Isaiah 64:4

"When the heart weeps for what is lost, the spirit laughs for what it has found." Sufi Aphorism

I boarded the plane for Tanzania and made a bucket list of things that I just had to do while I was over here. The list went on as I dreamed of this foreign and far away land where everything was exciting, new, and an adventure. I was going to go to Uganda and raft on the Nile, visit Kigali and see the sight of so much development, travel down to Cape Town and stand on the edge of the Cape of Good Hope with the wind blowing in my hair, finally understanding what it meant to journey to the edge of Africa and back.

My passport has many less stamps than I dreamed it would, and I can’t make these adventurous claims to friends back at home. All of these adventures require time and money. You want to know the best part, though? Let me tell you a few things that weren’t on my list, that I can now cross off.

1. Running across the finish line of the Kilimanjaro Marathon with two little girls small hands in mine.

2. Laying on a beach in Zanzibar and finding my undeniable heart and calling for missions.

3. Finding the micro-dipper.

4. Having a time of personal prayer atop a safari vehicle while trekking across the Ngorongoro Crater.

5. Gazing across the building tops of Nairobi from the top of the tallest sky-scraper.

6. Walking around town and speaking fairly effortlessly in Swahili with my new friends.

7. Inviting others to a church they’ve seen all their lives, but never stepped into.

8. Looking into the tiniest, shiniest, and purest 8 eyes in the world, and getting to call them “my girls.”

9. Getting to rely solely on Christ like never before.

10. Falling in love… in so many ways.

I don’t write my bucket list. I write a list of selfish desires and wants that He reads because He loves me. He reads my list because I am His. However, He writes my bucket list. He is the one who determines where I go, what I do, and who I’m with.

I got to appreciate the experience He wanted me to have, which has made it undeniably perfect. Given the chance, I wouldn’t change a moment. He has blessed me, and for this I will sit at His feet in awe and worship.

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:11

In retrospect, something tells me that Cape Town just wouldn’t be quite as beautiful alone.

Yours Truly