Ivory Black

If we were to be completely honest with each other I did not end the World Race as gracefully as I would have hoped to. In the end I yearned with my whole self to be far far away from the race, my squad, my team, and the world. I was frustrated and bitter and angry about everything having anything to do with the Race. I was still holding on to hurt from severed and sewn-back-up relationships, and I was really confused about why nothing looked the way I thought it ought to look in month 11 of my race.

 There weren’t an overwhelming amount of perfect memories to look back on

(but there were a handful).

There wasn’t a perfectly pressed and refined squad standing around me

(but we were certainly different).

And I hadn’t changed as drastically as I thought/hoped I would.

 

I could not wait to leave everything associated with the race, far behind me. America was all I saw in those last months; her graceful arms were spread wide to embrace me and wipe away my tears with offerings of with Chipotle, clean water, and laundry machines. America would make all my frustration and anger and bitterness go away. It would all be taken out to sea in the tide waters of the Atlantic and I would move on seamlessly into a great new adventure. Our leaders tried to warn us of this, “The way you leave this season is the way you will begin your next”.

 

 I laughed at that. I told myself that I didn’t believe it. I thought, there’s no way things could get worse than they are now. Even if I stay in this terrible, life-sucking, season, I’ll be in AMERICA with things like Gatorade, and the US dollar, and reliable electricity and everything will be better.

 

 And things were just as I remembered in America, completely and perfectly comfortable in every way. But as it turns out our leaders were right. I was in America and still in a terrible place. I was angry and completely detached from everything around me. It all seemed foreign; American life seemed cold and boring and machine-like: wake up, do something that helps pay for things like Netflix, watch Netflix, go to sleep, repeat. I hated it. It seemed to meaningless after spending the last year pouring myself out to work for people and with people to accomplish things that actually changed lives.

 

I avoided talking to people because I couldn’t stand having to answer the question, “So, how was it”? Sometimes when I was feeling particularly snarky I would retort, “I don’t know, how was the last YEAR of your life” or sometimes with a simple one word response. Because it was so much that I could never explain. It was emotional, wonderful, terrible, and strangely hilarious at times. Everything about me was different in a way that few people could understand.

 

A week passed, and then two, and then a month. I started to realize that what I left when I stepped on my last flight home from Turkey, and all of a sudden I wanted it all back. I wanted to get on the next 747 I saw. I didn’t care where it was going I just wanted to get back into the world and serve, and get dirty, and preach, and teach, and love, and adventure, and have extraordinary become ordinary again.

 

And maybe, just maybe I missed my squad, and my team, and our leaders, and the people who had become my family in just 11 short months.

 

When I think about this time in my life I think of the scene in The Grinch (the one with Jim Carrey-obviously the best one)where he stands on Mt.Krumpit, looks over the town of Whoville- recently robbed of all their Christmas-y things. The Grinch expects the sounds of sadness when the Whos wake up to find Christmas has been destroyed but instead they gather around and sing songs of jubilation. When their songs of holiday cheer ascend the mountain to reach Grinch’s ears, he feels his heartbeat in his chest for the first time in a long time. And it beats again and again, and it’s so strong that it throws him to the ground. And the Grinch feels again.

 

And I started to feel again.

I started remembering how good the Race was, and how good the people were, and how good it was to minister to the nations, and the goodness of having people in your life everyday who really know you and really love you, and the feeling of reverence and power we had when we prayed and worshiped together, and climbing waterfalls with my best friends, and the excitement of your team and squadmates getting fully funded, and how cool it is when God gives you His heart for His people.

 

 

And I remembered.

And my heart started beating again.

And it grew 3 sizes that day.

And then I did something I told myself I would NEVER do.