World Race Wedding Vows

I have an announcement to make. I am getting married! Yes, you heard that right.
I am stepping out and making the commitment.

<3

Haha! I am totally in love with my squad… and here are our wedding vows (by Brittany Latray aka amazing young women of God whose obedience blesses me!)

Dear future squad and teammates-

We are about to embark on an incredible journey together, one that will stretch and change us. One in which we have the opportunity to live in community and get to know more about one another than we do about our own families. One where we get to love on people and be the hands and feet of Jesus all around the world.

But, it’s pretty difficult to live in close community with people who may have come from very different backgrounds and have different talents and callings. I won’t pretend that it’s going to be easy, but I will make you these promises so as to make this journey as smooth as possible.

I promise that none of these listed below are anywhere near possible without God.

I promise to love you and the very unique talents and callings God has placed on your life to the best of my abilites.

I promise to hold your hands and speak healing over your body when you have malaria, a parasite, etc.

I promise to be vulnerable with you, even when it hurts, and I guarantee you it will. I do not share deep things about myself with many (any?) people, but because I love you- I will!

I promise to pick the lice out of your hair when we have an outbreak. And not be completely grossed out by it.

I promise to pray for you constantly.

I promise to help you do your laundry, washing clothes by hand with a board or in a tub isn’t always fun, but I’ve learned a few tricks along the way

I promise to let you borrow my clothes, my laptop, my toiletries, etc.

I promise to help you wash your hair when we don’t have running water and have to take bucket baths.

I promise to not get offended when you call me out on something and call me higher.

I promise to use my (limited) medical knowledge and  experience to help you when you are sick and/or hurt.  

I promise to share with you things that God is revealing to me about Himself and life.

I promise to not get really upset when you wake me up early in the morning. (I am so not a morning person so this will be challenging)

I promise to encourage you and speak life into your life whenever I can!

I promise to give you space when you need alone time with God or just need time away from people.

I promise to let you invade my personal space and not totally freak.

I promise to just sit and listen to you pour your heart out and cry and laugh with you through it all.

I promise to share with you my secret stash of instant starbucks coffee. And the secret stash of hard candy.

I promise to help you carry your gear when you are sore and tired.

I promise to step up and temporarily step into your role when you are sick and tired and have nothing left to pour out.

I promise to give you the “good spot” in the back of the truck.

I promise to hug you and let you cry over missing your best friend’s wedding, or a graduation, or loved ones.

I promise to be up for any adventure you can think of. White water rafting the Nile River? Let’s do it. Bungee jumping? Can’t wait.

I promise to eat your extra “fish head” soup or sadza because you can’t bear to eat any more, but you can’t waste it and offend our host. I’ll even eat your extra ant infested rice, been there done that one.

I promise to volunteer to be the one to cut off the chicken’s head for dinner.

I promise to kill any and all spiders, rats, or snakes. I promise you I will not ever kill a cockroach or get within 15 feet of one. Any volunteers for that one??

I promise to not place expectations on you, who you are, and what your giftings are. This one is especially hard, totally not possible without Jesus.

I promise to dance like a fool so you don’t have to do it alone.

I promise to lead at times and support you as you lead at times.

I promise to talk so much smack about your football team.

I promise to let you pack some of your things in my pack because yours just doesn’t have any more room.

I promise to share with you my heart and my calling and not hold anything back.

I promise to support you and your ideas and work with you to make them a reality!

I promise to tell you when I am offended by you and apologize when I offend you.

I promise to not post (too many) embarrassing photos of us with no makeup on and after not showering for days.  

I promise to trek the mile or so to the outhouse, even in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere.

I promise to love you and love on you as much as my feeble self can!!

I promise you that I am human and I will mess up, I will fail, but I will get up and keeping going after it.

I feel like we all just got married there, did these promises sounds like wedding vows or what?! haha. I can’t wait to begin this journey together. It’s so amazing that we have the opportunity to live together and pursue the same things and One together. I love you all already, meet you all very soon.

________________________________________________________________________

I said, "I DO!"
When you commit to the World Race, you commit to live in community with about 60 other believers for 11 months. Much like a marriage, we commit to love eachother through the good and bad, sickness and health, malaria and parasites. We commit to build each other up and speak life over every member on our squad. We commit to challenge each other and push each other to newer heights. I just love the way my lovely squadee Brittany put it in her post <3