Have you ever had one of those afternoons that you thought was just going to be a regular Wednesday afternoon, but it ended up flipping your life upside down?
Well I did. Let me tell you.
For the past 5 months I have lived in Gainesville, GA doing a fellowship with Adventures in Missions. Its been great and hard, busy and boring, lonely and crowded, and very, very different than my life as a frozen pharmacist in Minnesota. But now being an intern for the women’s ministry and working 9 to 5 is just regular life.
Then it happened.
I was at lunch with a good friend, Megan (who will be famous one day, trust me) and the director of the World Race approached my table. Actually its like he ran over to my table. He had this look in his eye, that I don’t know how to attach adjectives to, but you know what I am talking about. Its like when your older brother tells you he has a “special job” for you and its stirs in you a weary suspicion with a hint of curiosity, so you are obligated to follow him.
“Uh, hey Bill, what’s with the crazy eyes?”
Bill smiles and says when I am done with lunch, to join him over to his table. Something told me my lunch had ended early and Famous Megan will be eating dessert alone.
The next 30 seconds were where he proceeded to ask me, with no preface whatsoever, to be a Squad Leader. “Courtney how do you feel about launching in 5 days… well not that soon, you’ll probably have 6 days?”
… Well, gee… thanks for giving me an extra 24 hours, that is so generous of you, Bill. (insert the thinking face emoji)
Definition of a Squad Leader: to emotionally support, encourage, and lead a world race squad FROM THE FIELD for 5 months and then follow them, love them, etcetera them for the following 6 months from wherever I am.
Spoiler Alert: I said yes.
I’ll keep spoiling it: I am writing this from Abidjan, Cotê d’Ivoire… aka the Ivory Coast. West Africa.
So it was a pretty quick turn around, I wanted to call and have coffee with every last person, but time didn’t allow.
So I will spend the next few months in the Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nepal, India, and Cambodia. I am with the 2nd greatest squad ever born (next to I squad 2014), K Squad 2016, 50 young people from all over the USA. As soon as I landed, smelled the smog, almost got ran over by a taxi, got a bunch of questions in other languages, and saw the babies; I knew I had made the right decision.
Your job: please pray for me and my squad. Pray for protection and health. Pray for me to have wisdom and discernment for them. Pray for God to be glorified in these nations.
