Hello friend, and thank you for visiting my page!
If I’m being honest, this is a hard blog for me to get out. What I want to talk about that God has put on my heart is what it really means to live a life Unscripted. I also break the walls down of some of the stereotypes and preconceived notions towards being a “missionary”. This is difficult for me because admittingly I’m still figuring some of this out myself. (I’ll also apologize in advance for the length of this post- being concise isn’t my strength but its something I’m working on!) It’s been two months since I left home, and I can’t even begin to paint the picture about how much God has moved; its truly astounding to be bearing witness to the graceful movement of His holy spirit in myself, my team, and in the people he has placed in our paths. What often makes this so difficult to communicate is being smack dab in the middle of this journey. As God moves in and through us, sometimes the things he walks us through are just plain hard, and as I’ve been following him into deep waters, I’ve found it challenging to be transparent and vulnerable in sharing this with others. But here goes nothing.
I had no clue what unscripted was before I left other than the route was geared towards listening to God’s voice in the everyday. Learning to be in tune to the Holy Spirit and the voice of God sounded pretty cool to me, and that was really all I needed to know in signing up. Now, two months into this journey after some trial and error, personal discovery, team tension, and wrestling with the Lord, the picture of what unscripted is has begun to began to emerge into my mind. Unscripted is about seeking out the people that might never hear the message of the saving Gospel. Our purpose isn’t to partner with pre-established ministries, which in themselves serve an important function, but to intentionally find those places and those people where Christ’s love and the Gospel are absent. Unscripted is about connecting with people and showing them love; listening to their stories, blessing them, making sure they feel seen, and that they know about a Savior who loves them. Unscripted is about planting a Kingdom seed that you might never see the fruit from. It’s about praying for people who are suffering, people who are totally lost, who feel unloved, and not being there to see when God heals them, but trusting with your whole heart that he is faithful and will keep his promises to them. It’s about sharing your testimony with people and not knowing whether they will ever come to the Lord, but being willing to put yourself out there and having the faith that God will do the rest. A day in the life unscripted is well, pretty spontaneous. Here’s just one example.
We did a prayer walk through the streets of Santiago, a city that is facing so much political turmoil, and a people who feel unheard, unrepresented, and at the whims of an unjust government. Walking through the city and the square where protests break out every night, many of them violent, I immediately felt the spiritual heaviness in the atmosphere. We walked through the city and prayed prayers of freedom for the people, for breakthrough, for God’s light and hope to shine so brightly no darkness could be seen, for protection for the people, for a revolution of change and a city that knows the name of Jesus.
As we walked we also prayed for people specific on God’s heart, which led to four very different but important interactions. In one particular moment, I remember feeling such fear and sadness despite being in such a beautiful park. Out of nowhere my partner, Josh, and I came upon two musicians playing their trumpet on a bench under a shade tree, and I was astounded by how their music completely changed the atmosphere into something lighter, more free. I felt God telling me to stop and talk to them, and I almost passed them up – it’s a scary thing approaching someone without really knowing why God wants you there – but I turned around walked towards the graceful music. Seeing the surprise on their face as I stood in front of them, I almost froze and questioned what on Earth I was doing. But then God gave me the words. I introduced myself, asked them their names, and told them that their music was beautiful and completely changed the atmosphere of this park to be a place of peace. In my heart I wanted to pray for them, but I felt God say, just listen. Thomas had just moved to Santiago a month ago from Uruguay to join the movement in bringing justice to the people of Chile. He said he had been waiting his whole life for this opportunity; an opportunity to bring change to a people who are oppressed and unrepresented. I was so inspired by his passion, and through him, I began to feel the hearts of the people here. I told him about what our team was doing on the World Race and that we were all praying for the people of Chile; I wanted to pray for them two specifically, but they weren’t comfortable with us doing that, so I thanked them for taking the time to talk to us, and on we went. Walking away I don’t know exactly how God was moving through that interaction, but what I do know is that these two young men now know that they have people who care and who are praying for this cause that they believe in. They also know that there are people out there who believe so much in their God that they’d give up their lives to go on this journey to bring his light to others, and hey, maybe something about that struck a chord in them. Only God knows, right? Either way, I’m glad we stopped and I got to meet them and hear their story.
We kept walking and praying. I watched a group of city workers laying grass and planting flowers in the Plaza de Italia, right smack dab in the middle where the protests erupted every single night. There they worked, beautifying the grounds around a monument plastered with layers and layers of graffiti. It just gave me such hope to see, that they’d work all day to make something beautiful knowing that it might get destroyed when night came. I saw one of the workers by himself, and felt God telling me to talk to him. I said, “Hola, como te llamas?” (Hello, what is your name?) He paused and looked at me very skeptically. Then he said, “Porque?” (Why?). I smiled at him and said, “Puedo orar por ti?” (Can I pray for you?). He looked at me with a little bit of a smirk and then shook his head no. I nodded at him and smiled, and walked away. God gave me the word ‘mistrust’ for him, and laid it on my heart that he had been hurt and that was the reason he was distrustful towards people. I prayed for him. Maybe that’s all God wanted me to do. Maybe God just wanted me to be obedient and talk to him, without anything else really coming from it.
Next was Amelia. She was standing in the middle of a busy intersection with cars going in all around her, holding a cup of change. As made eye contact with me, admittingly at first I wanted to avoid her because I didn’t have any money to give her and I didn’t know what to say. But God convicted me in this moment with Acts 3:6 (Then Peter said, “Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk.”) And as we watched her walk across the street, I noticed she had a very pronounced limp, moving very slowly and clearly in pain. And then I thought, okay God, let’s do this. So we walked over to her. Praise God she actually spoke English. She was absolutely one of the sweetest women I’ve ever met. We asked her about her leg and she explained that there was something wrong with her brain that was causing her to experience vision problems and problems walking. She was a believer and said she prayed every single day that God would heal her. I asked her if we could pray for her, and she was clearly thrilled and grateful with the idea. As Josh and I began to pray for her, I just felt the power of the Holy Spirit moving. It was just a beautiful moment I was honored to be a part of. We finished praying for her, and she thanked us, and I was sad in that moment to have to say goodbye. There was something in her that had truly captured my heart, and though it seems silly saying goodbye to a person you met 10 minutes ago would be hard, it was. Though we weren’t there to see it, I truly believe in my heart that God is going to heal her.
Lastly, was Oswaldo. Walking through the park, Josh stopped me and said he felt a sort of heaviness in himself and wasn’t sure where it was coming from. I took a look around, and noticed a man sitting by himself on the bench; he had his back to us, but I could see he was missing an arm and a leg. I wondered if the heaviness he felt might be for the man sitting near us, and I pointed him out to Josh. We decided to go over and talk to him, and I am so glad we did because he was just such a joy to talk to. I truly don’t know how we had a conversation, because Oswaldo was speaking in Spanish the entire time and neither Josh nor I know much Spanish beyond basic phrases. God truly gave us grace to be able to talk to him. We told him about ourselves and the World Race, and he explained his father was a preacher in Chile. I was truly so moved that despite the physical ailments he had, he was SO FILLED with joy and light. He let us pray for him, and it was such a special moment. Another person that stole my heart in all of 15 minute conversation. Praying that ___ will continue to be a light to Santiago and the people of Chile.
Now for some transparency. In some ways, I am so excited to share this post. Wow, Holy Spirit moving in the hearts of the people of Santiago. Its so inspiring to watch God move and I just want others to know to hear these stories and know the power of God and of prayer. Prayer for healing, prayer for peace, prayer for joy, prayer for freedom for the captive. At the same time, I am still struggling with the fear within myself that this isn’t enough. That I don’t have anything to “show”. Because we are unscripted, I don’t have pictures or stories of traditional ministry, things that you might think that missionary should be doing. We haven’t gotten to play with any orphans, we haven’t painted or built anything, we haven’t handed out food at a food kitchen. But we’ve been in the midst of some amazing moments of sharing God’s love to the people we’ve encountered every single day. But its still a fear of mine. I’m a doer and I’m naturally inclined to seek out some kind of tangible results. But my faith in the Lord has taught me that what’s he is doing in and through my team is far more important than showing the right things. Because he’s moving. That I am sure of.
Our day might look like a prayer walk, but it also might look like spending a fun day with friends we met at our hostel, building a relationship with them, and then getting the opportunity to share the Gospel and love of Christ at the end of the night over dinner. In unscripted we use the phrase, “Ministry is life, life is ministry” to explain the fusion between everyday life and sharing the love of God. We don’t have “ministry time” from 10-4 and have “free time” afterwards. Literally every single moment of our day is filled with the opportunity to encounter people and share God’s love. Sometimes this is intentional through prayers for people that God reveals to us, sometimes its by “accident” when you have to go buy deodorant from the market and start talking to the shop keeper. This is the way I want to live my life, on the race and at home. Its so simple and beautiful, and you can do it to.
If this post has challenged you and what being a “missionary” looks like or if you have any questions for me, I’d love to hear from you. I am so incredibly grateful for everyone’s support in allowing me to be here. My team and I would so appreciate your prayers that God would just continue to speak to us and move through us, as we journey from Argentina and in our transition next month into Africa.
Thanks for reading,
SaV
