Some mornings this week I have woken up in awe that I’ve made it back.
11 months. 11 countries. Definitely more than eleven stories to share.
I’ve had hundreds if not thousands of conversations over the year. Conversations with children, adults, grandparents, people with luxurious homes, and those without. I’ve had conversations for hours on end, brief moments, and I’ve had conversations where words were never uttered. I’ve conversed with humans and mammals of all kinds (primarily the canine kind). I’ve had conversations I recall vividly, and others where I’ve been half asleep.
2 days before leaving Bolivia to head back to Canada I met Marisabela, and we had a conversation that I will forever remember.
She worked at a Christian bookstore that I strangely stumbled into. We were at our squad debrief in La Paz, and that day was our “adventure” day. That morning I had been doing some souvenir shopping on my own and was perusing a small mall-like building. There was not much in the building it was fairly empty, but I kept wandering up the stairs checking out what the shops had to offer inside. I saw a store with some T-shirts in the doorway and I figured I could check it out. As I entered the store I noticed all the Christian trinkets and books in the shop.
Marisabela greeted me warmly and shared with me about Joyce Meyer, she asked if I had ever heard of her; I let her know I had. She asked me about who I was and I proceeded to give her the summary version of who I was where I come from (the whole born in Canada, but raised in South America….that’s why I speak Spanish spiel). I filled her in on my year, and what all I had been up to.
She started to tell me that on her way to work she had been walking behind a couple of Americans and she was asking the Lord to be able to experience their culture – understand more of their world. She wanted to talk to them, but felt that she wouldn’t be understood. She then continued on her way to work.
A few hours later I appeared in her store telling her about the different continents and countries that we had visited. She took a keen interest in Africa, asking about my time there, how the churches worshiped, what state the countries were in as a whole.
After I filled her in on my experience in these countries she told me that if I had not come to see her, she wouldn’t have known about Africa. But because I came and shared with her – she now could pray differently for Africa.
She said I had planted a seed.
In my mind I immediately went back to a conversation I had had with a squad leader two months into the race. She had asked if I had come on the race to touch one person’s life, or for one moment, would that still make the year worth it?
I thought about it for a bit, and concluded that yep, I definitely would. Fast forward 9 months to the two days before I leave for home and I recognized that if I had experienced the entire world race only so that the lady in the bookstore of the dark and odd mall could hear about what the Lord is doing in Africa and be encouraged in her faith that day.
It was worth it.
The Lord allowed me to touch more lives than just Marisabela’s this year, but had he called me to the race for that moment, and that moment alone – it would have been a fulfilling 11 months.
The conversation I had with Marisabela was one of many that I’ve had this year. I was able to touch the lives of some this year, just by conversing and hearing them. Little did all of these people know that the Lord was using them to touch my life. Through the conversations I had with people over the year, I learned more about the Lord, his provision, his healing, his restoration, his mercy, his grace, his love, and his good gifts for his children.
The Lord didn’t stop moving in conversations once I left ministry on the race. He has provided me with conversations upon being home that have encouraged me, and I hope those I have conversed with too. Just the other day I had the chance to talk to a woman for a while at a Staples in Canada…in Spanish!
How wild is that!?
The Lord continues to surprise me.
I am ever so grateful to all of you who have followed me on my journey and supported me in prayer and finances along the way. I look forward to catching up in conversation with each of you!
So many of you messaged me or encouraged me right when I needed it this year, and I am so blessed to have you in my life supporting me along the way.
As my blogging days wrap up and my university paper writing season begins again in September, feel free to stay in touch and keep me posted on the happenings in your lives!
Thank you thank you! (:
Much love,
Christina
