No, I’m not in Atlanta, Georgia 😛
I’m in a country called Georgia, which is below Russia and above Turkey. I have family in Georgia, and I find it funny that I am in Georgia too 🙂
This month my team doesn’t have a ministry host, and we are in what we call “ATL” month, or “Ask the Lord”. ATL is a term I’ve only heard the World Race use, but it’s something that I have done a lot in my walk with Christ.
Most World Race squads have one or two ATL months, but my squad (Expedition) has had many more, because we are a pioneering squad. When we signed up for Expedition and went through our training, we knew that we were signing up for a less structured mission trip than any of the other routes. We don’t have set ministry hosts every month.
Expedition’s purpose is two-fold:
1. To love and serve people wherever we may be, and to share about Jesus and the Gospel when possible, whether that is with a ministry host or not.
2. To search for and find Christians and missionaries in this part of the world, or at the very least to find “people of peace” (people who may not be Christians, but who are open to us and our values, and who might be able to help the World Race find helpful connections in the community). Our hope is to find ministry hosts for future squads, so that when they come to this part of the world, they can pour into an established ministry.
Expedition is a pioneering squad, so we have much more freedom than any other squad to move around and follow God wherever He may lead us. We know which country we are going to every month, and most months, there’s at least a team or two who have ministry hosts, but the other half of the squad is usually in ATL. I imagine this is what the 72 felt like when Jesus sent them out (Luke 1:10-17) and said basically… trust in me, don’t bring anything, just go and prepare the way for me and my message, that the kingdom of God has come near.
This kind of faith-walking is one of the most exciting parts of my walk with Jesus as of yet 🙂 Not just on the Race, but always.
Even though ATL is less structured than serving with a ministry host, we still implement some structure and we desire to honor God with our time and energy (and honor our supporters). That said, you never really know what ATL will turn out to be, or how you’ll end up spending your day.
This is what ATL has looked like for me so far on the Race:
A. We pray together as a team (10-30 minutes or so), and come together to share if we received any specific direction. Then we go out and follow that guidance that we received from God in prayer.
B. If we don’t receive anything specific, we leave the apartment and start walking, choosing to be intentional to look for and engage in opportunities to serve and love people, and talk to them.
C. Sometimes we don’t pray together, and just each decide on how we want to spend the day, in which case we still leave the apartment with intentionality, trusting that God will allow us to meet people as we live our every day lives in these countries. For instance, some guys on my first team really valued working out, and they would go to a gym in each country, and they built many friendships that way, and got to share about Jesus.
Before I continue writing, I will say that I understand that “Option A” that I described above may seem like a weird concept to some Christians. I believe that it is Biblical and God has shown me personally time and time again that when I pray in this way, asking Him specifically for something to do or someone talk to, He always has something exciting for me to join Him in.
Among His many other attributes, God is wildly creative and filled with adventure and joy, and while “Option A” is a boiled-down-straight-to-the-point version of ATL, I believe that ATL can and ought to be explored and sought after by every Christian. ATL is as wide, grand, and deep as God Himself. It’s really simple and beautiful to live your life and seek after God’s heart at the same time. On the Race we have a saying.. “Life is ministry and ministry is life.” I think that’s very accurate. Every moment in your life is an opportunity to join in on what God is doing.
I hope and pray that my life is never lacking of me spending time in prayer and asking the Lord how He would have me spend my time, energy, resources, and my life. He can’t be boxed in, and He asks us to trust Him, and every time I say “yes God, I trust you with life” He never fails to amaze me with how He moves, and I’m always left filled with wonder. “Option A” of ATL is a very literal, every day, every moment way to follow Jesus that we do a lot on the Race, but ATL for me sometimes can feel as natural as breathing. My heart beats with anticipation of what God will do in and through my life, and I can’t think of anything more exciting than to get to join God in his pursuit of people’s hearts. Wow! What a privilege.
I’d like to share one story of you from our time in Georgia so far. My team came together and prayed for about 30 minutes. Then we shared what we felt God had told us during our prayer time.
One of the girls on my team, Meghan, felt that she should visit a man that she had met the day before, who sold some things on the street, and she also felt that God had told her something about a coffee shop.
I had a picture in my head of one of the girls on my team, Connie, laughing and having a wonderful time at a coffee shop. Connie loves to have fun anyway, but I felt that this was from God. I also felt very strongly the thoughts/words “have fun, live your life, be in community together, and people will be drawn to you”. I shared that with the team. I had also seen a picture of a man with a bald head.
With these 2 words/pictures about a coffee shop, the team decided to head out and look for that one guy, and grab a coffee somewhere along the way.
I was very sick at the time with bronchitis, so I actually didn’t even go out that day. But the team ended up splitting up, and two of the girls went to a coffee shop, Sam and Connie. They sat down and asked a guy sitting nearby for the wi-fi password. He ended up being American, and he works for the Peace Corp. They ended up talking for hours, and Sam and Connie were able to share about their faith with him, and about Jesus and what He’s done for us. Praise God!!
The other half of the team ended up walking around, and talked with the man Meghan felt led to, and prayed for several people around town, and brought cookies and smiles and love to them. It was beautiful how God used them to pray for so many that day.
…It’s funny too, that during the day, my team did run into a bald man (like I received from God in my prayer time), but it was our squad-mate Jacob lol, who lives in another part of town, but had just shaved his head. That was just a random meeting, but it fit in with what I thought God had told me in prayer.
Well, it doesn’t end there.
The Peace Corp guy (I’ll call him Harry), he told Sam and Connie that he knew of some Christians living in a tiny town/village nearby. Harry isn’t a Christian, but he had been over to their house for Thanksgiving. He gave the girls their contact info.
We called that Christian woman that Harry told us about, and she met us at a coffee shop within a few days to hang out. As it turns out, she is a missionary (Harry hadn’t told us that, but we guessed), she’s American, and she and her husband are in that tiny town for the long-run, following the Lord there, and doing many different things to reach that community with the Gospel.
….what?!??!?!?!?!?!? Seriously?! We went and spent the weekend at her house, where she and her husband host missionary interns (a group of 6 young women finishing their college degrees/missionary training). Those girls told us that they were completely and utterly shocked that we had met Harry at all, because he lived in another tiny village, and the fact that we met him in our city (the biggest city center nearby), they were blown away, because there are countless coffee shops in this city… and to think that we randomly met him, they were blown away.
But really, it wasn’t “random” at all, was it? Because we had trusted in God, we had prayed, and He had guided us towards a coffee shop. I don’t know how it’s possible that the girls picked that specific coffee shop, but it happened, and we are all blown away by this connection that God led us to.
And it doesn’t even end there!
The missionary asked us if we could host an event for some of the local women, a health event, because we have 2 nurses and 1 dietician on our team. And some of the girls on my team have been praying for months that they could host an event like this.
Just yesterday we were able to host this event, and a handful of the local women came and learned about women’s health, about first aid, about how babies are humans long before they’re ever born (abortions are a huge problem in this area), and about how as women they are worth it… they are worth being cared for in every way, including taking care of their own bodies.
Some of my team members teaching about health and nutrition
The event wasn’t this “Wow, this is incredible, look at all of the people who are giving their lives to Jesus” kind of thing… but my goodness…. God is so good!! Another missionary in that town was able to make deeper connections with the women there, and she was invited into their homes… and who knows what will happen from that sometime in the future? Who knows what beautiful things will come from that relationship, what salvations might occur in the future?
Who knows what abortions might be avoided, or what sicknesses can be avoided, simply by these women hearing the words our team had to share? I don’t know, but I trust that God used our team the way that He wanted to. Also, we were able to make a connection for the World Race (as it turns out, the Race already knew this missionary, but our team had no idea about that. I guess God wanted us to serve them now!)
And all of that started by us praying and asking God “God, what would you have us do with our day?” It took faith for us to believe that He would guide us, and it took faith for our team to walk out of the door and trust and believe that God is good and He would guide them because they were willing vessels.
That is what ATL is. It doesn’t have to look like the story I just told you, or the “Option A” kind of prayer I told you about. But it’s an every day faith journey. It’s having a trusting and open heart to the goodness and integrity of our God, and it’s holding your life with open hands and saying “God, I trust you. Use my time, energy, and resources however you want. I love you and I want to be with you, whatever that looks like.”
He is wildly-good! He is creative! He is awesome! His heart beats with love and forgiveness for people everywhere. Why would I ever say no to living my life with Him leading me? Why would I not ask Him how to spend my life, my time, my resources? I’ve never seen anything more beautiful than the way God allows us to be a part of His grand, amazing, majestic plans and purposes for redeeming this world and drawing people to Him.
There’s a song by JJ Heller that I really love called “I Believe”. Some of the lines really strike my heart:
There are so many things about you that I don’t understand, but I believe.
I keep moving forward when I’m holding your hand. I believe.
The truest things I know, are those I cannot see.
…I’d rather have Jesus, than houses or land. I’d rather be led be His nail-pierced hands. I’d rather have Jesus than anything.
Most of the time, I don’t understand God’s ways at all, but I trust Him. It is the biggest gift I’ve ever been given, my salvation and relationship with God. I hope to always spend my life asking Him where to go, what to do, and how to spend my days, what goals I should pursue, and what I should prune out of my life. He is a good Father who leads us on an amazing journey. We just have to say yes!
