For six months, I’ve been trying to write this blog. That’s a long time, and it is way overdue. Let me start by apologizing for not writing it sooner. I only regret it because I feel as it did not honor well all of you who gave to support me. I value so much the generosity I experienced with your finances, as well as the constant backing in prayer. Please do not let my inability to put words to a page de-value your contributions.
Ok, back to it. It’s 2:30 AM, I have to go to work in the morning, and here I am writing This blog. Finally. After all these months, why am I writing in the middle of the night you might ask?
Because conviction.
I’ve struggled to write this blog, because the World Race was such a transformative experience, but I have no words to summarize it. I sit down to try, and I walk away completely overwhelmed.
But tonight the conviction hit, and I realized that I don’t have to perfectly summarize 11 months, 15 countries, and countless lessons in this blog. After all it’s impossible to encapsulate friendship that deep, growth that substantial, and a God that amazing with words. I’m not even going to try.
I’m not going to try to tell you every story of every place and every person. But I will say is this: Who I was when I launched, and who I am now are drastically different people (thank God!).
God used cultural discomfort, the witnessing of miracles, radical encounters with the Holy Spirit, times of deep discouragement, times of unbridled joy and richness, and so many other things, to transform me from somebody broken and depraved into a Daughter of the King most High.
To know me now, is to know somebody that didn’t exist before. To know me now, is to know somebody who has experience the fullness of freedom so sweet, and so intimate, that she never wants to go back the way it was before. I have been transformed.
So thank you, everyone who prayed for me, and to everyone who gave to support. I am so grateful that your support, both prayer and financial, allowed me to go experience doing ministry in contexts that were unfamiliar, because that forced me to grow. I am so humbled that your support allowed God to work through me, and see his kingdom grow. I am thankful for the continued prayer and support as I’ve come home. Because it has been a difficult but good adjustment, but I wouldn’t have been able to do it without my prayer warriors behind me.
So what has this transition looked like for me? Or maybe a better way to phrase that is: what am I up to now?
To borrow a phrase that I learned from somebody on my Squad, “I have a whole shmorgizbord of things.” Or to put it in Plain English: God sort of patched together a bunch of different things for me, but all are good and both my heart and my time are full.
First, I am participating in a year-long internship called “The Lab.” This is an internship that is run through a nonprofit called North County Project. The North County Project
works side-by-side with young/upcoming Leaders while they continue to deepen their relationship with God, develop foundational ministry skills, and gain leadership experience through coaching and discipleship, to reach the One million people in North Orange County who don’t know the Lord.
I have the honor of participating in this program. We meet twice a week, spending part of our time discussing books we’ve read, and the greater part of our time having discussions/ learning time facilitated by different people in ministry all over North Orange County. They teach us what they are passionate about, and what the Lord has taught them in there many years of ministry.
It has been an incredible experience, and I am blessed to have stepped into this program within a month of coming off the field. It has provided for me deep fellowship and community, as well as a space where I am able to continue to learn and grow, pruning my ministry skills and expanding my understanding what ministry can look like.
However, this internship is unpaid… so what have I been doing for monies?!?
Well, the Lord really provided for me in this aspect as well.
Since February, I have been working for my denomination’s (Evangelical Friends… whaddup Quakers?) missions agency. I do a lot of random jobs, but it keeps me on my toes. It has also been incredibly educational about what it looks like to be a full-time missionary. I get to work with dozens of people who are doing this for real-full time. I am grateful that the Lord has given me an opportunity to see behind the scenes. I know that if the Lord does call me to full-time missions work, I will have a deeper appreciation for what it takes to send someone.
I also am working at our Yearly Meetings regional headquarters. Again, I’m doing random things in the office, but the people I’m working with are top-tier. I’m learning valuable communication skills, when to be strategic and went to be a dreamer, among other things! This is another opportunity that I have been so grateful for.
Lastly, I have become pretty heavily involved with my church’s worship team. Leading worship with something that I stepped into in a greater capacity on the World Race. It has been such a joy to continue this ministry now that I’m home. Being on the worship team has given me another outlet of community, which I greatly value, as well as a place where I can come and be with like-minded people who speak my soul’s language (worship through music).
So, this is where I’m at.
I have no idea what I’m going to do with my life. And for a while I found that very frustrating. However the Lord has made me so very content with where he has me. He has also told me that the season of life I’m in is a season of learning. The places he has placed me, and the people that he has surrounded me with are helping me learn what I need to know and become who I need to be before my next step is revealed.
I am grateful.
Please continue to pray for me, as I continue to attempt to discern what the Lord would have me do with my life.
P.S. please excuse any unclarity, or typos, as I wrote this in the middle of the night and I’m starting to feel a little delirious. Good times. Also, I wrote a significant amount of this using talk-to-text… because it’s the middle of the night and I felt too tired to type it out. Please don’t judge me too harshly.
