"Wow, God!"
The World Race has been quite a journey for me. Last May I felt God calling me away from school for a while to serve. Why? Where will I go? What will I do? What will people think? I'm scared. These were all thoughts occupying my head, but I knew what I had to do. After reading blog after blog of my friend, her teammates, her squadmates, other racers, alumni, Adventures employees (I was quite the blog stalker), I applied. On a whim. Interviewed, got accepted, paid my deposit, and I was going. It was fast and didn't quite sink in until recently.
The most popular question is are you excited? For the past several months, my heart screamed no! I'm not excited! I'm scared. I'm scared my squad and my team won't like me. I don't want to be broken in front of people that I've never met. I don't want to leave my family and my friends. I don't want who I see God as to change. I really don't want to speak in tongues. I'm scared and I don't want to go.
Training Camp for me was when these fears surfaced. When I allowed myself to deal with them. For the first half of the week, I wanted to go home. I wanted to leave and never come back. Praise God that I have some of the best squad-mates and friends in the world who would listen to me, pray for me, and challenge me. Challenge me to keep praying. To listen to God and not talk so much.
So I spent a morning down at the lake…just God and me. I journaled, read, prayed, listened, walked and worshipped with Jesus. God led me back to the gospel of John chapter 6 after Jesus feeds the 5,000 and walks on water. The people He fed were coming to the other side of the lake to see Him.
"The next day the crowd that had stayed on the far shore saw that the disciples had taken the only boat, and they realized Jesus had not gone with them. Several boats from Tiberias landed near the place where the Lord had blessed the bread and the people had eaten. So when the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor the disciples were there, they got into the boats and went across to Capernaum to look for him. They found him on the other side of the lake and asked, "Rabbi, when did you get here?"
Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, you want to be with me because I fed you, not because you understood the miraculous signs. But don't be so concerned about perishable things like food. Spend your energy seeking the eternal life that the Son of Man can give you. For God the Father has given me the seal of his approval."
They replied, "We want to perform God's works, too. What should we do?"
Jesus told them, "This is the only work God wants from you: Believe in the one he has sent."
John 6:22-29
Just believe in Jesus. Just trust God. Trust that God will make all things work together for my good. Romans 8:28. A cool thing about that verse…it's true! When Paul writes about God making things work together for the good of those who love God, he isn't saying that God's going to keep me in my comfort zone and do what I want to do when I want to do it. No, he's saying that God is going to make all things work together to make me more like Jesus. Because that's what good is to God, it's Jesus. It's going to hurt, I'm going to have to die to myself, but it's going to be so good.
And you know what? I'm excited.
"At this point many of his disciples turned away and deserted him. Then Jesus turned to the Twelve and asked, "Are you also going to leave?"
Simon Peter replied, "Lord, to whom would we go?"
