This is the question I have been asking myself for the past two months since I found out that I am doing the WORLD RACE!!!!
Next August I will be leaving to go on an 11 month, 11 country mission trip to serve and share the Gospel with unreached people around the world. I am going on route 3 which means I am going to:
Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Cambodia, Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia
It is going to be such an incredible adventure and I could not be more excited!
So, how did I get here?
I have wanted to be a teacher since at least 5th grade, maybe longer, and have had a plan for how my life was going to go since 9th grade. I would go to Clemson, get an education degree, and move back to Mt. Pleasant to teach and coach lacrosse at my high school. All was going according to plan, until junior year of college when I was in a high school classroom for the first time and realized that I really didn’t want to be a teacher. So this past summer, right before my senior year of college, I dropped the education half of my major and became just a math major. One that really hates math.
That left me having absolutely no idea what I wanted to do with my life and I started getting really frustrated with myself. One day was particularly bad. I was driving to work and I was in a awful mood because these terrible thoughts kept swirling around in my head. Why wasn’t I a better student these past three years? Why couldn’t I have put more effort into my classes? Why didn’t I care about school more? Why did I skip so many classes and miss so many homework assignments? Why didn’t I change my major sooner so I wasn’t stuck getting a math degree that I didn’t want? I was so mad at myself and I begged the Lord to take those thoughts away.
And He did.
He filled their spot with thoughts of people and things I love and bring me joy. He reminded me of my love for people. Of my love for befriending and serving and sharing the Good News with His people. He showed me that now, since I no longer had this mapped out plan for my life, I was free to go and do whatever He called me to do, wherever that might be. And that is when I remembered the World Race.
My friend and I jokingly talked about doing it a while back, but never really considered it, and I had completely forgotten about it until that day as I was pulling into the parking lot at work. I pulled up the World Race website on my phone, saw that there was a trip leaving 3 months after I graduate, and started my application. The routes had not been released yet, so I didn’t know where I was applying to go, I just knew that I had to apply.
Whatever, wherever.
So I did it. I submitted my application on a Wednesday, watched the live route reveal and fell in love with route 3 Thursday, had my interview the next Wednesday, got a call that I was accepted Friday, and I put down my deposit Saturday. And now here I am, two months later and finally writing my first blog post.
I am really excited about this journey and would love for you to be a part of it. In order to go on this trip, I need a team of supporters.
I need to raise $18,100. This money will completely cover all travel, food, lodging, training and insurance costs for the entire 11 months that I am gone. I need a team of people who are able to support me financially, whether it is in monthly giving or a one time donation. If you wish to donate you can click the Donate! tab at the top of my blog.
More importantly though, I need a team of people who will be praying for me from now until I come back from the Race. I need people praying for my squad and I as we prepare and train and leave for the Race and for our ministry while we are abroad.
If you want to keep up with me and my journey you can subscribe to my blog using the Follow Me tab on the left. I will be trying to update my blog twice a month until I leave.
Click the World Race Home tab on the left if you would like to learn more about the Race or explore their website.
-jb
