A trip to the other side of the world....

If you would've asked me a few years ago, "would you like to go to on a mission trip to Africa?" I would have happily answered NO WAY.  "I'm not called to missions",  I've always said.  So I never gave it much thought.  Sadly, anything that had to do with missions has never really interested me.  I thought it was great if someone went on a mission trip or moved across the world to be a full time missionary, but personally I never had any interest in doing anything even remotely close.  Until this year.

In January of this past year I made alot of decisions in my life.  One of those was to pursue Christ deeper than I ever have.  I wanted to dig deeper, to dive deeper, to live deeper than what I had known before.  I was tired of being normal as it pertained to me spiritually.  I wanted something more than what I had, more than what I had ever known.  And I went on a journey to pursue just that.  

And while I don't feel a call to sell all of my belongings and move halfway across the world, I have felt a call to do something else, which I believe is what Father calls each of us to do.  Say YES.  Put our yes on the table and let Him decide what that means, where that leads us.  We say yes before we even know the question.  And that's what I've done.  I've put my yes on the table and said whatever, whenever, whomever, however, whereever. 

I started reading the book Radical a few months ago.  It changed my life completely.  It turned the whole "yes" into something deeper.  And it challenged me to go deeper in so many ways.  While reading that book I felt such a strong calling to go on a mission trip.  I didn't know where, I just I wanted and needed to go.  And it was a strong desire in my heart.  Actually a very foreign desire because I'd never really wanted to do that before.  So as it all turns out, I found out about a trip my church was taking to Zimbabwe on a Friday, 2 weeks before they were scheduled to leave.  Turns out God had that trip in mind for me because 2 weeks later I had a passport, a plane ticket, and was on my way halfway across the world to step into something I'd never dreamed possible.

To say that this trip was life changing is an understatement.  I saw things I never knew.  I saw God in ways I had never had before.  I saw Him in a different people group as they worshipped Him in their tribal tongue.  I saw Him in glorious creation through wild animals and majestic waterfalls.  I saw Him in the eyes of children who had nothing, yet had everything.  HE was all they had.  And He was enough.  It was a humbling thing, needless to say.  Here in America, we have all we need.  Our faith doesn't cost us anything, really.  Maybe our pride at times.  But its not at a point where it costs us our lives. 

One thing that has stuck with me is desperation.  How desperate am I to see Him?  Not just see Him, but to see Him around me in ways I've never looked for before.  To see Him in the people I meet.  To see Him in His creation.  Just to SEE Him.  Theres a song that's near and dear to my heart, "The More I Seek You" by Kari Jobe.  That song came to life for me in Africa.  Because I went seeking Him, and I found Him in so many unexpected places.  And the more I found Him, the more I fell in love with Him.  It's hard not to fall completely head over heels in love with Him when you start seeing Him, seeing Who He is.  Who He REALLY is.

There's so much I could say about Africa.  It's hard to put into words sometimes how amazing that trip was.  It has put a love in my heart for a people group I never even heard of until those 2 weeks in August of this year.  And now the people of Zimbabwe are forever etched into my heart, into my soul.  If you're my facebook friend you can view all of my albums from the trip.  If not, I'm attaching a few of my faves here.

I'll leave you with this, if you haven't put your yes on the table yet with God, do it.  Throw caution to the wind and let yourself jump into complete abandonment to Him in every way.  I promise you won't regret it.