For the last few months I have been living at home with my parents trying to figure out what my next steps after the World Race would be. I came back in late June with a few ideas on my plate, one of them being a short-term camp counselor for summer day camp I have worked at in the past. One of things I loved about this job was the community and purpose it provided for me after a year long journey where community and purpose was already given to me.
Coming back to the United States, is probably one of the hardest things I have ever done. Before I left for the World Race, the United States was my home; it’s where my family and friends were and where I lived for the past twenty two years of my life, but now things were different.
Traveling to new countries every month, living out of a backpack, community living, and basic necessities became my way of life and my norm. Before coming back to the states, our squad leadership team really prepared us mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically for what we will experience in the coming months, but no amount of preparation or skills can ever really prepare for what the real thing is actually like.
So when I came home and started working at this summer camp, I felt blessed. I was blessed because I looked around at the people I worked with and knew that we had the same goal: to bring Heaven to earth and build Kingdom together here on the Northside of Pittsburgh.
The organization I worked with is called Urban Impact Foundation, and you can learn more about their mission and ministry here: https://www.uifpgh.org/about
With all of this being said, when I left summer camp back in July, God put the city of Pittsburgh on my heart and it was something I knew I couldn’t avoid any longer.
And if you know anything about me or have known me in the past four years, you know that I love Urban Impact Foundation SO much.
So naturally, I signed up to volunteer with them for two days a week. I also landed a job at a coffee shop making coffee for people. Things began too look up for me, and I started to get in the routine of things when a week ago, I got the phone call that turned my life around.
My former employer from Urban Impact called me and offered me a year long internship with them on the Northside of Pittsburgh. The internship included the opportunity for me to work alongside the department of education and do ministry within the Northside community– I can’t begin to tell you what it felt like to know that the Lord was answering my prayers.
On my race, all I did was talk about Pittsburgh non-stop to my my teammates, sometimes people asked me why I didn’t want to live there initially and to be honest, I felt like after doing something big and monumental like the World Race that I couldn’t return to my hometown and pick up a job where I left off. I thought I had to prove to myself and to the people who followed my journey that I had to do something even bigger or better than the race. But then it hit me the other day when my friend and squadmate, Katie, told me that I had to make a choice: was I going to choose what I am passionate about or was I going to pick something that other people were passionate about for me. So, I decided:
Urban Impact Foundation is what I am passionate about it.
For the next year, I will be working as a Urban Impact Foundation intern and support raising my own salary, like I did with the World Race.
And this time, I am doing something that 1. the Lord wants me to do 2. I am passionate about and 3. in a city that may be my hometown, but a city that is on a mission.
Pittsburgh, PA is a city on the move– not just with business or economics– but a city on the move with Christ. A city ready for revival. A city that already HAS experienced and IS experiencing revival as I type this.
I am excited for this new chapter of my life– one where I get to live out my dream as a missionary in the city that I love with an organization so dear to my heart.
As this new season begins, this means that this may be my last blog post for awhile on my World Race blog. I am going to be creating a new blog where I can post more about what I am doing with Urban Impact– I’ll make sure you can follow along as well! 😉
So thank you for following me along on this journey and riding it out with me– I hope you follow me on to the next one as well! God bless!
