When I was growing up sports was all that mattered to me. I loved playing basketball!! You could find me in a gym or outside shooting at all times of the day. When I was 16 years old I felt God calling me away from it. He had called me to do a mission trip in Ethiopia for 2 months in the summer. I was so excited that my parents said I could do it but just know that there was a good chance that I wouldn’t get much playing time on the basketball court the next season. That’s when I decided I really needed to think about this, did I really want to give up the one thing that I loved doing the most for God? Surly God wasn’t calling me away from what I loved. After much thought I decided that I wouldn’t go. I was going to work really hard over the summer to become a better basketball player. Maybe give myself a shot at going to some small college to play ball at.
Man did telling God no back fire on me. The next two years of my life were rough. I had disobeyed God and in doing so I separated myself from him. I told him my way was better and man was I wrong. By the end of my senior year i was content with never picking up a basketball again. The love that i fought so hard to keep was taken away from me.
At the age of 18 I realized that it wasn’t to late to obey God. I told him that if he ever wanted me to go back to Ethiopia that I would go and not ask any questions this time.
Now lets fast forward 6 years! I am driving to my best friends wedding that is 6 hours away. I have my music blaring and I am just crying because I am just so frustrated. I had been praying for months for God to show me what to do with my life. I was mad at God and you better believe i was telling him that I was mad. That’s when he told me “you haven’t been quiet enough for me to even talk”. Okay God i understand that i tend to be a very busy loud person. I made a deal with God i will be quiet for the next 30 minutes and just let him talk to me. So basically JESUS RODE SHOT GUN WITH ME FOR 30 MINUTES!!! crazy I know! He told me that the worldrace was what he wanted me to do next. That he knew that is would be really hard for me but that it was going to set me up for so many blessing and so many opportunities to love on people. As I’m hearing this I just start crying even more. Why you ask? Because for the first time since I left Pawhuska 8 months ago I felt like the world had been lifted off my shoulders. I finally knew what I was called to do. Secondly my sister is pregnant with my first little nephew. There is going to be a baby in my family and I am going to miss it. My best friend, my christina yang, my person, is going through the most exciting part of her life and I won’t be there for her. I just cried and cried and yes I am still driving at this point. I just kept thinking that i can’t do it, i don’t want to. I want to be in that delivery room cheering my sister on and telling her how amazing she is when that baby is there. I cant miss that is what I was telling God though my sobs.
Thats when I felt it, felt God giving me peace. Peace that it would all work out, that it would be the hardest thing I have done so far but that I could do it if i only trusted him. So I said YES!! Yes God I will go on the Worldrace.
I get to my friend who is getting married and the first person that she introduces me to Rose who had been on the Worldrace before. Gods timing was just amazing!!! I got to ask her all types of questions and she got to tell me stories about what its like to be a Worldracer!!
Now back to Ethiopia part of my story. The country that I will be spending my 26th birthday in is none other then ETHIOPIA!!! God is letting me go there even though I disobeyed him 8 years ago!! What a great God we serve!!!!!!
