When one hears that someone is training for an adventure mission trip they usually have no idea what type of training it is. One person asked me if training included an obstacle course or something...you should have seen my face...I cannot imagine myself actually making it through an obstacle course. It would be a lot like ....like....like....well like something no one wants to see basically. I am not the most fit person in the world at all. So I quickly expelled that thought from my mind and decided that the best course of action was to expect the unexpected.
My journey here was one of faith and a lot of running. Okay for you to understand that we have to go to the very beginning of the story. When I found out I had been accepted for the Ancient Paths Journey, I jumped up and down in my room like a soccer fan after their team wins a match. I was so chuffed with the acceptance until I realized I had no money. That got me for a little while till I realized something my friend Esther said to me once. His Will His Bill. If God chose me for this journey then He will make sure that He will get me where I need to be when I need to be there.
After a month of fundraising and realizing how empty my coffers were, I lost all hope as the training commencement date drew closer. I had headaches and stomach aches left right and center and for a little while I even felt like the Lord had abandoned me. Boy was it hard or what. I remember feeling like both God and my group of friends had failed me, till I realized that the latest I could come for training was a week later. So I mastered whatever courage I could gather and went on a three day fast.
This, my friends, was no ordinary fast. I usually think I can make it through fasts easily but on the third day I was so week my friends thought I would faint. But I carried on and pressed on in prayer. A day after the fast I managed to get a plane ticket from Harare to Johannesburg and then a bus ticket from Johannesburg to Port Elizabeth. I would leave the next morning on the 7am flight which meant check in was at 5:00 am.
I took time to say goodbye to my friends and got home late, too tired to even pack and I told my mother “Mom I leave tomorrow morning on the 7am flight to Johannesburg and then I will catch the 4:00 pm bus to Port Elizabeth. And my mother asked me “Do you have the money for the journey?” I said “No, But God will take care of me.” My mother was hurt and touched but after seeing my faith she prayed a prayer of release over me, I remember how she said “Father it was my responsibility to raise her now I place her in your hands to take care of her from now on.” I cried so much because I knew my mother had given me the blessing to go to the nations. I walked into my room and looked around and could not figure out what to pack for a year journey into nations. Preaching the word. I knew then that this journey is unlike any other I will ever face in my life. This would not just be a journey to the nations, it would be a journey to self discovery and the pursuit of God.
Now some of you may not know this but I have been traveling for work for years now. Packing is so easy for me. I am used to it, but after about three hours of fiddling around in my room and packing and unpacking my bag several times, all I managed to do was make a mess of my room and an even worse mess of my soul. I was afraid and troubled but more than anything I was afraid. At 1:00 am I realized I would not make any progress at all so I slept and woke up in two hours. Then I packed as if I was leaving for the weekend and coming back soon. And I said goodbye to all that had become so familiar to come to Jeffery’s bay.
I found myself in Johannesburg a few hours later with no money and no plan. All I knew was that I had to buy camping gear in Johannesburg and be at park station by 4:00pm. What followed was a day of faith and endurance testing. I caught the train to Sandton and went to a camping gear shop. I showed a shop attendant a list of things I needed and asked her to gather what I needed because I was expecting money before four ...(I so hoped I would) so I could buy these things. I had been promised money by someone but it really looked like no money was coming any time soon. So I just trusted that somehow the money would come through. I got a call a little after two that the money was in the account and I ran as fast as I could to the ATM and withdrew what I needed to buy what I needed to buy and I found myself running out of the camping gear shop with a 65 liter back pack and a suitcase in tow....destination....Park Station.
I looked like a crazy bag lady but I did not care, I had a place to be in the shortest time. I was still in Sandton at 3:20pm and I was just praying... “Lord please do not let that bus leave without me. So I ran for dear life and found myself sitting in the bus and 3:55 with all bags checked in and all I could think was Thank you Lord, I made it. Then I thought I hope I do not sit next to a guy, I am sweating like a sinner in church. But God being God and having a sense f humor, I found myself sitting next to a guy from Bloemfontein to Port Elizabeth. I got picked up from Green Acres in Port Elizabeth and was taken to Jeffery’s Bay for training still quite in a daze...But I was here and that was all that mattered.
Now as I look back I realize one thing...I am on an obstacle course already. But it is not some small camp. It is the obstacle course of life. And as I look at the journey so far I realize this... “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily hinders our progress. And let us run with endurance the race (obstacle course) that God has set before us.”
I am not, and never will be alone in this race because God Himself is urging me on and I am surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses...ready to encourage me as I run and make it through obstacle to Obstacle
Comments