Deuteronomy 6:5-9 says, “And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength. And you must commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these commands that I am giving you today. Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up. Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders. Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”
To take this Scripture literally, Jewish men would wear phylacteries on their wrists – a small leather box containing Hebrew texts on vellum – as a reminder to keep the law. In college, I wrote words or Scripture references on my inner wrist as reminders as to what God was teaching me. On the Race, I unintentionally did this through a collection of bracelets.
These are my first four bracelets from the Race during my time with my first team, Wild Fires.
Guatemala I bought the purple bracelet with the turquoise stone from a Mayan street vendor named Juana in Parque Central in Antigua, Guatemala. It was our first-ever ATL (Ask the Lord) experience, and TL and I were drawn to have a conversation with her. She told us about her son, who had broken his leg, and how she needed money for his hospital bills. We told her about Jesus, prayed for her and her son, and bought bracelets from her. A few months later, one of the full-time missionaries from AIM in Guatemala posted a picture of Juana on her Instagram. The caption read, “Juana’s countenance totally changed! – after talking some, she told me she wanted to reconcile with her Heavenly Father and asked if I would pray for her! It was an amazing time, and I watched her countenance shift from weighted down and discouraged to full of peace and joy!” HOW COOL IS THAT?! It was so beautiful to read that post, glance down at my wrist, and know that every prayer I’d prayed for Juana when I saw that bracelet had been heard and answered.
Nicaragua I have two bracelets from Nicaragua, though the second is hard to see in this picture. I bought the yellow bracelet in Granada, Nicaragua, when we took a weekend trip there to go volcano sledding. The other bracelet is a small black thread that I tied around my wrist that same weekend; you can barely see it peeking out between the purple bracelet and my watch. Nicaragua was the first place I had ever experienced spiritual warfare. The black bracelet reminds me of that time. The yellow bracelet proclaims the truth that Light always defeats darkness. The black bracelet is small, but tied in such a way that I can’t take it off. Spiritual warfare is a real thing we experience throughout our lives. But there is abundant, unshakable hope in Jesus Christ because He has already defeated all evil and death on the cross. That yellow bracelet is bigger and brighter than the black one. Light will always, always, always defeat darkness. Hallelujah, amen!
Panama I bought my Panama bracelet when my team took a road trip to Darién, Panama to run a children’s program for an indigenous community that had never experienced missionaries or children’s programs before. The women in the community beaded the bracelets themselves. I purposefully got the bracelet with green and red on it because we would be celebrating Christmas in Panama City. That was my first Christmas eyeball deep in ministry. Usually I consume Christmas like everyone else in America; I wear the tacky sweaters, go to the parties, buy and wrap gifts, overeat all the sweets, and attend church when I should. But this past Christmas my team and I worked endlessly through stress and spiritual attack and worry about a sick teammate to create a Christmas program that we presented to a room full of Hindu and Muslim people who had never heard the Gospel before. It was excruciatingly hard, but it was incredibly worth it. It was a testament to God’s goodness and provision, and a direct demonstration of 2 Corinthians 12:7b-10, “So to keep me from becoming proud, I was given a thorn in my flesh… Three different times I begged the Lord to take it away. Each time he said, ‘My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.’ So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” It was a Christmas I will not soon forget.
Lesotho In Lesotho, we decided as a team that we were done with a poisonous attitude of self-centeredness and wanted to press into Christ-centeredness and Kingdom-focus. We put everything we had into our ministry that month and it paid off. The day I bought my “KINGDOM” bracelet, we took an adventure day to Maletsunyane Falls. Usually on our off-days we would turn our “ministry switches” off and put blinders on to the Kingdom. But not this day. This day, we made friends with the children also walking on the path to the waterfall, sang Bible songs with them, played games with them, and shared our adventure with them. We stayed Kingdom-focused, even on a day when it would be easy to put the blinders on. I picked this bracelet at the waterfall gift shop to remind me to always “seek the Kingdom of God above all else,” as Jesus says in Luke 12:31.
These are the bracelets from my time with my second team, Five Multiplied.
Swaziland My Swaziland bracelet is not in this picture. In Swazi, I picked up a rubber bracelet (like the “Livestrong” bracelets) from my Alumni Squad Leader as she prepared to return to the States. She always wore one of these bracelets around her ankle that read “GOD IS BIG ENOUGH.” I wore it on my wrist for two months, through South Africa and Malaysia. When we traveled from Malaysia to Thailand, a homeless man sat next to me in the Bangkok bus station. He wanted to talk, but we didn’t speak the same language. We sat together for about 10 minutes, communicating through gestures and smiles. At one point, he pointed to my “GOD IS BIG ENOUGH” bracelet and gestured to communicate that he wanted to trade his bracelet for mine. I let him keep his bracelet and gave him mine. I still smile about it; a homeless man in a bus station in Bangkok doesn’t speak English, but is unintentionally proclaiming Gospel Truth on his left wrist. Indeed, GOD IS BIG ENOUGH!
South Africa My South Africa bracelet is a band of square-cut shells. We lived in Jeffrey’s Bay, and our home was a five minute walk from the Indian Ocean. I spent many many days on that beach, playing or resting or praying or working. It was on that beach and in those waves that I experienced first-hand the playfulness, kindness, and gentleness of God the Father. He and I played together in the deep waves, had conversations in the sand, and cried together in the shallows. South Africa was the month in which my intimacy with the Lord skyrocketed, and my Race and my life haven’t been the same since. I bought a bracelet of shells on our last day in town to remind me of that sweet, sweet time.
Malaysia I love my Malaysia bracelet; it has a great story and it makes me laugh. This bracelet was given to me by the previous Logistics coordinators of C-Squad, Haley and Monica. TL, my Logistics co, and I have matching ones. They were a gift to welcome us into the role. Becoming Logistics was a huge turning point of my World Race and the whole story is an incredible testimony (extra extra read all about it!). The charm of the bracelet is an airplane, but soon after I started wearing it, the wings and tail broke off haha. When I showed my teammate, Jess, she remarked, “Well that’s not a good sign.” Thankfully, we aren’t superstitious and all of our travel days have been marked by peace and provision from the Father! Yahoo!
Thailand I bought my green-and-gold Thailand bracelet from the night market in Chiang Mai. I chose this one because I wanted to add more color to my wrist; all my other bracelets were black and it was too dark and gloomy-feeling. Ironically, Thailand was one of the darkest months on the Race for me spiritually. Thailand is full of spiritual oppression and warfare, and I felt like I was drowning in lies from the Enemy and hopelessness. But coincidentally, going to the elephant sanctuary with my parents at the end of the month was one of the turning point moments of the month; we laughed and played and my spirit felt light and joyful again for the first time in weeks. Laughter with my parents ended Thailand on a good note for me – thank the Lord! That cute little elephant charm reminds me of how God used my parents to love me, minister to me, care for me, and draw me out of the darkness I felt stuck in.
My third and final team, International Harvesters, brought with it three final bracelets.
Cambodia In Cambodia, we did Ask the Lord ministry in a small city called Battambang. We spent the month playing in an empty dirt lot with street kids, bringing them joy and sharing the love of Jesus. We were so dedicated to going there every day that I never really experienced an opportunity to shop for souvenirs haha. I bought my Cambodia bracelet (top) in the airport before we left Cambodia, but I bought it to remind me of our time in that barren dirt lot that was brought to life with the love of Jesus. It was a tangible representation of how dead things come to life in the presence of Jesus’ Spirit.
Indonesia Indonesia was another busy month without opportunity to go souvenir shopping if you can believe it! I never saw a single bracelet! So this was another airport purchase haha. Indonesia was an “earthy” month if I had to pick a color scheme for it, hence the dark brown beads. We were very busy doing all kinds of church ministry: preaching sermons, teaching English, sharing testimonies, house visits, revivals, youth meetings, children’s programs, discipleship training schools, and more. I started out month 10 in Indonesia with a lot of apathy; I didn’t care about what we were doing and I was uninterested in putting forth any effort to try at all, let alone be excellent. So it was a struggle for the first week and a half. Then we had a spiritual revival led by South African pastor Dave and his wife Frances and the whole month looked up from there! I went from not caring about our ministry to the Lord calling me into the role of a prophet on our team and calling all of us higher in intimacy, community, and mission. Another sweet demonstration of His great mercy and willingness and ability to use anyone for His Kingdom! A phylactery I carry on my hands, not on my wrists, of something God did for me in Indonesia is my fingernails; I was a compulsive nail-biter from the age of 9, and in Indonesia I declared and claimed freedom in Jesus’s Name from all compulsion to bite my nails and one month later I am still free! Hallelujah!
Philippines We have a joke that God saved the best for last. Our time in the Philippines has been incredible and so anointed; I’ve even been praying about and considering coming back here long-term, though that is yet to be confirmed by the Lord’s Spirit. I bought my bright blue bracelet from one of the pastors we worked with on our trips into impoverished neighborhoods to do feeding programs. The bracelets he sells are made by women in the community as a means of income through Threads of Hope. I feel a big softness in my heart for the women of Manila, Philippines and find myself daydreaming of ways to bring the love of Jesus more tangibly to their lives. I don’t know if God will call me back here to Manila, but I know that He has placed this care for these women on my heart for a reason, and I am happy to support Myra, the woman who made my bracelet, in the meantime.
So there they are, all eleven phylacteries from my World Race journey! I’ve chosen not to wear them all all the time, but they all represent a special part of my journey and lessons I have learned that will matter to me the rest of my life. I don’t know if I will keep wearing them at home, put them on display, give them away, hang them on my Christmas tree, or something else altogether. But I’m thankful for all that they represent and what God has taught me in both the waiting and remembering.
If you see me wearing a bracelet when I get home, feel free to ask me about it! You may get to hear an exclusive story of “one time when I was wearing this bracelet….” 🙂
Until next time,
Jessica
