So many things to say, and for the most part, I feel I haven’t a clue as to how to say them (did that phrasing sound British?). Well, as usual, I’ll find the words as I go.
***If you would like to skip to the part where I say what’s coming up next for Matt, its marked near the bottom, but you’ll miss some good stuff!***
My World Race ended 150 days ago, about 5 months. In the same instance I can feel both as though my plane landed yesterday and as though it was a life time ago. So distant, almost like it never happened at all. It was a life changing experience in and of itself, but simply the fact that I took the leap and did something so radical was a big step for me. Every thing I had done before was what culture, my friends and colleagues, my parents, or my pastor would approve of as a sensible and smart decision: get good grades, join a club or two, try out a few sports, go to youth group every week and finish high school with a good GPA, go to college on a scholarship, join a campus ministry, learn to play an instrument, join the worship team.
Serve.
What’s that? You can play guitar? Join the church worship team too. You can keep a beat while hitting on a box? Play cajón whenever there isn’t a drummer.
Serve…
A girl likes you, but she’s got a few issues? I can fix all that………right?
Serve…….
For as long as I can remember, I felt like there was something….empty. I was so convinced that I was alone in this, and that if anyone figured out that I was different, I would lose everything. So here comes the mask. Matt is a nice guy. He’s helpful. He’s funny. He’s smart. But, above all else, he is useful. I thought that as long as people needed me around, then I would always have people around me. I wouldn’t be alone.
Serve……………..
Yes, I will learn the one instrument your worship team is missing. Yes, I will study a major that makes good money because that is what everyone expects. Yes, I will stick around and help out at a youth group long past being burnt out. Why? Because as long as people need me around, I will always have people around me. I wasn’t a mindless “yes man”, and I wasn’t opposed to alone time, but the idea off not being of use to someone was a suffocating concept. What purpose would I have otherwise? What love would I receive? Why would God himself take any time for me, if I wasn’t useful to Him?
All of this played in the background for years, making my decisions for me as I lived life as well as I knew how. Until…..
Until I knew God was calling me to do something crazy, something insane. Something that half the leadership and authority figures in my life would be against. Something that terrified my parents and brought my childhood pastor to chastise me.
God told me to go on the World Race.
I had just finished college. I had a shiny new 4 year degree in Electrical Engineering. But things don’t always work out the way you plan. I was very burnt out from school, and 6 months out from a rough breakup from a serious relationship that had lasted several years. There was so much I was still trying to figure out. About myself, about God. Everything that had once seemed stable seemed to be moving under my feet. It was in the midst of this that El Roi, “the God who sees me”, began calling me toward the race.
“So much uncertainty; but God, you are asking me jump headlong into more?”
But even when the foundation you built is shifting and every ephemeral grain of sand you put there with your own hands is falling away, He is good. He is good, and all that is left is whatever portion of you foundation that you allowed Him to truly speak into. What better place is there to start from?
“Ok God, I’ll do this, but You will have to take care everything. There is no way I can do this without You.”
Well, 8 months and $10,000 fundraised later, I was on a plane to Ukraine with 30 people I barely knew and no idea what God had in store for the next 11 months or how was gonna raise another $8,000 while on the go (spoiler alert, God took care of that too).
Well, it was life changing, eye opening, paradigm shifting. It was everything and nothing you’d expect of a missions trip. It was late nights of worship with guitars, voices, and hands drumming on whatever. It was long days clearing away bamboo with a dull machete, singing and dancing with kids in a Roma Gypsy ghetto, and teaching English to random people we passed out fliers to, then slipping in the gospel because it was technically illegal.
It was allowing God to tear away all the lies I had allowed to seep into my identity over the years so that He could replace them with truth. This can be painful, but you have to clean out a wound before it can truly heal. My identity is no longer rooted in how I can serve or how I can be useful. Jesus settled the matter of my value at the cross. From the very first month of my travels, my teammates began to speak this truth into my life, not even realizing how deep their words dug into the walls I had built over the years. They showed me love not because of what I could do, but for who I was. They opened the way for God to begin telling me how HE saw me.
[insert great segue here]
***WHAT IS MATT DOING NEXT?***
In the words of Solomon, “there is a time for everything under the sun”. My time on the world race came and went and I find myself in another season of transition.
Anonymous person asking a non-staged question:
“Hey Matt, what are you transitioning into?”
I am SO SO glad you asked! 🙂
A super typical question among my squad mates as the race was coming to an end,
“What are you doing after the race?”
For the entirety of my journey, I had a consistent answer, but to quote King Solomon once more, “There are many plans in a mans heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.” Toward the end of my time abroad, God began steering me toward something I had never considered. Gently at first, but as I warmed up to the idea, He began painting the picture with broader strokes.
Starting in January, I will be part of a 5 month leadership training / internship in Gainesville, Georgia with Adventures in Mission, the organization responsible for the world race. This program is called Center for Global Action, or CGA for short. My time will be split between learning in a classroom setting and getting a local part-time Job to apply what I’m learning.
KNOW YOURSELF
LEAD YOURSELF
LEAD OTHERS
This is the focus behind the program. A part of this program is helping race alumni (such as myself) fully unpack everything that we walked through and learned on the race. It is also about how to apply all of this to life back here in the states, whether you are in a 9 to 5 job, in a full time ministry setting, or even in the mission field again if that’s where God calls you. CGA is also so much more than that. Here is a great video that talks a bit more about it below!
Adventures in Missions is a non-profit, so attending CGA means fundraising again. The idea of fundraising for a discipleship program kind of weirded me out at first. Why would people donate to it? It isn’t a missions trip like the race was, why would people want to invest in me like that? But, that is the enemy trying to poke and prod. Will I still be sharing the gospel while I’m in Georgia? You bet. Am I still going there with a mission, with Jesus in my heart leading the way, and changing lives through me? I wouldn’t have it any other way. That’s part of the point, living with a missional mindset where ever God has you.
Would you prayerfully consider supporting me as God uses me in Georgia for this next season? Would you be willing to invest in the next generation of leaders in the body of christ by supporting this program?
And, more importantly, please keep me in your prayers. This is an intense program, and I know it will challenge and grow me in many ways.
Is there any way that I can be praying for you? Please let me know!
Also, all future blogs will on this new page:
matthewalexander.adventurescga.org
I will go ahead and move over all subscribers, but feel free to unsubscribe at any time.
Peace out Jesus lovers.
