Friday, October 28, 2011
It's About the Journey
2:59 PM |
Edit Post
I've recently come to the conclusion that life isn't about where we end up.
It's not about the final result. The completed task. The finished race.
It's about the journey. The process of how we got to where we are. What we learned along the way.
You see, I had a plan. My plan was to finish college (which I did), buy a one-way ticket to Uganda (which I did not), and be well on my way to life as a full-time missionary living in Africa (which I am not.)
Needless to say, life is not going according to my plans.
Instead, I graduated college, spent my third summer in a row in Uganda, came home, and started raising support for something else. Something that, in all honesty, I did not want to do. Instead of moving indefinitely to the country that I have fallen in love with over the past two and a half years, I will be leaving in January to spend eleven months visiting eleven countries that I do not feel called to and am not in love with. Not exactly my first choice.
But that's the thing. It's not about where I end up. It's about the journey.
A few weeks ago I headed down to a small town in northern Georgia to go to training camp for my upcoming trip. To say I went in hesitant would be an understatement. Although I had already started raising support, I went into training begging the Lord to close the door. To give me a peace that I wasn't supposed to go on this trip, that He had something else in mind. To let me walk away from the week happy that I had gone, but sure as sure could be that this trip wasn't for me.
Instead, I had the most exhausting, overwhelming, intense, draining, and hard week of my life. Bar none. And I knew. By the end of the first night, I knew that I was supposed to be there. Dang it.
I do not even know a tiny bit of what the upcoming year holds for me. It's not about the fact that at the end of every month, I will be laying my head down on a pillow in another country. It doesn't matter that at the end of the year, my feet will again hit American soil. It's not about that.
It's about where He takes me throughout the year. The still, small moments when I feel His presence and hear His voice. The hearts that are yearning to hear the Gospel, the good news of a Savior who loves them just the way they are-- even in the midst of their mess. The moments when He uses conversations to change lives. The diapers that need to be changed. The moments I see Him in a way that I never thought I would. The times where I learn to die to myself and choose to live that way. The children that need to be held. The people that need to see HOPE, myself included. The moments where I learn to pour out every drop of love that I have simply because He has loved me so well.
So I'm going on a journey. (Tentatively) Dominican Republic, Haiti, Romania, Moldova, Mozambique, Swaziland, South Africa, Nepal, India, China, and Philippines here I come.
Join me?
It's not about the final result. The completed task. The finished race.
It's about the journey. The process of how we got to where we are. What we learned along the way.
You see, I had a plan. My plan was to finish college (which I did), buy a one-way ticket to Uganda (which I did not), and be well on my way to life as a full-time missionary living in Africa (which I am not.)
Needless to say, life is not going according to my plans.
Instead, I graduated college, spent my third summer in a row in Uganda, came home, and started raising support for something else. Something that, in all honesty, I did not want to do. Instead of moving indefinitely to the country that I have fallen in love with over the past two and a half years, I will be leaving in January to spend eleven months visiting eleven countries that I do not feel called to and am not in love with. Not exactly my first choice.
But that's the thing. It's not about where I end up. It's about the journey.
A few weeks ago I headed down to a small town in northern Georgia to go to training camp for my upcoming trip. To say I went in hesitant would be an understatement. Although I had already started raising support, I went into training begging the Lord to close the door. To give me a peace that I wasn't supposed to go on this trip, that He had something else in mind. To let me walk away from the week happy that I had gone, but sure as sure could be that this trip wasn't for me.
Instead, I had the most exhausting, overwhelming, intense, draining, and hard week of my life. Bar none. And I knew. By the end of the first night, I knew that I was supposed to be there. Dang it.
I do not even know a tiny bit of what the upcoming year holds for me. It's not about the fact that at the end of every month, I will be laying my head down on a pillow in another country. It doesn't matter that at the end of the year, my feet will again hit American soil. It's not about that.
It's about where He takes me throughout the year. The still, small moments when I feel His presence and hear His voice. The hearts that are yearning to hear the Gospel, the good news of a Savior who loves them just the way they are-- even in the midst of their mess. The moments when He uses conversations to change lives. The diapers that need to be changed. The moments I see Him in a way that I never thought I would. The times where I learn to die to myself and choose to live that way. The children that need to be held. The people that need to see HOPE, myself included. The moments where I learn to pour out every drop of love that I have simply because He has loved me so well.
So I'm going on a journey. (Tentatively) Dominican Republic, Haiti, Romania, Moldova, Mozambique, Swaziland, South Africa, Nepal, India, China, and Philippines here I come.
Join me?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment