I was sitting on the couch in my living room. It was a Friday afternoon, and my roommate was going home for the weekend. As she walked out the door, she shouted a quick goodbye and a “love you”. I responded with a smile and a wave. “Love you, too! Have fun.”
The door shut. I was alone. I looked at my computer screen, and, after some deliberation, pulled up the World Race homepage. And then I started to think…
It won’t hurt to just apply. It’s not like I’m making a commitment here or anything. It’s just another option. And Megan’s doing it. She thinks I should apply. What’s the worst that could happen? I don’t get accepted? Fine. Then I’ll do something else. It’s not like I have my heart set on this anyway. And no one even knows I’m thinking about it. So, if I don’t get it, nobody has to know… Just do it.
“Ok… here goes…”
And that was it. Little did I know what would come from just clicking “ok.”
I’ve always been a planner. I live by the calendar, and keep an agenda with me at all times. And I’d had my future planned out for a while. I’d been dating the same guy all through college, and we were going to get married as soon as I graduated in December 2010. I was going to be a journalist and he was going to save the world by establishing fair trade connections between people in the U.S. and those across the globe. We were going to spend our lives traveling and changing the world together. That was the plan.
Until this past September when I got a phone call that would change everything…
“I can’t do this anymore. I can’t do us anymore.”
Who knew that two little sentences could change your life so much? My world had just been pushed out of orbit, and all my visions of the future were shattered. It was like looking through a window to a beautiful new world and having a bomb go off right outside, shattering the glass into a million tiny pieces that could never be put back together, and, at the same time, realizing that what you were looking at was nothing more than a picture, a dream of what you had hoped for.
So now what? What am I supposed to be doing now? I have no direction; nothing’s certain anymore. How will I handle this? I felt so lost, alone, and confused.
And that’s where the Lord came in. You can’t give up, Melissa. Trust ME. I’ll tell you where to go. Just look for my hand and my direction. Don’t quit.
So I listened. I talked to people. I asked for ideas. I looked for options.
In You our fathers trusted; they trusted, and You did deliver them. To You they cried out, and were delivered; in You they trusted, and were not disappointed.
Psalm 22:4-5
It’s funny how well you get to know someone just by living with them for a few months. My roommate had been telling me for months, “I really think you should look into the World Race. I just think you’d be amazing on it.” I’d never listened because of my plan. But now, when she said it, I started to think maybe she was right. So I prayed for God’s direction and for His will to be revealed to me.
The day I got accepted to go on the Race, I just felt this huge surge of joy. Not just happiness, but actual joy. It was like, for the first time since September, I could see a purpose for myself.
We are told to pray without ceasing, so I’m still praying through all of this. I want to make sure that I’m following God’s path for my life. And I know that, with that desire comes uncertainty because I’m giving up control to One who’s so much greater than I am. But I’m learning to enjoy the process, even if it is a constant challenge. And I’m learning that maybe God has bigger plans for me than I had for myself.
“I know the plans that I have for you,” declares the LORD. “They are plans for peace and not disaster, plans to give you a future filled with hope.”
Jer. 29:11
