The Lord Gave Me A Dream

I’ve got a fun story today—well, more like a small testimony of how the Lord has been planting seeds in my life long before I even realized it.

Before I went on the World Race, I remember sitting in a church service where they were interviewing a missionary. It was an open panel where people could ask questions about living missionally. I completely tuned it out, thinking, This doesn’t apply to me. I’ll never be a missionary. I even promised myself that I would never live missionally or do “things like that.” Little did I know that just a few months later, I’d be on a nine-month mission trip.

At training camp, I told everyone, I’m just here because I don’t know what to do for college. I’m not going to be one of those people who ‘grows a heart for missions’ and moves to Thailand or something. I was convinced I’d go home afterward, go to college, and never look back. I even prayed that the Lord would never call me to share the gospel in another country.

But over time, my prayers started to shift. I began saying, Use me, Lord. My hands are open. I’ll go where You send me.Still, I never truly considered moving somewhere permanently. Nowhere else had my heart.

Then I got to Albania. And something changed.

I loved every second of my time there. The Lord softened my heart toward the people in ways I never expected. But every time I expressed my love for Albania, the locals would question me, saying, Why do you love a place like this? Everyone here wants to leave, and you want to stay? And every time, my answer was simple: Yes.

Then I got to Guatemala.

Sophia and I were some of the few who genuinely loved the country. On our long chicken bus rides home, we’d dream up ministry ideas, talk about what it would be like to live in Albania, and imagine what we’d do if we ever moved there. We’d always laugh it off as just a dream—until we started questioning why the Lord had placed it so heavily on our hearts.

We made a plan: during debrief, we would fast and pray over this “silly idea” of moving across the world to do ministry in Albania.

When debrief came, I fasted and spent the day praying about everything—staying home, college, career paths, and Albania. I simply laid my future in the Lord’s hands and listened.

That day, I had a conversation with our squad coach, Chris. He asked me two questions that made me think: What would you study in college? and If you had a magic wand and could have anything happen in your life by the end of the World Race, what would it be?

I had previously signed up for a major in criminal justice, but I couldn’t see my life going in that direction. So I started praying—if I went to college, what would I even study?

As for the magic wand question? I told him I wanted unshakable faith.

As I continued to pray and process, I felt the Lord calling me to stay home and finish a degree. But in what? While talking with Chris, I was reminded of a dream I’ve also had for a while but thought I could never do it any time soon.  I always thought of it as my “maybe when I retire” dream—but I’ve always wanted to own a coffee shop.

So, I made the decision: I would change my major to business, go to school, and learn how to build my own business.

Later that day, I told Sophia what I had been feeling. I shared that I believed the Lord was calling me to stay home for school, go to Regent, and build an unshakable foundation of faith before being sent out. But I also told her—I truly feel the Lord is leading me to Albania. I’m holding it all with open hands, but that’s where I feel He’s calling me.

And then, Sophia tells me her dream.

She’s always wanted to open a coffee cart or shop—selling cheap coffee and sharing the gospel. Then she tells me that she, too, felt called to apply to Regent that very same day. And after she graduates? She also feels led to go back to Albania.

If that wasn’t enough confirmation, the teaching that night just so happened to be about feeling called to the nations.

The Lord has been writing this story long before I even realized it. And now? I’m just holding it all with open hands, ready for wherever He leads next.

Ministry:

Anyways, as you’re probably wondering, what is my ministry here in Guatemala? I am helping with a ministry called Dar Para Dar. So on Mondays and Wednesdays I go to the prayer house, which is in a coffee shop, and we pray. We pray, have a teaching, and worship from 9 am to 4:30 pm. On Tuesdays and Fridays we go to prayer mountain and help our ministry host build his vision, to create a place for people to come for free just to pray. So houses are being built, trenches dug, and roofs being put on. Also on occasion when we are not helping with manual labor on prayer mountain, we are interceding for villages and doing house visits. I think our ministry here is making such a huge impact on my prayer life and I love every minute of it. 

As for what you can pray for 🙂

-finances to fund the rest of my trip

-the ability to push through these last few months on the race and still give it my everything 

-the people of Guatemala 

-the house of prayer and dar para dar