In 2008 I went to New Orleans for the first time. I was there with my youth choir from church and we spent a week helping clean yards and singing around town. We stayed at the seminary and at the time parts of campus were still under repair from the hurricane. The campus, even then, had a presence about it, as if every building there was welcoming and inviting you in much like walking around the French Quarter. Almost ten years later and nothing has changed. I still feel just as at home there as I did when I was 17 years old. I remember walking to a group meeting with our choir director one night and he asked me how I was enjoying the trip. I said I was having a good time and made a comment about how nice the campus was for just going through a hurricane a few years before. He agreed and then told me: “You seem really relaxed here, like you’re right at home. I could see you being on campus here one day.”
Fast forward to 2017 and that prophetic statement just might be coming true. Me and Bethany spent five and a half hours on campus last weekend checking out the married apartments, talking to professors, touring campus, and asking endless questions to our tour guide Noah. With the exception of some new and improved landscaping, everything looked the same. I even think the ficuses in the cafeteria were the same ones from when I had been there in 2008.
Overall it was a great experience. It was a moment that 17 year old me wasn’t even sure would come. I wrestled with my calling in life all through high school and finally accepted it a year later almost from the day I stepped foot in New Orleans for the very first time. Thinking back on it, my acceptance of ministry really started on that trip. Being on the campus and picturing myself there as a student after my director said that is what really started provoking my thoughts about it being a real possibility for me.
Even though I have had this calling since high school, God is just now opening doors for it to come to fruition. One thing I tell people when talking about the race is that it is basically going to be a big reset button for Bethany and I. When we get back we will have almost nothing and be used to living with almost nothing. I told someone recently that when we get back we will just wait for whatever door God opens and that will be where we go. But it may be that He already has one cracked for us before we even leave.
Bethany here…
So on Monday Derek and I went to New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary to visit for, well, school obviously.
Why are we looking at seminary when we are leaving in 5 months to travel the world as missionaries for 11 months you ask?
Well, this has definitely been something in the making for us. Derek, as he mentioned before, has always felt the call to ministry, and seminary is definitely a natural progression.
For me, this is all coming together by forces much higher than I. I am all about supporting my husband in ministry,going back to school, whatever that looks like. But me?
I’ve always wanted to get my masters degree in something, but I have said since my last year of undergrad I would wait for God to direct that part of me, whatever that would be. Well, my fighting that calling is slowly coming to an end.
Walking through the NOBTS campus was amazing. It was quite surreal. It felt like this amazing, safe, sacred training ground.
We spoke with the dean of chapel, and one of the Women’s Studies professors. Both were informative, welcoming, and so encouraging. Not once did I feel pressured to commit to NOBTS, but was encouraged to truly seek the Lord for the answers to our calling individually, and separately.
Many of you know how much I love the NOLA area. I would up and move right now, not a tear shed.
Ok, maybe a few. But Derek and I fell in love with that area, and desperately want to help with the enormous need down there.
But why a degree?
I look at any degree as training. And while we are training, we will be serving. No time for party, relaxation, or idle time. We have but one life to live for the glory of God.
God has laid some big dreams on my heart outside of Derek’s calling to traditional ministry. But that’s what is so beautiful already. God is already working to make those fit together.
So yes, the next year and few months we will be focusing on serving the nations, reaching the uttermost ends of the earth. But Papa is already blessing us with a glimpse of a vision of what He has in store for us after.
There really is nothing wrong with talking about that, because we all know God is the one with all the plans. What He wants to happen WILL happen. As long as you don’t forget to be grateful for that very next breath you are taking, living in this moment NOW to glorify Papa, dream on.
We can only see a sliver of that vision. It can, and mostly likely will change as more is revealed in the next year. I want to be so prepared through the World Race for seminary that it motivates me to hit the books for four years, preparing and practicing for our kingdom goals.
