You asked the questions, we answered them! Here is a list of the most commonly asked questions we’ve received from people back home!
Q: What has been your favorite country so far?
A: It’s so hard to pick a favorite! I have a couple favorites for different reasons. I would say that Cambodia & Thailand have the most beautiful landscapes and I LOVED the hot, humid weather. They also had the friendliest people I’ve ever met in my life! I loved the food and our experience with ministry those months because we got to share the Gospel with people who have never heard of who Jesus is.
BUT Jon and I both felt that Serbia was definitely our #1 favorite experience so far! We became so close with our amazing hosts, the food was awesome, the ministry was amazing (it was all relationship building & sharing Christ’s love with the community- so practical & fun!), and our overall experience totally exceeded our expectations! We cannot wait to go back!
Q: What is the best thing you have eaten on the Race?
A: The Khao Soi in Thailand! I eat it back home at Thai restaurants but it’s definitely way tastier in the motherland- it was wicked cheap (about $1) & I ordered it any chance I got in restaurants or on the streets.
Q: Do you have a translator for all of the language barriers in each country?
A: Nope! So far we’ve had one paid translator with us in Cambodia but for all the other places, we either have our host translate for us (if they can speak English), we make friends who are able to translate when we’re with them, or the Lord just shows up & we are able to communicate through the language barrier by using hand gestures, pointing, etc. It’s amazing how well you can connect with a person who speaks a different language just by taking your time to learn & understand what each other is saying. We’ve gotten really good at playing ‘Charades.’
Q: How do you think you have grown so far?
A: Wow. So many ways, things in which I never even knew I needed to grow in. If I were to write out all of the ways in which we’ve grown so far, I would need an entire separate blog just to explain everything. But a few of the ways I’ve seen growth in both myself & Jon is first through our intimacy with the Lord: discovering how to not just love Jesus but to truly, deeply, intimately fall in love with Jesus to the point where I am so content with Him that I lack absolutely nothing. Finding my identity in Him instead of my identity in what the world thinks about me, and even letting go of finding my identity in my husband. I’m finally at that point in life where the most important thing that matters to me is walking in obedience to Christ, having a constant “yes” attitude to Him, & learning how to listen to His voice- if He asks me to move to India, I’ll do it. If He asks me to spend my life in full-time ministry, I’ll do it. I’ve never felt so free & weightless in my entire life!
The second way I’ve grown is through living in constant community with others: learning how to truly listen to people’s stories & feelings, how to give healthy, constructive feedback to teammates & also how to receive constructive feedback even if it’s hard to hear, patience, vulnerability, humbleness, extending grace to others, and how to encourage & push each other to grow more. The third way is in ministry: experiencing the endless love of Christ in my own life so much that it now overflows into me loving others without even having to try. Seeing people the way God sees them, my compassion for others, & feeling my heart break for the things that break God’s heart.
Our marriage has also grown SO much! We’ve faced & overcome challenges that most married American couples might never face, we’ve learned so much more about each other, we pray together more, we put our relationships with God before our relationship with each other (this is the key to healthy marriage!!!!!!!!!!!!), we’ve both set our hearts on the same thing which is our obedience to God & our love for Him, we’ve experienced & seen things together that we never imagined we’d see, we know how to give healthy ‘feedback’ to each other without fighting, and we have continued to fall more and more in love with each other by falling more and more in love with Christ. There is a lot, a lot, a lot more I could say but I’ll stop for now.
Q: Where is the weirdest place you have pooped? (Question from Katie B. <3)
A: My favorite question! I’ve definitely had quite a few unique experiences. I will narrow it down to one: when our team was in the desert in Argentina, the family we stayed with had a bathroom that was outside and their toilet (like many others) didn’t have any running water, therefor it didn’t flush. It looked like a normal toilet except that to flush away your “crime”, you had to fill a bucket with water and pour it into the toilet bowl. Because of the gravitational pull of the water, this would cause everything (mostly everything) to be pulled down the pipes never to be seen again. But in some cases, depending on the size of your…deed, you would need to pour multiple buckets of water into the bowl. Well, I had a big grumbly feeling rolling through my stomach one day and my thought was “hmm…I know that if I go #2 in that toilet right now, it may or may not be able to get flushed down.” This was a problem, seeing as though there was 1 bathroom and 12 humans. So, I grabbed a roll of TP, and headed out into the scorching heat of no-man’s land. When I say that we were in the desert, I’m talking about exactly what you are picturing in your mind: dry, barren, lifeless, hot, decaying animal carcasses with vultures pecking at them, deep sand stretching endlessly for miles, with the closest neighbor living 40 minutes away by truck and small bushy trees dotting the landscape with massive parakeet nests in them. I trekked far away where no one could see me, squatted down into the sand hoping that I wasn’t intruding on a scorpion nest, and did what I had to do and then buried it. Also, side note…when I left the house, one of the families little Chihuahua dogs followed me and stood staring the entire time I was going, his eyes burning deep into my soul. It was an intimate moment that I will never forget.
Q: What is it like to be married while doing the WR?
A: Absolutely amazing. Life changing. The healthiest thing we could have ever done for our marriage. That doesn’t mean it’s always easy, but we’re not looking for easy. We want the challenges and to be pushed out of our comfort zones because that’s the only way growth will happen. I would recommend this to ANY and EVERY married couple out there. Our marriage will never, ever be the same after this experience and we are forever grateful we took this leap!
Q: What has been the most challenging part about this experience?
A: I think the most challenging part about the WR is pouring and pouring and pouring into people and different relationships around the world and then having to say goodbye at the end of every month. It’s definitely a blessing to share my heart with so many people who need love and I’m very grateful for those divine relationships I’ve made but the goodbyes are so heartbreaking and difficult to keep doing every month.
Q: What will you do when you return back home? Has God been showing you any of His future plans for you yet after the Race ends?
A: I love this question! We have a plan. We carefully and intentionally have constructed a very, very detailed and permanent plan for after the Race ends! Are you ready?! Here it is…
We are remaining 100% open minded and completely dependent on listening to what God wants us to do and where He wants us to live after this journey ends. We know that we can’t just go back to how things were before the WR started and we want to live our lives serving the Lord so whatever His plan is for us, that’s what we’re doing! We don’t quite know yet what that plan is, but I will say we have had certain places and things that He has placed on our hearts that may be a part of His plan for us. I’ll save those secretive little details for another time. 
All in all, we realized that we don’t need to have a plan. God’s already got a plan for us. We just have to be patient and wait for His timing in revealing that plan to us.
Q: What are the sleeping situations like & how is it living with a group of people?
A: It totally depends on the location we’re in but most months we sleep on the floor using our inflatable sleeping pads. A couple times we were provided with a bed to use but we’ve found our pads to be the most comfortable option. Sometimes we sleep in our tent, sometimes we sleep in churches, sometimes in cabins or houses. Since being gone for the past 7 months, Jon and I had our own room together 5 out of the 7 countries we’ve been to. Other times we share a room with our teammates! It’s like a big giant sleepover party 
Living in community 24/7 can be described as many different things! It’s so much fun, it’s challenging, it’s annoying, it’s helpful, it’s a party, it’s a learning & growing experience, you have to sacrifice A LOT of privacy, you learn how to communicate better, you become family with your team, but it’s definitely a mutual understanding when we all go into hiding somewhere to get just a couple short hours of alone time every now and then. All in all, it’s a huge blessing and such an amazing and unique experience!
Q: What is one item you miss most that you would have brought with you on the Race if you could have?
A: REAL buffalo sauce. A lot of it.
Q: Are you able to use your cell phone and if so, how many unread emails do you currently have? (From Jill)
A: Well, Jillian…great question. We have access to our phones if we come across WiFi to connect to. And right now, at this exact moment in life, I have 68,261 unread emails on my phone. And growing.
