Jesus Threw a Paper Airplane and Now I’m Not Coming Home

 

Ok, so I click baited you a bit here, but let me explain because that title isn’t so far from the truth. 

 

In 2020 when my first try at the World Race was on pause, I felt a teeny little sensation that my time with Adventures in Missions and the World Race would not be over after one round. 

 

The sensation lingered. It’s lingered all year. 

 

I remember in the 4th month of the race telling the Lord “If you make me a squad leader, I’ll know you want me to continue on with the Race, likely beyond this year. If you don’t, I’ll know you have something else for me.” 

 

A fleece, you could say. 

 

So when I got asked, I looked up and said, “Ok, I’ve got it. Let’s go.” 

 

For months 4-9 I’ve wondered quietly, “what will that next step look like?” 

 

It’s a bit of a vulnerable position because people are chosen from each squad as potential candidates for alumni leading squads and alumni team leading. It’s a little under the table, a little private and there isn’t much of a warning. Either they want you or they don’t. 

 

A pursuer, I thought many times of messaging the mentors for the January routes, taking the matter into my own hands, but I always got a hard stop. 

 

“Wait, let ME do this,” I felt from the Lord. 

 

I’ll be honest. I started to get antsy. What if there wasn’t anything for me? What if I didn’t have the opportunity to go back out and lead another race. Would that mean I had been hearing from the Lord all wrong the whole time? 

 

In month 9, I got quietly approached by a January mentor who used to be my squad leader. We were hanging out and catching up and He shifted a bit, “So there is something I wanted to ask you…..,” He said. 

 

And I knew. 

 

Even with God’s consistent whisperings throughout the past two years, I was asking for more confirmation and took about a week to pray about it. 

 

I made a list of all the confirmations I had already received and the list was longer than I thought. He had actually already confirmed a lot. 

 

I just had one hold up. 

 

I was tired. And in my tiredness and little drops of burn out here and there I had begun to doubt if I was qualified. Classic me, honestly. Lightly, I had been thinking through an opportunity to go home and get a theology degree. After countless debates with old men intellectuals on the field and my pride getting picked at like a field daisy, I had begun to wonder, “Who am I do to this?” 

 

But God had told me to Feed His Sheep in January and He had written leadership over my life and He’s called me to be a warrior for His kingdom and he’s given me a platform to share about him and on and on. 

 

I still wasn’t convinced. 

 

In the middle of the desert, at a 24/7 prayer retreat in month nine, one of my friends approached me and said, “Hey, I got a vision I wanted to share with you.” 

 

She knew nothing. Didn’t know I had been asked. Didn’t know what was in my head. 

 

She told me she had received a vision of me with a stack of notebooks on how to follow Christ, how to step into my calling, etc. In the vision, Jesus walks up to me and he rips the papers out of my notebook and starts making paper airplanes. He looks at me and says “Join me” and I join in making them too. Before we know it, all the papers are airplanes and He smiles at me knowingly. 

 

I told her, “You have no idea what that means to me.” 

 

It was the final confirmation. God really is just calling me to go. Again. 

 

I write from a place of humility because I will be fundraising again and needing a group of supporters who believe in what God is doing in and through me and for the nations. 

 

Here’s what I can tell you. I’m a Shepherd and I’m a warrior for the Kingdom of God. God has spoken this over my life and I believe Him. He placed 25 people in my hands this year to love and to disciple and to lead and he’s asking me to do the same for another 20 next year. 

 

I am a firm believer in the World Race. It is not simply a mission trip where people go do a short term project, feel good, and leave. It’s an investment into the growth and development of the Kingdom of God and His army both in America and in the nations. We aren’t stirring up a big church camp high and then sending these people home. We are digging in, developing and training for endurance in the faith for 11 months straight. And while we invest with eternal impact for each individual that races, we make it our daily grind to share the Gospel with the nations. What mission trip do you know of like that? 

 

I’m here to tell you we aren’t letting up. We’re there when sin patterns rear their ugly heads to the surface, we’re there when the breakdown comes, we’re there for the crisis of faith and we’re there for the withdrawal from the honeymoon phase of the first few months of being abroad. We want these people to know how to live kingdom every day, not just when they’re serving. We want them to know how to struggle well, to talk to God when they doubt, and to never, ever lose their faith. We want Jesus to shine out of them like lanterns. 

 

And just this is enough for me to lay down my time and my talents. 

 

But then again you know my heart was for the nations first and that’s happening alongside all of this too. If you’ve been keeping up with me, I don’t need to convince you of that. 

 

We’re changing a generation and lighting revival all over the world and I want and I am called to be a part of that and I’m asking you to be a part of it too. 

 

Will you join me? Will you send if you can’t go and take part in the eternal impact that is happening all over the world? 

 

I’m trusting in faith that God will provide and this is the first step. If you’ve read this far thank you for your love and support! 

 

I’ll be home for one month and then heading back out to the nations in January. 

 

Let’s get coffee and talk about Jesus.