It has been about a month since my last blog, and let’s just say a lot has happened. I have gone to prom, feasted at tulip time, built a bookshelf, written support letters, met with potential supporters, gotten a new job, graduated high school and fundraised over half of my trip expenses! So just a few things have happened :). To say this month has been busy would be an understatement, but through all the busyness of it, the Lord has been teaching me a few things.
Oftentimes when I tell people I am doing the World Race, they will ask me if there is anything I am worried about, as a good American naturally would do! Usually I tell them I am worried about if I will get enough sleep in a tent and if I will handle the food well. But then I always say, it’ll be fine. Because it really will all be fine. There is not much I can do about how well I sleep or how well I handle the food, but I can control my attitude. Either I can spend the next three months before the trip worrying about how my worries will go, or I can trust that if God will provide all I need. In Matthew 6:25-27, Jesus says “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?” This verse makes it seems so logical not to worry, but to my human brain, it seems so necessary to worry. Although I keep telling people that everything will be fine, that is the truth that I am trying to convince myself to believe, not the truth that I actually believe. There have often been days that I feel discouraged about fundraising, wondering if I will ever reach $17,500 or if I will have to spend all my life savings, but then the next day the Lord steps right in and reminds me of His goodness. Currently, I am at $12,165, almost 70% of my trip! Raised in 5 weeks! There is no way I could have done that on my own, it is only by God’s goodness and provision that I can say that. The more I focus the fundraising on the money I can raise, what I can do to get the money, the more I worry. Once I put it into God’s hands, the worry goes away because the pressure is no longer on myself, but rather knowing that if this is His plan for my life, He will provide and He will show up.
One way that Adventures in Missions encourages us to fundraise is through meetings. When I first heard about this, I was very nervous because I don’t know all the facts and didn’t love the idea of having to rely on others for funds. But so far I have met with 5 people, mostly family which makes it a lot less nerve-racking, but still a little scary. And again, if I put the focus on how well I can share, then I will never lean on God and trust that He will do the work in people’s hearts, which is what I should be doing.
Through fundraising I have learned that all I need to do is ask, if I don’t ask, no one will know the need and if I don’t share, no one will understand what I am doing. And although sometimes it has been a little scary and awkward, God’s hand has been so very evident on this journey and without having to rely on His provision, I would never know the goodness and faithfulness He has shown me.
