As my eyes locked on my parents through the sea of faces flooding through the airport gate, my heart skipped a beat. I was overwhelmed by a surge of emotion as my dad's arms wrapped around me for the first time in eight months – uncontainable joy mixed with deep love and excitement, yet swirled in hints of fearful reservations.
Due to AIM's recent effort to bring parents into a better understanding of the World Race, last Saturday my parents landed in Romania and spent five days of ministry alongside myself, ten other racers and their parents in the town of Draganesti-Olt.
Despite the excitement of seeing my parents again, bringing them into this experience made me feel strangely exposed and vulnerable.
It’s one thing to tell them about the Race through blogs and emails, where I have control of what they see and how they experience it, but it’s another thing entirely to invite them to experience it for themselves, where it’s subject to their own judgement.
The truth is, I care about my parents’ opinion.
I value their judgement and I was uncertain of how they would respond to the culture and community that I have not only come to love, but has become an integral part of who I am.
Regardless, I knew God was about to do something great.
The airport reunion led into an emotional five days of raw conversations, intimate worship, hearty Romanian meals, a picnic with the town's people, Easter services, gypsy children, and powerful times of group sharing and testimonies.
In a slightly customized version, my parents experienced for themselves a typical week on the World Race.
As usual with World Race culture, ministry started in the center – within the hearts in our own community – and worked its way outward, spilling onto the Romanians around us.
And what I can say for certain about this week is that God showed up.
His Spirit was alive and moving in the hearts of every racer and every parent.
Our parents jumped right in with us, worshiping with all their hearts, laying hands on one another in prayer, befriending Romanians, sharing their testimonies, teaching the Word, offering wisdom and visions, and being vulnerable with us.
And what an honor it is to have parents who are willing to share their hearts with you; choosing to be real rather than hiding behind a mask.
It was several years ago when the realization first hit me :
My parents aren’t perfect.
Although the notion shattered my world at the time, it opened the door to a beautiful, new intimacy with them.
My parents are people.
They have hearts that have been broken, wounded and touched by Jesus, just like mine.
And I have found that time after time when I bring them into my world and trust them with my heart, they protect and love it more than anyone else I know.
Furthermore, the more that I trust them with my heart – raw and broken as it is – the more they trust me with theirs.
And because of that they have become more than just my parents, they have become my dear friends.
Friends that I can open up to, be raw and vulnerable with, lay hands on in prayer, speak life into and walk with hand in hand on this journey to Heaven.
They may not be perfect, but one thing I know is that they LOVE me.
I see it written all over my dad’s face. I feel it in my mom’s embrace. I hear it in their voices as they look me in the eye and tell me how proud they are of me.
Their love is a love that sees me and embraces me as I am.
It's a love that I feel safe in.
A love that wants only good things for me.
It cries with me, fights for me, and believes in me even when I stop believing in myself.
My parents’ love for me is the most tangible reflection of Christ’s love that I know.
And as I sit reflecting in this quaint Romanian cafe after seeing my parents off this morning, I’m left feeling overwhelmingly blessed-
For parents such as these that love me with unrelenting, sacrificial love,
Who travel across the world to be with me, who trust me enough to be vulnerable, and who model to me what it is to truly love Jesus.
I couldn’t be more grateful to have shared this week with them.
