Live in the Land

Well the time has come, it’s my last ministry recap. For our final month of the race my squad was very blessed to live in Greece (its been a dream)! Our ministry for this month has looked very different from all the others, we did what we call ATL – Ask the Lord. Our squad wasn’t given hosts or any kind of requirements for our time in Greece, our teams simply prayed into where God wanted us for the month and what kind of ministry He wanted us to do each day. This type of ministry month gives a lot of freedom to simply go and do what God asks of you each day, it also allowed for a lot of practice for what living a life on mission after this year will look like in my day to day life. 

As we prepared for this month while we were in Romania, my team and I felt a pull to  mirror the early Church in the way that they cared for one another and invited the people in the communities around them into their homes and conversations about Christ. One of my teammates had a strong conviction about living near one of the cities the apostle Paul had worked in and written letters to – we chose a small village called Derveni that was just an hour outside of Corinth. In this small coastal village we studied Pauls letters to the Corinthians each day – it was so cool! 

When we first arrived in Derveni we were greeted by one of the women that worked in the cafe right beside our Airbnb, and soon after we met the rest of the women working there – two of them spoke incredible English. As the days went on I started spending more time at the cafe talking with the women and hanging out with the kids when they got out of school. God was making it clear that our mission in this village was simply to love the people and make His love known – and truthfully I struggled with it a lot. After 10 months of having work I could pretty tangibly point to  and schedules to follow it was pretty hard to take a step back and see what we were doing in Derveni as ministry. There were times I felt like I wasn’t really doing anything and that I wasn’t honoring the mission and all the people that donated to me – and I also knew if God put us there it had to be purposeful. 

When we first got to Derveni I started a new Bible reading plan that is taking me through the Bible in chronological order in two months (I’m obsessed by the way). Within our first few days I was reading about the life of Abram (aka Abraham) and the covenant that God established with him. In Genesis 12 God begins the long history of Israel’s covenant by calling to Abram: “Go from your country and your kindred and your fathers house to the land that I will show you. And I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing…” What struck me was that at the very beginning of God’s all He asked was for Abram to go live in the land he was shown – God promises him blessing and abundance without any other pre-requisite. Just go live in the land. 

During our time in Derveni this was what I was learning to do. I’ve followed God around the world (and I hope to continue to do so) and that part isn’t hard anymore. I love following the Spirit of God around the globe, He has taken me to some absolutely amazing people and places. What I needed to learn was the mission in just living – in living my mundane life in a way that is set apart for God and that welcomes the people around me into God’s love. My friends and I spent a lot of time with one family, and God affirmed over and over again how worth it that one family was. We spent a lot of days doing our Bible studies at the cafe so we could talk with her as she worked, we hung out at the beach with them, we went out to late dinners and gelato dates with her. The simplicity of just living life focused on loving God and loving His people without any other schedule or requirements was so sweet and such a good thing to practice before returning stateside. I don’t really have any crazy stories of radical encounter from this month, it was just soft and sweet loving our friends and praying over the town. 

And thats it. Just like that my year on the World Race is over. As I’m finishing this blog I’m sitting at the airport in Athens waiting to board my flight to the states. My friends and I will spend a little time at the World Race base debriefing our year, and then I go home. I’m planning to write one or two more blogs to answer some of the questions I’m anticipating and wrap up some reflections so stay tuned for those!