After months of preparing, prayer and presentations I finally found myself on a plane leaving American soil. Instead of thinking, “yeaaaahhh baby, I am so ready for this, let the adventure begin!!” I started thinking, “What the heck was I thinking!”
To sing about traveling into “the great unknown“ is so vastly different from actually boarding the plane to arrive there. And quite frankly, I felt much more comfortable singing about it; but it wasn’t until the LAX plane to China that this became apparent. Too late…
I honestly spent so much time convincing others that this trip would be X,Y and Z that I forgot to let the intensity of it penetrate my heart. I was so full of the ‘right answers’ that I convinced myself I was absolutely ok with everything. (Ok with everything-eh. Comfortable with everything- certainly not.) I mean, I would laugh as my grandma explained all her irrational fears of world travel with me, but secretly there were times where I wondered the same thing.
At this point of the trip it was time to turn off my phone. Mom and dad were no longer a phone call away and it would be a significant amount of time before I could talk to them again. I have been away from home for long amounts of time but, for the past 8 months I was living at home and was in the pace and heartbeat of our life in New York. As we pulled away from LAX, I acknowledged that for the next 11 months I would be on a different pulse than my family and bonded to a new family’s heartbeat.
While leaving, changing, stretching, praying and all the other “ing’s” associated with world travel were obviously going to happen- it was at this moment that I realized that the Jessica Rose Ecker leaving American soil would not be the same woman returning nearly a year later. Ok, maybe not the first time I realized it but, the first time I felt it for myself and not just because it was the thing to say.
Anyway, I don’t share this information lightly or without purpose. I share it to inform you, reader, that I am not fearless. I am homesick on day one. I am weak. I am traveling into unknown and it is not comfortable for me. I share it to inform you that I have arrived at the place of my soul where I have nothing but total dependence on Christ alone. And, because the more real with you I am in sharing my weaknesses, the more clearly you will see that the strength of Christ is the only thing that carries me. (one of those weaknesses being grammar, punctuation and spelling as I no longer have my mother to edit my blogs- dangit!)
With all of that said, I am off! Goodbye America!
Please be praying for my team, the travels, the people, the health and safety of this mission and mostly for us to have the ability through the Holy Spirit to bring the Kingdom.
Blessings
