Here They Come

This year has been a challenge. I have seen a lot of change, struggle and pain. I went through a lot before the race and it didn’t stop when I left, as I had hoped. Losing my Grandpa a few months ago really threw me for a curve ball. A lot of the things I was writing, or planned on writing went out the window. I promised you all that I would share the amazing stories from around the world. Unfortunately, I have not fulfilled that promise. I am sorry. Just know that processing a lot of this takes time. Honestly, on that note, I never really knew what processing was. I always held things in and just tried to figure it out myself. I never shared my heart with people like I have now. I used to think hard times just make you tough and stronger. I never realized that talking with others helps so much. It doesn’t mean you are weak, it means you are seeking a place of understanding and knowledge. With all of that being said, I am growing, exponentially. So will the number of stories that I plan to share.

I will start with a story I should have dropped in September/October. Morocco. Wow. What an amazing place. What a loving culture. I have a future blog I plan to write about the Muslim culture in depth. I have a heart to clarify what it’s really like overseas compared to what our media shows. That is for another topic for another time, but just know that they will give you everything they have to make sure you feel loved and at home. Morocco tends to be classified as a 3rd world country, so when I say they will give you everything, I mean everything. You will never leave a home hungry, even if they are feeding you their food for the next 5 days. You will meet a stranger and they will have you in their home meeting their family and eating traditional meals in the same day. Morocco is a place of community and giving.

I have just recently had a team change. The six other people I was traveling around with has switched. My previous team who I lived with all the way up to last week grew so much in Morocco. A lot of the work we did wasn’t on a schedule. We didn’t have a school or organization we were teamed up with. We weren’t operating out of a premade plan. We were living a life of what we like to call, ATL. Ask the Lord. Before we would head to countries, we would pray into the time there. Also, we would wake up every day and pray about the day while in that country. We ask the Lord to highlight certain people or places and we go on a hunt for things we may hear or see during those prayers. No schedule, just living a normal life and letting prayer lead the way. You want to know what is crazy, it actually works. If you feel like you’re praying and daydreaming something, it is most likely God trying to show you something, not just your imagination. I have been through so many of these prayer sessions and to see so many details and specifics be spot on is scary. Scary awesome that is. How have I missed out on this my whole life? The prayers would start and we would begin to see places we hadn’t even been. Then someone else would get a visual of a person or a name. We would look for these areas and these specific people and let God do the rest. This may seem far fetched. It may seem crazy to some of you. I do want to tell you that God does speak and it is so special once you start to listen and understand.

One of my teammates, Charles, and I went to lift almost every morning at 7am. We would walk by this restaurant on the way. One of the servers there would stop us and talk almost every day. For the sake of safety, I will call him Ben. I don’t know why I picked Ben by the way. I really wanted to do something like Mr. Dude but that would be over the top. So anyway, Ben was a great guy. Very smart. His level of wisdom was through the roof. He is around 30, from Morocco, and currently getting his masters in Philosophy. That being said, he questions everything and won’t leave a conversation until everything is solved or understood. We got to laugh with him for short amounts of time every day and we decided to start eating at his restaurant every once in a while. That lead to trying to plan some days to hang out with him when he was actually free. It was hard to find a good time, but that day finally came on our last night in that city.

The guys on my team set up a time to meet Ben at a cafe near the center of the city we were staying in. We had a man who helped us get set up when we got to Morocco. He is a local and an underground pastor. He joined us, taking a huge leap of faith. It is illegal to convert to Christianity there, so talk about a faith that moves mountains for him to show up. Let that sink in real quick. I wrote about his underground church here. https://tylerburke.theworldrace.org/post/where-are-you-what-are-you-doing. This is what I wrote in that blog that was related to this man:

“Here is some of the good news. Even though I can’t share where I am exactly, I can talk a little about what we are/have been doing. I have been blessed to engage with people and a culture who could be banned from their countries or, God forbid, killed because of their faith in Jesus. I think as a country (America) we take it for granted that we can practice our faith so freely. The term ‘a faith that moves mountains’ is tossed around a lot. I will tell you in full confidence that I have finally found it. I have seen it firsthand. I have been able to touch it. I sang/danced to worship songs in the middle of it. I have listened to messages on Sundays in a completely different language and not understood a word but felt it. Man is it sweet. People who have church in a back room and have to close all their windows in 90+ degree heat. People who give up jobs and only work on trying to find believers in the area to minister to. People who have no money coming in but put their full faith in God to provide. When you struggle with faith, think of them. Remember what some of this world looks like. Again, I have been blessed to see it and I want to bring you all in as well. Be grateful and never hold back. America has the opportunity to live and share freely, use it every chance you get.”

So, I was with Charles, Daniel, our alumni squad leader Eric, and this man to go meet Ben. We sat down at a coffee shop and started with some small talk, with no expectations of where the conversations would go. We just wanted to love on Ben, even if Jesus was never mentioned. The conversation did end up leading into how the world was created and Adam and Eve. We then got into some very interesting conversations like, when God spoke the world into existence what language did he use? How did Adam and Eve communicate before sin entered the world, did they need language? Ben was a firm believer in God, but has read almost every religious book out there and respects them all. His philosophical mind just runs in a way that makes it hard to narrow in on one thing. Did I mention these kinds of conversations in Morocco are extremely frowned upon and in some places, highly illegal? Well that’s where God pulled an “I got this, bro”. The minute we started talking about Adam and Eve, the coffee shop emptied. It was as if God was creating this safety bubble for us to speak freely with Ben. We sat and talked about some of the most amazing topics I had never thought about until the coffee shop closed around 11pm. Four hours. Four hours of great conversation and getting Ben some real answers. Nothing about religion. Nothing about Christianity and why we think it’s important. Just, Jesus. About how Jesus died and rose again. About how Jesus is what bridges the gap to God, not any religious background or man made story of how we can get to heaven. Simply, Jesus. We left feeling great that we got to water a seed of faith that someone had already planted in Ben.

As we were walking out of the cafe, he was experiencing a spiritual high like never before. He was feeling something but didn’t know what. That is when we got to briefly explain the Holy Spirit. So naturally, he wanted to sit and talk more. We found a bench in the park across the street and sat there from 11pm – 230am. Yes, that’s 7pm – 230am. We dove into deeper questions. People sitting on benches and walking around us stopped showing up. Round 2 of God creating that bubble happened. He protected, we went deeper and deeper. We started talking through scripture and answering questions. At this moment is where I got to see one of the most fulfilling things in my walk with the Lord and on the race. I saw Ben, a grown man, stare off in the distance with his jaw to the ground. He then asked us, “Is this why all of you are so different? Is this why every time I am with all of you I feel so loved? It’s because of Jesus isn’t it?” I teared up because I saw a 30 year old man experience that child like love for Jesus that the Bible describes. At that moment he also remembered something. He said, “It all makes sense now. I remember having a dream about 4 years ago. It was Jesus. It felt more real than when I am awake. He walked up to me and I could feel His clothes. He looked at me, smiled, and put his arms straight out. He then turned and walked away and that is when I woke up.” Our response, “That WAS Him Ben. When He put His arms out He was resembling how He died on the cross for you.”

Ben couldn’t believe it. Many years of studying all of this and it finally clicked. He told us he wanted more of what we had. We then got to watch and hear Ben commit His life to Jesus. No one sees this overseas. The percentage is so small. But this isn’t just about Ben, it’s about all of us, always. It was so inspirational for me because I watched a man not only find eternity with Jesus but he was also risking everything. If someone finds out He could lose his schooling, he could lose connection with family, or in some parts of the world, be killed. That is true faith. That is one of the biggest inspirational stories I have ever witnessed. Please sit on this story for a moment. Close your eyes and imagine that life. If you say I believe Jesus died and rose again for me, you could lose everything you have. You could be killed. I know many of you have heard of this before, but have you HEARD it? Did it really sink in?

Blurred faces for their protection but that doesn’t take away from the power of this picture. Here is that conversation about scripture. Here is that bench.

I was so nervous leaving Ben. I got to pray for Him at the end of the night and told him I would pray for him for the rest of my life, every day. He cried and we were able to form such a strong bond. I wanted to just stay there with him and watch him grow. That is when the sun rose and I realized we were leaving. I figured Ben made the best decision of his life but it would fade away shortly after. I didn’t have faith. I watched how big his faith was and then I resorted to none. I felt like I was cheating him. Well, God said “I got this, bro” yet again. Would you believe it if I told you another World Race team went to this town a month or two after? It was a route just like ours, focused on prayer. Ben was highlighted in their prayers and they had no idea why, they just trusted what they saw in prayer. We couldn’t share what we were doing or that we all were connected, but for Ben, it doesn’t matter. It’s people that are helping him understand Jesus. He went from a newly blossoming tree to a full size tree bearing fruit. We were able to communicate with that team and fill them in on everything once the information got through the grapevine. Eric, the alumni squad leader, that was with us that night had worked with this other squad before us. They told him, we met this amazing man named Ben and he got to tell them exactly why their prayer walking led them to Ben. It was a wrap from there. They answered all of his new questions and he loved it. He loved it enough to carry on conversation with me about it. Ben messaged me:

“I meet with a new brother. He teach me a lot of things of the Bible. I’ve become. A good man, I know the true I follow Jesus Jesus, Change my life. Thank God. Thank you to your prayer for me, thank you. I become change.”

Talk about an amazing quote to frame in my house one day.