I’m over halfway through the race and I’ve realized that for many people on the other side of my blogs or my social media the World Race might seem like a vacation. If we haven’t had much time to catch up you might be thinking that the World Race is easy. Perhaps you even think I’ve been wasting precious time and money. I understand your concerns and I’m here to let you know that the World Race is HARD. In fact, it has probably been one of the hardest years of my life.
If there is one thing I’ve learned, the World Race is not for the faint of heart.
I was talking with my friend, Anosh, on FaceTime the other day and as we talked and I shared all that God has been doing we both marveled at how much I have already changed this year. I used to hate talking about God or my faith and now I spout His goodness freely. I never used to understand how to struggle with and for the Lord in the midst of community because vulnerability was too hard for me. Now I’m honest and open about the hard things. I never used to be the person that could offer spiritual encouragement because I was in constant need of it myself (which I still do, but now I’ve learned the balance of giving and receiving). The biggest thing is that I never even knew what I was missing nor did I realize how much growth there could be back then. I was honestly pretty content and I thought I knew a lot. But then… the race happened and the blinders were ripped off.
Like I said, I have changed SO MUCH, but it has come at the price of really hard work with so much more to be done.
Let me just outline some of the ways that the World Race has both forced and encouraged me into growth:
- LIVING IN COMMUNITY-There are few things quite as humbling or convicting as living in a close community. I’m constantly under a microscope. Someone always knows where to find me and usually knows what I’m doing. People truly see the good, the bad, and the downright ugly in one another. On top of that, I always have other examples to look to. At any point in the day, you can find someone serving in some capacity or another who is spending time with the Lord. This ability to see glimpses of other people’s spiritual walks is hard too. Sometimes we go through seasons where we can’t hear God quite as clearly or quite as often and it’s really okay, but it is hard to cope with when the person doing quiet time next to you is having dreams, visions, and hearing words from the Lord regularly. It can make the Spirit of Comparison rear its ugly near and you have to choose not to listen. But it also wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t tell you that sometimes I would do anything to be alone. It wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t tell you that sometimes I get really fed up of my squadmates (even though they’re awesome people). It wouldn’t be fair to tell you that sometimes I desire the simplicity of leaving community outside of the walls of your home. In all of these moments, I have to CHOOSE my community. I have to CHOOSE to love this place the Lord has put me. It is the hardest thing I have ever done.
- FEEDBACK-Another beautiful thing about community on the World Race is feedback. It is something you really have to grow to appreciate. As teams, we sit down and do feedback every night. It is a tool that we use to help one another grow in our ability to be more like Christ. Feedback can be positive (pointing out the good things you’re already doing) or it can be constructive (pointing out the things you do that don’t line up with the character of Christ). Constructive feedback doesn’t always come out eloquently and sometimes it definitely stings. But it isn’t just receiving feedback that changes you, it is giving it too. When you change your mindset to intentionally see the CHRIST in the people around you, you are changed too.
- SPACE-As a general rule, we try to complete at least 4 hours of ministry per day with the exception of one day off per week. Some months our set ministry time is longer, sometimes it is shorter. Aside from meals and the team times we have every day, we tend to get a fair amount of free time. Way more than we ever did in America, I promise. All of this space and the few distractions has created so much room for God to move. He draws our attention to the things He is wanting to work on within us, or the ways that He desires us to minister, or the ways that He wants us to press into the people around us. We don’t have much out on the field… a few ratty outfits, some basic hygiene things, the occasional comfort food (#Oreos), and our bibles. We are drawn into a place of deep dependence of God to fill the gaps left by the frivolous “necessities” we got used to in America. The combination of all that He wants to do within us and the dependence we have on Him in that space is good, but it is ultimately still a choice. We have two options: choose ourselves and be miserable or surrender it to God and depend on him. It wouldn’t be too bad if this was a one-time choice, but it is daily and I’ll admit that I have chosen myself more often than I’d care to admit and as the newness of the World Race wears off it only gets harder. This is the place where obedience and intimacy are grown.
- SPIRITUAL WARFARE-This is something I had never really experienced prior to the World Race and honestly didn’t experience too much of in the first few months either. Here or there I would feel a heavy presence, but nothing seemed able to touch me until last month. In Ethiopia, there was so much of it and it was hard for me to cope with. The war is not against flesh and blood and it is largely invisible. The compound we lived on was right next door to a mosque and the village has been somewhat untouched by Christianity. There are a few small churches but many of the villagers did not know Jesus and did not want to. On the very first night there I started to have nightmares. I proceeded to wake up in full panics multiple times a night for over a week, but truthfully I don’t have very high spiritual discernment when it comes to darker forces and I attributed it to something weird I was eating or continent change. Then I realized that multiple squadmates were having the same problem and we put the pieces together. We did overnight prayer, we plastered scripture around our rooms, and we prayed over every square foot of the house. My nightmares seemed to be stopping but then my teammates were telling me that I was still panicking in the middle of the night… but now I couldn’t remember it was happening. It shook me to my core to know that this warfare could be affecting me without my knowledge whether that be due to lack of discernment or simple inability to remember. But that is honestly the minor league stuff. Since being at debrief we have received more teaching on the topic from the World Race Director himself, Bill Swan. He taught us about our spiritual authority and then taught the process of deliverance. He SHOWED us deliverance in two people on our squad who literally had dark spirits upon them that they didn’t even know were there. You can carry them and not even realize it for years. I recognize that this sounds insane and honestly, it’s hard for me to believe too, but I really think it is only hard to accept because if we do then we also have to accept that these things can affect us. It also means that we have to trust and rely on the goodness of God to deliver and protect us. It has been a massive growing experience for me.
All of this is just scratching the surface, but the rest is so difficult to put into words. To be clear, I am not writing this blog to gain sympathy or to prove that this has been a worthwhile use of my time. I am writing this blog because of the inexpressible joy that the Lord has given me toward this experience. It has been the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but it has also been the most rewarding thing I have ever done. The World Race is a mission trip, but it’s really more of a personal journey than anything. It has allowed me to experience growth that I didn’t know I needed. I can confidently say that I know Jesus more intimately now than ever before, and at the same time am so so aware of how much more there is to Him that I can’t comprehend.
So, if you’ve ever considered coming on the World Race, financially supporting someone who is going, or even considered the validity of the experience I am here to promise you that it is worth it and if that is the way the Lord is leading you, walk in it joyfully.
With love,
Kristen
