I’m back!!! I finished the World Race and am now back in good old America! I want this blog to be a thank you to all my wonderful, generous, persistent supporters who have made this past year possible for me! Whether you gave one time, many times, prayed once or several times for me thank you all the same! God knows how you have helped me!! I appreciate you so much! Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!! This past year was truly the most I have grown, most I have experienced, most I have struggled, and most I have loved and enjoyed life of any year of my life. I am so very thankful to you and to the Father for giving me this opportunity. With Him everything is possible and through Him comes every good and perfect thing!
I also want this blog to be an honest assessment of where I now find myself.
“We made it! It’s over now. What’s next? Shoot…I don’t know. I don’t know what to do. God, give me some direction, please.” These have been some of the thoughts running through my mind since returning home to America and to the Northwoods of Wisconsin. While it is wonderful to be home, it’s stressful at times; guess I was hoping to feel a little more relaxed and confident about all this. So transitioning back to “real life” has been a bit harder than I first anticipated, and to be quite honest I could use the prayers still. Trying to process what just happened these past 11 months and also looking forward to the future seems to have me caught in a fog, some sort of existential funk. One of the absolutes I declared over myself in the presence of the W-squad men was to “speak the truth of who I am in Christ over myself each day going forward”. It is certainly something that I need to put into practice as the devil has been coming at me with ridiculous lies like this: “you don’t belong anywhere; you don’t have what it takes; you still struggle with some of the same things as before you left; what good was that trip anyway”; and so on. I know these are all lies and shots he’s taking at my while I’m in a fairly vulnerable point in life right now. Reestablishing quiet times with the Father, talking through things with family and friends, speaking truth over myself, and doing activities that make me come alive have been my counterattack. Although the struggle goes on it does not go on in vain. I know who I am and I know God’s faithful! So thank you for your continued prayer for me with this.
I am looking forward with a boyish excitement to road tripping out to the northwest with my family this coming week. There is something about going west that puts a certain excitement in a man’s heart! At least it should! The Northwest has always been pulling me and it won’t be long Lord willing before I pack up and move all three of my Rubbermaid totes (books and clothes mostly) out there for another adventure! Following our time out west I am hitting up Project Searchlight in Atlanta in hopes of gaining some help transitioning, processing, and moving forward. I am also looking forward to seeing my squad mates again! Starting to miss those guys…it’s only been a week… goodness this is unusual for me! Which reminds me of something that I’ll share. One of the biggest lessons I learned on the race is the value of solid community, where we challenge one another, affirm each other, build one another up, pray for each other, and just get rowdy together. Even though feedback and team time every day wasn’t always what I wanted to do after a day of ministry it sure taught me a lot and so I thank God for that!! Praying that those of you reading this have made it an intentional point to make darn sure that to the best of your abilities you put godly people around you consistently. People who you can trust, people who are real and who really care.
That’s all for now! I love you guys. You know this is really just the beginning!:) Go out there and DO! As Bob Goff so profoundly puts it in one of my favorite books: “Love Does”. The peace of Christ be with you and His mercies felt anew each morning! Great is His faithfulness!
