I’m currently reaching the end of my time in Ghana, which means I’m almost to month 6 of the race. How crazy! This is the part of the race that’s notorious for being the most difficult, it’s when the beginning of this journey seems so far behind you and yet the end of it seems so out of reach. The last time you saw your friends and family feels like forever ago and seeing them again seems like forevermore to go. You’re just here in the middle; the newness of it is far gone and what lies ahead is uncertain.

The reality of what home was, is, and will be feels like a weird distant dream.

It feels like a distant memory and like an odd destination.

It’ll be so different, it already is.

I’ll be so different, I already am.

The word that God has been resonating in my heart since 2020 started has been “embrace” and I have been practicing to actively choose to embrace things whether I want to or not. 

It can look like a variety of different things. Sometimes it looks like choosing to embrace moments with your teammates, sometimes it’s stopping to say hi to some kids along the side of the road that you’re walking by, sometimes it’s eating mystery food items offered to you, sometimes it’s embracing the fact that you haven’t stopped sweating in days and you probably won’t any time soon, or accepting that your clothes will probably never actually be clean until you go back home. Sometimes it’s choosing to embrace the feelings of sorrow, joy, or brokenness that being on the field brings and letting God speak to you through them.

Other times it looks like taking the time to talk and pray with a lady washing clothes outside who feels hopeless; her husband being Muslim, her family being deceased, her body being sick, and her heart wondering if God will come through enough for her kids to eat.

Or walking up to a random group of strangers, asking them if you can share with them about the love of Jesus, and to your delight ends in all 7 of them giving their hearts to Jesus for the first time.

But sometimes it also looks like embracing the devastation you feel when you encounter people who reject Him and you can do nothing more to minister to them than to fall on your knees.

And those are just to name a few of my personal examples.

God has been transforming me simply through me choosing what he’s placed right in front of me.

So I just want to encourage you today, that instead of ignoring or running away from what comes in your path, no matter how scary, uncertain, or uncomfortable, to choose to embrace how God wants to change you (and others) through it.