Our travel day began at 3:30 am on December 1st in Granada, Nicaragua and about 10:30 am December 3rd in Manila, Philippines. Our travel experience was about 40 hours long and took us through 4 different countries including the US of A.
Going through the United States was hard. It felt like I was going home and that was hard because I was excited to go home. When we landed in Miami, I was able to call and text different people which made it feel like I was heading back to them. I’ve loved the race but it’s challenging. It’s challenging to dig into the crap I hold onto, it’s challenging to learn hard lessons, it’s challenging to live in constant community, and it’s challenging to be away from home.
It would have been so easy to hop on a plane and head back to Knoxville and into the arms of my family and friends. It was overwhelming to think I had 8 months more of this intensity. My mom gave me wise words to not look at the big picture but take each day at a time.
BUT I didn’t run home because this journey of love that God has me on is worth it. Journey of love discovering the love He has for me as well as the love I have for those around me. Praise God I didn’t head back to Knoxville and that I’m now sitting on a porch overlooking a busy street in Manila, Philippines!
Classic World Race style led to a huge change as we were ready to leave the airport. All the teams were loading up and our team was asked to take our things off one bus and put it on another bus because we were no longer going to Tent City but we were going to Tondo with another WR team of incredible sisters and brothers, Sweet Aroma! Such a surprise and shock but we piled in and headed to Tondo.
No place I’d rather be then in Tondo with these 2 teams and working with this church. We wake up every morning at 4 am for prayer and worship with people in the church. Then we have done other things like teaching kids, prayer walks, feeding programs, and hanging out with the kids in the community. We also get to do senior citizen jazzercise in the morning with the people there. And kids run up to us, hold our hands and yell Auntie Jenni.
The truth God had for me at the beginning of this month was His strength. And yes ever since the beginning I’ve talked about operating out of His strength and in most ways I have. Yet it’s come to the point in the race that I’ve run out. I reached a breaking point at the beginning of this month. Nothing in my flesh wants to be doing ministry here. Of course it’s fun traveling around and seeing new things but nothing in me wants to be living in this neighborhood of extreme poverty. Nothing in my flesh wants to cry over the filthy child as I hand him an egg in the food line. Nothing in my flesh wants to be sweaty day in and day out. Nothing in my flesh wants to wake up at 4 am to pray and worhsip. Nothing in my flesh wants to be separated from my family.
Yet everything from God IN me refutes every single one of those statements times 100. Thanking God for His strength today and learning to rely on that and asking for it every single day no matter how easy life may be. Just the fact that He has me waking up at 4 am is another indicator that I can't do this life on my own.
Cheers to waking up at 4 am, clear direction, ministry changes, senior citizen jazzercise, and living out of God's supernatural strength,
Jen
