The past four years of my life have been consumed with classes instructing me on ways to maintain a professional relationship with a client; don’t become overly concerned with a patient, keep it friendly without forming a friendship, fix the problem and move on, etc.
This transferred over to how I was living my life on the race. When it came to interacting and serving, I was all about efficiency and fulfilling the requests of our contact. I never really stopped to make small talk with anyone and the last thing that I intended to do was form a meaningful relationship with people I would leave a few weeks later.
Then, I found myself accidentally in love.
My prayer this month has been for a heart like my Fathers. Boy did He deliver.
I fell so deeply in love with our contacts in less than a month. The children and workers at the Agape Home captured my heart in just 5 short days. I’ve been completely infatuated with all of these beautiful people. And now I’m struggling to find a way to let go. My short stay with them very truly changed my life.
My natural thought process as I begin to pack my bag for Malaysia is to think, “See, this is why you don’t do feelings. It always ends in heartbreak.” I’ve grown to find on month four of my race, however, that blocking out feelings is a sad, empty, and meaningless way to exist. I want the people I meet to remember me as the girl who was on a mission to get God’s will done. More importantly, though, I want them to value a friend who shared Christ’s love with them and fought for them fiercely.
I’m learning to love passionately for the blink of time that I am able to spend with the people that God puts in my life. I have not been called to half-ass this path that I’m on. I’m called to live my life in a way that I have to count on God to show up; to act radically and courageously as a woman of God.
So that’s what I’m doing.
Goodbyes are hard, especially when you’ve poured your heart into a place. But at the end of the day the role that I have played in each one of the places I have been is so tiny. It doesn’t even begin to compare to the way that the Lord is working there. Instead of living in fear of falling in love, I’m living with a firm confidence that God will show up and deliver on his promises. Because at the end of the day, isn’t that what this life is all about?
“You will never be completely at home again,
because part of your heart will always be elsewhere.
That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people
in more than one place.”
UPDATE-
On Wednesday I will begin my journey to Malaysia! Thailand has taught me so much and has included one of my favorite weeks of minsitry so far on my race.
I need to be fully funded by the end of the year. That’s only about two months away!! Please consider supporting me by clicking the tab on the side of my page or sharing this site with friends.
Thank you all for following my journey and supporting me from home. It is appreciated more than you know!
