Trying to answer the question “Why are you going on The World Race,” feels impossible. Like trying to describe something so complex and so deep and full of color and tears, impossible. But, its important. You guys (my friends, my family, my supporters, my team, my people) need to know and I need to be able to verbalize. So let me try…but give me grace as I bumble all over a bit.
I’ve been praying about this for 2 years. The first time I said it out loud I cried. I remember sitting on the steps where I was living, the only person in the house, bawling. I know now that I was crying mainly because I was scared, but really also because I knew this was something. You know, those moments when you just have that feeling in your gut. It comes on you slowly until its a tidal wave of consuming emotion. Excitement. Terror. Hope. Did I say terror? I mean lets just boil it down and say that I felt every emotion ever, ever. I knew this was something. And something was going to change me.
I’m going on the World Race because I love people. Maybe that sounds small or simple, but its hardly either. I love them close up and messy as much as I love them far away where I can watch them. Not like a stalker, gosh. I want to know about relationships. Your relationships. Her relationships. His heart. I want to know what made you choose your husband. What its like to love your child. How you find strength when so much is broken. And the beauty of my job, being a therapist, is I get to see this. And love this. And love THEM. And help restore and dream and hope and grieve alongside beautiful, wonderful, people.
But the thing is…there’s more out there. I want to be with people in ways I haven’t yet. I want to be in the most beautiful of places and help restore the most awful of circumstances. The countries I’ll be traveling to, South Africa, Mozambique, Swaziland, India, Nepal, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua, will be breathtaking. Not just in beauty, but in pain. I want to be a part of bringing Love to these places. And the best love I know is God’s awe inspiring, capital L, Love. Sacrificial and sovereign and full of grace.
And you know, maybe its just as simple as that. For now. So, friends, I need your help to do this. I need your love. I need your love in prayer and encouragement. Really, so so so much prayer and encouragement. Your words feel like itty bitty, no actually HUGE, gifts that give me HUGE courage. I also need your love financially. For the next 6 months, as I prepare to leave, I’ll be fundraising like a crazy person. Stay tuned to this blog for more details.
Thanks for listening, friends. I can’t do this without support from you all who believe in this. And in me.
From a hugely vulnerable soul,
Christi
