I have never been a writer, nor have I ever kept a blog; I can barely keep up with journaling on a daily basis. Nevertheless, here I am. I must be honest, I was completely caught off guard and a little anxious when I learned that I would need to keep a blog for the Race, because it requires me to be vulnerable and transparent with more people than those I come in face-to-face contact with. But I’m excited. This is a new zone outside of my comfort zone that I’ve tried to expand so many times. So I guess I’ll begin again, with more of an introduction as if we were face to face.
Hi, I’m Sydney, it’s nice to meet you (insert a friendly handshake and a toothy smile here). I live in North Carolina, just outside of Raleigh, and I’ve been here for about 17 years. I was born in Missouri and moved just after I turned five. I’m 21 for about five more days, and I’m only 5’1″, so don’t let any pictures fool you. I went to a small leadership school in South Carolina for two years, graduated in May of 2016, and moved back to NC. I work full time as a live-in nanny to an absolutely precious two-year-old and her 11-year-old brother.
I accepted Jesus at some point during my senior year of high school. I didn’t really have this hallelujah moment where the light from heaven rained down on me with the chorus of angels singing. It was more of a thought that grew into a question that grew into an answer that grew into a choice of life. Since the time I moved to NC I had been taught about God and Jesus and Satan, but at that point in my life it all just seemed like another story from a collected work of myths- far off and not really relevant to now. And then I went through a period of denying the Lord’s existence, but at the same time acknowledging it because my gosh, I hope there’s something more than nothing out there beyond us. Senior year, though, is really when I started to grasp just who God was, and it was more than just a story. There was something about people who really loved this guy that I really wanted. So I signed up, for the mailing list and whole nine yards. He wrecked my world, and in a year and a half, I quit college and ended up at a Christian leadership school that I never saw coming. This is the place God used to bring missions to life in me.
I’ve always loved traveling, and I prefer a road trip with a paper map to an airport with too many people. Different cultures has always been something that grasps my interest, although history with all the dates has never been my best subject. There’s something about being immersed in something completely outside of who you are that just excites the ever loving goodness out of me. Helping people has always come natural to me, almost to a fault at times. I love being able to do things for people, and sometimes I wish I could do everything. I had pondered being a missionary for several years before this, but more as a doctor or a scientist, never really in the sense of spreading the love of Jesus through the gospel. In the leadership school- which by the by is called the South Carolina School of Leadership, henceforth known as SCSL- we are required to go on a mission trip every year we attend. My first year I worked in an orphanage in Arkansas, and my second year I went to Alaska. Never have I felt more comfortable and at peace outside of my comfort zone (I know that doesn’t logically make sense, but work with me here). Missions has just been confirmed over and over again over the past two and a half years, and at this point there is no other option.
So there I am in a shell (nut or sea, reader’s choice). You are all my friends now. And whether it’s just my mom reading this- hi mom- or 497 random people, welcome to the next year and some change of my life. Maybe even longer, who knows?
