Remember how I said that God uses unlikely people in unlikely places? If not, click here to read said blog.
Anyways, today we met Jason at our favorite coffee shop in El Poblado. He is an American that is originally from Pennsylvania and we got to talk about Colombia, job interviews, our trip, and how confusing it is to try and pay for things in Colombian pesos while converting in your head and trying to remember that “mil” in Spanish means thousand not million. Anyway, as the rest of the group returned to their coffee and blogs, I got to continue talking to Jason. We talked about science and I got a little too excited when he mentioned CRISPR (thank you Dr. Hale for teaching me all about genetic technology). We dived in deeper and talked about science and religion and the tension that often exists between the two. We discussed being open-minded to people and ideas that are different than our own and how even if we disagree with people, we can still treat them with kindness and respect. As the conversation ended and we headed out, I asked if I could pray for Jason. He agreed and a group of us laid hands on him and prayed. We prayed for safe travels on his spontaneous trip to Colombia. We prayed for his job interview coming up later that week for his dream job. I thanked God for a chance encounter that I won’t soon forget.
Teagan, one of our Squad Leaders, took an awesome picture of this sweet moment of prayer with Jason.
Rewind a few days to Saturday. I was talking to Teagan and told her that I missed having intellectual conversations, especially relating to science. Between growing up with my friend Will who was always down for a discussion about the difference in people’s perception of colors and surrounding myself with premed friends for most of college, I was very used to these types of conversations before the Race. Now, don’t get me wrong, intellectual conversations happen a lot on the Race, they are just mostly centered around faith and theology (which makes total sense and are great but I just really miss science). I’m a HUGE nerd, especially when it comes to science, and I was missing nerding out over cool new genetic technologies with Christy, Ben, and Sam in Dr. Hale’s Genomics class. I was missing chemistry club and freaking out with Sprice (Sarah Price, but we all call her Sprice) about our Boller presentations and needing to finish our theses. I was feeling like a tiny part of my normal was missing. And then God put Jason next to me in a coffee shop.
So thank you Jason, for simply wanting to talk. Those 30 or 45 minutes were exactly what I needed on this rest day and God knew that. I enjoyed getting to share my insight and hearing yours and, if you’re reading this, I wish you the best of luck for your job interview and your future endeavors. Know that we will be praying for you!
