So here I am once again…gazing out the window of an airplane, my favorite place to process. Except that this time my 45 other squad mates are no longer in stow.
I am on my own.
And for many that seems pretty normal and a year ago it would seem normal to me as well. But now it feels so strange, like this non essential but so very comfortable part of me is missing. And although I’ve been grown and stretched in a million and one ways in the area of letting go and saying goodbye…No goodbye hurt quite as much as this one.
Two months ago I couldn’t even comprehend what my post Race life would look like. I didn’t know where I’d be or what I’d be doing. I didn’t know what this next season would be about or how I was even going to deal with letting go of the current season of the Race, the season that changed my life forever.
And that’s when it hit me:
the life of living out of a backpack, moving and traveling into the unknown every month,the life of no constancy, no privacy, and lacking all comforts, the life that had once terrified me…
that life had become more comfortable to me than the perfect little life I had waiting for me back at home, the place that had been my home for twenty two years.
But that’s part of the beauty and downfall of the human spirit, our ability to accept and adapt.
It’s the beauty in knowing that I truly could be placed in any part of this world and know that I’ll be okay. I could forgo Starbucks and running water for the rest of my life and survive. And cell phones or cars. It’s the beauty of accepting no place in THIS world to be my home.
And yet it’s in the downfall of becoming so comfortable that you’re too afraid to move. The downfall of losing those big dreams and visions in the midst of everyday life. Of staying put and missing what God has next. It’s the downfall of the glitz and the shimmer of those things you swore you were going to cherish forever starting to fade. When bath towels lose their luxury and warm water coming out sinks loses its awe. But in the biggest downfall of all, when we become so comfortable that we no longer need God.
This whole life after the Race thing, is so uncomfortable. I don’t know where I fit back into the place I call home. I don’t know how to be my new self around my family and friends. I don’t know how to handle the luxuries all around me in my American life. I don’t know how to live with my heart scattered all over twenty countries. Or how to convey what God has done in my life over the past year or understand what he’s done in yours. I don’t know how to see these things on television and walk away, the things that were once right before my eyes, or the orphan that I once held in my arms. I don’t know how to explain that these Kingdom dreams I have, that replaced those American ones, means my life will look different and sometimes even crazy. I don’t know how to convey that my heart and spirit long to travel and go to the broken, no matter where they may be. I don’t know how to replicate that amazing World Race community I once had. Or how to be in this world but not of it. I don’t know how to stand firm on what I believe without being totally un-relatable to everyone else. I don’t know how to pray before every meal. Or how to keep up all these relationships in my life with only technology. I don’t know how to get a job….how to go about everyday life without losing sight of the beauty, wonder, and grandness of my Father.
Clearly I don’t know a lot right now and it is really uncomfortable but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Because it’s been in those most uncomfortable moments that I become alive, that I learn to fully trust and rely on God.
And I could get wrapped up in all that I don’t know, so much so that it turns into fear. Or I could enjoy the ride, enjoy this next season of the uncomfortable. I could trust and rely on my God who has never let me drown before. One of my favorite things about my Father is how He protects our todays through the unknown.
See two months ago I had no idea what my post race life would look like, and for good reason. God was protecting my todays on the Race by withholding what would happen in my tomorrows. He was allowing me to trust in Him fully while being apart and present for every single beautiful moment on my Race.
And then on my last day of my wild and crazy adventure of the World Race He showed me what was next, he showed me Our next big adventure. Which I am finally ready and so excited to share.
I’m going to Greece!
This January I will be packing up and leaving for the unknown once again. God broke my heart on the Race for His children still stuck in slavery. He burned in me things I will never forget and women I will always remember. So this January, I will be interning with the A21 Campaign in Thessaloniki Greece, helping to put an end to human trafficking.
I will be working in the after care program, helping to take care of the girls directly pulled out of trafficking. I will be doing life with them and loving them as Jesus has loved me. I know it won’t be easy. And I have been warned about the intensity of this internship. I know there will be days I want to go home. And moments where my heart will completely break. I know that I will be thrown into situations where I will have no idea what to do. I know there is so much that I don’t know, but in all this uncertainty there is this one thing that I do know.
And so as I navigate through this new season of my life, I keep my eyes fixed on my Father. And as I gaze out this window of the airplane, I know that I am never alone.
So Life after the Race may be all Greek to me and Greece may be all Greek to me but I have a God who is everything to me… And that is illuminating every unknown.
Stay tuned, as I continue to blog about this next adventure God has for me. If you are interested in hearing how you can support me please email me at [email protected] or if you are interested in catching up please let me know, I am home for four months and would love to see everyone.
