I Lost Everything. I Failed.
On Tuesday my wallet containing my passport, team money, personal money, team cards, personal cards, and all kinds of identification went missing.
On Wednesday I booked tickets for McKayla and I to Lusaka from Livingstone to get a new passport.
On Thursday I left with McKayla to Lusaka and met up with my friends that live in Lusaka. They took us around town, made us dinner, we ate caterpillars together and they took us to where we would be staying the night. We stayed that night at the super comfy house of a British couple with two small children.
On Friday we got up early and spent the day at the American Embassy getting my passport, running around town getting passport photos, going to immigration to get my passport re-stamped, went all day without a single ounce of food, and had many frustrating moments. We were suppose to get a bus back to Livingstone at 2 so that I could baptize Brooke but we didn’t even up getting finished with everything until around 5:30. Later that night we had a nice dinner with my friends from Lusaka and went back to the British couples house to stay the night one more time.
On Saturday (today) Brooke got baptized, me and mckayla got on the bus back to Livingstone, and I have a passport back in hand and the rest of my missing things have been worked through and dealt with.
Now I am home and I have had hours and hours and hours of time to think and process through these past few days.
Before I lost everything I was at my peak of being Treasurer. I was confident, I knew mostly what I was doing, I was organized, and I was everything I thought I would never be. I started to love being Treasurer and I started to enjoy the responsibility. I enjoyed being able to care for my team and do the work no one would choose to do. I enjoyed being able to serve my team by being Treasurer.
When I lost my wallet and everything inside it, I wasn’t worried about my personal cash, money or items… I was worried about my teams cash, money and items. This was very hard for me. It was hard knowing that I was the one that lost everything. I lost all the cash, I lost all the cards, I lost everything. The one thing I was responsible for and in charge of I failed at. The one thing I started to love and grew so much in I failed at. I felt like a complete failure.
I had to put my pride aside and let people help me. I had to allow my team to help me. I had to allow myself to let people help me. I had to swallow my view of myself and humble myself and let people into my struggles. This was hard but ended up being so so sweet.
My team helped me look for hours, my team went to the taxi station to check taxis with me, my team offered to let me use their cards for the time being for personal use, my team prayed over me, my team put my anxiety to rest when they told me they weren’t disappointed in me, my team lifted me up in encouragement, my team supported me as I went on a 3 day adventure to the capital to get a new passport, my team gave me huge hugs when I got back, my team was my rock and my team is the reason I am still sane.
Having to leave for 3 days and go to the capital was one of the most crazy experiences of race by far. I was able to meet up with friends from my church that we partner with and they took care of me and my friend McKayla that went with me. Earlier this year I had met them and I had made connections and a friendship with them and God ended up using that connection for his good. If this event with my passport would have happened in any other country I wouldn’t have had connections and I wouldn’t have had such a smooth process. My friends were able to feed us, laugh with us, find us housing, drive us everywhere, give up 3 days of their lives for us, pray with us, and care for us. My friends were a true blessing from the Lord and I will forever be grateful God blessed me with that connection in this situation. God was truly truly in the middle of this situation by blessing them to us.
Another thing I experienced was a lot of “FOMO” or Fear Of Missing Out. I have struggled with this the entirety of my race and my life but having to leave my bestfriends, teammates, and sisters at this point at home for three days was so hard. I had McKayla and we got super close… but I missed my 10 other missing pieces. I missed out on the opportunity to Baptize my dear teammate, best friend, and sister Brooke in Devils Pool, I missed 3 days of ministry and fun activities, I missed sweating in our small house and running from bugs, I missed the long walks everywhere, I missed everything. God really showed me through this that he wanted me to choose into him more. He wanted me to fully surrender to him and rest in his presence. This was a hard thing for me to learn but a beautiful thing for me to learn.
I also experienced so many practical lessons on how to safely carry money, how to divide up documents and things into different places to keep things safe and so on. I hate that I was the person to be the example, but now everyone is able to check themselves and make sure they are carrying everything carefully if they weren’t before.
I learned a lot through this adventure but the biggest thing I learned is that it happened for a reason. I didn’t fail. God can still use me. God is still working. I am not stupid. And most of all… God has given me grace. Things are going to happen in life that sucks… but that doesn’t mean it’s the end and that doesn’t mean you can’t learn from it and get even better. This situation sucked but it’s not the end and I 100% will learn from this and be better.
I am not a bad Treasurer. I have not let my team down. I am not inadequate… I am a powerful woman of Christ that went through a sucky sucky sucky situation. If I hadn’t had walked through this I wouldn’t have learned and seen Gods goodness in this magnitude. God is always working. Always always always.
***Prayer Requests***
– Pray for continued protection over my team.
– Pray for God to continue to work in my team.
– Pray that I can continue to trust Gods plans in this season.
