Most days, it all seems so unreal.
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It all started, when I was in the sixth grade and I could feel a pull. It was a pull that came from deep in my bones towards something beyond my greatest imagination. I would sing the words of hymns at church and they would resinate with me and echo through me like electricity. All I had to do was close my eyes, and I could feel the Holy Spirit ingulf my heart. It all started on Sunday mornings, as a 12-year-old girl, sitting on the Preacher’s bench. My eager, naive heart, aching for a grand adventure, began to rest in the arms of Jesus himself.
If only I had known then, that the verses in those old songs would be some of my favorite comforts in my greatest times of need as I grew into a young woman.
Before I knew it, I was graduating from High School and was getting ready to leave for College. My hunger to befriend every person in a lost world, to pour love onto the very least of these, growing stronger than ever. I left to move out on my own for the first time with no reservations, and full faith in His plan for me. I was completely fearless.
My faith took an unexpected turn when I got to College. The newfound freedom was exhilarating and I jumped into every organization, club and committee; whatever I could get my hands on to build a foundation for who I really wanted to be.
Suddenly, in my 18 year-old mind, my trust and reliance on Jesus had some competition for the first time. When I was growing up, I never loved anything the way that I had loved the Lord. Nothing mattered to me more than pleasing Him.
But suddenly, I had a new life, full of new friends, I had new leadership roles, where people were actually asking for my advice and looking up to me *WHAT*, new responsibilities, and of course, all the cute boys. Not to mention school only lasted half the day, so we had way too much time to have fun, be together, and dream about how we would make our mark on this big world.
It was my Freshman Year of College that I began to choose Jesus. He became 3-dimensional, seeping into every brand new area of my life. Jesus was my biggest fan, my greatest confidant, and he started to show me that I could take over the world if I wanted too, but it would all be an empty nothingness without the love and the joy that only He could provide.
And my friends… what a brand new, unconditional, never-ending, freeing, absolutely most beautiful love He showed me.
The honest truth is, this dark world turns into the brightest light if you surrender your life to a God that knows your steps before you ever even begin to move your feet.
Being passionate about many different careers and life-paths is difficult. I am a natural-born people pleaser, and it is so easy for me to make a good situation out of anything. When I graduated from college, I was so excited to start my “adult life”. I thought my restlessness would finally subside when I moved into my own place, start my teaching career that I had wanted since I was a young girl, and move home to finally live close to my family again.
I laugh now to say that I had it all planned out.
Our God has taught me some of the most important lessons of my entire life in the first two years in “adulthood”. The first, most important, and ultimately the lesson that led me here, would definitely be to never live your life for any reason, person, opinion, title, or any temporary worldly possession.
LIVE YOUR BEST LIFE. CONQUER YOUR GREATEST FEARS. PRAY WITHOUT CEASING.
And finally, follow Gods Will for you. Even when it is terrifying.
I have prayed about the right time in my life to follow my World Race dreams since I was 19 years-old. Some girls followed boys, followed careers, followed something familiar, their families, hobbies, the path that society expected them to take, etc. The greatest joy I have looked forward to in my 24 years has been the opportunity to finally GO. I have been dreaming, reading, researching, skyping racers, messaging racers, letting myself escape into dreams of finally being free of an obligation, or an excuse that I made to give myself reasons to pretend the Holy Spirit hadn’t bid me GO GO GO and spread the Gospel, for 6 long years.
Finally, last January, everything that I was holding onto way too tightly, trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, our Jesus sat on the floor right by my side and waited on my heart-aching sobs to subside long enough for Him to say:
It is time. You are ready, my child.
It is with the fullest heart that I tell all of you that I have been accepted to the World Race Mission Trip. It is an 11-month Mission Trip, and we will travel to 11 different countries, spending a month in each one. I will depart from America, and my life as I know it on August 1, 2018, and (God-willing) won’t return until June 2019. The route could possibly change, but as of right now I will spend 11 months of my life in the following countries:
Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Cambodia, Thailand, Indonesia, and Malaysia.
Please be in prayer for me and my family as I get ready to transition to serve in the Mission Field to spread the Gospel to a world in desperation of it.
I need to fundraise all of my efforts to go on this trip, so I need your help. I would love to come speak at your church, to your youth group, or just tell you more about where I’m going and what lies ahead of me. My family and I have had the privilege to serve at many churches, schools, and wonderful people everywhere in the Southeast, and I would love to reconnect with you, or meet you for the first time, and get you involved in this process so I can take pieces of you with me.
Donations can be made here if you go to my homepage and click “Donate” at the top. Donations will be necessary to send me to go, but above all else, the power of prayer for my journey is what I really need the most.
Please feel free to subscribe to my blog, email or message me for any questions about donations, helping out, or any way you would like to be involved in my journey. I want all of you to be apart of my Adventure of a Lifetime.
May the Lord Bless you and keep you.
LET’S DO THIS, Y’ALL.
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“Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”
-John 15:13
“Take delight in the LORD and He will grant you the desires of your heart.”
-Psalms 37:4
“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’”
-Matthew 25:40
