Have you ever thought back to pivotal moments in your life, and marveled at the fact that they did not seem so big then, but have had a profound impact on your life? After reading another racer's "Looking Back" blog, I was inspired to write my own, and see the ways God has brought me to where I am today.
I was born in Clear Lake, Texas (near Galveston). My parents divorced when I was really little, and eventually my Mom met and married my stepdad. I didn't find this out until I was a teenager, but when they met, my Mom didn't tell him that she had two daughters at first. When he found out about us, he was excited. Having a Dad who didn't have to be there, but instead chose to be, had a great impact on the way I view family. I am very thankful for them.
In late August of 2001, I had just turned 13, and my family decided to move from Texas to Bonne Terre, Missouri. My Dad is originally from the St. Louis area, and my parents wanted a new start for us. I was obviously upset at having to leave my friends and the place I knew, but I was excited for a new adventure. Within a few weeks, we had packed up our house and made the drive to Missouri. It was strange going from upper middle class suburbia to small town Missouri, but I loved all of the new, exciting things it brought. I remember, right before we started back at school, we watched the homecoming parade from our neighborhood. I had never seen a parade, and the excitement that it brought the town was contagious. We started back to school a week or so after we moved, and it was interesting being the new girl, although kind of challenging to do so in 8th grade. It was like you could start fresh with your identity. The counselor at my school had helped me enroll, and also had a son that was in my little brother's grade. He was invited over to their house to play, and when my Mom went to pick him up, they invited us to go to church with them. We had never really been consistent church goers, just every once in awhile. We decided to go, although it was just Mom and the kids.
We started going to Sonrise Baptist Church, and loved it there. It was a small church, and the people there were very loving and accepting. My sister and I got involved in the youth group, and after a few months went to a concert with them. Near the end of the concert, they invited those that did not have a relationship with Christ to pray with them. At that moment, I had the realization that although I went to church, I had never made a commitment to follow Him. I felt that I was a pretty good person, but God was softly calling me to Him, saying that He wanted more for me. So, I prayed and decided to follow Him, whatever that would look like. The next Sunday, I was baptized, along with my sister.
High school was a fun, but sometimes hard time for me. I was in a bunch of clubs, choir, did plays and musicals, colorguard, student council, and just generally tried to have a good time. I always felt on the outside, though. My friends had all grown up with one another; I hadn't. I always felt weird and awkward, and that I was only tolerated by other people. I spent more time trying to define my faith by what I didn't do (drinking, drugs, having sex, etc) than by my relationship with Jesus. A couple of the summers of high school, I went to Bates Creek Camp, which was a weeklong church camp. I think it was the first time I went to Bates Creek, they had a speaker that was a missionary to Belarus. This was the first time I had really given any thought to missions. I thought it sounded really cool, and they gave out little coins that had John 3:16 in Russian. I kept that coin for years, and decided that I would go to Belarus one day.
I had always been really into music, and I played violin in the orchestra in middle school in Texas, and sang in as many choirs in high school as I could. I decided that I wanted to be a high school choir teacher, and applied to Missouri State University in Springfield, MO, because they had a good music program. I got accepted, and I was even chosen to interview for the Presidential scholarship, which would have been a full academic scholarship. Unfortunately, I didn't get it, as they only had 30 scholarships to give out for the whole state. I did, however, get the next best scholarship, which was the Board of Governors, which paid for my tuition, but not housing. I went to the campus during the summer to attend the freshman orientation and registration seminar. I learned there that they had made changes to admittance into the music department, because there were too many students coming in. I had to take a music theory test the day I found out about this, which had previously just been given for placement in the theory classes so you could start at your level. You had to make a 50 out of 75 to pass, and I made a 47. They told me that I could not take any music classes until I had passed the test, and auditioned for the department. I was devastated, and felt like my plans had all been messed up. Because they didn't get my results back until the last minute, I was literally the last student to register at the seminar. I was also in the honors college, and you are required to take at least one honors course every semester. The only one that was left was honors psychology. In the fall, I came to school, retook the theory test, and passed it. I struggled hardcore in my psych class, and ended up making a C in the class. This dropped my GPA to a 3.4, and I ended up losing my scholarship because you have to keep a 3.5 .
I had also signed up for Intro to Religion, as it was one of the options for one of the general education requirements. I loved the class, and I loved learning about religion instead of learning theology and doctrine like you do in church. In my opinion, the three things that most affect peoples' choices in life are love, money, and religion. I liked the anthropological and sociological side of it. In the spring, I was finally able to get in an audtion with the music department. I had lost my voice the week before, and the accompanist played much slower than I was used to practicing with the recording. Needless to say, I felt the audition had gone pretty terribly. It seemed like it was taking forever to hear back about the results, and I was tired of waiting and honestly pretty over it. I realized that when you are excited about writing papers for a particular class, that is probably where your passion lies and you should go for it. I decided to officially change my major to Religious Studies, and two days later, got my acceptance letter to the music department. I was surprised to find out that I had no desire to be in the music program anymore, so I declined the acceptance.
My sister, who was a year ahead of me in school, had also gone to MSU, and had gotten involved with the Baptist Student Union. The summer before my freshman year, she and some of her friends from the BSU were taking a trip to Stockton Lake, and she invited me to come. I immediately clicked with them, and it was so refreshing to be with people who were passionate about their faith. When school started, I jumped right in to ministry at the BSU. We had weekly worship services on campus, and I volunteered to greet people at the door. Although I don't really remember the meeting, I apparently made an impression on a certain Josh Mendenhall when I remembered his name the second week. I was at the BSU for pretty much every event, and my faith really started to grow. Instead of it being defined by rules, I was discovering that Jesus wanted an actual relationship, not to just be an aquaintance to someone who lives somewhat morally.
I knew that I really wanted to go on an overseas mission trip, especially after my sister went to India with a group from the BSU. The opportunity arose my sophomore year for us to go to Belarus, and of course I was on board. Josh and I went to the same church, and I knew (from Facebook stalking, lol), that he was interested in missions, so I found him and asked him if he would be interested in coming to an informational meeting. We had always thought the other was cute, and had on and off crushes on one another, but the timing had never worked out. I will admit that I invited him for personal gain, haha. During the planning time, we learned that the family we were going to help had been transferred from Belarus to Ukraine. I was a little disappointed that my dream of going to Belarus hadn't panned out, but Ukraine still sounded really cool. We left at the end of December of 2007. Our seats on the flights were given randomly, and Josh and I not only bonded by sharing music in the Detroit airport, but we were seated next to each other for several of the flights. During the trip, we got to know one another better, and my crush intensified.
Because the family had just moved to Ukraine, we did a lot of work mapping out the city for them, playing with their girls, and just spending time with them. We also went to a small village and put on a VBS type day camp, as well as prayer walking around the village (which was an adventure because it was soooo cold. We could only stay out for about 30 minutes, and all of the guys had ice on their beards by the time we were done).
When we flew back to the States, I didn't get to say bye to many of my teammates, including Josh, and just felt so empty. A few days after we got back, Josh and I talked on the phone for 4 hours! If you would like to read more about our story, you can read it here. One of the things that drew me to him was that I knew he was interested in missions, and that is obviously an important interest to match in a spouse. We started dating on Valentines Day of 2008, got engaged at the end of January of 2009, and we were married on June 19th, 2009 (which is also my parents' anniversary).
In the summer of 2010, we had the opportunity to visit a good friend who was spending two years in Thailand. Before we left, our church wanted to pray for us. They were also sending off Brittany Cox, who was leaving for a mission trip called the World Race. They explained that it was an 11 month mission trip to 11 countries. I thought it sounded so cool, but no way would we ever get the opportunity to do it.
We spent our first anniversary traveling down the river in a motor boat, riding elephants, held a huge snake, hiked to a waterfall, and topped off the night at the Saturday night market. It was a wonderful way to spend our anniversary. I also fell in love with Thailand. It's a beautiful country with beautiful people. While we were there I hoped we would get a chance to come back someday. This also cemented my dream of doing missions as a career. Our friend worked with a family that was more permanently living there, and their ministry focus was on community development. We got to hang out with this family, including their 4 kids! It was so cool to see how a missionary family functions, and I felt so blessed to get a little glimpse into what life could be like for me and Josh (and our kids) one day.
I was finally going to graduate college in December of 2010, and in early September, I was looking around for full time work for after I graduated. I was working at Hobby Lobby as a Customer Service Manager, but they already had a full time CSM, so there was no chance that I could work full time there. A friend happened to write a Facebook status that he was wanting to volunteer at the Humane Society and he was wanting to find someone to do it with. I ended up checking out the website, and saw that they had a position open, so I decided to email my resume. I got a call a week or two later, interviewed, and got hired. There was a busy couple of weeks where I was working both part time jobs and going to school, because my boss at Hobby Lobby asked me to stay for one more week past my resignation date, and I agreed to. After I graduated, I started working full time at the shelter and loved it. It was my first "grown up job", and it was nice to be excited about going to work every day. In October of 2011, the Board of Directors fired the Executive Director, and that turned my working life upside down. I didn't agree with their decision, and the next few months were pretty stressful at work. In February, they decided to have employee performance reviews.. We had to fill out evaluation forms, which asked for our opinions on different things. I was honest on my form about how I felt, and my honesty eventually got me fired. You can read more about that story here. Although I was sad to leave, I had so much less stress in my life. I was glad that I stood up for myself and what I believed, and I wouldn't take any of it back. I am now working at Hobby Lobby again, this time in the craft department, and my job is so easy and non-stressful.
Because Josh and I knew we wanted to do long term mission work, we would look into any missions organization that we heard about. I had totally forgotten about the World Race, until I read an article in Relevant magazine about this time last year. We decided, after much excitement and prayer, to apply. We were accepted in May, and decided to go on one of the January routes. As it got closer, we felt that postponing until July was a better idea. We made it official, and it was one of the best decisions we have made. Our squadmates already feel like family, and I am so excited to go on this journey together.
There is so much more to my story, and I hope one day I am able to share it with you. I would love to hear your story, too! It is so neat to look back at the conversations, decisions, and events that have shaped my life so far, and to see the way God has quietly orchestrated all of it. Maybe, when I am 80, I will write another (even longer!) looking back blog. Life is an adventure. 🙂
