I lived in West Michigan my whole life until I “moved” to the Chicago-land area for college. I grew up in a Christian home, and knew about and loved God my whole life. I am very close to my family, and have been so blessed to see it expand in a huge way this past year. My parents adopted four kids in March of 2006, so in addition to the five of us they already had, there are now nine “kids” ranging from age 9 to 23.
My faith started becoming more real to me when I was in junior high – through some struggles I had, God became the only constant in my life and the only one I could depend on for everything. I made profession of faith in December of my freshman year in high school because I knew that I could depend on God and that He would always take care of me. I was active in my youth group, and during that time I started feeling a tug on my heart toward overseas missions. I had the opportunity to travel to Ecuador twice during high school on mission trips, and as God opened my eyes to what was “out there” in the world, He made my desire to serve Him overseas even stronger.
Anyway, I graduated from high school in 2003 and did what every “good” high-school kid does – went to college. I’m currently a 22-year-old senior at Trinity Christian College in Illinois, and Lord-willing, I’ll graduate in May of 2007 with a bachelors of science degree in nursing. God chose that career path for me because He gave me a love for helping people, and He made me a very practical and hands-on type person, and nursing just fit that perfectly. During college, I’ve had the opportunity to do some more short-term overseas mission stuff. The summer after my freshman year I went with AIM to Jamaica for two months, and the next summer I went with AIM to India for two months. I was also able to go to Malawi, Africa with a group from my school, and was able to explore some of the differences in health care between a third world country and health care in the US. Last year I was able to join my school’s leadership team for a group called Acting on AIDS, a student-led advocacy group that tries to get the word out about the impact AIDS is having on the world. Because of my involvement in Acting on AIDS, I was also asked to be part of our campus ministries leadership team on campus this year, and am so excited to see what God is going to do on and through our campus throughout this year.
I heard about the race last fall-ish (2005), and thought it was a pretty cool idea, but honestly didn’t really see myself doing anything like it. I knew I wanted to go overseas as soon as I graduate, but kind of tried to make my own plans to find a hospital or orphanage and settle down in one place. Throughout the past few months or so, I’ve been following the participants blogs pretty closely, especially when they went to India because I knew the orphanage and the situation they were talking about. Anyway, I digress… God started putting this idea in my heart, and I’ve been thinking about it and praying about it for quite a while now, and even started filling out the quick-app once this past summer. I still wasn’t sure, though, so I closed that web page and tried to think about the future. God shook that up, though, my first week back at school when my pastor talked about taking risks and not wanting to get to the end of your life wishing you had done something that you were afraid of because it would involve a big risk, and that was really the confirmation from God to say “all-right, I’m going to fill this out on faith and see what He’s got in mind for me.” Long story – but I got accepted almost right away and am so incredibly excited to see where God is going to take me and the other World Racers through this adventure. Yay God!
