Hi everyone! We are very excited to share our World Race experience with you. Here’s a little background on how we chose to apply to the World Race, how we selected the Expedition Route, and some thoughts moving forward.
Next August, John will be leaving the Marine Corps which prompted several questions about our future – where will we live, what we will do there, and who will it be with? While John began to stress about transitioning out of the Marine Corps, Victoria saw it as an opportunity: with nothing tying us down anywhere, we had endless options of what we could do.
Let’s back up to before all of this. John grew up Catholic and struggled with only studying Catholicism from an academic standpoint. Victoria grew up Christian and struggled to know what a real relationship with God was; more than going to church on Sundays. We both encountered Jesus in Hawaii like never before. This included us both completely dedicating our lives to the Lord as well as getting baptized! Since then, it’s been a journey to find out what living as Christ-followers is like.
Ever since 2013, I (Victoria) have thought about the World Race; I know multiple people who have served before. At least once a year since then, the thought of applying has come to mind. For various reasons (including putting our potential engagement/marriage on hold for a year), I never applied. The World Race came to mind this year a few months ago and this time I presented the idea to John. I expressed that since this has been a recurring idea for the past 5 years, it must be significant. With John deployed, our communication is limited, but the day I wanted to talk about it, we were able to email back and forth almost all day. We apply that same day. We didn’t know what would happen or if we would even get accepted, but we wanted to at least try — and here we are!
The World Race is an 11 month mission trip to 11 different countries around the world. Through prayerful consideration, we have decided to go on the Expedition Route which takes us to countries in the 10/40 Window; the rectangular area of North Africa, the Middle East and Asia approximately between 10 and 40 degrees North latitude. The 10/40 Window is home to some of the largest unreached people groups in the world. The countries we will be serving in are China, Nepal, India, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Mongolia. Though physically, mentally, and spiritually challenging, we feel that we are ready, willing and able whereas others maybe aren’t, won’t, or can’t. Because of the inherent difficulty, we agree that the Expedition Route is likely to be extremely rewarding – to share His love with the unknowing, to force ourselves to trust Him, and to share in adversity and grow in our faith together.
God’s plan continues to amaze us; how He’s fashioned our lives to be so much more than we could ever imagine! I (Victoria) didn’t know that going on a mission trip in 2012 would change the way I saw the world. I didn’t know that going to college in Hawaii would be one of the best decisions of my life. I didn’t know that I would marry a Marine and be a military spouse. I didn’t know I’d be going on the World Race with my husband! But God did. As much as we can think and dream of what we’ll be doing in 5 or 10 years, nothing will top the plan God has for our lives.
Please join us in our journey! Subscribing to this blog is an easy way to do that. Once we depart, we will post weekly updates (written, pictures, video clips) to share what we’ve experienced, people we’ve reached, and ways God has impacted us. Please keep us and the communities we will join in your prayers.
Love,
John and Victoria
A closing thought…
This section of lyrics from Matthew West’s song “Do Something” really hit home as to why we want to go into the world, because that’s what God created us for. Listen to the full song if you have a chance, it’s a good one.
I woke up this morning
Saw a world full of trouble now, thought
How’d we ever get so far down, and
How’s it ever gonna turn around
So I turned my eyes to Heaven
I thought, “God, why don’t You do something?”
Well, I just couldn’t bear the thought of
People living in poverty
Children sold into slavery
The thought disgusted me
So, I shook my fist at Heaven
Said, “God, why don’t You do something?”
He said, “I did…I created YOU!”
