Since I have started openly sharing about my plans for the coming year with friends and loved ones, a common question I have encountered is “Why the World Race?”. And even more commonly, “Why now?”.
For those who do not know me very well yet, I will share a bit of background. I graduated with my Bachelors degree in Science and Nursing in May of 2018. After originally being a pre-med student and being accepted to Mercer’s medical school, God redirected my path to complete a nursing degree first. I finished my degree in May, began my dream job as an emergency/trauma nurse in July, and was fully set on taking the MCAT this January (Jan 19, to be exact) in order to apply for medical school again this coming Spring. Like I have said in previous posts, I seemed to have my life pretty figured out. And yet, something just didn’t feel right. I was working full time, studying full time, and honestly completely sidelining God. I was telling myself that I wanted to go to medical school to better serve the Lord (which is still true), and yet I was so focused on my own purposes that time with God almost seemed like a distraction, rather than the fundamental core of all I was doing. It was time to take a step back.
That is what the World Race is for me, a step back. A step back from everything that my own determination can achieve. A step back from relying on my own strength and idolizing my own goals. A step out of the driver’s seat of my life, and a step into finally fully allowing God to truly have his way in me. And it has to be now. I was at a make or break moment, and the decision had to be made. I could continue striving on towards what I want and attempt to forcefully make it happen through my own will power and determination, or I could fully surrender to God. Those were the options I was presented with, and I knew it could only be one.
For those who have been fully behind me in my journey towards being the surgeon I still hope to be one day, I still firmly believe that God is not saying “no”, but rather saying “not yet”. A recent sermon that really impacted me was called, “Detours on the Road to Our Destiny”. Detours to our plans are ways in which God is preparing us for our destiny and preparing our destiny for us. Going to nursing school was a huge detour from the original plan of going straight into Mercer’s medical program, and yet the ways in which taking that step, that seemed very illogical at the time, shaped my life is undeniable. God worked through that detour in ways I never could have imagined and I am ready for Him to do it again.
So that is why I am going on the World Race, and that is why it has to be now.
Is it logical to quit my dream job, leave my family, and turn down a second opportunity at medical school, absolutely not. But God never called us to be logical, He called us to be obedient.
