There and Back Again: An Eleven Month Journey of Faith, Community, and Hope
"And why not? Surely you don't disbelieve the prophecies just because you helped them come about. You don't really suppose do you that all your adventures and escapes were managed by mere luck? Just for your sole benefit? You're a very fine person, Mr. Baggins, and I'm quite fond of you. But you are really just a little fellow, in a wide world after all."
-J.R.R Tolkien, The Hobbit
So how was your trip? This is the question that I have mulled over in mind over the past few weeks of being home, and I am still not sure quite how to answer that particular question. For me to say that the World Race was a good trip, or even a great trip for that matter, cannot truly explain what the journey was or wasn't. Ultimately it was a year that I truly will never forget, I experienced God working in ways and in places I would have never thought I'd see in my lifetime. I wish I could fully express how thankful I am that you were willing to invest into my life and for helping making a dream become my reality. This is my attempt to recap a year, and share a glimpse of the journey that you were very much a part of.
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What's Mine is Yours:
Over a year ago I set out to embark on an eleven month journey traversing through what ended up being over eleven different countries by the time it was all said and done, and if you are reading this you were an integral part of that journey. As I began preparing for the World Race, one of the biggest questions I had going in was how was I going to raise all of the money needed to even make this possible? Yet it did not take long for me to understand that the claim that God provides is more than merely a nice idea, it is very much much a reality. This is something I saw over and over again, be it through your generous donations on my behalf, the anonymous donations of thousands of dollars to my fellow squad-mates, or by the way people I met around the world who joyfully and generously shared their lives, their homes, a meal, or whatever else they had with myself and my team.
From the very beginning during my first month in Kenya staying with the Osundwa family in the town of Siaya, I was blown away by the way strangers from a country over 7000 miles away showed myself and my team what it means to provide for another, beyond cultural differences or language barriers I saw that the love of Christ is a stronger bond than any other tangible thing found on this earth.
Learning the Importance of What I Have Been Taught:
Throughout the journey this lesson of God's provision is only one of the many things I learned a long the way, I experienced what it means to live in community with others, finding that though it takes work, patience, and a willingness to be honest and real, at the end of the day it is worth it. Coming home I see the importance of what that community brought out, and have the desire to be part of that type of community in some form moving forward for the rest of my life.
Honestly in many ways what I learned over the course of the past year are things that cannot always be easily explained or described, whether it was the countless ways that God worked in and through my life be it through a time of prayer, preaching, worship, building, or tearing down. Along with those times it was the lessons of life and faith found through the lives of people that I met along the way, be it babies in an orphanage in China who were too weak or sick to cry, seeing the same true joy that Christ brings on the smiling faces of children spanning from Kenya, Cambodia, Moldova, and everywhere between, and sharing a meal and a time of worship with a 102 year old man and his entire family in Uganda.
The growth I found during my time on the World Race, is not something that ended at month eleven and my return home. The lessons that God teaches are an on-going process that ultimately will continue throughout the rest of my life.
Thank you for being a part of something that truly was life-changing. I am truly blessed to have people in my life who are willing to support me through prayers, financially, and by words of encouragement. As I began a new chapter of life, I know that God will continue to be there every step of the way, and that no matter where the road leads or with whom I travel it with, I can trust that the Lord has plans that are greater than my own. I would say to wish me luck as I embark on this new journey, though I don't really believe in luck, but I do believe in grace, love, and the redemption that comes only through Jesus, so I'll take those with me and I hope that in your own way you will too.
If you are interested in following me I will be posting on a new blog; cngmi.wordpress.org
