——- Romania:February, 2015 ——-
Hot coffee
cold nose
thrift stores
cold everything
big fur hats
I’m in love with Europe and I don’t care who knows! I already knew I would love this place seeing as I had already gone to Germany and Latvia back in high school. But you never know how one country varies from the next. In case you were wondering, all the things I loved about those European countries exist here. It’s only our first Tuesday day 4 and I’m already dreading the leaving. Surprise it’s also All Squad month and while we’re smooshed in a small house (41 people 6 rooms) I am so incredibly excited to be with everyone for the rest of this month. Because lets be real, there is never alone time or quiet moments (especially when you have been living with 8 girls for the last month) so if I’m going to be forced to be social or to put in my headphones when I want to be by myself then I might as well get to know the rest of my amazing squad.
I’m definitely feeling sentimental because
1.) the last time we had all squad month was India month 2 and I knew all of 6 people and thats all
2.) it’s month EIGHT?! what the heck? how did we get this far into the race
3.) we just received our end date of the race.
We have flights to America. The month, day, hour and minute I’ll be touching American soil.
I was surprised that my very first response was disappointment that the race will be over in that little bit of time. May 22 at 4:50 central time give or take delays I’ll be standing in Texas (Houston) the land of Mexican food mere hours (an impossibility to make) away from my sisters graduation. Everyone around me will speak English. Not just English but American/Texan English. The flight will take all of 4 hours the shortest flight we will have taken and then what? I collect my bag at baggage claim for the last time with my squad and then I’ll be on my own. Logistics won’t be telling me how to get the next place and there wont be another ministry host waiting to greet me and my team. The learning curve will still be there but instead this time I’ll be figuring out how to have conversations with people I’ve known longer than a year. I’ll be using a phone to make coffee dates. The language barrier will instead be from the constant stream of Jesus that has been poured around me for the last year against the American Voice.
These people I have grown to strangely love will pick up their packs and disperse to a varying amount of states. I will no longer be saying goodbye for month until the next country or debrief. It will be an indefinite amount of time with no guarantee.
People have been concerned with what will happen when we get home. Applications to schools have been sent out. Jobs have been searched for. Anxiety over trying to figure out how to make our lives big for God when we get home. Excitement over how soon we will see the people at home that we have desperately missing. But in the midst of all this planning (which is not all bad and we definitely have been called by God to use our lives well and that means not just sitting on the sidelines waiting for Him to bring something directly in our paths) the good of this race which I used to question existing will be no longer. There is no replication of the journey God has led us on this year. I just went back and read a few of my blogs from before the race where i was unsure of what the Race would hold and if the uncomfortableness and uncertainty of whether or not I was supposed to be on the Race would pan out. I knew unwaveringly God would be able to use me but I was not sure if I was doing what I was supposed to do. It is crazy reading all the reasons that I knew God had for me to be on the Race and month 8 having seen it all play out. He has used me. He has broken me. He has shown me the tiny-ness of my existence. The tiny dot I am on the timeline of eternity. He has been glorified in more ways than I can tell you. And one of the craziest parts is how it fills me with peace being shown and told by Him that He has no need for me to go to these countries and tell these people about Him. As radical as that statement sounds its absolute truth. Think about it. He has no need for me to have done any of what I have spent the last 7 months doing. BUT He created me to do this. I was created simply to enjoy God and glorify Him.
I wrote while in church the other day:
“I was allowed to come here to experience this, the privilege I have had to praise God with these people miles, hours and a continent away from home. You see, they love God. They didn’t need me to come here to tell them to come to Him. I cannot get over how God was here before me. I knew it before, that there were Christians around the world but I hadn’t stopped to think what that meant. Y’all we worship the SAME God. Can you even fathom?”
