At my church, they do a tradition the first Sunday of every year where we choose a word. The word that you choose is religion based, and instead of creating resolutions to work on that entire year, you focus on that one word to improve your faith. My word for this year is “GO.” Last year, my word that I chose to work on was “Application.” I had developed a good relationship with God at the beginning of the year, there was just one thing that was missing. I would pray over and over about things, and I even began growing patient while I awaited my answers. My problem was figuring out where to apply God’s answers. For that entire year, I kept getting one word, and one bible passage, as answers to prayers from God. The word that kept coming to me was “Missions.” I kept asking God what my next step was in my faith, and that is what always jumped out to me. As I kept trying to improve my faith, whether it had been at FCA, Younglife, Church, youth group, or church camps, the verse about the Rich Young Ruler showed up EVERYWHERE. Everything finally fell into place when I attended the Student Life Takeover camp in July. During one of David Platt’s sermons, he spoke about mission work and it’s importance. He stated that missions are the “abundance of faith and Christ pouring out from your heart so that you may go help others, the way God helped you.” Now along with that sermon, as well as countless times before and after, he discussed the story of the Rich Young Ruler. In that story, he approaches God and asks God what he can do to become a better Christian. Once God tells him to abandon all of his worldly riches and have faith in him, the man gets angry and storms off. Through that story though, I realized that God is telling me a message. What message? Well the message is simple. Drop everything and Go. I decided to pray on what that meant, and a way to apply it. Through countless days of prayer and thought, I found where it could be applied: Adventures in Missions. Through this trip, I will be able to use all of my gifts and abilities that God has sharpened for 18 years to be able to share how God can and will work through the lives of people I touch.
