Well it’s been a while. You may have wondered if I disappeared off the face of the earth or stayed in some remote village in remote Central America. Nope, I’m here, back where I was over a year ago.
I apologize for not giving an update sooner on my experience. I cannot thank you all enough for supporting me financially, motivationally, and in prayer to send me on a journey that few are lucky enough to experience. It was an incredibly challenging, exhilarating, tiring, nurturing, confusing, motivating, and paradigm shifting 9 months.
I’ve sat down a few times to write a return blog. I either got distracted or didn’t know what to write. Sometimes I would type and go super in depth on one thing and realize it wasn’t what I was aiming for. Our squad discussed the return and the difficulties we might experience, but it either didn’t sink in as well as it could have, or it’s just impossible to ensure a smooth, joyful transition away from something so emotionally complex, so filled with change that it felt like the same amount of life had passed in nine months as would have gone by in five years back home.
Coming back was weird and normal at the same time. After five minutes in the car talking to my parents, we all stopped and concurred that it felt like I had never left and had been talking in the car the day before. It got weird a few days later. After seeing a bunch of old friends and hearing about their lives, I realized the things we talked about were completely different than what I had been talking about for 9 months. I went from talking about life problems and philosophical things, always having deeply honest and personal conversations or intense theological discussions and stories of ministry, to talking about where people were living to the career they were starting. It made me feel sick to my stomach, honestly. I know it was different since I hadn’t seen them for a long time, whereas I bad been around my racer friends every hour for 9 months which produces a different type of interaction and intimacy, but it was strange. I was disenchanted and pessimistic about the American way of life for a while. I saw it as empty and unfulfilling, the pursuit of improving quality of life getting in the way of doing things that are actually meaningful. I had seen so many people around the world in situations that would make many people cringe, but they have more hope and joy than you could imagine because they have what matters: a place to live, food to eat, an amazing community, and a loving Lord.
The transition process seems to have been both voluntary and involuntary. I honestly couldn’t have chosen to get used to being back any faster. I felt uncomfortable in general and my thoughts reacted differently for some time. It took about 4 months for this to totally go away. I have realized that anything that remains after that is mostly my choice. I can choose how to view life and the world based on what I experienced, and my actions are up to me. I don’t simply come back and be different. Of course, figuring out how to be a different, better person applying what I learned is an entirely different story that I’m not going to get into now.
Since then, the involuntary reaction to coming back has gone away as of approximately October. Being back hasn’t been easy or felt completely right though. I do think I had been viewing it in the wrong light though; I perhaps had been thinking about it all as if the joy and fulfillment I experienced on the race couldn’t be experienced unless the situation was almost identical. We had been living in constant community with people who are like-minded and focused on ministry and growing closer to God, where the purpose of our work each day was what we as Christians deem the main purpose of our life: proclaiming the gospel and loving on people. It was an incredible blessing to have that, extremely difficult to leave, and even more difficult to realize soon after I was back that I didn’t have it anymore.
For a few months, I actually said that I wished to be living in another country doing ministry again, specifically India because my heart is attached to it. I missed sleeping in tents in Africa, freezing in the jungle in Nepal, and walking around the compounds at night looking at the stars and doing prayer walks. I even miss being horribly sick at the same time as my friend, at two in the morning in a remote Nepali village with no electricity and squat toilets, laughing hysterically at how helpless we were and how absurd the whole scenario was.
My goal after college was to be an aerospace engineer, so the plan was to apply for jobs even before I got back. I decided to wait until I returned so I could focus on where I was. Once I returned, I got a slow start to applying for jobs. It took a while for me to get used to the career idea, and I was secretly hoping God would give me the opportunity or even the permission to do something else ministry related, ideally international. Fast forward, I am getting more excited about the chance to work on something aerospace related because I remember how much I love engineering and space. I’m not completely set on doing it for life, though, and I’m moving forward with the mindset that I will try it out for a few years and see where God leads me through that. After my time in India, my passion for the country and culture was enforced (I had been drawn to it specifically even before my trip), and now I would be thrilled if full-time ministry there in some capacity were part of my future. I have no clue how that and aerospace engineering fit together, but I am praying that God gives me the privilege of being able to do both somehow.
A few good summarizing statements about the past five months and encompassing the previous paragraphs would be these: The transition was difficult and it took a while to adjust. I am unsure about a lot of things in my future, and I am tentatively moving forward with hope and patience, both of which I can never have enough. I hope that God leads me into full-time international ministry at some point, ideally in India, but I will have to wait and see. For now, I am excited to enter engineering and make some cool technology. Please keep praying that I will see God’s desires and purpose for me where it is difficult for me to find, and to be unafraid to proclaim his saving grace and purpose whenever the opportunity rises.
Again, thank you so much for standing by me and supporting me. I met so many amazing people around the world, was able to pour encouragement into and bless them, and got to see God do amazing things in people’s lives.
Godspeed.
Luke
