Going into the world race I thought that all of my problems would disappear. I thought I would leave as a new AK- someone that no one would recognize.
But, the truth is, i’m the same old AK! I’m still not perfect. I’m prideful. I’m selfish. Im not very patient. I’m still bad at fully relying on the Lord. I could go on haha…
I’m still AK in the good ways too. I am AK to the core and that is beautiful! On the race, the closer I’ve gotten to Jesus, the more I’ve learned and understood about myself.
So, the world race didn’t fix me, but leaving the race I feel like God gave me… something like a tune up. I love better now. I give grace better now. I have more peace. I trust the Lord more now. I understand my faith better now. I have more knowledge on who Christ is now. etc! I wasn’t completely transformed into a new person- God didn’t want me to be a new person! He loves me and who He made me to be. God met me where I was at in all situations, showing me grace and patiently teaching me.
I’m not coming out of the race perfect and I will never be perfect. But, I can keep growing for the rest of my life. God can keep working on me and refining me. He can keep giving me tune ups!
So what did I learn? Just to list some things: how to put my validation in God. how gracious and merciful God is. how to deal with change. how to let God’s love work through me. I learned what I actually need in this world & to set my mind on things above. I learned that God is always with me. I began to understand the power of prayer. I learned how to work with all types of people. I learned different ways to love people without words. & how important it is to have a good community that loves Jesus. I learned alllll about the old testament. And I learned how to make my faith my own- to discover God for myself!
I wouldn’t trade these lessons for the world. not all of them were easy to learn, but i’m oh so thankful.
Through the World Race, God has brought me so much joy and happiness. He placed so many people and memories that I will hold close to my heart forever.
I come home in one week and that is SCARY. I’m really not sure where the past 9 months went- it felt like 2 seconds. Although I am excited to go home and see my family & all those good things, letting go of this season is hard. everything in the past 9 months has been centered around Jesus- my community, lifestyle, conversations, motivations, etc. It will be hard to go home and navigate life without all the things i’ve grown to know so well since being on this trip.
There’s a lot of things I will miss. My friends (why do I have to leave them??), travel days, living in a room with at least 6 other girls, ministry (teaching english, manual labor, assistant preschool teacher, random tasks…), having to keep my phone on airplane mode, wearing the same three outfits all the time, listening to music on the way to ministry, seeing cute kids everywhere I go, screaming songs on the guitar, playing sorry for dipped cones, walking to the store 3 times a day to get chocolate wafers, always being dirty and having scrapes on my legs, 7/11 hot ham and cheese.. & all the random food that i’ve discovered is so good, and all the random adventures/things in between!
I was thinking the other day how my life on the race is so random and funny at times. The other day I was just sitting outside my house (in Myanmar) and a little boy walked up with a small snake in a water bottle, fed it one of my apple slices, and then sat down and started playing solitaire with me- and I didn’t think anything of it! it was completely normal. I forget that if a random boy did that to me in the US I would think it’s so strange. that was the first example that came to my mind, but weird, quirky stuff like that happens all the time. That’s something I will miss soooo much and don’t want to not have in my life!
well this is a bit of a jumble of a blog, but please pray for a smooth transition for me as I come home! I’m so thankful for this season of life. My life isn’t fixed now, but WOOHOO!, because Jesus is continuing to work in me! Thank you all for supporting me and caring about my trip. Coming home knowing there’s people who care makes it so much easier! Thanks for reading
