Happy snow day Sunday and cheers to my first ever blog post. We will see how this goes.
I have been thinking about what my first blog post should be all morning. When I was first asked to blog by the World Race staff I thought “Yah! I will have so much to blog about when I go on the race!” But I quickly realized I have a lot to blog about now. Thankfully my lovely roommate helped me decide what my first post will be about. So there we go.
I am already beginning to feel separation anxiety and FOMO with my community. I am at the age of weddings, friends having babies, and fun, spontaneous adventures. I live in a city that has infinite amount of restaurants, coffee shops, concerts and people my age. I live an hour from my grandparents who I enjoy eating lunch with on most Sundays and 20 minutes from my parents. I have (in my opinion) the perfect job. I have a community of educators whose main mission is to educate and love on the babies in our building. Most people have a hard first few years of teaching but my first two years have been a dream with involved parents, community members, and coworkers. I have it made, right? So why did God call me to do the World Race when I am loving life in Nashville?
I spent July-November asking God why he placed the World Race on my heart. Why not just use me in Nashville? The God reminded me of my passions. I’ve always had a heart for cultures and people. In college, I worked with refugee families in Knoxville and was drawn to their stories. I also got my masters in Urban Multicultural Education. From both of these experiences, I came to a conclusion: People have very different backgrounds; different taste in music, food, art, games, etc. but people share the desire to be loved. No matter what race, nationality, age I worked with, they all wanted to be loved. It is easy to love your job, your family, friends, city, etc. But all of these things will not satisfy. Believe me. I could list things I have loved over the years more than God and it always leads to heartbreak. I want others to experience the LOVE that never ends. A love that brings hope that nothing else can bring. We all have a desire to be loved for a reason. I believe in a God who loves us so deeply and he wants everyone to experience that love.
There are many reasons why I want to go on the World Race and some of the reasons are selfish. I get to experience 11 countries in 11 months. That’s a lot of culture and people. I also get to go to some of the most beautiful places on earth. But what I am quickly realizing is that I also get to see a lot of heartbreak, failure, and loss. There are going to be many times when I will sob because of how broken the world is. But then I get to share the hope of Jesus with 11 countries, with the people on my team and with the people I get to meet along the way. The world is broken but the good news is that we have a God shows us that there is hope in Him. This isn’t my story of my great adventure of traveling the world to all these exotic places. It is a story of God using me to share the love that I have experienced from my community in Nashville to people in Ghana, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, India, Nepal, Thailand, Cambodia, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Belize. God is using all of us for His story.
MY challenge to you today is to ask yourself “How can I show God’s love to people in my community?”
1 John 3:16-18
