.
Now that you know what the program is, I will go on with the
story. I saw that a friend was leading a Passport trip in January and
immediately God started working in my heart and speaking to me. I asked Him if
this is where He wanted me to go to squad lead. I felt like He said yes but I
needed more confirmation before I made this huge decision. Throughout the next
couple of weeks, I kept praying about it and God kept confirming that He wanted
me to go. There has not been one time when I heard God say don’t go.
After much prayer and confirmation, I called Adventures in
Missions and interviewed with them for leadership. A week later, I was accepted
to lead a trip. I really wanted to go to Nicaragua and wanted to stay as far
away from Africa as I could. I had a rough time in Africa while I was on the
World Race and thought I could be used more efficiently somewhere else.
Not to my surprise, when Kayla called me to tell me I was
accepted to lead a Passport trip, she also said the only trip for a male leader
that we have left is the African expedition trip. It was to the same countries
I had already been to. I thought about declining Kayla’s offer but God had
confirmed it to me in so many ways that He wanted me to lead a Passport trip so
I said “Ok, God has confirmed it to me that He wants me to do this so I am
going to follow Him wherever He leads me�.
After accepting to lead the trip to Africa, I got a call
back from Kayla later that day telling me that some circumstances had changed
and I may have an opportunity to lead a trip to Nicaragua instead of Africa. I
didn’t know for another week where I would be going but I put my trust in God.
Then on November 29, 2011 I found out that I would be leading a trip to
Nicaragua!
So here I am, fully putting my trust in God, about to lead
10-15 college age students on a four month journey in Nicaragua. Please keep
praying for me as I embark on this journey to follow God around the world.
