YOU GUYS.
I’m a World Racer. (est. October, 2017)
(This is all a little crazy, and also really exciting. Stick with me here while I figure out what it is to “blog,” and I’ll explain everything and tell you all about it.)
I don’t really know how to begin to tell you everything that has been happening to lead up to this or how this even came about, and I certainly don’t know how to say it all well. I want to tell this ~awesome~ story that makes you feel chills and get totally on board with what I’m saying, but I have zero idea how to do that. I am in no way gifted in writing or storytelling, so I’m just gonna write what I feel and maybe (hopefully) it’ll make sense at the end.
I guess we can start with what the heck this is. If you’re not sure what the World Race is and haven’t googled it yet, a short summary is that it is a mission trip that goes to 11 different countries around the world in 11 months. Crazy, awesome, insane, amazing.
Why/how/when did all of this start?
Step 1. South Africa. The mission trip I did last summer, spending a month in South Africa as a ministry intern, changed my life and I couldn’t explain it to you if I tried. My heart broke for the needs of the people, and was changed for good. God is really moving there, and his hands are evident in the lives of the people I worked with and encountered. I left South Africa and returned home with a discontent for the way things are and a desire to help heal the broken.
Step 2. Adventure. If you know me even a little bit, you know that I dabble in adventure. In the past year I’ve been to three different continents, doing everything from road-tripping all over the western US, going on a safari in South Africa, hiking Machu Picchu in Peru, climbing Half Dome in Yosemite, and sky-diving in Hawaii. I’m no stranger to a good adrenaline rush and I have a strong desire to travel and to see the world.
Step 3. This thing called the World Race. I followed it on Facebook, and knew of a couple people who had done it, but never really looked at it closely. It was just something I glanced over without giving much thought to. That is, until it wasn’t. Until it started showing up everywhere, and I finally gave it a closer look.
Step 4. Jesus. He was the one who made me glance twice at that World Race post on Facebook. He was the one who whispered “what if” as I started reading the blogs of Racers in the mission field. The past couple of months I’ve been prayerfully considering that “what if,” and found that every time I would doubt or feel afraid, a door would open, all the lights would turn green, and everything started screaming “GO.”
Step 5. Application, interview, prayer prayer prayer, acceptance.
Step 6. Write first blog post and tell all your friends. 🙂
So, in a nutshell, the Father has been testing my faith, asking me how much I trust him, and how far I’m willing to go to prove it.
Do you love me?
Yes.
Do you trust me?
That is the question that has defined my life. Do I trust you, God? Do I trust you to change all of my life plans? To sacrifice the comfort of home, and of family and friends? Do I trust that my life will be infinitely more rich if I really let you have control? The struggle of wanting things for myself and for my life, but not knowing if the Father has it in his plans for me, has been the source of all of the trials in my life. Fear and insecurity mar the relationship between me and my Father, and I am slowly learning how to let go, have faith, and be courageous.
Right now my life is nursing school. I have one more semester before I graduate from one of the best nursing schools out there with a degree that could get me a job anywhere. I never wanted to be a missionary. I never penciled “be a missionary” into my life-plans for after graduation. This wasn’t something I could have foreseen, but it was something God has been preparing me for for a while now. Lucky for me, I don’t really know anything and God is amazing and omniscient and has greater plans for me than I could ever fathom.
Do I trust you, God? Yes, to the ends of the earth. And so I am going. This October my team and I will embark on a life-changing adventure around the world to serve in partnership with churches and ministries in local communities to preach the Gospel, plant churches, work in orphanages, minister to women and children trapped in prostitution as a result of human trafficking, and bring the restorative hope of the Father’s love to many tribes and nations. We will travel to the following countries on our journey.
- Chile
- Bolivia
- Paraguay//Argentina
- Cambodia
- Thailand
- Serbia
- Romania
- Bulgaria
- Ethiopia
- Rwanda
- Uganda
While I am SO excited to begin this journey, it comes with a lot of sacrifice, and a lot of prayer and trust. To be able to go on this awesome adventure, I need your help and your support. I need you to join with me in prayer, with encouragement, and for donations for funding. I am inviting you in, to follow this blog and my journey into the nations, and wherever God leads us, and be a part of my support team.
I will post updates and more information soon about fundraising and my next steps as I go into this, but until then, friends, please keep me and my team members in your prayers. Please feel free to follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and subscribe to this blog for more updates and any information on things I will be doing to fundraise for this journey. Until then, if you want to donate (and know that I could never be grateful enough if you do) you can do so on this blog website, right at the top.
If you have ANY questions, or just want to talk to me about this at all I would be so happy to talk with you about it! Just text or call me at 616-204-8876, email me at [email protected], or Facebook message me. I am so stoked about what God is doing and am really excited to be able to share it with you and have you be a part of it if you want to be.
Thanks for hanging in and reading all of this if you made it all the way down here. I still have so much to say, and I will, but my fingers are tired and my brain hurts a little, so I’m going to leave it here for now.
In peace, in Christ,
Brittney
