Perspective: a particular attitude toward or way of regarding something; a point of view.
It’s been a over a month now since we landed in San Francisco and ended our long journey around the earth. I’ve successfully circled the globe with my squad and we’ve all returned to “normal” life. But I suppose that’s the crazy thing: “normal”
When in China, we traveled from the far Northern border all the way to the southern border and Island of Hong Kong. We traveled East to West and stopped in 6 major cities throughout China. Every city was different. Billions of people live in China. Each city we traveled to an 18-hour train ride or further away. The food, the landscape, the dress, even the language and dialect changed with every stop. No two cities were alike, much less the people who lived there. New flavors would cross your pallet. Spicy, then rich. Noodles, then dumplings, then seafood, then Peking duck. Each different and unique. The Panda’s in Chengdu were different than the Great Wall in Beijing. The cities shaped with different architecture, even the flowers changed from place to place. It was hot and humid in the south. Warm and dry in the North. Diverse and ever changing as we rolled from place to place through hills and along rice fields.
Before traveling to China, I think it was easy for me to think everyone there is Chinese and, well, they are. But that’s also like saying everyone in America is American. We are… but travel from state to state or even city to city and you find countless differences in the way people live or dress or talk. Texas sure isn’t California and California is a long shot from South Dakota. But we are all American.
Why did I expect the rest of the world to be different?
Going on the race has opened my eyes to a whole new world. Well actually, it’s just opened my eyes to the world that has always existed, I’ve just never seen. My word for China is perspective; because there were hundreds of different shapes and sizes and things to see in China and we barely scraped the surface. Likewise, the year as a whole has been continually changing and reshaping my perspective on life. The greatest change I experienced on the race has been a new set of eyes, a new heart, from which to see the world.
Watching the news is no longer hearing about distant countries going through civil war. The struggles in the middle east, are my friends the Syrians. Countless faces that immediately jump to mind. Real people facing real struggles. The earthquakes and natural disasters across the world. They could be my friends in Mongolia, Morocco, or any other country. The political activists fighting for change in their country, hoping for a better world tomorrow, my friends from the universities, doctor students from Kazakhstan, engineering students from Afghanistan.
Then there’s me, and you, here in America…
Life is big. It’s 7 billion people big.
It’s hard to wrap your mind around that number but just think of all the people you drive by on the street every day, very few of which you will ever know. Then multiply it by a few thousand cities across the earth, a few hundred countries… even if you traveled the world the rest of your life you would still only barely see and understand all of life that takes place every single day.
And then there’s me, and you, here in America…
It’s small. I’m one person. I happen to live here today. Tomorrow, I might move. Somewhere overseas is someone my age making the same decisions. Should I go to school, should I move towns, what job should I take. Somewhere else people are searching for food, starving, or fleeing war-torn homes in search of safety. All of these are part of the world we live in.
And then there’s me, and you, here in America…
The conclusion? I am WAY to small to do anything much in this world.
But my God… He is plenty big. Like 7 billion people big.
He knows everyone of them. He loves every one of them. He died for every single one of us. He wants a relationship with every single one of us. He moves daily through the world healing, saving, restoring, remaking, redeeming, loving, and caring for all His sheep.
A quote recently struck me:
“What makes God great is not that nothing is too big for Him
but also that nothing is too small for him either.”
The world is Big. Like 7 billion people big.
That’s not too big for God. But neither is one person, living a small quiet life in the middle of South Dakota, too small for Him. A mom, working to raise her kids. A worker just trying to pay the bills. A homeless man, waiting for his next meal.
So often we pass over people. God doesn’t. He sees. We’re not too small.
My view, my perspective, it’s small, I really don’t understand much of anything on how this world works, how many people are out there right now living their lives. But I don’t have to. At the end of the day, life is life. You take one more step, where ever you find yourself, and keep moving forward. Each of us has our own path. Yesterday we took a step, today we take a step, and tomorrow, the same. The only real question we each must answer is this:
Do you know God?
And He’s not too Big to know. We can all know Him. We can all love.
I traveled the world this last year… so now what? It was grand, it was amazing, I am forever thankful for the opportunity. Now? I’m back, life moves on just as it always has. A moment passes and on we go…
I think there’s a point somewhere in here:
No matter how big or small you think your life is… we are all small next to God.
We are all just one in 7 billion. TINY
But to Him, we are also all as special as one in a billion.
The world is big. We all have hurts, struggles, pains, joys, hopes, dreams… No matter what your life, your past, how small you might think you are compared to the world, how unimportant, insignificant, screwed up, hopeless, uncertain, confusing, lost, whatever word you might have for your own story… It’s not to big for God, and it’s not too small either.
He loves you.
And there is NOTHING like walking this earth holding His hand.
14 countries later I’m back home. I have more joy in my heart than ever before and it doesn’t have a single thing to do with traveling or the places I’ve seen. I would trade them all, I’d trade the whole earth in a heartbeat, just to be able to hear God’s voice, to know His love, and walk with Him.
The crazy part…it doesn’t matter where in the world we are! It doesn’t matter what country you live in, it doesn’t matter what language you speak, it doesn’t matter how big or small your influence is or where you come from. God loves you. And He doesn’t ask us to trade the world to know him. Instead, He traded the whole world to know us, He died to know us. Just to be friends with us!
Have you talked with Him lately?
He loves you.
With Faith, Hope, and Love
Nathan
