Great question!
From the few seconds of my first overseas mission trip to South Africa, I knew right away that my life was in the process of changing forever and it has greatly! After my trip to South Africa I continued on many other domestic and overseas mission trips and they have been great… but soon one trip after another I started to notice something different about myself during each trip. I started to become comfortable.
This didn't hit me until last summer when I helped my friend Elisa, on a local mission trip she helps leads for a week over the summer called DC Serve. This was the first time I was helping/doing a mission trip where I was helping a different organizations other than my church. I only knew a handful of my staff team members and knew none of the students. Even though I had a lot of experience with mission work, this was the first time since my very first trip to South Africa, I felt uncomfortable.
I have to be honest, it surprised me and made me a little overwhelmed. Towards the end of the week during worship the song "I Will Follow" by Chris Tomlin was playing and I was reading and listening to the words and thats when it hit me that I was living a comfortable life. I was not following Him, I was following me. These trips started to become about me and not about serving God. When we are living and serving God we are not always meant to be comfortable people and that is what was happening to me with my mission work. I was starting to realize that things in life are meant to include a sacrifice, patience, faith, compassion and understanding, The big picture of my life was unfolding as I made this realization.
I first heard about the World Race from my mentor Steph a couple of years ago and I always kept it in the back of my mind thinking that it would be fun and exciting, but I didn't think that this was for me. I can't handle going away for 11 months and being with complete strangers. I said these things because this was something I was not comfortable with so I automatically pushed this idea to the side.
After my time with DC Serve I did a lot of time praying and asking God what I could do to start living an uncomfortable life for Him. Then a couple days after that prayer I came across The World Race on twitter. I started to research and pray more about the World Race. After reading blog after blog and hearing stories of people's friends doing the World Race I knew that this is what God was calling me to do. I knew when I applied, there were going to be so many uncomfortable things about this trip that I was going to face, being away from family and friends for a whole year, not knowing a single person on my team, living without so many materalistic items, etc. But that is what living uncomfortably is all about. I am ready to take this risk to live an uncomfortable life for God and by doing that, serving His nations along the way. In living uncomfortably I hope to strengthen my relationship with God and find out more about myself along the journey.
