Sometimes all the stars align and a group of people “just happens” to be in the right place at the right time so that an Awakening can occur. You’re probably asking yourself, “what is she talking about?” and “what the heck is an Awakening?” These questions are super valid, and I’m actually so glad you asked!
An Awakening can best be described as a conference that multiple Squads of World Race participants come together and partake in with one another. An individual or individuals from the Adventures in Missions office come(s) to teach and speak on a topic (more on this in an upcoming blog). We were incredibly blessed to have Reid and Ana Mason lead our Awakening and I truly could just go on and on about how amazing these two individuals are, but I’ll save you the reading so just trust me when I say “they’re AWESOME!” We also had the opportunity to learn from other squads who were farther along in their World Race journey, and we were able to give away fresh insight and perspective that may have never even crossed the minds of Racers who have been on the field for longer. In order for this to happen, said Racers have to be in general proximity to each other within the same time frame. Do you get the whole “stars aligning” thing now? Apparently it is very rare for routes to cross over so that this has a chance of happening. All I know is I am so incredibly grateful that it did.
The Awakening ended up being in the town where my squad is currently serving for ministry so we didn’t have too far to travel. Quite literally we packed our day packs with a few outfits, left our big packs behind at our hosts home, and walked to the inn where the conference would be taking place.
Thursday afternoon we walked downtown to the inn, where we were greeted by members of K Squad. They are on their fourth month of The World Race and are also serving in Honduras, just in different cities than my squad. Some of them traveled an hour and a half to be there, others had over six hour travel days. Welcome to The World Race! One more squad would be attending the Awakening with us, and it was F Squad, an incredible group of month 11 Racers. Yes you read that correctly... month 11! They served in Nicaragua for their 11th month so they had farther to travel than either F or P Squads. All that being said their travel day did not go as planned... again I say “WELCOME TO THE WORLD RACE,” so they didn’t arrive until late that first night after many of us had already gone to bed. We had the honor and pleasure of being able to meet them and get to know them on Friday though.
This weekend was exactly what I didn’t realize that I so desperately needed, EXACTLY when I needed it.
I was inspired by members of F and K Squads and all of the valuable knowledge and advice that they had to give away and impart on us. I loved getting to know Reid and Ana and having them around was a sheer delight and blessing. I walked away from this weekend with new and blazing passion that I can’t wait to put into action as far as my own experience with The Race goes. God blessed my squad with this opportunity and we are so excited to be able to share about all that He did not only this weekend, but all that He is doing on this incredible adventure that is The Race in general. Please stay tuned for an upcoming blog on some of the crazy cool things God did while we were at The Awakening and checkout some of my squadmate’s blogs to get their perspective on the weekend as well!
God bless my friends!
-Meagan
