this is wild.
this new season of my life.
this idea of leaving everything i’ve ever known.
i never have been one to follow the crowd, i believe that is boring. in my oppinion, going your own route and following what makes your heart do a little leap is a more enjoyable way to live life. this silly belief of mine explains my decision to take a gap year SO much ! if you haven’t heard by now… im participating in adventures in mission gap year program. i will be traveling to romania, guatemala, and ecuador to love those humans, sharing the truth and grace of jesus christ! so cool right !?! although god is so good and the way he is using me for the glory of his kingdom is so cool, the road to make the decision to take a gap year and do it for the lord was NOT easy. let me enlighten you people: whenever you start to step towards what god has called you to do, you become a threat to satan. youre not a threat to the enemy if youre sitting on the sidelines. you become a threat when you step in the game. dont let this discourage you- the lord will not allow hardships or temptations come your way if you can not handle it. this knowledge of me threatening satan flared up my energy and passion to follow the lords plans for me. hahaaaaa you got nothin on me satan!!!!
only a few of yall know my gap year story from the start so i will share a lil… jk thats a lie. its gonna be alot.
~summer 2018 camp Kadesh: ive gone to this camp ever since i was 15 and every single year it has changed my life entirely. no exaggeration. that camp was a tool god has used to meet me where i was at and pull me closer into his truth and love. so the theme of kadesh 2018 was “revolution”. i had heard from previous campers that the theme “revolution” wasnt as good as the others, so i went to camp kinda sluggish. LITTLE DID I FREAKING KNOW THAT THIS “NOT AS GOOD” THEME WOULD BE THE BEGINNING OF MY LIFE RADICALLY CHANGING. to sum up that emotional and extremely powerful week- the power of love and need to love others was an evident point. i laid down my heart to jesus, with tears streaming down my face i realized everything i tried to do with selfish intentions ended in disatser. that week at camp i allowed the love of christ engulf my heart- let me tell you, when you allow that to occur you cant keep it to yourself ! the urge to love others with the overflowing love youve let christ pour over you is toooooo great! you cant ignore it ! rEVOLution- everything must change, you must revolt !
okay- came back from camp with the overpowering desire to love others and change everything. honestly, i had no idea what “change everything” even meant for my life, i just knew i needed to do it. heck, i didnt even know where to start- i remember being overwhelmed with the thought: “how? how do i even change everything????” instead of abandoning the idea of everything must change- i broke it down into a littler thing. taking a step back from the word “everything” helped because man oh man, EVERYTHING is a lot of things- HA chill out, toooo much stress. in order to be a revolutionary you have to be close to the lord. for me, becoming closer to the lord required a powerful and expressional worship every week- the kind where you can dance and shout because jesus’ awesomeness is extremely joyful ! so, i started going to Watermark Plano every sunday morning (shout out to emma harper for introducing me to that church- that thing has so much passion for the lord)
~summer 2018 watermark plano: when i began attending Watermark regularly the sermon series was the outsiders. LET ME TELL YOU PEOPLE- GOD IS SO COOL HOW HE TIES EVERYTHING TOGETHER ! HES LIKE A GENIUS OR SOMETHING ! this sermon series emphasized our calling to be ambassadors and make deciples. it showed a deeper level of the purpose of being a follower of Jesus that we should live like Jesus lived.
as i continued to be moved by the words that were preached, multiple verses stuck out to me and tugged on my heart. tugged is a cute word but that doesnt accurately describe what occurred, those verses yanked on my heart and consumed my mind every single day.
Luke 4:18-19
Matthew 10
Luke 18:29-30 ← the Lord spoke to me through this one the most !!!!
every single time i thought of these verses my thoughts kept going to the phrase; follow him, just go. okay- pause. i havent experienced god straight up speaking to me. ive never experienced him booming down to me words calling out to me to do something. when i experience the presence of the lord i get EXTREMELY emotional. it starts out with an overwhelming feeling of pure joy, my heart jolts in my chest and then i cant contain the amount of joy felt so i normally start crying. so when my brain kept resulting to those 4 words; follow him, just go i would feel that heart jolt and would have to fight back the tears.
life went on, summer got busy and everytime i would push the idea of following jesus, loving like he did, giving up everything and just go to serve the kingdom of god the idea would come back stronger and stronger every time. THAT is when i knew. this wasnt some dream to get away and travel and this wasnt some stupid thought in my brain to leave the privileged life ive ever known and live like jesus did. i was being called by God- to just go. once i had identified God was trying to tell me, i tried to figure out on my own what the heck i was supposed to do with just goin and followin jesus. it didnt work out too well, i learned one of the things god was showing me was that dependence on others AND on Him was the most important. i reached out to one of my very wise sunday night small group leaders, lisa, asking her to dinner so i could share my struggle of not knowing what to do with the calling of going and following Jesus.
fact: god shows up in conversations
another fact: he DEFINITELY spoke through lisa’s words that night
after spending 4 hours in a cafe, so deep in conversation the idea of a gap year program brought assurance into this “Gods plan” thing.
~september-october 2018: i told my parents im not going to college next year….did not go over well with the parentals. they werent very receptive to the idea, they never even heard of a gap year program, heck i hadnt even heard of it before. my whole family has gone to college- its what you do. so my parents kept pushing me to look at colleges and work on scholorships. every single time i would attempt to look for a christian university that had a good interior design program and business department, i would feel helpless. i knew going to college would make my parents happy and i would get less judgement and confusion from other people, so i kept looking into colleges. i remember one night- i was so determined to research a bunch of colleges and FIND one to attend. i started at 9pm & through frustrated hot tears falling out of my eyes i slammed my computer shut at 4am. discouragement and saddness overwhelmed me everytime i thought about going to a university instead of taking a gap year. THAT is a sign of a shut door. open doors bring hope, shut doors bring frustration. i went back to my parents and confirmed i was not going to college next year. i started to research gap year programs, i came across ywam and the world race BUT i love staying in my comfort bubble so i shut those programs out and narrowed down the search to programs in the US and Canada ONLY. by doing this i was trying to stay comfortable. i wasnt fully depending on the Lord and i wasnt letting Him lead me to where he needed me. I made excuses. after a month believing my made up excuses, i realized im a hypocrite. i was telling people im living like jesus but in reality my fears and selfish desires enabled me to TRULY trust the lord and his abilities.
~november: by this time, my parents were more okay with the idea of a gap year program and begun helping me try to figure out what program to go with. after understanding i needed to stop making excuses, to let go & let God, i timidly told anthony “yo, i realized im not fully depending on the lord but being held back by my fears. but i decided im going to trust where the lord wants me- so i want to follow Jesus across the ocean if thats what he wants.”
~okay- fast forward because im not trying to write a whole novel.~
the world race program is the one→how i heard about it ???? WELL PART THREE OF GOD TYING EVERYTHING TOGETHER: 5 years ago on vacation in Alaska i went to a coffeehouse for internet. there were no tables available, the only empty chair was at a two top table which was already taken by a girl. she offered the empty seat to me and sparked up a conversation. we became friends and began following each other on instagram. although we havent seen each other since, i saw she started participating in this missions program called the world race. her posts sparked a deep interest in this program that i cant explain… so let me sum this all up: God placed this random gal in a coffeehouse in ALASKA to meet me so that 5 years later the Lord could use her to show me His plan He has for me. HOW WILD IS THAT!? you can not convince me that was just a coincidence. although the pieces were formed years apart, theyre finally all coming together to create the plan God has for me.
the road to the decision of taking a gap year was not a smooth one BUT God works in mysterious ways and He always ties everything together in the end…. im so excited to continue this journey, i hope you will keep tuning in to see what else the Lord has in store for my life !
much love,
emi
