A week and a half ago I looked back at my parents one last time before I walked through security at the airport. I tried to hold it together, a tear sliding down my cheek. Making my way to the gate sitting and waiting for my plane to take off it started to feel real. I wouldn’t be able to hug my friends and family back home for the next year. I could maybe see their faces through broken internet dates, but it wouldn’t be the same. I wouldn’t be the same. I’m not the same, and I haven’t been for a while.
The time between boarding in St. Louis and landing in Atlanta where I was reunited with my squad was the longest few hours I’ve felt in a long time. Over 285 World Racers took over the Holiday Inn in Atlanta, Georgia for a handful of days worshipping and spending time together until early hours of the morning, walking around the city talking and getting to know different people, unpacking and packing packs over and over again in rooms, learning the most intricate details of what the next year will look like, and having the opportunity to meet some of the parents who are sending Racers to all corners of the world.
Since leaving Atlanta 40+ of us stayed in a hostel in Panama City, Panama, divided into teams, and traveled a day on a bus to various locations all over the country to our respective ministry sites. Our team is joined with another for this first month and we are doing an array of things. We have visited two different churches assisting them in their services and programs, played a lot of basketball with the locals, visited a nursing home, smashed cans used in recycling in order to provide housing for tribal girls nearby, dug a trench to relieve standing water near the base, uprooted trees and planted new ones, cleaned the base, and joined with other missionaries in differing communities to learn about the native tribes and what ministries are trying to serve them in specific and intentional ways.
Tomorrow we are leaving the base to travel three hours to an Indian reservation to live in their community for five days. There’s no electricity, running water, or any of the typical comforts of present day society. This is a tribe of approximately 250,000 people and the 12 of us along with other missionaries in the area are going to live in community with them and be there for them in whatever way we can. Upon returning from the reservation we will work with other churches in the area, as well as visit a women’s prison, go back to the nursing home, and we are hoping to also work with an adolescent drug addiction facility. It’s been a whirlwind, but in the best way possible.
In John 4 Jesus talks with a Samaritan woman. This story has been told to me thousands of times but hang with me for a minute because there’s something I think is incredible and I’ve missed it so many times before. A Samaritan woman goes to a well and Jesus initiates conversation with her asking her for a drink. She’s taken aback. Jews and Samaritans avoided each other, but this man was breaking down the barriers. He was initiating conversation with her. When she challenged him with why he was talking to her he explained how if she only knew him she would have asked him for a drink instead. She’s completely thrown off because he doesn’t have anything to draw water with and the well is deep. Jesus explains how anyone who drinks this water he’s speaking of will never be thirsty again. She then accepts his offer and asks for the water. He proves to her he knows her by revealing intimate details about her life no stranger would know. She felt the change. She knew he knew her. She knew he was who he said he was. Now this is it…I hope you’re still with me because this is the part a lot of people don’t pay attention to. You have to go into the next heading in the chapter but it says she left her jar and went back into the city to tell people about him and her experience with him. She had walked all that way with a jar to get water because she was incredibly thirsty and after an encounter with God she left her jar….she wasn’t thirsty anymore.
I’m in Panama. I’m going to be traveling for a long time yet, but I’m not thirsty. I’ve encountered God. He knows me. I’ve left my jar and I’m going city to city telling people about Jesus.
(As a disclaimer I wanted to post pictures in this blog but the internet connection wouldn’t cooperate. They are on facebook so feel free to check them out there and thank you so much for all the emails and comments. I truly love all of you and the support and prayers you shower me with. I couldn’t be more blessed!)
