How Did I Get Here?

Why Missions?

I have restarted this blog probably five times now. How do I tell my story in such few words?

Let’s start in 2012 when I went on my first mission trip to Portland, Maine with my high school youth group, Get Real. This trip was the first experience I had traveling to do mission work. Local missions has always been a part of my life, volunteering at shelters in Indy or feeding the homeless with my church, Mt. Gilead.

But this time, I got to travel with some of my closest friends at the time to a state none of us have ever been to. Now at 15, I did not know the impact this trip would have on me. Since 2012 I have been on five more mission trips. I started out in Maine then I went to West Virginia, Alaska, Puerto Rico, Iowa and Puerto Rico again. To prepare for each of these trips, I fundraised the cost, got to know my team and prayed a lot. Basically a much smaller scale of The World Race since these trips lasted roughly a week each. 

Puerto Rico

So you noticed that I have been to Puerto Rico twice. Anyone that knows me knows that I have a deep love for Puerto Rico that was planted with me in 2015. The first time I went to the island I was a recent high school graduate. Getting to Puerto Rico was a bit of a struggle due to the flight delays, overbooking flights and loss of luggage. I was slightly nervous going into this week because of all of the road blocks we had encountered. Once we got there and got introduced to our missionaries, the pastor and the community I started to really connect with the locals. Throughout this week I was shown such deep love by strangers that became good friends. I am still in contact with a couple of my dear friends I connected with on my first trip.

In September of 2017, Puerto Rico got hit with a massive hurricane causing a huge set back to the island and the loss of many of their friends and family members. During this time, I was in close contact with my friends on the island and I was so uneasy not being able to contact them for weeks. In the summer of 2018, I returned to Puerto Rico with my high school youth group to help rebuild as much as we could. This second trip is where everything clicked for me. I met such amazing people once again and reconnected with old friends. The first day of ministry happened to be a Sunday, so we started out the week with a church service. The pastor didn’t speak English, so we had a translator during the service. The pastor stopped service and said he felt God was calling him to bring people up to the alter. He pointed at me and one other girl I was on the trip with. Confused, her and I went up front as we were quickly surrounded by the church locals. They put their hands on us and were praying passionately. While we did not understand what they were saying, we both felt honored and thankful that we got to experience this. After church, I was so stumped on why the pastor felt called to pick me out of everyone. I prayed a lot about it during this week and spent a lot of time on the rooftops (one of my favorite parts of the island is the flat rooftops). I almost stayed in Puerto Rico for that summer to continue mission work. 

On one of the last nights there, a few of us were carrying trash to the curb. This trash had been sitting there for awhile and was covered in maggots. The not so glamour side to missions, but I was still so happy to be there. While I was carrying the trash to the curb, I heard God say that this is what I am supposed to be doing, missions. It was the craziest thing ever. At the most unexpected time, I heard my calling to do mission work and I was so full of joy! This started the long journey ahead of me in getting to where I am at. 

Ignoring the Call

At first, I was so excited that I got called to go into mission work, but I didn’t know what that looked like. I was overwhelmed because this wasn’t the plan I had for myself. I was going to grad school right after undergrad to get my masters. That’s what I thought at least. I applied to a few grad schools and had the opportunity to come interview at the schools. During this time I was in an internal battle with myself. I could feel that I was going agains God’s wish for me, but I didn’t want to let go of that dream of graduate school. Over time, things kept falling through for me. My interview got canceled and another one got moved to a time I couldn’t make it. After talking to my missions pastor at church and a lot of time praying about, I realized I couldn’t ignore God’s call for me. My heart is in missions and I am so excited that this is where I am at! I communicated a lot with a current racer and she helped me tremendously in answering questions about The World Race. I applied, and here I am! I am so thankful for the journey getting here and all of the amazing people that have guided me along the way.