In 2016 I traveled to 12 different countries, made a new family of 35+ amazing people, saw monuments, scenery, and cultures I have only dreamed of, and yet, I don’t believe 2016 was the best year of my life. I don’t believe my best is a thing in my past. But, it took all of 2016 for me to realize this simple truth.
In reflecting back to where I was at this exact moment a year ago, I was so scared, excited, nervous, awe-filled, at the mountain of opportunities that sat before me in the year. I was choosing to undertake one of the biggest, most challenging, most exciting things I had ever done. I sat on the edge of a life-changing year and believed that it was going to be the best year I had ever or would ever experience.
Let me tell you, 2016 was a year so full of experiences, challenges, and celebrations, that I don’t even know how to accurately put into words what this last year has meant to me. I learned that God writes my story, that I am not in charge of my identity, that it is possible to live a week with 4 girls, 3 guys, 1 bathroom, and no water, that I actually do like pears, and that God’s love and promises for me are so outrageous that it will take the rest of my days to truly begin to understand them. My year on the World Race taught me more about others, myself, and God then I ever thought I needed or wanted to know.
The last year was so full of every experience, every emotion, that sometimes I feel like I made it all up in my head. It doesn’t feel real that I met God in the sunrises of Haiti, or danced with Zulu women in South Africa. I can’t accurately describe the smell of the pig pen that I painted in Panama, or the feeling of the mist hitting my skin at Victoria Falls. But the thing that I know is real and have held onto this year, even in returning home, is that my God is good, His love for me is unshakeable, and His promises are not void.
It is because of those very things that I believe 2016 was not the best year of my life. To many on the outside, and even myself throughout the year, my 2016 couldn’t possibly be topped because of what I saw, experienced and learned. When I was in college I studied abroad for a semester, and when my semester was done I truly believed that the best time of my life had happened. I believed that I had checked the box, and there was nothing that could happen that could top that time. My months after studying abroad were some of the hardest I ever experienced, which led me to believe even more that my life was headed on a downward path, never to reach the level of excitement, growth, or happiness as I had just experienced. I spent a lot of years being ok with mediocre, just assuming that God had given me my best and the rest of the time would just be ok.
It took most of 2016 for me to learn that the mindset I was living in since college was not one that actually represented God. In the beginning of the year I figured the amazing year ahead was just a fluke, God forgot somewhere along the way that I had already had my best year. In fighting to understand God’s love and goodness on the Race I have finally began to understand that God is always desiring to give me not only my best, but his best.
It’s with this new outlook that I look ahead to 2017. I can’t guarantee that 2017 will hold as many new experiences or amazing sunsets, but I can guarantee that God will always be fighting to give me his best. It won’t be easy, and it may be messy, but every good thing I have ever experienced has been birthed out of challenge. I choose to believe that 2017 can only be better than 2016 because I get to understand God’s love more, walk in His spirit, and live a life of greater abandon for Him.
So here’s to 2017! May it be a year of greater challenge and growth. May it be your best year yet!
