Question: What person has impacted you the most?
This is a hard question because I have had a few people impact me significantly throughout the race, and I’d hate to say some have impacted me more than others, because they have all impacted me in different ways. But off the top of my head, I immediately think of Jennifer from Panama and the little girl Katie from Nicaragua that I have blogged about before.
Let me tell you about Jennifer. Jennifer and her husband, Isaac, are currently raising their 4 beautiful kids in Panama. My team met Jennifer through working with YWAM and she shattered my viewpoints on God. She had a faith in God unlike any I’ve ever seen before. For example, she bought her wedding dress during a rough patch in her and Isaac’s relationship because God told her she would marry him. They weren’t engaged. But she trusted the Lord and acted obediently. I know, it’s hard not to see that as complete nuts – but if you knew Jenn you would just laugh and understand. Jennifer also sees God as the merciful Father figure that He is. She sees Him as the Healer that He is. She sees Him as a God who gives rules not so that He can punish us if we break them, but so that we can live fully if we follow them. I know it all sounds simple in a way, but Jenn is far from simple. And I’m not sure I’ve ever seen someone as in love with their Creator as she is – and it rocked my world.
In my blog “Poverty Now Has a Name” this is what I said about Katie:
How do I help Will? Or his little sister, Katie who clung to my leg the moment she first met me at the feeding center, and who has greeted me with a big hug and smile every day since then, who I tickle, and call my best friend, and pick her up and carry her everywhere. How do I help when I hear that their dad, who works at the dump, is an alcoholic and beats their mom? How do I help when I hear that Will and Katie lost their one year old sister because their parents gave the baby some unknown pill, hoping it was an antibiotic that would help her, and yet she ended up dying?
Katie shattered my views on the world. You hear stories about things happening on the news, or you read blogs about things happening across the world. You’re probably reading some racers blogs and think “Man, our world is so broken.” But I don’t think you can ever fully understand how broken the world is until you come face to face with it. I looked a 5 year old girl in the eyes after hearing those stories about her life and fell completely in love with her. And in that moment, I knew my world would never be the same. My world will never again be a world where I can ignore the brokenness. Katie changed my life forever. And my heart still breaks for her daily. But my heart also beats for her daily, and I pray for her daily.
Question: What happened in Tugri?
Tugri is a community in the mountains of Panama and is home to some of the Ngobe (an indigenous tribe) people. Essentially, I have never felt so claustrophobic and trapped before in my life. There were about 50-60 people inside this one room barn all day long. We slept two to a tent – in the tiniest tents ever made. We ate some not so great food, and went days without electricity or running water. On top of that, we had kids crawling all over us for about 12-13 hours a day, on top of that God called me to fast from food so I didn’t even eat for 2 of the 5 days up on that stupid mountain, and on top of that it rained from about 12pm to 4am every single day and it was super depressing. Overall, I did not enjoy Tugri and it’s an experience I never hope to repeat.
Question: What is the biggest need in general you saw?
I know this sounds pretty cliché – but the biggest need I saw was Jesus. But I believe it. And I believe it because the biggest “problem” (for lack of a better word) I saw in Central America was poverty – and I believe that the only way to fix that is through Jesus. In Nicaragua I started reading the book “When Helping Hurts” and the authors make this argument that everything wrong in the world started at the Fall – which is also what I believe. But they argue that 4 relationships were destroyed in that moment: man’s relationship with God, man’s relationship with their self, man’s relationship with other men, and man’s relationship with the rest of creation. And that it was the destruction of these relationships that caused poverty. And the only way to restore all four of these relationships – and hence, “solve poverty” is through Him.
Think about it. You can educate people to respect the rest of creation. For example: teach them how to care for chickens. Then they can raise chickens, have eggs, and have enough chickens to kill and eat also. You can tell a person that they need to respect other people if they want to hold a stable job and therefore keep a steady income to support their family. But this won’t heal a person’s relationship with their self. They won’t believe they deserve a better life – a life of more abundance – until they believe in and join in a relationship with the only One who really can give us a life of abundance. And therefore, no matter how much you try to help them, they will eventually cause themselves harm until they believe they are worth more. If someone doesn’t believe they deserve better, they will never have better. No matter what you do to help. No matter how much money, clothes, or food you donate.
So what can you do? Help teach them about their relationship with God, and then the 3 other relationships will fall into place.
Question: What food do you miss the most?
Mmmmm. Good question! And my answer is probably unexpected: the foods I miss the most are the simple food I would eat all the time. I don’t miss pizza or ice cream, because I can find those if I seek them out. What I miss the most is waking up and pouring a bowl of Special K strawberry cereal and milk. (Actually, I miss milk A LOT. Milk in other parts of the world is not even close to being the same.) I finally got milk and cereal for breakfast during month 4, and it was awesome. I miss having a turkey, cheese, lettuce, tomato, and pickle sandwich for lunch. With a banana and greek yogurt for dessert. And for dinner, I miss having a grilled chicken breast – without bones! – with a side of broccoli and a baked potato. And I REALLY miss my 3 points on Weight Watchers caramel truffle ice cream bar that I would eat every night.
Question: What’s the biggest lesson God has taught you so far?
God teaches me lessons each and every day. And I don’t think any lesson from Him is bigger or more important than the next. Also, those lessons are really hard to sum up in a paragraph of a blog. But in short, God has taught me a lot about freedom (Panama lesson), extending grace (Costa Rica lesson), dependence on Him (Nicaragua lesson), glorifying Him (another Nicaragua lesson), being content and joyful in all circumstances (Honduras), and currently God is teaching me just how much He actually loves me.
Question: What’s your favorite food you’ve tried?
Oh man. I think the food I miss most from Central America are fried plantains. See, I have learned that there are two different ways to make fried plantains and it depends on how ripe they are when you cook them. You can get them when they are still green, and fry them up like French fries so that they’ll be starchy and crunchy. Or you can wait until they are over ripe and they’ll be sweet and soft when you fry them. Both ways are delicious and I’m not sure which way I like better… It depends on my mood.
But the best meal I had was on an off day in San Juan del Sur in Nicaragua. B. Neal and I ate lunch together at this restaurant called Iguanas that was right on the beach. We both got these fish tacos, and they were hands down the best fish tacos I’ve ever had. I think if ate those fish tacos every day for the rest of my life I would die happy. Just kidding, but they were really good.
As of now, me and my new team (Drop the Mic.) are in Malaysia and are loving the change from Central America to Asia. Thanks so much for the prayers! Keep them coming 🙂 I’m super excited for this new team, and can’t wait to see how God uses us!
