Wow, so I did it, I made it nine months embarking on this journey. And now in a few days, I’ll be home, I can’t even begin to figure out or understand how it’s going to be different. Sleeping in a bed, having endless amounts of hot water and a shower, food other than carbs, my family, my friends, my church, my new boyfriend, and even if all those things were still the same the fact is that I’m different now. I have a new perspective and outlook on life, I’m responsible for the things I’ve seen, and I’ve grown so much with my relationship with the Lord. During this trip he has shaped me, blessed me, encouraged me, and loved me more that I’ve experienced in my life. And I’m so thankful for the way God has used this trip in my life and how he has used me to further His kingdom. This journey definitely had some challenges and hard circumstances, but looking back God was holding my hand every step of the way and using me more than I could ever see in that moment. That’s the cool thing about God, he lets us be human, to mess up, to grow, to sometimes be blind or ignorant to the good, or lacking perspective on people or situations, we are human. And because we are it makes bumps in the road, either we screw up, or someone else screws up then effecting us, or a million other human faults that happen. But these bumps in the road are what make life, life. With out the bumps, and if everything was smooth sailing, and life was perfect than we would never need to cry out to God for help, to give up control, or to surrender. It’s those bumps in the road that bring us to our knees and bring us closer to God. Because the more times you let God into your life and into the hard things, is every moment that you get to see God come through and reveal His power and love. If we never called out to God and never had bumps to throw us on our butts, how easy would it be to live your life without even the thought of God? Not saying that the only reason we need God is because of the bumps, don’t get be wrong. I’m just saying look at every hard circumstance in your life and ask yourself did you see God in it? If the answer is yes then sweet! That’s great! If the answer no, then ask yourself, did you cry out to God and invite him into your life? Many times I catch my self thinking like “what the heck God, where even were you!?” But in reality I never invited him, or asked for help. Whenever I’m thinking about this is always reminds me of David. So many times David was faced with a huge challenge, to fight Goliath, to be a king, to lead people, to win battles, running from Saul, and countless things. And he relentlessly cried out to God for his help and to rescue him, and look how many times God showed up for David! That’s crazy! So in the hard times, you gotta invite God to the hard things, and believe he has the power to rescue. Lots of challenging things happened on the race that I didn’t know how to deal with, but the truth is, I wouldn’t be the person I am today without those hard things and bumps along the way. So for that I’m thankful.
So it’s kinda impossible to sum up 9 months into one blog so imma give you 3 good things and 2 hard things as an over view!
THE GOOD:
1. Spiritual growth
So I have experienced so much growth during this trip. I’ve learned what church is, what worship is, what listening prayer is, what ministry is, and what being a missionary is. During the last two months of my race I read the whole Old Testament front to back, and learned so much about all of that, and about Gods character through it all. I’ve learned so much about the power of prayer, of people being healed and prayers being answer. And I’ve learned about the Holy Spirit, that he’s not just some quiet dude living in the shadows, but he’s alive and active and is crazy amazing! I’ve learned more deeply about the love of Jesus and His sacrifice he made for every person ALL around the world! And about God, I think he’s even more Indescribable to me than when I first began this trip, and I think the more deeply you know God the more indescribable he is.
2. Community/Leadership
Living in community with so many people and living in tight living spaces, and being with my teammates 24/7 has grown me a lot! It’s been a time of consistently being there for your teammates, sacrificing what you want and putting their needs first, caring for them, encouraging them, and so much more. With my teammates I’ve been through things that only we could understand, and there’s a special bond that comes to traveling the world with nearly strangers and ending up great friends. When God wrote in the Bible “iron sharpens iron” I’ve truly never felt or understood that as much as I do now after living 9 months in constant community, it’s pretty amazing, God was right! Like always! And also within living with my teammates, but then during the first 6 months leading my teammates. I have grown so much is leadership and knowing what that looks like and how to do that well, even through hard things.
3. Growing in ministering to women, children, people better
So this one I feel like should be a no brainer! Of course I’ve grown in ministry that was my job for 9 months. But my horizons have been broadened to ministering to people, of different cultures, different backgrounds, different walks of life, and all ages. I’ve ministered to people I would have gotten the opportunity to know if I was still in America. And the Lord has taught me so much about what it looks like to show Jesus an any type of situation with people.
THE HARD STUFF:
1. The men in all the countries
This part was very hard for me. Albania was under communism for so long, and their country is now developing and healing and figuring out how their country works now without being under communism. And the men had no respect for women, so in my circumstance, my team and I were all girls, and I was the team leader. And the men in my ministry and city we were placed in had no respect for us girls, it was always their opinion, their ideas, their decisions over ours. Also, the men were so demoralizing to women, then endless amount of stares at my body every single time I was out in public, didn’t matter what I was wearing, the men would sexualize me. I would try to go for a run around our block, and I would have cars follow me and circle me, yelling sexual derogatory things out the window and doing their Albanian cat calls, and so many times of men yelling things from across the street or across the room. It was hard to feel that and be surrounded with that every time I leave the apartment. In the Philippines men were very friendly and kind, they restored my faith in men and they were harmless and friendly, they were great. The time in the Philippines that I struggled with men was at PVT. When we went into one of the most popular sex trafficking streets in the world, and were ministering to the girls stuck in the sex trade and showing Jesus in some of the darkest places. The men were awful, it was so hard for me not to just instantly hate them, to hate who they are, what their doing, and how they are treating the girls. But as I tried to love them and not hate them, soon in my eyes they turned into lost people who need Jesus just as much as these girls do. Every part of the industry is broken and hurting. It would bother me so much when I was talking to the girls and guys from the bar would come up and hit on me, and their ego and ignorance was unbearable, it would get me so mad I’d be ready to fight every time I saw one of them walking up to me. But basically every man in the bars participating in the sex trade were from all over the world, Americans, Australian, British, very few Filipino men, if any. I love the Filipino guys. In South Africa, the hard part for me was to see how the men treated the women, and to see them really fall short from being a man. So many are addicted to drugs and alcohol, couldn’t care less about their family or any children they have to raise. But one situation that really got me feeling some type of way was when we took our kids that we play with everyday on an overnight camping trip to the beach. We had 8 girls and 6 boys with my team, which is 7 of us. So we planned food and games and lessons and all. Then later for our lesson time we planned to split up girls and boys and do a “Man of Christ and Women of God” talk. And so we took the girls and talked with them and shared what was on our hearts and then we let the girls ask or write down questions about God or being a girl, or just anything. And one question for us was “Do you like boys? And is it hard to like boys?” And as soon as Maggie(my teammate) read that question off the paper instantly all 8 girls starting shouting “noooo! All boys do is hit girls! All they do is hit!” “And they drink all the time! They all grow up to hit their wives! All they do it hit!” The girls just all reacted to the question with remarks like these. Tina, Maggie and I just looked at each other and realized we got something to talk about. It was so heartbreaking to hear these little girls saying all these things, only 9 years old, and this is what they know of men to be true. So we started off by saying “not all men are bad and not all men hit, do you think Caleb(another teammate) will grow up and hit his wife?” And the girls said “NOOOO!!!” So then we said “do you think Kyle will grow up and hit his wife?” And the girls said “NOO way man!!” And we said this for all four boys on my team and by this time the girls got the point, that not all men are bad. But to be honest I still struggle with those same thoughts that these 9 year old girls have. It is the truth that not all men are bad, but just like any one truth, sometimes it’s hard to believe it.
I hope I don’t leave you guys with the wrong impression on all this, I think men are wonderful and there are some amazing men in this world, but I wanted to be honest with you guys, about this biggest struggle that I had on the race. So thank you to all the men out there who are loving and amazing dudes, you guys are killing it.
2. Church
Church was something that I learned a lot about on the race. I learned that church doesn’t always have to be a huge group or some certain number of attendance to be qualified as church. Also doesn’t matter where you have it, doesn’t have to be in some nice church building, sometimes it’s in the oddest places, but it doesn’t matter where, because we are the church, so we bring it everywhere we go. But something I love so dearly is the people from my church back home. SBC family, you guys rock! They are some of the most friendly, thoughtful, caring people I will ever meet in my entire life. Back home Sunday is my favorite day, I love going to church and fellowshipping with everyone. A lot of people have come and gone, but that makes it sweet also, cause most other churches I visit, there’s always gunna be some SBC family in there. Sundays have been a constant my whole life, when my parents made me go when I didn’t care about the Lord and then when I got saved, and started seeing the people in my church to be the beautiful people God made them to be. But on the race that constant was taken away, in Albania, the church didn’t speak English, so listening to the service and fellowshipping made things difficult to say the least. With the language barrier it basically made church non existent, which wasn’t an easy transition. Then also in the Philippines, church didn’t happen on Sundays, we didn’t have enough transportation to get to church, and I there was only one church that spoke English. So again, church was non existent for another 3 months. Then in South Africa, we had church on Sunday, which was weird to get back into, but South African church is very different from American church. So that was a very weird transition, because they are so different. The church we went to was Pentecostal and very very loud, at all times. And they were always slaying people in the spirit and prophesying over people and kinda all over the place. How they went about everything most times made us feel like it was a charade and all an act. Most services during the preaching I would just take my bible and read the whole service, and slightly listen to get the jist of the message, and then discern what i believe to be true and what not, according to what I believe. So taking into account all these things, church was all together a struggle on the race, but one constant that was there was my team of 7, and church happens anywhere. So living in community with my team, we worshipped together, encouraged each other with the word, and had church with us. Which I loved doing that, it’s just that church looked very different these 9 months. I’m so excited to get back to my church family and see them again, I won’t be taking that for granted anymore.
The race and this experience is impossible to sum up in one blog, but I hope I have given you a glimpse of what this time has looked like. It was been a crazy amazing experience, that has been so good and rewarding, but also really hard. I’m so thankful for this time I’ve been able to have with the Lord.
P.S.
“Rachel, what’s next!?”
Well let me tell you! I will be home for exactly 11 days, then going to Ohio for a week, and next flying out to India on May 22nd, on another missions trip!! We will be running a conference, a vbs, street evangelism, and everything else God has in store for me to do there! There is a team of 7 including me, and we will be home June 20th. And then after that, I have no idea. But what I do know for sure is that I have a God that loves me more than I know and he’s never gunna let me go. So the plan is to start stepping through the open doors before me and seek what the Lord has for me on this amazing adventure called life.
